Page 5

Olivia
Then . . .
The music swam through the room and even though I was exhausted and sweat was trickling down my body, I’d never felt so alive.
“Again,” Christoph barked as I finished yet another dozen pirouettes and fouettés in rapid succession.
I glanced at him in the mirror, realizing we were alone, as the last rays of the setting sun highlighted his stern dark features, his hazel eyes unforgiving as he waited for me to keep going.
So I did. Instead of ten spins each, I pushed for twenty. Then added another round of thirty. I was panting, my heart pounding hard and steady when the music suddenly stopped.
I froze, my feet still in first position, and lifted my gaze to his in question through the large mirror.
His eyes slid slowly down my body and heat licked my spine in their wake.
I swallowed, unable to speak, as he took a step in my direction. Another.
Since the day I’d arrived at La Scala, I’d felt this magnetic attraction to him. I couldn’t help it. Tall for a dancer, he still wasn’t a big man, but he seemed so much larger than life with his personality, his talent, his passion. And as much as I tried to brush it off, it was hard to ignore his blatant stares at times or the way he’d make excuses to correct my technique—a brush of the hand here, a lingering grip to reposition my body there. None of the other students got half of the attention that I did in these past two weeks, and I wasn’t sure what to make of that other than it was going to be a long, hot summer as we danced around this... whatever it was.
I jerked and sucked in a breath when he came up behind me so close, I could feel his body heat. Our eyes locked in the mirror, and he slid a slow hand down my arm. “You are gifted, Olivia,” he murmured, his deep voice low, hypnotic. Reverent. “Such a beautiful dancer. As beautiful as I’ve ever seen.”
Chills hit my flesh at his praise and his touch, and I leaned back into him involuntarily, needing more of it.
He bit back a smile, as if understanding the need. “Tu mi tenti.”
I spun around, finding myself in his arms. “Sorry?”
He cupped my cheek, his thumb brushing my lower lip. “Don’t be.”
Four
Olivia
“There’s my girl!”
I glanced up from where I sat with Elizabeth on the floor of my parents’ living room as she bolted up from where we were playing to make a beeline toward my brother, who’d just arrived, his very pregnant wife and daughter in tow. They were in town to visit my parents for several days from their home in the hill country before the baby was born.
Camden shot me a smirk as he hoisted her up into the air, then snuggled her close, pressing several kisses to her cheeks.
She giggled and ate it up.
“Have you been good for your mama? Huh?”
She laughed some more and nodded, lost to my big brother’s charms as the doting uncle he was, so I rose and made my way over to say hello.
I bent over to smile at his daughter in her wheelchair. “Hey there, Isla. Aren’t you looking pretty today?”
She smiled up at me from behind her glasses. “Thank you.”
“And so do you...” I stood and hugged Vanessa, patting her belly. “When is this one gracing us with her presence?”
“Not soon enough.”
Cam turned to us. “What are you talking about? I thought she was just having too many of her brother Sam’s pancakes.”
She rolled her eyes and moved to the large bay windows that overlooked the lake, where our dad was manning the grill, along with our uncle Jack.
I joined her while Cam entertained the little girls.