Quiet Walks the Tiger - By Heather Graham Page 0,61
you down in the studio,” he advised her with a tired but pleased grin. “I’ll finish up in here while you get started with her. Then I’ll be back down, and we can lock up together.” He frowned slightly. “What’s Patty doing here now anyway?”
“Private lesson,” Sloan said with a wry smile. “She has an audition for the Solid Gold dancers on Monday, and we’re going to work on the number she’ll be doing—sprucing up at the last minute.”
“Oh,” Jim nodded sagely. “Hey,” he asked as they both walked to the connecting door, “heard from Wes? Think he’ll be impressed with the place?”
“Oh—ah, yes and yes,” Sloan mumbled as she walked past him. “I, uh, talked to him last night, and he’s still detained, but I’m sure he’ll be quite surprised by our success.” She lowered her head and winced as she hurried to the studio. Wes sure as hell was going to be surprised—if he ever returned. She was beginning to think the entire thing had been a fabulous dream that had turned to a painful nightmare at the end. But it wasn’t a dream; the gold band and diamond cluster on her finger weighed heavily to remind her of reality.
Patty was a good dancer. Her instinctive grasp of dance was a natural talent, and Sloan had hopes that her student would succeed with her audition. She lost track of thought and time as she tutored her pupil. It was a fast, rugged piece, performed to a number by a popular rock group, indicative of the work she would be doing if she got her job.
“It’s good, Patty, really good,” Sloan told the anxious girl. “Just watch your timing. Let the music be your guide.” She sighed as Patty stared at her blankly. “I’ll run it through, Patty. Listen to the music while you watch.”
Sloan set the stereo and moved into Patty’s dance, allowing the beat of the music to permeate her limbs and guide her. Her concentration was entirely on the harmonious tempo of movement; she was heedless of anything around her. As the song neared its end, she rose in a high leap, one leg kicked before her, the other arched at her back, her toe touching her head.
It was then that she saw Wes, leaning nonchalantly in the doorway, his dark suit impeccably cut, hands in his pockets, his eyes glittering with a hard jade gleam as he watched her, that crooked smile that wasn’t a smile at all set pleasantly into his features as he listened casually to whatever it was that an enthusiastic Jim was saying to him.
Sloan almost fell. She had a streaking vision of herself crumpled on the floor, her limbs twisted and broken.
But she didn’t fall. She landed supplely and finished the piece for Patty, her thoughts whirling at a speed more intense than the rock music. She should have been prepared, but she wasn’t. She was in shock.
Her eyes clenched tightly as she struggled to hold back tears of uncertainty. Had he finally come to call it quits? To tell her he had extracted whatever revenge he had required and that their best course now was a divorce?
Her heart was pounding tumultuously, and she knew it was more than the dance. She had learned painfully to live without Wes, but seeing him cut open every wound. He seemed to exude that overpowering masculinity which had first entrapped her senses as he stood there, so tall, so broad and yet achingly trim, the lines of his physique emphasized by the tailored cut of his suit. The profile, though hard, was still the one she had fallen in love with...Her eyes flicked from the full sensual lips that could claim hers with such mastery to the hands that dealt pleasure even as they mocked...
If only his eyes weren’t so cold and hard...relentless, ruthless, and condemning now, contemptuous when they lit upon her.
She was shaking as the music ended, and she struggled for control. She loved him, and she wanted their marriage to work no matter how the odds appeared to be irrevocably against them. Now was her chance to at least show that she was willing...
“Patty, keep working,” she told the girl hastily, rushing to the doorway. She forced herself to be calm even as she longed to throw herself into his arms, even as her eyes glimmered brilliantly with hope.
She stopped a foot away from Wes, halted by the chill in his eyes. She had no chance to take the initiative—he