Virgin Dancer (4 page)

But she had felt his hard hot body rubbing against hers, his agitated breath grazing her ear. It had been unmistakable how much he'd wanted her. Then why hadn't he simply loved her as she asked him to? A one-night stand had been all she wanted, and she was quite sure that he was a man who wouldn't object to such an offer. He could have any woman who went to his club, looking for a night of passion. Yet he had not taken what she offered him.

It drove her completely crazy.

She knew that she should have been glad that it ended this way. Obviously, Alrik had some serious problems she didn't even want to think about. She should simply move on and look for someone else, maybe a man who'd be available for a serious relationship, along with the sex. Maybe fate had intervened and told her to wait for the right man. But this didn't change the conviction that she had to talk to him once more, to know why he had rejected her.

As if she needed a reason to return to the club. She wanted to see him again - she simply had to. The memory of his kiss, his skin on hers occupied her thoughts during the long, hot days in the dance studio, and at night when she tossed and turned on her bed, unable to think about anything else but him.

Besides, there had been a few strange incidents during the last few days. She had the distinct feeling she was being watched. Sometimes, when she walked down the street from her apartment building towards the subway station, she felt it, and the tiny hairs at the nape of her neck stood up, tingling with sensation. But when she turned around, no one was there - at least nobody who didn't seem to be occupied with themselves. This was what she hated most about the big city. People didn't look in each other's eyes. Maybe it was an instinctive way of coping with living among such masses of human beings.

Once, she had been stepping into the train, when she had seen a stranger who was apparently trying to come nearer to her. He didn't look directly at her; yet he continually moved to new places to stand or sit, every time drawing a bit closer to her. He seemed to be very eager to stay near her, although he didn't say a word or even watch her, except when she pretended to look in another direction and peeked at him from the corner of her eyes. Last night, she had opened the window of the tiny flat she shared with Amber and looked down. There, he had been again, standing on the other side of the street. Although it was dark, she recognized him from the way he stood, half-concealed in shadows.

She had to talk to Alrik soon. Clearly, he was involved in something, and this sensation of being followed had only started since she'd been to his club. Maybe this had something to do with him and the strange man was someone he had hired to watch her. Or she was just paranoid and welcomed any reason to see him again. Whatever, she just couldn't let it go. The aura of mystery and danger that surrounded Alrik drew her to him, irresistibly and irrevocably. She knew very well that she might get burnt if she came too near to the flame. Well, he had warned her.

To hell with the right man, she thought when she entered Ragnarok the following night. It was eleven on a Friday, and the place was already crammed with the usual stylish people, having been declared the most popular nightclub in several city magazines.

Since Alrik wasn't to be seen anywhere, she went right up to the private elevator leading up to the penthouse, but a security guard stood in her way.

"No visitors," he said. "Mr Larsson is busy tonight." He had a hard accent; probably Alrik had brought him here from Sweden.

Jade glared back at him. "But I'm sure that in my case, he'll make an exception. I must speak to him, urgently."

The guard smiled slightly, although he didn't look amused in the least. "I hear that quite often, Miss. Now please step back from Mr Larsson's private area or I'll have to accompany you outside."

She had no choice but to leave the club, but she was fuming. So 'Mr Larsson' wasn't willing to see her, not caring enough to grant her a brief audience! Maybe he was just 'busy' with some of his female guests, telling her that she was the first to enter his holy chambers as well! She didn't know why she was so consumed by jealousy when she didn't even know for sure if he was with another woman. Actually, she was very glad that she hadn't given him her virginity, after all. Surely being rejected like this would have hurt much more if she had been with him intimately.

Besides, she had no right to expect anything. She'd thrown herself at him promising a one night stand, positively begging for it. Now she had to suffer the consequences. She shouldn't be agonizing about Alrik anymore.

Probably it's for the best, she thought. All she had lost was her pride, and it would be easier to mend that than a broken heart.

^*****

"Caleb, it's me!"

Jade knocked on the door a few times, using a special rhythm pattern so he'd know it was her. She always did that when she visited her younger brother, knowing how much comfort he found in these little rituals. He was sixteen and had been living in a boarding school for special needs children for the last two years. Since her parents had divorced, they both had found new partners, so a teenage son with Asperger's had become an obstacle that stood in the way of their newfound love interests. Jade hated them for sending her brother away from the home he was used to living in, fully knowing the stress a whole new environment meant for him. Not to speak of living alone among strangers, without a family who loved and understood him best.

When she entered the room, Caleb was sitting at his desk, frantically typing rows of numbers into his laptop. He briefly turned his head and looked up into her face, giving her only the slightest hint of a smile before he returned his attention to his computer screen.

"Hi Jade," he said, not thinking about standing up to greet her. "You are twenty-two, now," he added, as a matter of fact. So he had thought about her birthday, even if he hadn't called her. Caleb had always loved numbers.

She went up to him and cautiously wrapped her arms around him, hugging him from behind. He went rigid at first but relaxed as she lay her cheek against his, looking at the endless algorithms he wrote.

"Thank you. Are you doing your math homework?" she asked softly.

He grunted disparagingly. Obviously he had finished all his homework hours ago.

"Of course not," he said, not stopping typing for a second. He had a clear, deep voice, pronouncing every word very precisely as he spoke. Some people, especially other teenagers who had their own way of expressing themselves, thought that this was weird.

"Why aren't you outside with your friends? The weather is lovely today," she said, gesturing to the window. "Look, the leaves are already turning red and golden," she added, knowing that her brother showed no interest at all in the beauties of nature. It was a shame, since his school was located in a vast strip of land covered with lush green forests. The drive from New York City was almost two hours each way, so she couldn't manage to visit him more than once or twice in a month - which was quite often, compared to her parents' sparse visits.

