Dancing for the Lord The Academy - By Emily Goodman Page 0,64

run the full routine out there—“ He grimaced and forced himself to put the ice back in place. No matter how much it hurt now, it was going to help later…he hoped.

“Then we won’t do it. Listen.” Hurriedly, Danni reached for a pencil and sketched out a few lines of choreography, grateful that Carolyn had taught her how to write out her ideas a long time ago. “We’ll just make a few changes. Here…and here….” Within a matter of moments, she had outlined the entire pas de deux, removing a lift here, changing it there so that it was his left arm bearing all of her weight. “We can do this.” They had to do this. She knew that it probably would have been better for Nick if he just bowed out, but she wasn’t about to give Katarina the pleasure. The other girl was not going to win—not like this.

Nicholas stared at her as though he had never seen her before. “Are you sure this will work?” he demanded, his eyes roving over the page as he struggled to absorb it all.

“Positive.” She shrugged lightly. “It’s not perfect, but it’ll keep your shoulder from having to bear any more weight tonight.” She frowned suddenly. “Except…don’t you have to carry Clara back to the sleigh? Maybe….” There wasn’t much she could do about that one, she realized bitterly. Allie was still refusing to admit that Nicholas might actually have a problem with his shoulder; and as hard as she had been on him earlier that day, there was no way he was going to be able to convince her of the need to shift the routine now.

“I can manage that much. She’s mostly resting on the left anyway.” Though as snotty as Allie had been earlier, it wouldn’t surprise him if she reversed the movement. No—she was the stickler for detail. If she suddenly reversed the movement now, everyone would know that she was trying to set him off-balance.

And in his fairer moments, Nick had to admit that she probably wasn’t trying to hurt him. The truth was, if he went to Allie right now and seriously told her that he was hurting, she would be as understanding as anyone else out there. She might be annoyed enough to suggest that he just bow out and let someone else have the role for the night, but she wouldn’t go out of her way to hurt him more, either.

He studied Danni’s new choreography again—thankfully, he, too, had been through a few lessons in basic choreography and knew how to write it down—and considered it. It might just work.

The certainty washed over him all at once, a gentle reassurance straight from the Lord. He could do this. It would be enough. “Danni, you’re a life-saver!” He bounded to his feet and hugged her tightly, the ice pack falling away. “I was dreading going out there and telling Androv that I couldn’t dance, but with this….” He stopped suddenly, despair breaking in again. “It’s going to get us in a lot of trouble, isn’t it? Fooling around with Androv’s choreography. He’ll never agree, and there’s not even time to practice it….”

“Just make sure you remember your cues,” she informed him. “And keep in mind that this is more a recital than anything else. It’s our families out there, not some reviewer.”

“Right.” The reviewer would be tomorrow night—and Nicholas already planned to make sure that Allie couldn’t find him all morning. He sighed. “Can you do this?” It was a serious question. The moves she’d sketched out for herself were a little bit more strenuous than the original, pulling the attention of the audience to her instead of keeping it torn between the two of them. For him, it was nothing shy of a blessing. For Danni….

“No problem.” She pulled him back, hugging him again, then let him go. “Now, get that shoulder iced so that you can do what you need to do out there.”

He obeyed, resting his head against the wall again as he settled the ice pack back on his shoulder. “You going to tell Androv?” she wanted to know.

She raised an eyebrow. “Are you kidding me? Far better to ask forgiveness than permission, in this case.”

Nicholas nodded. “I agree,” he said firmly. “What he doesn’t know about beforehand, he can’t use as a reason to pull me and leave you without a partner.” He eyed her. “You do realize that this is going way beyond the call of duty, right?