Moments of Julian (8 page)

“
Do you know how much you
just embarrassed me?” I screech as we make our way across the
parking lot toward my car. “And did you walk here?”

“
Of course not,” he says,
his eyes squinting as he shakes his head.

“
Then where is your
car?”

“
That doesn’t really
matter right now, I’ll get it later. I was just going to get
something to eat on my way to class,” he says with a nod of his
head toward the burger place next to the Thai restaurant he just
stole me away from. “And I saw you inside and I don’t know, I was
suddenly inside too.”

We’re at my car by this point. “You
kind of sound like a stalker.” I raise an eyebrow at
him.

“
I told you, I was just
getting some food,” he says as he takes a step closer. I can smell
that signature scent of his again. Crisp and sophisticated. “No
stalking needed.”

He licks his lower lip and then bites
it and I realize then how crazy it makes me feel inside when he
does that.

Just a few more inches and there will
be no more space between us. And oh, how bad I don’t want there to
be any more space between us…

“
Not now,” I breathe,
pushing my hand against his chest. “Not when I know Avia is
watching from inside like a hawk.”

“
Later then?” he asks
hopefully as one eyebrow arches up.

“
Maybe,” I tease. “If
you’re a good boy.”

He gives a bad boy chuckle that
reminds me a lot of a man taking on a challenge. I pull my door
open and he automatically climbs into the passenger
seat.

“
Pretty soon I’m going to
start thinking you’re just using me as a taxi,” I tease as I back
out.

“
If I’ve got to take a
taxi, this isn’t a bad one to ride in.”

“
Not bad?” I say in mock
offense. “Do you have any idea how much this car cost
me?”

“
I never said it was
cheap.”

“
Uh huh,” I say as I close
in on the dance building. I park the car and climb out. I’m about
to reach for my bags but Julian has already grabbed them and is
carrying them inside.

He can be a challenging pain in the
neck, but he is a gentleman.

Then again, I did tell him to be a
good boy tonight.

We are ten minutes early and no one
else is here yet. Julian sets my bags on a chair and turns hungry
eyes on me. “There’s a changing room down that hall, past the
bathroom.”

I dig my clothes out and warily meet
his eyes. “Thanks,” I say, and head in that direction.

I’ve opted for a skin tight pair of
black leggings today and a grey shirt that is loose fitting through
the shoulders and tight around the waist. There’s a mirror in the
changing room that I appraise myself in. My rear end looks pretty
amazing, even I’ll admit it.

By the time I walk back out into the
classroom, four other students have arrived, as well as Beth. I’m
slightly disappointed and relieved at the same time. Julian is
talking with Beth next to the stereo, but he glances back in my
direction every few seconds.

I turn away from him and a coy smile
curls on my lips.

Within the next three minutes the rest
of the class has arrived, each of us wearing some form or another
of dance clothes. I’m dying to put my shoes on, but Beth once again
asked everyone to wait another week.

“
Alright!” she says
cheerily from the front of the room. “Let’s quickly review the
waltz for the first twenty minutes and then we’ll move onto the
cha-cha basics!”

We first go over the box step, which I
remember easily. Back, side, together. Forward, side, together. We
then practice the rotating box step on our own and I mess it up the
first time, but so does everyone else. And then it is time for
partners.

I dance with a man who is in his
fifties, and then another in his thirties. We switch partners again
and I dance with Beth to practice the underarm turn.

Finally, we go over the rise and fall
footwork which still has me messing up.

“
It looks like all of you
have the basics down alright,” Beth says as she turns the music
off. “We will be learning the basics of all three dances before
moving onto some more complicated steps. Let’s spice things up a
little with the cha-cha-cha, shall we!”

This time, Beth has everyone line up
in one long line, with her on the right side, and Julian on the
left in front of everyone.

“
So, the cha-cha is
counted in fours, but starting on the two. Two, three, four, and
one. Or, you’ll more often hear me counting it as two, three,
cha-cha-cha. How about you all clap it with me?”

I really do feel like I’m back in
preschool as we clap out the rhythm. She has us do this eight or
nine times and I’m sure everyone else around me feel like an
idiot.

Julian meets my eyes as we clap, and
we both have a humiliated smile upon our faces.

“
Great!” Beth says in that
teacher voice of hers. “Now, we’re going to just start with a
simple walk. Like this. Walk, walk, walk.” She takes three steps
forward in a very precise line, her feet extremely controlled. “And
then back. Walk, walk, walk. Do it with me.”

This feels stupid and pointless. But I
do it like everyone else.

“
Now, I want you all to
step first onto the ball of your foot, not your heel,” Beth says
over her shoulder as she watches us. “This is proper form, but it
will also help you to get some movement into your hips when that
time comes!”

It’s a weird way of stepping,
especially when going forward, but I watch how Beth does it, and
mimic the movement.

“
Okay, let’s get a little
side action going on. So you step side, together, side. Side,
together, side. And then back again.” I watch carefully as she does
the side steps and wonder if my hips will ever move like hers
do.

“
Girls watch me, boys,
watch Julian.”

I’m watching, but I’m not watching
Beth.

Not when Julian’s hips are moving like
that.

And of course he looks over his
shoulder and sees exactly where I’m staring. He gives me a
wink.

From here Beth has us move onto the
rock step and it is with this one that I see where they are getting
their hip movement from. When I step back with my right foot, my
left hip drops down, the right rising, when I step forward on my
left foot, my hips settle to the left.

This time I catch Julian looking at my
hips.

