Kiss Me, Dancer (3 page)

“I’m bracing myself.”

“Monica Bickles left two days ago for a trekking holiday in Tibet.”

“Why? Are they having a sale on incense? Or has she gone bonkers for a monker?”

“Monker isn’t even a word.”

“I know, but monk doesn’t rhyme with bonkers.”

Natalie made a tsking sound. “I hate to interrupt your highly intelligent train of thought, but that’s not the issue. You know Monica moonlights as a psychic reader known as Madame Lumina?”

Casey nodded. “So I hear.”

“And you know I’m in charge of the raffle. Well, Monica donated three free readings. But since she won’t be taking any calls in the Himalayas…”

“Oh no. I can guess what favor you want.”

“See that? You
are
psychic.”

“No. I’m not. And I am not going to pinch hit as a gypsy for Monica.”

“But I listed the prizes everywhere,” Natalie whined. “Someone will be expecting to win the free readings. Consider it your donation to the new library fund.”

“I already donated ten dance classes.”
Assuming I‘ll still have a dance school, thank you, Mr. Vonrelis
.

“Come on, Casey. It’s only a few measly phone calls. Look, I have a deck of tarot cards—”

“Great. You do the readings.”

“I also have a voice like Fran Drescher.”

“True.”

“And if I had to pretend I was Madame Lumina I’d get all nervous and blow it. But you’re a good actress. You could pull it off. Which is why you’re hired.”

After a long pause and a deep sigh, Casey said, “All right. But only because of the time you took my place on that blind date with the chiropractor from Bayonne.”

“Chiropractor from Bayonne? Oh, you mean Herbie.” Her eyes lit up. “Got news for you: he was huge.”

“Spare me the details.”

“No time anyway. Gotta go organize the raffle drawing.” She patted Casey’s hand. “Don’t worry, I’ll prep you before the first appointment. I’ll loan you my tarot deck and make you big printouts of the various meanings. And to avoid a lot of confusion, like getting a bunch of calls from Monica’s other clients, I’ll give you one of my back-up mobiles that I hardly ever use. That number will be given to the raffle winner.”

“I have a bad feeling about this. And it isn’t psychic.”

They parted ways and Casey ambled toward the ping-pong tables. A hand-eye game of skill she hadn’t played in years. She used to be pretty good at it. All she needed was a partner.

“Miss Casey.”

She turned to see Josh Byrne standing there. Next to his dad.

Casey swallowed hard when she saw Drew Byrne’s teal blue eyes studying her. She tried glaring at him, but the way his sculpted torso filled out the sleeveless tee he wore and tapered down to his tiny jeans-clad hips made her pulse race.
Ought to be illegal to be this sexy
.

She glanced at his perfectly carved delt. Sure enough, there was the tattoo of a blue tractor-trailer. So, he was definitely the womanizing player her brother mentioned. Knowing it spelled bad news, she tore her gaze away from him, forcing back fantasies of licking him from head to toe.

Casey turned to his son and covered her discomfort by saying, “How about a game of ping-pong, Josh?”

He tucked in his chin and shook his head. “I’m terrible at it. You’d only get annoyed with me.”

“No, I wouldn’t.” Poor kid. Was it his father who made him feel that? “In fact, I’ll teach you some slick moves.”

Drew stepped forward, his expression cocky, his eyes doing the elevator dance on her. “Like what?”

A nervous Josh must have feared another run-in between his father and his dance teacher because he said, “My dad is a champ at it. You should play with him.”

Oh, she wanted to play with him, all right, but not ping-pong.

Before Casey had a chance to decline, Drew said, “Think you can handle a grown man?”

She wasn’t sure if that was a sultry double entendre or just a snide challenge. Either way, Casey decided this obnoxious, arrogant butthead who didn’t want his kid in her ballet class could use a good ass kicking. “Try me.”

The game moved quickly into a fierce competition. She had to admit he was good. But cracks began to show in his ego every time Casey delivered one of her trademark smashes, sending the ball like a bullet off the far corner of the table for a point. His grumbling and the tense crease that formed between his brows tickled her predatory instincts. Moving in for the kill, Casey revved up her best backhand spin shot. The same one she’d used to beat all the guys she grew up with, including her super athletic brother Parker.

