32. Caleb
Chapter 32
Caleb
C eleste straddles a chair and, gripping the armrests, tilts her head back. I fist my hands, willing myself not to react, my palms sweaty and ready to touch her. To pull her to me. To kiss her. To own her.
Not that I could do it from the back row of the theater. I came to watch her rehearsal a few times. Staying in the shadows like a creep, but I couldn’t help myself.
She moves around effortlessly, and so seductively. Frankly, the entire performance, not just her numbers, is racy enough to send my blood boiling.
It was kind of hot at first, but as time passes, it’s purely annoying. I have half a mind to call Reinhard and have the show canceled.
Watching her today has a different flavor.
We haven’t had a chance to speak since last night. Something shifted between us at the gala. Even before it.
Starting with her not-yet-fully-explained overreaction about her dress. Then my need to find her all night. To stand up for her to Carly. To protect her from Corm. To claim her at our table.
Fuck, that was so hot, and so fucking risky. The interaction—or lack of it—with my father, and Celeste’s reaction to it.
When she stepped in, allowing me to find my composure after Corm’s question. When she deemed my father an asshole. When she came on my hand.
It all collided into a potent cocktail of feelings, and I arrived at the conclusion that we can no longer pretend this is simply an arrangement. It’s more.
But I saw it in her eyes, the moment she realized the same.
And when she panicked.
That’s why I came here. She dashed away this morning because her friend needed her, but we need to talk. We need to own this fragile, but very real, thread between us.
But as her practice progresses, I’m getting more and more agitated. Because yes, watching her today has a different flavor, and one of the truly bothersome reasons for that is walking across the stage right now .
Why is today’s rehearsal just her? No other dancers? Just Celeste and that idiot choreographer whose gaze on her doesn’t scream colleagues. Fucking asshole.
Celeste stands up when he approaches her. He sits on the chair in the same position she just had and demonstrates something to her. Something that doesn’t look nearly as graceful as her version.
She nods and they switch. As she tilts her head backward, he touches her shoulders from behind. She adjusts her posture, I think.
My mind stops processing the visuals at their face value, tainting the image with a bubbling outrage. Why is he touching her?
He moves his hand up her throat, tilting her chin further. She flinches and stands up, the chair toppling.
My legs move before my brain gets a chance to argue. “Get away from her.” My voice booms through the auditorium.
The two of them whip their heads to me.
“Who the fuck are you?” the choreographer dares to ask. “You have no right to be here.”
My legs eat up the distance, reaching the stage in long strides. With my hands, I find purchase at the edge of the wooden platform and jump up in one swift move, propelled by my anger.
“I have all the right to be here. I own the fucking place.” I put my hands into my pockets, savoring his flinch. My eyes find Celeste. “Are you okay?”
She nods, but then winces before she shakes her head.
“I don’t care if you own the building. Get the fuck out of my rehearsal.” The idiot steps forward, puffing out his chest.
Reluctantly, my gaze leaves Celeste. “I advise you to shut up right now. Don’t you dare touch my wife again, because you’ll not only lose this job but any other opportunity in this country.”
Somewhere in the back of my mind, where the rage isn’t ruling, I register Celeste’s gasp. That doesn’t stop me from taking a few steps closer to the idiot. “I strongly suggest you get out of here right now. No one touches my wife like you just did without consequences.”
The echo of Celeste’s heels fills my foggy mind, disappearing quickly behind the heavy black curtain at the back of the stage.
“You can’t—”
I’m done with him. I need to be with Celeste. “You’re fired.”
I storm away, following Celeste’s footsteps. I yank the curtain to the side and emerge in a hallway. I rush after her, calling her name.
She doesn’t stop. She doesn’t look at me .
Until she does.
And my heart stops and restarts in that moment.
Pausing in front of a door, she looks at me and I halt. Our gazes collide, tears pooling in her eyes.
The pain in her expression burns through me with a vengeance. I feel her suffering in my veins, deep in my bone marrow.
The oxygen doesn’t hit my lungs. Something is really wrong. And while I don’t know what it is, I know without a shadow of a doubt that I caused it. And the reasons, the logic, the explanation of my actions, are unimportant.
What matters is that she’s hurt. And I want to burn the world to take that hurt away.
Celeste pushes the door open and disappears.
My shoes slap against the concrete, the sound almost obscene in the silent building. One leg forward. I scared her. The other one. I hurt her. Another step.
I scared her.
I hurt her.
My footsteps chant in my head, and it feels like a lifetime before I reach her door. I knock.
Nothing.
Leaning my forehead against the wooden surface, I stop myself from barging in, because something tells me I need to let her be in charge here .
But fuck, I want to break the fucking door down and demand answers.
Claim my right to console her.
Absorb her pain.
“Celeste.” I knock again, and almost fall forward when she yanks the door open.
