want to hear this, but I feel like I have to say it. Don’t leave the ballet. I know you really wanted the program in New York, but that’s not a reason to leave the ballet for good. There are so many other opportunities. What will I do without you? It’s not like I have a single other friend here. Truly—you’re the only thing keeping me sane.
And I don’t even want to go to New York if I have to come back here this fall and find out you’re gone.
I know you’re disappointed, and I know you said you wanted to go live your life—but is whatever you’re going to find out there worth walking away from this dream?
I mean, yes, you’re talking about things I’ve never done, so maybe there is something about it that I don’t understand. I mean, you want to find true love and settle down and have kids, and I’m a girl who has never even gotten flowers from a guy. Plenty of bouquets have been delivered to my dressing rooms over the years, but none have ever been from anyone who didn’t want something from me.
What would it be like to have a boy bring me flowers just because he wanted to make me smile?
I’ll never know. And I guess a part of me gets it—why you’d trade ballet for the possibility of that excitement. But it feels so premature. So permanent.
And what if he’s not out there? What if you leave and the things you’re leaving for don’t appear?
The sound of footsteps on the stairs pulled Cole’s attention. He shoved the letter back in the envelope and the envelope back in the box. He picked it up and walked toward the front door just as Connor appeared at the bottom of the stairs.
“Thanks for doing this, Cole,” he said. “You’re a good friend.”
“Anytime, man,” Cole said. “I’m almost finished here, and then we’ll grab some lunch. You look like you could use a meal.”
“I have casseroles for days.”
“Great. I’ll heat one up. Be right back.” Cole walked outside with the box under his arm. He reached the truck, opened the passenger side door, and set it on the front seat.
What other secrets about Charlotte Page were inside that box?
And how many ethical codes did he violate if he opened it to find out?
30
Charlotte propped her ankle on the ballet barre and leaned over it, stretching out muscles tight from neglect. While she had walked away from a life in professional ballet, the desire to push herself hadn’t gone away, and that meant rehearsing and training.
That meant not letting her muscles get weak.
Thankfully, Brinley had agreed to let her in to the studio whenever she wanted, though she’d made no progress on convincing Connor to let her buy the studio. She’d left him two messages, but so far, no reply.
She had two hours before Cole and Amelia showed up (or not), and she planned to spend them the same way she would if she were in Chicago. She’d taken enough time off.
After she’d warmed up, she took her place on the floor and began to move. She was tentative at first, and then she remembered her moments with Amelia, her moments of recalling the way Julianna threw herself into every role she danced, whether she had a solo or was hidden in the back.
In her mind, she’d assigned sounds and words and numbers to the steps as her entire body moved to the music. An exhale here, a zip-zip there, then a hah on the button of music.
Julianna had a secret Charlotte had never uncovered. She didn’t care for the spotlight—it wasn’t what drove her. She simply loved to dance.
That wasn’t why Charlotte danced. Not only did she not always love it, some days she actually hated it. So why? Why sacrifice everything for something she didn’t love?
Shoo-turn-hah. Over and over, moving instinctively, her body taking on a mind of its own.
As she moved, realization struck her. It wasn’t passion or even ambition that motivated her. It was an overwhelming desire to be worthy.
She was still, even now, trying to earn her place, as if she didn’t have the same right to be here unless she had something to offer. She peppered Cole with gifts that all seemed to cry out, Do you like me yet? She’d tried so hard to be seen, to prove she had value.