It hadn’t exactly won her any dates in high school, but that wasn’t an issue here. Mr. Sexy Moneybags was way out of her league. He’d never bother with a plain Jane scrounger like her. And if he did, it would only be for a lark. She’d learned that lesson years ago.

Which made her fight even harder to beat him.

It wasn’t long before Drew slammed his paddle down on the table and declared he’d had enough. “Damn. Got a cramp in my shoulder. Old wrestling injury. We’ll finish this some other time.”

A cramp in his shoulder? He couldn’t come up with something more creative than that? “Sure,” Casey said with a saucy grin. “Any time.”

He turned away. “Come on, Josh. Let’s grab a hot dog.”

“We just ate hot dogs.”

“Then it’s time for the Ferris Wheel.”

Josh bit his lower lip and glanced at Casey with a mischievous glint before hurrying after his father.

***

When Casey checked her voice-mail she saw that a call had come in from her landlord about fifteen minutes ago. She could kick herself for missing it. Weekend or not, she’d left him a frantic phone message yesterday begging him to get back to her.

Hoping to reach him now, she made her way out of the playground. This would not be a conversation she wanted to share. Last thing she needed was for her students or their parents to hear her sounding all bent out of shape. She walked along the street beneath leafy sycamores and maples until the noise of the bazaar receded.

He picked up. Good. “Hello, Mr. Vonrelis. Thank you for getting back to me. I was very disturbed by your letter. You see, I’ve invested so much into—”

“You knew it was only a rental property.”

“But that’s why I wanted such a long lease. I’ve spent the last three years establishing a school here. Starting all over in a new—”

“Look, Miss Richardson, I’m retired. My wife and I want to move to Florida. I need to sell that property now. I already got a good offer, but if you can match it I’m willing to turn him down and sell to you instead. More than that I can’t do.”

“What’s your asking price?”

His answer nearly made her pass out, but Casey kept her voice steady and said, “All right. I do want to buy it. Please hold off with your other buyer until I have a chance to make some arrangements.”

“Don’t take too long.” And he hung up.

***

Drew relished sitting at the top of the Ferris Wheel when it paused. It gave him an odd sense of power looking down from this height on all those tiny people who didn’t know they were being observed.

Like Casey Richardson. He watched her rushing out of the bazaar to the street. He could hardly believe he’d just endured a beat down from a ballerina. A sexy sugar plum fairy with the eye of the tiger and a killer backhand.

A barely suppressed whimper on his left told Drew that Josh didn’t share his exhilaration for heights. It baffled him sometimes how he and his son could be so different. Was he a bad father because he didn’t know what to say at a time like this?

Drew played with a few possible comments in his head, but everything sounded so stupid and embarrassing that he remained silent. Unable to speak to his own flesh and blood. A piece of himself seated next to him that he’d watched enter this world nine years ago in the delivery room. Sure, some mistakes were made. But did it have to mean the two of them were destined to drift farther and farther apart?

The Ferris Wheel cycled down, and their turn to step off came. “Hear that, Josh? They’re announcing the raffle drawing. Should we go find out if we won a free DeCeccho’s pizza every week for a whole year?”

Josh just nodded. “Okay. Sure.”

How could the kid be so brazen on stage and so shy face-to-face? Throughout the afternoon people had stopped Josh to congratulate him on his performance. It only made the boy shrink and blush and stutter.

The awkward part for Drew was that he did not know any of these neighbors and friends except for a man who ran the ice cream parlor where they’d often grab a shake before heading to Drew’s turf in the Hamptons. He usually didn’t stick around the North Fork when he picked up his son for a weekend. This was Heather’s territory, and even though they’d been divorced for seven years, he still liked to keep their worlds separate. Except this place was also his son’s world. And today Drew noticed how much of it he was missing.

The same person he’d seen bopping around with Casey Richardson stood onstage at the mic. She had a cadre of little girls around her. The biggest girl held a glass bowl, and the others took turns plucking out folded pieces of paper with the names of people entered in the raffle. There were about twenty prizes, from a grand prize of a brand new laptop computer all the way down to a homemade pie from the local bakery.

