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So she had heard right. Katarina had been crying. Just like the earlier fear and sadness in the blue eyes had openedsomething in Juliette’s chest, the tears went even further. They sliced, a jagged edge of pity and helplessness splitting Juliette’s ribs to the deep empathy within.

She was about to head back, grateful that she had remained unseen and thus sparing both of them the embarrassment of witnessing someone so prideful fall apart, when the silence was broken once again. Just before Katarina disappeared from the balcony, quietly closing the wood and glass doors behind her willowy form, she whispered, looking up at the clearing sky, at the shy stars peaking among the storm clouds.

“Thank you.”

Juliette did not sleep the rest of the night, the warning from Helena warring with the tearful vision of Katarina thanking her stars.

PART II

VARIATIONS

7

OF MORNINGS AFTER & SETTLING IN

“So, the night went well, I take it? No blood on those amazing parquet floors of yours?”

Gabriel was bent over his bag, looking for his water bottle, sweat dripping off his face. They had just finished their morning class, with Francesca taking over the duties of wiping the floor with them.

The core dancers had departed, and the soloists were congregating in their usual corner. Most of them rarely spoke to Juliette and the other principal dancers. Gabriel was an exception, but then he always had been. He winked at them as he straightened and swaggered exaggeratedly closer to where she was pulling on her leg warmers.

“You are being ridiculous.” She threw a slipper at him, which he caught with his free hand while chugging water. Juliette could absolutely hear the swooning happening in the soloists’ corner.

“About the blood?” He puffed out his chest, taking a deep breath, and then sat down next to her. “It isn’t unreasonable to ask, you know. All things considered.”

“Am I missing something, Gabriel? Because first Helena was all up in arms about me making space for another prima who would come to stab me in the back, and now you?”

Juliette reached for the towel, if only to have something to do with her hands, while Gabriel took his time answering. When he did speak, he sounded thoughtful.

“That is actually not what I meant at all. Mostly, I was making a terrible joke about the total ball-buster that is Katarina Vyatka. But now that you mention it, or should I say now that Helena mentioned it?—”

“And what did our esteemed Doctor Moore mention?” Francesca made her presence known, her tone pure venom.

Juliette felt the corners of her mouth twitching.Ridiculouswas the word of the morning, that was for certain.

“You, for what it's worth.”

Francesca gaped but then waved exaggeratedly.

“Disparagingly, I’m sure.”

“Just to imply that whatever happens, you will watch my six. Literally.”

It was an old joke between them. Francesca smirked.

“On my watch, it has only gotten better. You are welcome, amor. As for the esteemed doctor and the point she was making, I am sure you of all people saw all the possibilities and all the angles in this entire affair.”

Juliette bit her lip. Her reputation as a cerebral and methodical dancer extended to her life choices, and she had never been impulsive. How was she to explain to Francesca and Gabriel that yesterday had been very much an aberration for her and, for once, instinct had taken over?

A change of subject was required. Because as Gabriel had, Francesca was bound to ask questions. And Juliette would much rather not answer some of them.

Especially the ones about how her morning with Katarina had gone. Or what Katarina looked like in just a towel with water droplets running down her long neck, chasing the blue veins down that translucent expanse of skin. Or how Julietteforgot how to breathe and executed the most perfect imitation of a deer in headlights. A very flustered deer that turned all beet red at the revelation of the longest legs barely covered by the aforementioned towel. Or how Katarina’s chest rose and fell under Juliette’s flustered gaze.

Or how Juliette turned away as if slapped when their eyes met and she realized that surely she was making this woman uncomfortable. She distinctly remembered mumbling something about the time and it being the perfect hour to go for a run before grabbing her shoes and sprinting out the door. No, gun to her head, she’d never be able to say what time it was, but it was exactly the proper time to disappear from the apartment and maybe the face of the earth and what had she gotten herself into?

After tossing and turning for a few hours before dawn, Juliette had chosen to eschew the struggle and attempt breakfast. But with the shower and towel and, well, all that skin, she found herself on the warm, still-wet-from-the-rain Paris streets that met her with birdsong and sleepy pedestrians. She didn’t push hard, just enough to brush off the cobwebs of the sleepless night. But the vision of freshly showered Katarina, smelling of Juliette’s shampoo, was something this run—even if she had chosen to set new speed records—would not be able to erase. That image was branded into her brain.

So after all that, being subjected to questions from Gabriel and Francesca was decidedly not ideal. Even before either of them sensed blood in the water. Or whatever it was that was making Juliette act like a schoolgirl with a crush.