13. Plena and Brass Bands #2
My shoulders are up to my ears, my arms out wide. I’m confused about what she’s doing. I know I look silly because she’s giggling at me.
I push her face with mine so I can lean close to her ear.
“I don’t know how to dance.”
“Oh, I’m starting to see that, yes.”
God, she’s beautiful up close. Like she’s not even real. She pulls me closer to her and is practically climbing me. I can’t believe she’s touching me. And smiling. Not running away.
“Cypress, you can’t stand there like a tree.”
While it’s not the first time I’ve been accused of being a tree, it’s the first time I’ve found myself wanting to be something else. Everyone moves around us like water. Is that what she’d prefer?
“What should I do, then?” I ask.
She rewards me with a devious smile. “Here, let me lead. Put your hands here. When I step forward, you step back.”
It doesn’t occur to me at all that we shouldn’t be dancing.
Not even a day ago she was in my arms as I was hiding her from the Feds.
Now we’re under Edison bulbs in the open air.
Instead of worrying about it, I put my head down and listen.
Dutifully following her direction, I place my hands where she tells me, back up, then step forward.
She points to other dancers to show me how our hips should move.
By the time we are ready to switch and it’s my turn to take over, I’ve lost all sense of myself.
I’m desperate to put my leg between hers and move us back and forth and around.
I want her to roll her body into mine, using my leg to balance as she gives into the rhythm and beat.
Her skirt flies around her, and sweat drips down her temple. I’m mesmerized by her breaths and the feel of her thighs against me.
I pick up on things the surrounding men are doing with their partners and try them with her. She’s delighted by my efforts. I’m not even sure I’m doing it right, but that becomes unimportant.
“Something you said stuck out to me.” She lays the side of her body on mine. I pop her up and spin us around.
“Oh yeah?”
She moves all her weight onto me again, and I hold her steady.
“You said those Feds knew about the Heat Map. Which means you know about the Heat Map. I was too horrified by the idea that these people were making a pattern of my habits to realize you also made that same pattern. How long have you been following me, Cypress?”
I don’t think she’s been thinking about this long; otherwise, the idea of dancing with me wouldn’t have occurred to her. Or maybe she thought of it earlier and wanted to confront me. Either way…
“Not long.”
“Casablanca?”
“I was there,” I confess.
“Bangkok?”
I meet her eyes. Yes.
“Manila?”
I shake my head.
She was never in Manila.
“Okinawa,” I offer instead. Her smile is stale and slowly fades. “I just missed you in all those places except Casablanca. But by then, I had an idea where I could find you next.”
Her smile is gone. Ah, yes, the reason we shouldn’t be dancing—I’m hunting her, and she is my prey. She and I realize it at the same time.
“What do you want with me?”
There’s the question she’s been wanting to ask. It’s funny how I have so many answers to that.
“There’s someone who’s laid down a lot of money to see you.” Her eyes dart between mine. She’s afraid she knows exactly who hired me.
“And you’re what? Their dog?”
I take my time with the dance, knowing it’s going to end soon. She’s letting me touch her and explore how she moves underneath my hands.
“I find people. I have the nose for it.”
“You found me, Cypress. You kept me from someone else taking me. You asked me to stay on the island.” Her eyes turn glassy. I’m desperate to know what emotion she’s feeling. She blinks, and it’s gone. “But I’m leaving—tonight—if I can. I want nothing to do with you or the man who hired you.”
“Where will you go?”
She laughs lightly.
“Not Toronto.”
“Come with me. I’ll pay your way and make sure you’re safe.”
“Come with you…to the someone who hired you to track me down? Who is it? What do they want?”
God, she looks so tragic. She knows exactly who it is.
“It’s three men. A pack of bonded alphas. They wanted to know if you’re safe.”
The drums immediately cut off, and there’s just one high pitched scream from a trumpet. She stops breathing. Her face goes white. Even her lipstick fails to color her skin.
“Kelya, I’m serious. Come with me. Let’s settle this. They won’t stop. If it’s not me, it’s someone else.”
Her eyes narrow as she thinks hard.
“You haven’t told them where I am?” Kelya’s voice wavers, and her hands tremble, but her eyes remain wide.
“No…but they want you back in Saint Kane.”
The drums resume and so does the beating of my heart.
She slowly blinks at me, color returning to her soft face.
She’s decided something. Kelya grinds herself on my thigh and lays her hands on my chest, digging her nails in just enough to bring me some pain.
We are close enough to kiss, if that were something I wanted.
Sensual, pleading, submissive eyes lock with mine. Oh no. I won’t let this work on me. But her fingernails dig in harder, just how I like it.
“Cypress, don’t tell them where I am. Tell them you lost me. Don’t take their money.”
A breeze picks up, sending fresh air between us. The oxygen makes my brain start working. I lean down and practically press my lips to her ear.
“No, Sweet Rosette.” I take in a drop of breath, hoping to smell her, but instead, I smell the millions of scents around us.
This is going to be the death of me. “You’re not leaving this island unless it’s with me.
If I have to tie you up…” She lets out a quick gasp. “And drag you out of here, I will.”
I try again to smell her hair, and all I smell is her eucalyptus shampoo. I blow out the offensive scent.
Kelya looks up at me with absolute ire, then suddenly grabs me by my neck. I suck a quick breath, and my glasses slip down my nose. Her eyes are an angry storm. I hold on to her wrist, but don’t pull her off of me. Her hand is shockingly warm, and when she squeezes, my heart skips a beat.
I can’t stop drinking in the view of her pert mouth and long eyelashes…
Without warning, Kelya drops her hold on my neck and kisses me. Right on the mouth.
I grab her body as she lays into me. She’s up on her tiptoes. It’s a passionate and angry kiss, like she can’t believe it was her who started it.
Before I can return the kiss, she pulls back.
“Please don’t tell them where I am.”
I’m already shaking my head.
“No, that’s not happening…”
Kelya socks me right in the nose. It’s such a brilliant hit, and I immediately start bleeding down my mouth and jaw.
My glasses fall off my face, and I catch them before they hit the ground, never to be seen from again.
When I look up, shoving them on top of my aching nose, she’s nowhere to be seen.
It’s just the congested crowd dancing under the pale moonlight.
“Fuck!”
I feel like I just tumbled around in a barrel careening down a mountainside. Some kind people ask if I’m ok, but an aggressive woman is telling me off, in solidarity with Kelya, not knowing the context, but enough to call me an asshole.
Yeah, I’m an asshole.
That lighter she stole from my pocket before she took off has a tracking device on it. My chest pinches, and I rub my sternum.
I wish I smoked.
Maybe I’ll pick up a pack—and a new lighter—on my way to stop her from leaving.
Sorry, Matty.