The woman read each name, and excited winners accepted cheers. Unfortunately, Drew did not win the pizza or even the video games Josh would have liked. But he heard his name being called when they announced the prize of three free psychic readings by someone named Madame Lumina.

“That’s you, Dad. You won.”

Psychic readings?
Couldn’t he at least have won the complimentary games at the bowling alley? This wasn’t the kind of prize he could give to Josh. And he sure as hell didn’t want it for himself. But Drew forced a smile, raised his arm, and the woman passed him an envelope with a certificate inside.

After every prizewinner was announced, the exuberant tide of people that had rolled its way up to the front of the stage began to recede, the bazaar winding down.

The older woman he’d seen earlier wearing the big Kentucky Derby hat passed by Drew. “Excited about your free readings?”

He smiled, but said, “Not especially. I’d rather not know my future.”

A redheaded matron broke into the conversation. “Don’t worry. She’s not very good.”

Ms. Derby Hat frowned. “I heard she’s excellent. Monica Bickles told me she swears by Madame Lumina.”

The redheaded lady tossed Drew an exuberant grin. “Good, bad, who cares? Either way, it’s all in fun.”

“Maybe for some, but not for me.” Drew held out the envelope. “Why don’t you take this? I’m just not interested in listening to some loony tell me about my life.”

He knew he shouldn’t let his crankiness show to these ladies, but Drew couldn’t hold back. After Josh’s triumphant performance the boy would no doubt expect his father to change his mind and let him return to the dance classes. And maybe he was right. But that would mean admitting defeat in front of Casey Richardson. Again.

If only he’d kept his mind on his game instead of visualizing her playing ping-pong in the nude, he might have fared better. Or maybe not. Her coordination was amazing. And watching the speed and grace of her movement was mesmerizing. Which only made him want her more.

Ms. Derby Hat interrupted his thoughts patting his hand with a motherly smile. “You look so stressed. You could probably use some advice from Madame Lumina.”

Chapter Three

That night Casey played a CD of Miles Davis to calm her nerves, but she put on some fresh coffee to help her think. She chewed her fingers as she wandered back and forth through the three rooms above the dance studio she’d turned into a home for herself. The green and blue striped curtains she sewed from a remnant, the rocking chair she lugged from the thrift store, the shelf she put up to hold the unicorns she’d been collecting since forever. Some were delicate glass, some tacky plastic. Ceramic, wood, pewter, even a stuffed one.

She stopped and brushed her hand along her favorite. A frosted crystal blue unicorn with a fairy riding on it. A gift from her dad for her fifteenth birthday, only a year before he died. Parker had probably picked it up for him, because Dad was bedridden by then.

Casey could still hear her father saying, “Listen to the dreams in your heart.” He never made much money as a gardener, but he loved his work. And he was always there to defend Casey when her mother scolded her for chasing rainbows.

When the gurgling coffeemaker stopped, she poured herself a big mug and sat at her kitchen table. Casey could hardly believe she told her landlord she wanted to buy this building. Sure, telling him that might give her a little more time, but for what? There was no way she could ever come up with the seventy or eighty thousand she’d need for a down payment on a mortgage. Not that a bank would give her one anyway. She had no assets. And after three years the school was just breaking even.

But if she bit the bullet and left here she’d still need start up money. Including a deposit on a new rental. One that wasn’t so far away she’d lose her current students. And finding a suitable place would not be easy. Last time she’d searched the North Fork for about a year looking at barns set too far back on farms and storefronts in strip malls too narrow for dancing and too creepy for her to live in even if the zoning allowed it.

She sipped her coffee, rummaging through her options when the phone rang. “Hi, Mom.”

“Parker said you’re being kicked out of your building. I told you not to spend your savings on such a flimsy idea. All that money wasted.”

The one person she could always count on to put her down. Why had she answered? Casey leaned her cheek against her hand, her whole body sinking. “I’m working out some possibilities.” Who knew what that meant? But she thought it sounded businesslike.

“There’s a new restaurant looking for waitresses.”

“But I don’t want to give this up.”