Stumbling at the threshold, I find purchase against the doorframe with my arm.
The tears are gone as she stands there in her comfortable wrap dress, the one she usually wears at her practice. Fuck, she’s beautiful.
And clearly whatever her initial reaction was, she’s found her composure. Now, she glares at me with venom.
It shouldn’t, but it still gives me hope. Combative Celeste is one I know well. One I can handle. But there is no way I’m letting her wear that mask without explaining what hurt her earlier.
She doesn’t invite me in, but she isn’t blocking the entrance either. I glance over her shoulder. There is a mirror, a vanity, and a rack full of clothes. It’s her changing room.
“You own this theater?” She puts her hands on her hips.
Shit, I forgot I blurted that out earlier. The thought of that asshole choreographer sends another jolt of rage through my veins, but I rein it in, forcing myself to focus on what matters.
“That’s irrelevant.” I push past her, knowing I might push her too far, too fast. But fuck, I’m not sitting on the sidelines.
“I don’t need you saving me.” She bangs the door closed.
I take that as a win. If she’s willing to be with me in a close, confined space, she’s willing to talk. Or at least to listen.
“He was touching you,” I growl. Not the best opening, but a relevant one nevertheless.
“He was directing me.”
“You flinched.” It comes out like an accusation.
“You couldn’t have seen that.”
She steps away from the door, but also away from me. Turning her back to me, she faces the mirror and starts doing something with things on the vanity. Something that looks a lot like busy work to avoid me.
“Look at me, Celeste.”
She keeps reorganizing the chaos in front of her. Grabbing a long bottle, she sprays around her head. Her hand circles around furiously and she misses most of her hair, the abusive mist hitting my lungs.
I clear my throat and demand, “Look at me and tell me his touch was innocent.”
She flicks her gaze up, meeting mine in the mirror. Instead of an answer, she glares at me, like I’m the villain here.
But she can’t admit he touched her as a part of his work. Because I might have overreacted, but there was more behind his touch.
“That’s what I thought.” I scoff. “Isn’t it enough you flaunt yourself half-naked in front of the audience several times a week? I don’t need to watch some fucker groping you.”
As soon as the words leave my mouth, I regret them. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
She doesn’t turn, but her gaze cools. She lifts her chin. “Get out of here.”
A frustrated growl lodges in my throat. I hang my head for a moment, but then I find her gaze again. “Celeste, I didn’t mean… I’m sorry. It was a shitty thing to say, and I didn’t mean it.”
She laughs. “Didn’t you? Like father, like son.” She delivers the words with confidence, but her lips tremble, at odds with her determination.
If she kicked me in my balls, it would’ve hurt less. She looks down, and I consider leaving, to shield myself from the influx of feelings.
Feelings I don’t want to name. Some of them undiscovered and scary. Some of them just plain nasty.
Celeste turns to face me now. Her hair dislodges from the twist at the back of her head, and a sleek ponytail springs around, landing on her shoulder.
She’s still put together and made up as always, but the bouncing tresses make her look more real. Almost exposed.
“I hate jealousy,” she whispers.
“Maybe I wouldn’t have to be jealous if… Never mind.”
The coward in me roars its ugly head like it always does when a sign of commitment wafts my way. Goddammit.
How the fuck did we get here? I came today to take her out after her rehearsal and talk.
I wanted to tell her how this faux marriage has grown on me.
How I enjoy her company.
How she flipped my world upside down, showing me that not every relationship needs to be rotten. A transaction.
That I’ve never needed anything from anyone, and now I need her around. I still don’t want anything from her, but I want to give her what she needs, what she wants, what makes her happy.
But I don’t get to say any of those things, because somewhere between me entering the darkness of the theater and this painful moment, we unearthed something ugly and confusing .
“If what?”
“If you were truly mine,” I bark.
“That’s rich, coming from someone who can’t even take me to his bed.”
The words slap me into action before I can even consider the consequences. I eat the short distance between us and fist her hair, tilting her head toward me.
I half expect her to kick me, but when she doesn’t… when she only stares at me defiantly, but full of heat, I pin her with my hips, lodging my leg between hers.
“You haven’t screamed my name yet, black swan. Don’t you dare pretend I’m the only one avoiding commitment. We’re both guilty of keeping our walls so high we can’t even see what’s real anymore.”
Her breath hitches. Her body still taut, she sags a little, and the suggestion of her pussy against my thigh alerts my cock immediately.
I pull her ponytail harder and lower my lips to her face. The familiar scent of flowers envelops me, fogging my brain like the aphrodisiac it is.
She whimpers and slackens more, her hands shooting up to grip my shirt. Like she can’t hold herself up, but also like she wants to make sure I stay close.
I inhale a lungful, dragging my nose up her cheek. “I’m ready to demolish my walls. The question, black swan, is what are you going to do with yours?”