Temporary, her mind whispered.This is temporary.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
The studio was quiet again,the kind of quiet Lily loved best—when her students had gone home tired and smiling, and it was just her at the barre, finally free to move for no one but herself.
She flexed her toes in the soft silk of her ballet shoes, stretched her leg along the barre, and folded forward until she draped nose to knee, enjoying the pull along her hamstring and calves. Each breath she took lengthening and loosening her body as it softened.
The wall of mirrors reflected the clean lines she’d practiced until they were second nature—the deep arch of her back, the point of her toes, the sweep of her arm—rather than the restless flutter she’d been carrying inside all week.
Since Saturday, when Rush had walked her back to the studio after lunch, she’d only caught him in glimpses—his sheriff’s truck cruising down Main Street, parked outside the hardware store, idling at the light in front of Maple and Main. She’d forced her mind to focus on her classes and the pageant rehearsal, well aware of the dangers of daydreaming aboutSheriff Callahan. He was wrestling with things he didn’t—or couldn’t—share.
But when she closed her eyes at night, or now, alone in her studio, it wasn’t long before the memory of his mouth on hers distracted her. Her body flushed scarlet hot just thinking about it.
Before he’d walked back to his office on Saturday, he’d keyed his number into her phone. Rush Callahan, as Lily suspected, wasn’t one to chat over text. For her part, she’d sent him only one message, a picture of her midweek pick-me-up latte from the diner. Someone had drawn what looked suspiciously like a broken heart in the foam on top.
Lily
Is Monica trying to send me a message?
His reply had been immediate, and she’d grinned at the screen like a schoolgirl with a crush for an embarrassingly long time when it came through.
Rush
Monica who?
Was that how dating worked now? She was so long out of practice; she wasn’t sure if she was even doing it right—if that was what they were even doing. Were insanely mind-blowing sex and clipped text messages how dating worked? If so, it was definitely more fun than any of the excruciating blind dates she’d suffered through. She wasn’t even sure she’d ever really dated Tucker. They had been too young for that.
The contradiction gnawed at her. With Rush, intimacy had come almost frighteningly easily. At the cabin, they’d both been pushed to the edge, and in that pressure cooker, pretenses had burned away. Yet when it came to sharing anything but the heat of their bodies, Rush pulled the walls right back up.
Evie was no help. When they talked, she just warned Lily not to get hurt and to set clear boundaries.
That was the problem. Evie didn’t have the faintest idea how messy and exhilarating it felt to push on those boundaries until she wasn’t certain what “too much” or “not enough” looked like anymore.
After everyone left that night, Lily had slipped into her smaller private studio to dance and burn off some of the anticipation and confusion. Dancing had always calmed her, a way to strengthen her lungs and body and still her mind, but somewhere between opening the studio, teaching classes, and planning a wedding, she’d lost the part where she danced for herself. In the weeks since she’d bolted from the church, she’d been gathering those pieces back, one by one. Tonight, she was here again, breathing and reclaiming.
The faint scent of lavender drifted from the dried bundles she’d tucked around the studio, filling her with calm as she sank deeper into the stretch.Inhale. Exhale.
I am a still lake, not a stormy sea.
Movement at the doorway caught her eye.
Her head snapped up. Rush leaned one shoulder against the doorframe, watching her. Snow dusted the brim of his Stetson and the shoulders of his sheepskin coat. A to-go cup steamed in his hand, mixing cinnamon with the scent of lavender.
Something in the set of his shoulders looked heavy.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, straightening from the barre.
“Nothing,” he said, not moving from the doorway. His weight rested easily against the frame, just watching her with those quiet, steady eyes hidden under the brim of his Stetson. She wished she could see the color. His face may not have given away any hints of emotion, but his eyes told another story. Were they storm-dark with passion, like the ominous thunderclouds that rolled through Northfield in summer, orthat pale, steel gray she’d seen before, cold and remote as a winter sky?
He shifted the cup, and the light caught on his knuckles—split and bruised, fresh marks layered over old. The punching bag again. She wanted to ask—would have asked if it was anyone else, but that’s not what he wanted from her. Rush didn’t want her poking at his bruises, not the ones on his hands and definitely not the ones under his skin, the bruises no one could see.
And that’s not what you want, either, a voice inside mocked her.
“Keep going,” he murmured. “I want to see you.”
A delicate shiver coursed through her. The thin black leotard clung to her curves, the black tights leaving her hips bare without the buffer of a skirt, and she’d never been more aware of her body. She was used to being watched for form and rhythm, but under Rush’s gaze, every nerve sharpened, tuned into the roiling energy he controlled so well.
The playlist shifted, the opening notes of a sultry track filling the studio—one she reserved for nights when she danced only for herself. Lily closed her eyes, surrendering to the music, letting her body move. She told herself it was muscle memory, but the truth was, she was dancing for him.
