I guess. He’s established a nice business, with a reputation for quality work. He’ll do a good job for you.”
“If I decide to hire him.”
She wondered what he looked like in a tool belt, then reminded herself that was not only not the kind of question a woman should ask her doting father, but also one that had nothing to do with establishing a business relationship.
But she bet he looked just fine.
It was done. The frogs in her stomach were still pretty lively, but she was now the owner of a big, beautiful, dilapidated building in the pretty college town of Shepherdstown, West Virginia.
A building that was a short walk from the house where she’d grown up, from her mother’s toy shop, from the university where her father taught.
She was surrounded by family, friends and neighbors.
Oh God.
Everyone knew her—and everyone would be watching to see if she pulled it off, stuck it out, or fell flat on her face. Why hadn’t she opened her school in Utah or New Mexico or someplace she was anonymous, somewhere with no expectations hovering over her?
And that, she reminded herself, was just stupid. She was establishing her school here because it was home. Home, Kate thought, was exactly where she wanted to be.
There would be no falling, flat or otherwise, Kate promised herself as she parked her car. She would succeed because she would personally oversee every detail. She would take each upcoming step the way she’d taken all the others that had led here. Carefully, meticulously. And she would work like a Trojan to see it through.
She wouldn’t disappoint her parents.
The important thing was that the property was now hers—and the bank’s—and that those next steps could be taken.
She walked up the steps—her steps—crossed the short, slightly sagging porch and unlocked the door to her future.
It smelled of dust and cobwebs.
That would change. Oh, yes, she told herself as she set her bag and keys aside. That would begin to change very soon. In short order, the air would smell of sawdust and fresh paint and the sweat of a working crew.
She just had to hire the crew.
She started to cross the floor, just to hear her footsteps echo, and saw the little portable stereo in the center of the room. Baffled, she hurried to it, picked up the card set on top of the machine and grinned at her mother’s handwriting.
She ripped open the envelope and took out the card fronted with a lovely painting of a ballerina at the barre.
Congratulations, Katie!
Here’s a small housewarming gift so you’ll always have music.
Love, Mom, Dad and Brandon
“Oh, you guys. You just never let me down.” A little teary-eyed, she crouched and turned the stereo on.
It was one of her father’s compositions, and one of her favorites. She remembered how thrilled, and how proud she had been, when she had danced to it the first time on stage in New York.
Kimball dancing to Kimball, she thought, and shrugged out of her coat, kicked off her shoes.
Slow at first—a long extension. The muscles tremble, but hold, and hold. A bend at the knee to change the line. Turning, beat by beat.
Lower. A gentle series of pirouettes, fluid rather than sharp.
She moved around the dingy room, sliding into the well-remembered steps. Music swelled into the space, into her mind, into her body.
Building now, from romance toward passion. Arabesque, quick, light triple pirouette and into ballottes.
The joy of it rushed into her. The confining band flew out of her hair. Grande jeté. And again. Again. Feel like you could fly forever. Look like you can.
End it with flair, with joy, in a fast rush of fouetté turns. Then set! Snap like a statue, one arm up, one back.
“I guess I’m supposed to throw roses, but I don’t have any on me.”
Her breath was already coming fast, and she nearly lost it completely as the statement shoved her out of dance mode. She pressed a hand to her speeding heart, and panting lightly, stared at Brody.
He stood just inside the door, hands in his pockets and a toolbox at his feet.
“You can owe me,” she managed to say. “I like red ones. God, you scared the life out of me.”
“Sorry. Your door wasn’t locked, and you didn’t hear me knock.” Or wouldn’t have, he decided, if he’d thought to knock.
But when he’d seen her through the window, he hadn’t thought at all. He’d just walked in, dazzled. A woman who looked like that, who moved like that, was bound to dazzle a man. He imagined she knew it.
“It’s all right.” She turned and walked over to turn down the music. “I was initiating the place. Though the dance looks better with the costumes and lights. So.” She pushed at her tumbled hair, willing her speeding heart to settle. “What can I do for you, Mr. O’Connell?”
He walked toward her, stopping to pick up her hair band. “You lost this during a spin.”
“Thanks.” She tucked it into her pocket.
He wished she’d pulled her hair back into it. He didn’t care for his reaction to the way she looked just now, flushed and tousled and…available. “I get the feeling you weren’t expecting me.”
“No, but I don’t mind the unexpected.” Especially, she thought, when it comes with fabulous green eyes and a sexy little scowl.
“Your mother asked me to come by, take a look at the place.”
“Ah. You’re another housewarming present.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Nothing.” She angled her head. Dancers, she mused, knew as much about body language as a psychiatrist. His was stiff, just a little defensive. And he was certainly careful to keep a good, safe distance between them. “Do I make you nervous, O’Connell, or just annoy you?”
“I don’t know you well enough to be nervous or annoyed.”
“Want to?”
His belly muscles quivered. “Look, Ms. Kimball—”
“All right, don’t get huffy.” She waved him off. A pity, she thought. She preferred being direct, and he, obviously, didn’t. “I find you attractive, and I got the impression you were interested, initially. My mistake.”
“You make a habit of coming on to strange men in your mother’s toy store?”
She blinked, a quick flicker of temper and hurt. Then she shrugged. “Oh, well.