"I am developing a new search engine," Caleb explained calmly. "It will not only lead you to sites according to your personal interests, but also connect you with people who share them and live in your area, with direct links to their social sites. I also provide maximum security to prevent anyone from analyzing your surfing and purchase history, and sell information about your customer habits to the industry. You will be one hundred per cent anonymous, all of the time, without the need for additional programs to hide your IP."

She pressed a kiss to his cheek and was rewarded by one of his random smiles. Since their childhood, she had been the only one he allowed to do that. From both their parents, he didn't tolerate more than a quick hug or a ruffling of his auburn curls that were so similar to Jade's, only cut short. He had become quite a handsome young man. She wondered if he even realized when a girl at school was interested in getting to know him better. Probably not.

"This sounds like a work of genius, Caleb. But I fear that such a search engine wouldn't be very profitable, would it?"

"Not if I tried to sell it to the industry," he said. "But I imagine that many people would be more than happy to spend a small sum a month for using a search engine that allows them to keep their privacy."

Now she laughed. "Caleb, if you continue to have such ideas you'll be rich like Bill Gates before you even go to college. Will you buy us a nice house in the Hamptons to live in then?"

"I'm sorry, but I can't do that, Jade," he replied earnestly, unable to follow her little what-if fantasy. Caleb only saw what was real. He couldn't imagine a scenario that didn't make sense to him. "I am not rich. I have forty-nine dollars in my wallet, one thousand four hundred eighty-nine dollars on my account, and my half of the money that Grandma left us. You know that I can't spend it until I'm twenty-one. A house in the Hamptons is worth approximately …"

"I was only joking, Caleb," she interrupted him, giving him another tight hug. "I only meant that
if
you were rich one day, you'd buy me a house. But we will live together one way or the other. As soon as I've finished ballet school and have a proper job, I'm going to look for a place where we could move in together. Would you like that?"

"No," he said bluntly. "I live here, Jade."

She sighed. Changes in life weren't very appealing to Caleb. At least her brother seemed to be happy here, even if he hadn't made many friends at school and remained an outsider, no matter how smart or how clever he was. He was just different, but she loved him just for that. One day, when Caleb had finished school, she would find a way. She knew that he wouldn't be able to live on his own without someone regularly looking after him, explaining the world to him.

It was often simple things that confused her brother. The subtle nuances of human behavior, like odd reactions from others to something he had said. When they had been younger, he had asked Jade about it later, imitating the other children's facial expressions so she could help him interpret their meaning. Any changes in his daily schedule could bring him into a sudden state of fear, even panic - a train that hadn't the same number as his usual one on his way to school, or a restaurant that couldn't provide his favorite dish at lunch because one of the ingredients was out of stock.

Finally, he seemed to finish whatever he had been writing and turned to her. He looked at her, then averted his eyes while he spoke. This was one of his many special behavior patterns that isolated him from others. It just felt strange, made him appear disdainful for not making eye-contact when he talked to you. It would appear as if he wasn’t listening, although he saw everything - there was nothing that escaped Caleb's attention.

"What happened, Jade? You look different," he said. "Your voice sounds different today, too."

She took a sharp breath before answering. He was right. She hadn't slept much for the remainder of the night. Alrik had been on her mind all the time during the drive here; images of him had flooded her mind. His lips on hers, kissing her senseless. The radiant grey of his gaze as he stared down at her, naked on his bed.

Now it was her time to look away. But there was no point in lying to Caleb.

"You're right," she admitted after a while. "You know … recently, I went to a club. On the evening of my birthday.”

“What for?”

She hesitated. “Well … to dance with my friends, have some fun. But the point is that I met a man there."

"Was he nice?"

Jade smiled. "I don't know if 'nice' would be the right word to describe him. He is special, not like other men. His name is Alrik, and he comes from Sweden."

"Like the Vikings," Caleb said, excitement sneaking into his voice. Besides numbers, he loved history books. His eyes wandered to one of the books on the well-filled shelves along the wall. "What does he look like?"

To her own embarrassment, she couldn't help blushing. "You could say that he looks much like you'd imagine a Viking, minus the beard and helmet with horns," she said.

"The Vikings only wore helmets to battle," her brother remarked. "And there is no archeological evidence pointing to horned or winged helmets at all. Will you marry him?"

"Caleb!" she cried, aghast. "I just met him! Besides, we decided that it's better not to see each other again."

"Why?" he said, clearly astounded. "So you don't like him?"

"Of course I like him. It's just that now is not the right time - or place for us to be … a couple."

"I don't understand," Caleb said.

"We don't fit together," she tried to explain, knowing that this was a blatant lie. That night, every touch, every whispered word had felt as if they had been made for each other. It couldn't have been more perfect.

It was obvious that Caleb still didn't understand, and he seemed to start growing disinterested in this pointless conversation. Longingly, he looked over to the computer, where the cursor was blinking behind the last row of numbers he had written.

"When will you see him again?" he asked, ending the discussion. "You like him." He said that as if he didn't have the slightest doubt concerning this statement. Jade had often found that he had a talent to reduce complex problems to the most important facts. It was a result of the logic-driven way his mind worked.

She wasn't able to answer for a few moments, then she sighed. "I don't know," she said. "Maybe never." At the same moment she suddenly felt positive that she wanted, rather needed to see him again, desperately. Caleb had the amazing ability to reduce every problem to the simple facts.

"You will," Caleb said, finalizing their conversation. Not wanting to talk anymore, he had returned to typing while Jade was left alone with her turmoil of emotions. Slowly she crossed the room to stare out of the window with empty eyes.

"I really hope you're right," she whispered.

*****

Chapter Four