“
Okay, now we’re going to
put it all together into the cha-cha basic,” Beth says, turning
around and facing us.

“
None of that was the
basic?” one of the older guys says, his voice sounding
nervous.

Everyone has a laugh at
this.

“
I’m afraid not,” Beth
smiles. “The cha-cha is a bit tricky, but once you get the rhythm
and basic down, it will get easier. Now watch as I go through the
basic.”

The basic starts with a side step and
then a back rock and a forward, and then two side steps. Next is a
forward and then back rock and two more side steps. And then three
forward steps, and three back.

My head is already
spinning.

It takes at least a half an hour of
practicing this step before Beth even turns the music
on.

“
K, you should know that
the cha-cha is normally quite a fast paced dance and the music we
will be using today is about half pace. Over the next few weeks, we
will be working our way up to full tempo music.”

I get completely behind the first
three times we go through the basic. The side step throws me off
when I try to step first with the ball of my foot. I feel like I’m
more hopping to the side instead of stepping.

But by the sixth or seventh time, it
is starting to feel more natural. I think I can hear the right
rhythm in the music.

By the end of the hour, we’ve gone
through two more steps and danced them all with partners. Same as
last week, I mess up here and there with every partner. Except
Julian.

It’s a good thing he can lead, because
the entire time we dance, I am mostly aware of the way his hand is
palm placed on my back, the way his hands are so strong and firm
around mine. The way our thighs brush every once in a
while.

A man with so many tattoos does not
seem like he would be this graceful.

“
Great practice everyone!”
Beth says as everyone packs up. I glance over at Julian as I gather
my things to see him pull his cell phone out of his pocket and hold
it up to his ear. He talks quietly for a few minutes and I take my
time packing my things up, finishing at the exact same time he
hangs the phone up.

“
I’ll take you back to
your car,” I say as he walks over to me. We are the last two in the
building besides Beth.

“
Actually, remember the
hectic life I told you about before?” he says, his eyes apologetic.
“It just came calling. I’ve got somewhere to be and I think I’ll
just walk back to my car.”

“
Are you sure?” I ask, my
brow furrowing. “If you have somewhere to be wouldn’t it be faster
if I drive you back to your car?”

I can see it in his eyes that he can
tell I’ve caught the fault in his logic. But that smile spreads on
his face and he shakes his head. “Nah, I could use the exercise.
You newbies slow it down so much this is hardly a
workout.”

I lightly punch him in the arm and he
flinches away with a chuckle.

“
Fine,” I say, trying to
push back my smile. “Get wet if you want.”

I can see that there is a dirty joke
he wants to say, but he just presses his lips into a thin smile and
holds the door open for me.

“
See you Thursday,” he
says, giving a small wave before starting down the
sidewalk.

“
See you.”

I wasn’t really expecting to actually
hook up with Julian again tonight. I may have bantered, but I
wasn’t necessarily going to do anything.

But I am slightly disappointed that
there isn’t even really the option now.

CHAPTER SIX

Things get extremely boring for the
next two weeks.

There are no more mysterious board
meetings. No more clients inquire about secret, new technology. The
tech floors continue about business as usual.

Julian said he’d see me Thursday, but
he wasn’t there. And he wasn’t there the following Tuesday, or the
next Thursday.

Dance wasn’t near as fun without
him.

The logical explanation was that he
was busy with whatever it was he did for a living. He’d told me
twice that his life was hectic at the moment and so that had to be
the reason he hadn’t been around.

But my unfortunately female brain and
heart kept coming up with other ridiculous scenarios.

Like maybe he was married. There was
that phone call he’d gotten before he walked out the last time I
saw him. He was so weird about his car that day too.

Oh hell, maybe he drove a minivan.
Maybe he had kids.

Maybe not.

But maybe he’d gotten tired of me and
my snarky attitude, just like every other male on the planet. Maybe
I’d just been too much and he’d gotten sick of me.

Maybe, maybe, maybe.

Thankfully, I had a trip to Toronto to
distract me and keep my head in a less pitiful state.

Gretch booked me a first class flight
that had an unavoidable layover in Minnesota. After the last few
weeks I’d had, I had her re-book my returning flight. I was
supposed to fly in late Wednesday night, have my meeting Thursday
afternoon, and then return Friday. But life required a little
R&R, so I decided a mini-vacation was in order. I’d return
Sunday morning and give myself a few days to relax and get my mind
off a certain tattooed gentleman.

“
I know I’m going to be
gone for four days, and I know this is a killer place, and I know
you have a fake ID,” I say as I carefully roll up the last of the
dresses I’m bringing. Kale leans in my doorway, his arms folded
across his bare chest. Also lacking shoes or socks, he is classic
Kale at the moment. His muscles flex, something that seems to
happen without conscious effort on his part. I’m pretty sure they
do that in his sleep. “But I will cut your throat if you throw a
party here while I’m gone.” I zip the suitcase closed and give him
a hard stare.

“
You’ve been such a
tightwad the last week and a half,” Kale says, glaring at me. “Who
shoved the stick up your—”

“
No one has shoved
anything up my anywhere,” I snap as I grab my carry on and head for
the closet. I start grabbing the shoes that go with what I’ve
packed into shoe bags and carefully put them in the luggage. “I
just need to blow off some steam this weekend.”

“
Some?” Kale comments, but
his tone has softened. I hear him cross my room and flop on his
back on my bed. I cringe. Martha already made it this morning, but
I’ve been witchy enough to Kale today.