Nate

by Tijan

  A new awareness was coming over all of us, not just me. This wasn’t a good look. If they were going to critique or fix, they did it immediately. She came over to us, and she was walking around us. Then she settled back, looking me up and down.

  Her gaze wasn’t moving from me.

  “This isn’t going to work.”

  Fear slammed against my sternum.

  I shouldn’t have been daydreaming. That was a lesson learned early on. They could always tell when you weren’t feeling the dance.

  “You’re going to do a solo at this time.”

  Matthew made a sound, jerking farther back from me.

  She ignored him, her gaze fully on me. She asked me, “You have time to learn a new piece?”

  A sound rose from the other dancers.

  This wasn’t done, not when our choreographer was going to leave in two days.

  She heard and motioned to everyone. “Calm down. It’ll be fine. It’ll pick back up, but in this segment, I want Quincey to be the only one on stage.”

  A whole new murmur went through everyone.

  “Yes, yes.” She was talking to herself, nodding and walking around me once more. “Yes. I want to do a new solo piece for you, but I need to think about it first. Give me the day. Or wait. You come with me.” She turned. “Miss Aimes.”

  “Yes?”

  “Run through the rest with the dancers. Start at the end of where she and Matthew would finish.”

  “Uh…” Miss Aimes was looking at Matthew. “What should we have Matthew starting from?”

  “He’ll run in with them and go to his normal place. We’ll use her understudy today. I’d like Quincey to come with me for the afternoon.”

  Matthew was frowning at me, but I held my hands up in a slight shrug. I didn’t know what was going on, either.

  “Yes.” Patrice wasn’t waiting. She rotated on a heel click and motioned for me. “Quincey, if you may?” She strode off, and I hurried to pull off my pointe shoes, then darted to grab my bag and go after her. She was halfway down the hall by the time I cleared the room.

  “Come, come, Miss Quincey. We need to get into our feelings this afternoon.”

  I followed her to one of our back rooms, and she cut the lights except for two.

  “Okay. I want you in the middle and hunched over. Look like you’re in pain.”

  Whaaaa…? Okay.

  I did as she said.

  She had moved to a corner.

  “I’m going to go through the moves in my head, but for now, I want you to dance by yourself. But--” Her voice raised on a sharp note. “I don’t want you dancing as a woman. You’re going to dance as a man. I want aggressive, fierce, and raw. I want beautiful lines. Grace. But fierce. I want you to make the crowd gasp at the things you can do, and I know you can do them. I’ve seen you move.” She waited for a beat.

  The music from the show started playing.

  “And go.”

  I hesitated, but then instead of the music, I heard Nova’s laughter.

  I began to move.

  I heard Nova’s babbling.

  I moved faster.

  I saw her picture for the first time.

  I saw Valerie opening the door with her in her arms.

  I saw her on Valerie’s lap as we laughed in her kitchen.

  I saw Nova in my arms as Valerie was talking to Nico in the living room.

  I heard the phone call to tell me that Valerie had died.

  I saw my mother as I walked into the room, how Guy was helping her stand.

  I saw Valerie in the coffin for the wake.

  The funeral.

  I was holding Nova.

  When the coffin was lowered into the ground.

  The first time Nova spent the night.

  That first night with her in my father’s house.

  Nate with Nova.

  The first time they met, as he held her, as they studied each other.

  I saw Nova waving Miss Penguin in the air.

  Nate’s home.

  I kept moving. Spinning. Throwing myself in the air. My back arched.

  I pushed off, looking as if I was levitating, and it was all Nova.

  I was dancing to her.

  The hospital.

  Smelling Valerie’s favorite perfume.

  How Nova quieted.

  How I felt walking out with Nate at my side.

  Then Nate.

  Feeling Nate.

  Touching Nate.

  Him touching me.

  How he claimed me.

  “I want to fuck you.”

  I was spinning, spinning, spinning, and I stopped on a gasp. My back arched out. My arms in front of me, and I pushed up, then I began moving backward. My fingers and arms were moving as if they were ribbons.

  I was going to Nate.

  He was embracing me. I was feeling loved by him.

  I was loving him back.

  I switched, bending almost all the way down so my head was behind my ass, and my arms were in the air. The ribbon was still moving. I was attached to the sky above, to the ground below, and I was moving again. Round and round. I was going faster and faster.

  Tears were streaming down my face.

  The music was building.

  The tempo was increasing.

  My spins kept going, going, matching the same pace.

  Until it stopped.

  This was the moment when Matthew was supposed to dip me to the floor as he covered my body with his.

  I flipped my body over as if I were him, and I was staring at the ground. I was panting. Sweat was rolling down my body.

  I had blended my movements and his movements.

  Now it was done.

  And I was broken.

  The music cut out. I couldn’t move, not yet. The emotion was pounding through me.

  “That was…magnificent.”

  Patrice strode from her corner. She added, “You can do what I want you to do.”

  I was almost gasping, the emotions were still rolling through me, but she moved to me. She was speaking as if she were waiting for my own opinion on the weather.

  I looked, straightening now. I stood, the sweat falling down my face.

