Was this crazy?
She’d been thinking about going back to the club all week, but she wanted to spend as much time with Gabby as possible while she was here, and they did some touristy things like check out Little Havana and the Bayside Marketplace where they had some of the nicest seafood she’d ever had while overlooking the water.
Emily also had some practical things to take care of. She had to buy a car. She had to pick up a few things that the apartment didn’t have. Some extra kitchen utensils. Sheets. Towels. And after a week in Miami already, she felt like she was getting there.
Gabby was back in Seattle. She’d texted Emily last night to say that she made it home and that she’d miss her these next few months.
Emily was here for a full year, but she imagined that either Gabby would come back, maybe over winter break, or she might get away in the spring. Emily didn’t think she’d go a year without seeing her best friend, and Gabby absolutely loved Miami. She’d be coming back for more of that sunshine too, not just to visit Emily.
She ordered the taxi before she thought anymore about it. She took one last look in the mirror, making sure her makeup was okay. She was going without a bag, just putting the essentials in the pockets of her shorts.
As Emily took the elevator down to the ground floor and walked out into the humid night air. It was still around eighty degrees at nine o’clock, and Emily had been so relieved to find out that the air-conditioning her apartment did in fact work.
The car pulled up, and Emily slid into the backseat, her body humming with a nervous energy as she watched the streets go by, the nightlife in this city vibrant. Emily lowered the window in the backseat, the breeze flowing through her hair, music wafting in from each bar they passed until the car pulled up outside the club.
Emily took a deep breath as she strode towards the door, a line forming to get in, and she remembered that last week they’d come earlier, both of them so nervous and in need of a drink or two before they started dancing.
Now, Emily was arriving with the rest of the crowd, the music streaming out onto the street as the door opened and closed with each person or couple the bouncer let it.
Eventually, Emily made it inside, the atmosphere even more charged tonight, and she’d heard a few people in the line talking about the band tonight. She didn’t recognize the name, but it sounded like they were a big deal.
She’d been daydreaming all week about coming back here, and more specifically, running into Alex again.
She knew the odds were slim. Yeah, Alex worked here some nights, but Emily didn’t think she’d get that lucky.
She knew she really wasn’t in a place to start something with anyone. She’d just moved here. She had a new job to focus on in a few short weeks. But Emily couldn’t seem to keep her mind from drifting back to last week, to the way dancing with Alex had made her feel.
And she honestly didn’t know if it was Alex herself or that feeling of finally being comfortable dancing or some combination of the two. Whatever it was, it had brought her back here.
She scanned the crowd before she even realized she was doing it, looking for a flash of blond hair, but she didn’t see Alex out on the dance floor.
Emily did her best to ignore the way her chest felt a little heavy, that pang of disappointment. Last week had given her the confidence to accept any offer to dance, which she would never have felt like she could do when she’d walked in with Gabby at the start of the night.
The only thing was, Emily only wanted to dance with Alex. She had a sinking feeling that if some guy asked her to dance, that it should be fun, but that she’d just end up comparing him to Alex, and noticing how there wasn’t anything else there. No chemistry. No attraction.
A shiver chased up Emily’s spine when she felt a warm hand on her lower back, and when she turned, her breath caught in the throat.
There was Alex, her blond hair straight, falling a few inches below her shoulders, her blue eyes almost sparkling.
“Will we dance?” Alex asked by way of a greeting as she came around to stand in front of her, leaning in a little so that Emily could hear her over the music.
“Yes.” Emily didn’t have a chance to over think it, because Alex was leading her by the hand out onto the main dance floor, weaving through the couples dancing all around them.
Emily was so focused on the feeling of Alex’s hand in hers and the amazing dancers surrounding them that she hadn’t realized that Alex had brought them right to the top of the dance floor beneath the band, the lead singer, a woman wearing a black cocktail dress dancing on the stop as she sang.
Before she could panic, Alex was there, standing opposite her, reaching for Emily’s other hand and getting them moving to the music, starting with some simple turns, and it wasn’t long before Emily forgot about where she was and how many people could see her dancing.
The music, the crowd, Alex. It was all so intoxicating. The rhythm of the percussion, the power of the brass. The way Alex was looking at her as she sashayed by her, her hand on Emily’s hip, smoothly reaching for her hand and turning her twice as Alex kept moving to the beat.
Emily couldn’t remember ever feeling this alive, and she lost herself in the music, letting herself fall into Alex’s magnetic presence, into the way she made Emily feel like she was the only woman in the room.
6
The soothing rhythm of the ocean’s waves hitting the shore blended with the faint sounds of music and laughter coming from the nearest bar. The moon’s glow illuminated the beach as their feet sunk into the sand, both of the carrying their shoes.
Alex could have spent all night dancing with Emily, but she couldn’t risk a repeat of what had happened last week.
Emily was probably leaving Miami in the next few days, and Alex wanted to get away from the club even just for a few minutes to talk, to find out what her story was. Maybe she was staying for a month and not a week or two? Not that it made much difference.
