Page 17

She’s exquisitely perfect.

I watch with bated breath as Bethany and Dev move together—the devastated Odette and her prince in the last moments before their deaths. Tchaikovsky’s famous melody is steeped in sorrow, the haunted notes echoing in the darkened stage as the lone spotlight shines on the tragic couple.

They reach for each other—a series of pirouettes and lifts—their movements restrained, yet desperate at the same time.

My heart swoops and falls with them, desperately wishing they could find another way out even though I’ve seen this ballet a hundred times and know the ending by heart. God, if Grace knew about this, she’d call me a secret romantic.

The last few weeks under Sir Ian’s tutelage have yielded no additional clues. He has been completely professional. Faultless. But my sleep has been destroyed, marred with nightmares where I wake up bathed in sweat—my mind and body still fighting with each other. It’s like my body is trying to tell me something my mind can’t remember.

It’s unsettling and annoying. I haven’t felt this way in years.

Dev lifts Bethany in the air, followed by an achingly tender embrace. My heart clenches in wistfulness and longing.

I’m thrown back to a time when I was with Alexis at IBA.

“You have that look on your face,” Alexis snickered as we peered at the stage where a Swan Lake rehearsal was taking place.

“Shhhhh. This is my favorite part.” I nudged her. “And what look?”

Her sharp blue eyes twinkled with laughter as she leaned in. “The look of love and heartbreak. Like you’re Odette.”

I pursed my lips. “How aren’t you moved by this? Undying love, life and death, all performed without words.”

“I am.” Her voice quieted as we stared at the prince carrying Odette toward the lake to their deaths—because they couldn’t break the curse the sorcerer placed on Odette and would rather die than be apart. “You’d make a great Odette someday, Tay. I know it in my gut.”

There was a wistfulness in her voice, and I tore my gaze away from the stage to look at her. Her eyes had a faraway look. Our friendship bangle dangled from her slim wrist.

She smiled. “You have what it takes to make it to the top. Grit. Talent. Even the teacher said you captured Odette’s essence so well. You’ll be unstoppable once you have the technique down.”

Oh Alexis, how wrong you were. A weight settles on my chest and I touch the cool metal of the bangle around my wrist.

“That’s what you’re missing, you know.” Charles’s deep voice interrupts my thoughts, and a pillar of heat appears by my side.

Rolling my eyes, I mutter, “Why are you even here, Charles? Don’t you have work or whatever you CEOs do?”

“My uncle’s first performance. I can’t miss it.” He shuffles closer to me, staring at Dev and Bethany. “Your Odette is missing the vulnerability and all the nuanced emotions that make her role a classic. Your version will march up to the prince, slap him across the face, and come up with some scheme to kill the sorcerer. This is why you keep having issues dancing the role.”

Amusement laces his voice as he straightens his suit jacket. He probably thinks he has me all figured out—he has no fucking clue why I can’t dance the vulnerability required for Odette.

You don’t know shit, Charles.

“Shut up.”

The smirk falls off his face and he arches his brow. “What did you just say?”

I glower at him. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. You’re the last person to talk to me about this.”

His shoulders stiffen and a lock of blond hair falls across his face. That damn annoying mask he wears all the time falls off his face. “What on earth is wrong with you? Can’t take criticism?”

“No, I have no problem taking criticism, but it’s rich coming from you. A man with no dance qualifications to speak of, standing here telling a woman how she’s wrong for a role she’s a professional in.”

My breathing comes out in rapid pants as if a runaway train is barreling toward a head-on collision, its brakes cut, unable to stop. “And how dare you ask me what’s wrong with me? Why don’t I ask you what’s wrong with you? How is someone who doesn’t even have the guts to tell the world what he’s thinking even qualified to lecture another person on vulnerability, love, and heartbreak?”

“What the fuck?” he grits out.

Charles’s countenance turns stormier, and in this moment, I can’t hear anything other than the blood pumping in my ears. The poison is overflowing inside me and it needs to come out.

The vague silhouettes of business suits that fateful night barge into my mind.

That fake charm at the bar I fell hook, line, and sinker for, followed by pain. Lots of pain.