  She wasn’t looking at me. She was focused on her phone. “Do you have your own studio? I heard that you did.”

  “What?”

  She put her phone away and smiled at me. “I’m going to need the afternoon to go over your steps, but tomorrow is my last day. I’m going to have everyone asking me questions, so I’m thinking total privacy is needed for us to get this piece down. Could I come to you?”

  “Tomorrow?”

  She frowned. “No. I won’t need that long. This evening. We’ll go through everything. Is that doable for you?”

  “You want to come to my place and go through these steps?”

  “Yes. Is that an option? I like what you did just now, and I don’t want to lose its momentum. If we finish in time, I can be here tomorrow for everyone else then.”

  She was coming to my house. Well, Nate’s house. “I dance in the pool house. It’s not that big.”

  “That won’t work. New plan. You go eat and then come back. Meet me in an hour. I’ll have everything ready to go. It’s going to be a long night.”

  She strode off, and I was left wondering what in the hell just happened.

  * * *

  NATE

  “What’s going on?”

  Quincey had called, explaining that she needed to rehearse this evening. She sounded excited but nervous, and I knew something was different. This didn’t sound like a normal event for her.

  “She wants to do a new piece with just me. It’s a solo. It’s last minute, so we have tonight to go over everything. It’ll probably be late.”

  Late. Quincey. Downtown Seattle.

  I wasn’t going for that.

  “What time are you going to be there?”

  “She wants to meet me at six.”

  “Will there be others the
re?”

  “No. It sounds like it’ll just be her and me.”

  That’s all I needed to know. I was up and moving out of my office, going in search of Emily and Nova. “That’s fine. You do your thing, and we’ll be excited to see you when you’re done.”

  They were in the toy room, and Emily was on the floor as Nova was throwing stuffed animals across the room. I came to the doorway. Emily looked up at the same time that Nova ran to me.

  “You sure?”

  “Babe. It’s your thing. Do your thing.” I knelt, picking Nova up, and immediately she was wriggling to get free. I put her back down, and she ran back to pick up Miss Penguin. She was bringing her back over to me.

  “Okay.”

  “Okay.” I frowned, not sure why Quincey was feeling bad at being asked to stay late for extra time. “We’ll talk to you later.”

  “Okay.” Now she sounded relieved.

  We hung up, and I asked Emily, “Interested in overtime tonight?”

  She smiled at me.

  39

  Nate

  The dance studio was a large brick building, and there wasn’t anything special about it. A simple sign hung over the door, so that and the address were the only indicators I was even pulling up to the right place. That and the girl lingering in the doorway, peering outside.

  I parked and headed for the door, and seeing me, she glanced at her phone.

  I raised my eyebrows, then she let me in.

  A gust of heat blasted me as she stepped back inside. I followed, the door swinging shut behind both of us.

  “You’re Nate?”

  “Jesus. Now you’re hoping I am, aren’t you?” I meant it as a joke, but fuck. She was someone’s daughter.

  I was now looking at females this way.

  She tensed.

  “I am, by the way. Next time, ask for ID, or you could’ve made me text you.”

  She raised an eyebrow back at me. “Yes, Father?”

  I grunted. “Better.” Now it was my turn. “How do you know my sister?”

  When I first brought up Quincey, Aspen told me she knew a few dancers. I never cared before, but I called in a favor figuring it was after hours, and this place would be locked up tight.

  “She took one of my community classes. I almost fell off my chair when she called tonight and asked if I had keys to this building.”

  I nodded toward the inside of the building. “Are you in this production?”

  “I have keys because I teach a class here on the weekends. The whole building is empty except for the showcase room upstairs. It’s Showcase 1. There’s a watching area that you can sneak in and hang out.” She began edging back toward the door. “Word of advice?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I overheard a couple of dancers leaving when I was here earlier. Your girl is up there with Patrice, and that’s a big deal. Don’t let either of them know you’re here.”

  “Noted.” I gestured for the door. “How far is your vehicle from here?”

  “I’m parked around the corner. I’ll be fine.”

  “You sure?”

  “Yeah. I’d be more worried about your vehicle. That’s a brand-new Mercedes-Benz G.” She gave me an up and down. “Too bad you didn’t visit your sister more when she lived here.”

  She gave me a wink and slid out the door.

  I gave a short nod before I headed for the stairs, intending to heed her advice. I knew the dancing world had its own culture and rules. I didn’t want to mess anything up for Quincey.

  The hallway was dark, half the lights were turned off, but the room where Aspen’s friend said they’d be in was empty. It took a little until I heard music coming from a room near the back of the building. I was going on a guess, and there was a door on one level. A few stairs went down, then a pair of double doors were right next to it. The music was coming from all of the doors.

  With the setup, I was wondering if they’d moved to some form of a stage.

  I chanced it, moving the door, and it was quiet.

  I could breathe easy, and it was also dark.

  I slipped inside, heading up the walkway.

  Quincey was on the stage. Her choreographer was beneath her, standing.

  “No, no, no. Whatever you felt earlier today, that’s what I want you to feel. I need emotion.”

