seat.”
I warm up at the barre in my soft canvas ballet shoes as he speaks.
“Frederick was showing off in the wings five fucking minutes before he was supposed to join you on stage. He fell and broke his ankle, though we didn't know it was broken at the time. He's out for the season. The understudy couldn't be found with only minutes to go on stage. I was there. I knew the part. I wasn't going to just leave you out there without a partner. I made Frederick strip and took the costume. Apparently while we were dancing, the paramedics took him out of there naked. I was fucking furious, so I hardly cared. And you know the rest. We danced.”
What we did was so much more than dance. My breath catches in my throat at the memory of the moment when his hands spanned my waist with such certainty I knew exactly who had me.
“I-I didn't know you could still dance,” I say.
“Of course you did. You've been dancing with me for months.”
“But I didn't know it was you. I thought you retired because you were too injured.”
Sebastian sighs. “There was a lot of rehabilitation, and I'm not sure I'm quite back where I was technique-wise. But it was mostly the scars on my face. It's not exactly a ballet aesthetic. You know? And I didn't want pity or people to come see me out of some morbid fascination like some sideshow freak.”
I understand this. The world of ballet is all about beauty and the illusion of perfection. A beautiful top male principal dancer, lusted after by nearly everyone who watches him, suffers a disfiguring accident... There’s pity and shock. And he's going back on stage? Not in this lifetime. I get it.
“Who will I be dancing with for the rest of the season?” I ask. I don't hate the understudy, but I'm not nearly as comfortable with Shane as I am with Frederick on stage.
“Me,” he says. “Apparently, after Sunday night, you and I are the talk of the dance world. So, I guess I'm back.”
“The company hired you?”
He laughs. “I own controlling interest in the company. Trent is a name I invented to perform under and hide my family money. My real name is Sebastian Grant of Grant Enterprises. After I retired, I found this company struggling and offered to help. I wasn't planning on performing again, even though I was asked to. Now, after Sunday night, people are a lot more insistent.”
A giddy thrill runs through me at the prospect of being partnered on stage with THE Sebastian Trent for the rest of the season.
“But if you're dancing with me, why have I been rehearsing with the understudy the past two days?”
I can almost hear the shrug in his voice. “Because it took the company that long to convince me to come out of retirement. I'll be dancing with you tomorrow night.”
Sebastian Trent and me, up on the big marquee in front of the theater for the entire run of the Firebird.
“Put the blindfold on,” he says.
“But, I've seen you.”
“This isn't a negotiation, Ms. Lane; put it on.”
“Yes, Master,” slips past my lips as I reach for the scrap of black fabric hanging over the barre. I can almost feel his smile from wherever he is. It permeates the air like a hot breath during a slow fuck.
A few minutes later, he's beside me. He takes my hand and slings my dance bag over my shoulder.
“Step down,” he says when we reach the stairs at the side of the stage. I tentatively feel my way down each step. “Where are we going?”
But he says nothing. He just leads me up the aisle and out through the concession area. I only know because of the way the sound of his shoes change when we go from carpet to hard floor. Then outside into the cold night.
My breathing is coming harder as unease winds its way through me. I hear a double beep on a car, and a door opens.
“Get in,” he says. He helps me into the car, then shuts and locks me inside. My hand reaches out instinctively for the door, but the child locks are on.
A moment later, the other door opens, the locks snap down again, and the car starts up. I reach to remove the blindfold, becoming increasingly panicked by this change in our pattern.
He grips my wrist, hard. “No.”
A moment later, a rope is being tied around my wrists and then looped