“Rich men like you just know how to take what’s not yours. Because you guys can get away with it. You’re all one dimensional. So how dare you lecture me on emotions!”

My pulse roars in my ears, my skin hot to the touch. I clap my hand over my lips, belatedly realizing how much I just spewed out—the lack of sleep from the recent resurgence of my nightmares must be getting to me.

And I took it out on the wrong man, who’s standing next to me and saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. Guilt slashes through me, and I swallow.

It’s not right. “I-I’m so—”

“You’re talking in riddles again. If you have an accusation, say it. If you think I did something, call me out on it. Don’t pussyfoot around this shit. You had nothing on my uncle back then and now you have nothing on me.” Charles’s nostrils flare as he stares at me, his chest rising and falling rapidly. His lips twitch in fury—his entire body is vibrating with restrained anger.

Someone hushes us. I look around, finding everyone in the ten foot radius glaring at us, and I realize we are causing a scene.

I am causing a scene.

I look at Charles again and something shifts in his gaze. He frowns, his eyes sharpening as they cascade over my face. Perhaps he sees the guilt or the regret. Perhaps he’s noticing my dark eye circles. But something registers in those arresting eyes of his, and now they’re reflecting a new emotion.

Pity.

The last emotion I want from anyone, least of all…him.

He pulls me into a darkened corner farther away from my colleagues, and I swallow my gasp when I see Charles looming over me. He’s flushed, a muscle pulsing in his jaw.

“You don’t know anything about me,” he rasps.

He leans down some more, obliterating the inches between us. The heat from his body singes me and I fight the urge to back away.

“You don’t know the first thing about men like me because you know what, Taylor? I bet you don’t even know yourself.” Those crystal blue eyes sear into me, like they can see through to my soul.

Applause rings through the audience, and I startle, my attention temporarily drawn to the closing drapes—the performance has ended. But there’s commotion—more commotion than usual.

People dash across the stage and I see Dev carrying a distressed Bethany toward Sir Ian. She’s clutching her foot as strained sobs tear from her lips.

Something is wrong, but I barely notice, because all I could think of was Charles’s accusations.

Charles straightens to his full height, his eyes darting toward the crowd gathered around Bethany and Sir Ian. He takes a few steps in their direction, his jaw clenching, but he stops himself.

Turning toward me, he says, “You go about lashing out at everyone—myself, my uncle, whoever you deem unworthy, even when you don’t have a shred of evidence the person you’re attacking with your words deserves them.”

My nostrils flare as a ragged breath slips out of my throat.

His eyes soften, the fury from earlier slowly receding into the background. He’s picking up his mask from the floor and putting it back on.

He murmurs, “I bet the person you want to hate is yourself. So before you accuse others of hiding their emotions, why don’t you hold up a mirror and take a good look and figure out why you’re lying to yourself.”

He spins around and stalks away.

The person you hate is yourself.

His words ring in my ears, a sucker punch to the gut, and I curl into myself, clutching my sweatshirt tightly as an ache sears into my chest.

Closing my eyes, I slide down to the floor, my head hanging between my knees as my breathing becomes shallow.

A sticky sense of shame seeps inside me, weighing me down.

Alexis is gone. Camden left. My dreams are tainted. My future is uncertain. In the last few weeks, my journey to recovery has regressed a few steps. And now I’m an angry shell of a person who’s trying to put on a brave face every day.

Aren’t you wearing a mask too, Tay?

I’m the world’s biggest hypocrite.

Identifying the problem is step one to resolving it. This is good. This is progress. And progress is never linear. I recite the words I’ve read in my self-help books and slowly feel my mind calming down. It’s painful now, but once I get past this, I’ll be stronger, one step closer to reclaiming myself.

I lift my head up and look at my colleagues gathered around Bethany. Medical staff have arrived, alarm clear on their faces. Charles and Ian are in a heated discussion, their frustration and concern evident.

Charles turns toward me, his penetrating eyes snaring mine. He swallows as regret and something undecipherable flashes across his face. I hold his gaze—finding a strange power in them, like someone finally sees me. The real me, scars and all.

And for a split second, I feel less lonely.