  Quincey was dripping in sweat and panting slightly. Her hands were on her hips, her feet apart. She looked hot in both ways.

  My phone started buzzing, and I reached into my pocket, hitting the button to stop the buzzing. Moving through my screens, I was hoping that I was hitting the screen dimmer, but I moved farther up and backed into a corner before I pulled my phone out.

  Mason: Call me when you can.

  Logan: I know Mase is texting you. Don’t listen to anything he says.

  I took a breath, then silenced my phone and put it away. I loved my friends, but not tonight. Being here, sneaking in here, I felt like this was a sacred environment. This was Quincey’s world.

  I wanted to soak it up.

  I moved to the very back, the very far corner, and I eased down into one of the seats.

  As I watched Quincey go through her steps and adjust to what her choreographer said, she was breathtaking. Everything up until now had been a whirlwind. Crisis, then crisis, then crisis, and another crisis. I was waiting for the day Duke showed up at the door or the day when Quincey broke, but so far, neither happened. I knew Quincey thought I was handling everything with ease, but I wasn’t.

  I was faking it.

  Faking it until I hoped there was a day when I felt like I got it.

  That day wasn’t today or yesterday, and I doubted it’d be anytime soon.

  What I was doing in the meantime was doing everything possible to ensure that my family was safe, and that meant Quincey now. I didn’t know when that started. At first, it’d been about pulling her in and taking her away from Dick Duke. Then it began about setting an environment where she could feel safe but also where I controlled everything.

  That was the dick side of me.

  She’d been a loose end. I tucked her in, pulling her under my power so she couldn’t do anything to hurt me. Or even attempt it.

  Then it changed.

  And it wasn’t when we took Nova to the ER. It wasn’t afterward, though, that was a whole different level of nice. It was before all of that. I couldn’t pinpoint it.

  No. I did know.

  I was thinking and remembering, and there’d been one time.

  We were both giving Nova a bath. She splashed Quincey, a bubble hit her in the eye, followed by a plastic hippopotamus, and the smile Quincey gave Nova when she handed her the hippo—it was then. It was small, but she loved Nova with every fiber of her being. I saw it, and I felt it then. That was the first chink in my armor.

  Now it was mostly gone.

  Not all of it.

  Some of it.

  Enough where I needed to admit that I had feelings for this woman.

  Who was I kidding? Of course, I had feelings for this woman. I was here, waiting to surprise her for a night away, and I was almost giddy about it. But I was also content to sit, watch her, and wait.

  I could sit here for days, and I’d be okay. That, right there, was another clue to me.

  “Miss Quincey, arch your back and grunt like a man!”

  Yes. It was a blaring clue to me.

  I didn’t care.

  * * *

  QUINCEY

  If I heard Patrice tell me to grunt like a man one more time, I was going to bend over and fart like a man.

  I would never do that, but I was daydreaming about it by the time she said we had it. I collapsed on the stage, legs spread out, arms on both sides of me, and I didn’t want to move, like ever. Every part of me was aching, and I knew I needed to go downstairs, dress, drive home, and then crawl into bed.

  I wanted to cry.

  I’d been dancing for almost fourteen hours straight today. That was so much more t
han normal.

  Patrice called out, “Okay. I’m going. Must get to sleep and be back in the morning. You can take the morning off. I’ll see you later today, Miss Quincey.”

  I raised an arm. “See you, Miss Patrice.”

  She left, and I could’ve fallen asleep where I was laid out on the stage.

  I might’ve except the floor was disgusting, but then I heard movement.

  I jerked upright. “Who’s there?”

  Someone was there.

  A shadow separated from the back of the seats and moved down the aisle.

  “Hello!” I shoved to my feet. Who the hell—fear and fury were in my throat, but then I heard a soft chuckle.

  I was back to wanting to collapse.

  “I knew you’d go late, but I didn’t think it’d be this late.”

  Nate was moving down the aisle, coming to the stairs, and coming up to where I was.

  I almost swayed on my feet. “What are you doing here?”

  “Emily’s got Nova tonight, and your mom was going to check in with her, too.”

  “What?” My voice broke because what was he saying?

  He came over to me, eyeing me. “There’s a five-star hotel two blocks from here. I was thinking we could spend some time alone there.”

  I was hallucinating. Patrice had seriously worked me too far tonight.

  “I’m making this entire conversation up, aren’t I? This is a weird subconscious wish I’m having where you show up, whisk me off my feet, and take me to a hotel for the night.” I pretended to pinch myself. “Wait. That hurt. I must be awake.”

  “You’re funny. I never knew that before tonight.”

  I grinned, but seriously, I was tired.

  “I need to eat.”

  “We can get food.”

  “I might need you to carry me and pretend you’re smelling lilacs.”

  His grin was instant. “I always smell lilacs.”

  “Good, then. Only smell that when you pick me up.”

  “I’m going to pick you up?”

  I nodded. “If you’re going to make a romantic gesture, you have to go all out.”

  “And all out means picking you up and carrying you out of here?”

  “At least.”