Dancing with Fire
Chapter thirty-two
Sterling
The silver buttons of my dress uniform are too bright, reflecting the headache-inducing glare of the grand ballroom’s chandeliers an unfortunate reminder of the woman who isn’t here.
I adjust the high collar of the navy jacket, feeling the familiar, restrictive tug of the fabric against my throat.
It’s a formal cage, one I’ve inhabited every year since I joined the department, but tonight it feels smaller.
Tighter. Like the air in the Hilton’s banquet hall is being pumped out by a slow-leak vacuum.
The scent of floor wax and thousands of imported lilies cloys in my nose, a sterile substitute for the rough, honest smells of the station.
“Hayes, look alive,” Jake says, nudging my shoulder with the subtlety of a falling rafter. He’s already on his second scotch, his own dress uniform looking remarkably less stifled than mine feels. “You look like you’re waiting for a backdraft to hit. Or a court-martial. Or both.”
“I’m fine,” I lie, my voice sounding flat even to my own ears.
I take a sip of a lukewarm bourbon, the burn in my throat failing to distract me from the hollow ache in my chest. It’s been three days since the loft went quiet.
Three days since the smell of her shampoo stopped lingering in my bathroom.
Three days since I watched her walk out with a box of books, a half-finished layout for a client, and a cat that looked at me like I was the one who had set the fire.
“Right. Fine. That’s why you’ve been staring at the entrance for forty-five minutes with the intensity of a man looking for a structural crack,” Jake mutters.
He doesn’t look at me, but his hand finds my forearm, a quick, solid squeeze that says everything he won’t put into words.
“She’s coming, Sterling. She’s Mandy. She wouldn’t leave you hanging at the Ball.
Even if you two are... whatever it is you are this week. ”
I don’t tell him that I’m the one who left her hanging.
I don’t tell him that I let the silence win because I was too much of a coward to tell her that the ring in the velvet box at dinner was the only true thing I’d felt in years.
I just watch the door. It’s a professional habit, scanning the exits, checking for threats, but tonight, the threat is the possibility that she won’t show.
And the even greater threat that she will, and I’ll realize that the canyon between us is too wide for any rescue mission to bridge.
The room is a blur of navy blue, gold braid, and silk gowns.
The clinking of glasses and the hum of five hundred voices, it’s all a performance.
We’re playing the role of the city’s heroes while we field questions from donors and city council members who see the uniform, not the men inside them.
I’ve been fielding questions about ’my girl’ for twenty minutes, pasting a smile on my face that feels like it’s made of dried plaster.
Every time someone asks where she is, I feel the lie of our arrangement stretching until it’s ready to snap and whip back into my face.
“Sterling? Is that you?”
I turn, the movement mechanical. Dr. Priya Anand is standing there, looking elegant in a draped champagne gown that probably cost more than my first car.
She looks the same as she did a year ago, polished, composed, and entirely wrong for the way my heart is currently stuttering.
She belongs to a time when I chose women who didn’t make me want to rewrite my entire existence.
“Priya. You look lovely,” I say. It’s the polite thing to say. It’s the safe thing.
“It’s been a while,” she says, her hand fluttering toward my arm before she catches herself.
She’s a doctor; she’s trained to read vitals, and I’m pretty sure mine are currently flatlining.
“I heard things were... interesting. At the station. Something about a roommate who turned into something more? The rumor mill at the hospital is remarkably efficient.”
“Mandy,” I say, the name a jagged stone in my mouth. “She’s more than a roommate.”
Priya smiles, but there’s a sharp, analytical edge to it. “Of course. The designer. I saw you two at the fundraiser. It looked very... committed. Is she here? I’d love to actually meet the woman who finally got the Great Sterling Hayes to settle down. I thought you were married to the job.”
I open my mouth to offer some non-committal vague response, some lie about a deadline or a sudden illness, when the air in the room suddenly changes.
It’s not a physical shift, but I feel it in the marrow of my bones.
The noise of the band, the clinking of glasses, it all drops into the background, leaving only a single, sharp focus point at the top of the grand staircase.
Mandy is standing there. And for a second, I forget how to breathe.
She’s wearing a red dress. Not just any red, it’s the exact, vibrant crimson of our department’s dress ties.
It’s a defiant, beautiful middle finger to the distance between us.
Her auburn hair is down, cascading over her shoulders in waves that I know feel like silk between my fingers.
She looks like a fire I have no intention of putting out.
She looks like everything I’ve been trying to convince myself I don’t need, even as my body aches to move toward her.
My drink stops halfway to my mouth. Beside me, I hear Jake let out a low whistle, but I can’t look away.
Mandy isn’t looking at the room. She’s looking at me.
Even from across the crowded ballroom, her eyes find mine with the unerring precision of a compass needle.
It’s a physical weight, that gaze, pinning me to the spot while the world continues to move around us in slow motion.
The red of her dress is a beacon, a flare in the dark of this stuffy, formal cavern.
“I guess that’s her,” Priya says, her voice sounding small and distant. “The dress. It’s... bold.”
“It’s perfect,” I say, the words slipping out before I can filter them.
I don’t look at Priya. I don’t look at Jake.
I just watch Mandy as she starts to descend the stairs, her movements graceful despite the way she’s gripping her small clutch like a lifeline.
She’s terrified. I can see the familiar tension in her shoulders, the way she’s holding her breath.
She’s here for the performance, but the dress, the dress is for me.
It’s a signal, a surrender, or a challenge. I don’t care which.
I’m about to move toward her, to bridge that canyon of floorboards and bad decisions, when a figure cuts across my line of sight.
It’s Derek Marx. He’s wearing a tuxedo that fits him like a second skin, looking every bit the corporate shark in a room full of rescue workers.
He’s managed to get a plus-one invitation, and he’s moving toward Mandy with a predatory confidence that makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up.
He walks like he owns the floor, like he owns her.
He intercepts her at the bottom of the stairs, his hand reaching out to capture her elbow.
I see her flinch, a micro-movement that only someone who has memorized the way she moves would notice.
He’s talking, leaning in close, his posture possessive.
He’s reclaiming his trophy, his voice likely filled with the same polished manipulation that almost broke her.
The sight of his hand on her skin hits me like a physical blow to the solar plexus, worse than a kick from a panicked victim.
“Jake,” I say, my voice low and dangerous. I don’t look at him as I hand him my glass. The bourbon sloshes against the rim, reflecting the red of her dress.
“Go get her, Saint,” Jake says, his voice devoid of its usual teasing. “Rescue mission. Now. Before I go over there and start a fire just to have an excuse to pull her away.”
I don’t walk. I move with the focused, singular intent of a man entering a burning building.
The crowd parts for me, the gold braid on my shoulders a badge of authority that I use to weave through the sea of silk and wool.
Derek is saying something to her, a smirk on his face that tells me he thinks he’s already won.
Mandy is looking at the floor, her face pale, her knuckles white where she’s clutching her bag.
She looks small next to him, and it makes my blood boil.
I reach them just as Derek starts to lead her toward the bar, his hand sliding up toward her bicep.
I don’t wait for an opening. I don’t ask for permission.
I step into their space, my presence a solid wall of navy blue between them, and I place my hand on the small of Mandy’s back.
The heat of her skin through the thin fabric of the dress is an electric shock, a grounding wire that snaps my world back into alignment.
“Sterling,” she breathes her head snapping up. The relief in her eyes is so raw it hurts to look at. Her pupils are blown wide, reflecting the chandeliers and me.
“Hayes,” Derek says, his voice dripping with condescension. He doesn’t pull his hand away immediately, testing me. “I didn’t realize you were still... involved. Mandy and I were just about to catch up over a drink. Discussing the future. Real stability, you know?”
“She’s busy,” I say. I don’t look at him. I keep my eyes on Mandy, watching the way her chin comes up. “We have a dance. And I’m not the kind of man who likes to be kept waiting for his partner.”