her starting point. With an explosion of power she sprang into a grand jeté. Her muscles stretched and her body soared as she leaped across the space. Everything receded into the background. She landed and rotated fluidly into the first fouetté. Her support leg en pointe, she spun, her working leg whipping the turn to greater speed with each rotation.
As her speed increased, her moves become more desperate, more frantic. She allowed her spin to waver, let her arms drag her off balance. Finally, she fell out of the spin, collapsing onto the ground in an abandoned-yet-controlled sprawl, one leg bent beneath her, the other stretched forward, her body draped over it in a posture of absolute despair and defeat.
There was a moment of silence. She could hear her own breathing, feel her chest heaving against her extended leg.
“Beautiful, Maddy. Beautiful.”
She heard him begin to draw. She kept her body alert despite the temptation to relax into the stretch. She knew without asking that Max wanted the dynamic tension of the position and the emotion of the dance, not simple anatomy.
After five minutes, her body began to stiffen. She concentrated on each protesting muscle in turn, tensing and releasing them without changing posture. After ten minutes, she heard the scrape of Max’s stool on the floor.
“That was great. Absolutely what I was looking for,” he said as he approached.
She allowed herself to sit upright at last. He extended a hand to help her to her feet. She started to rise, but the leg that had been bent beneath her buckled, refusing to hold her weight. She stumbled, but his arms were around her before she could fall, one big hand splaying beneath her rib cage, his fingers grazing the lower curve of her right breast, the other grabbing her hip. Instinctively she reached for him, too, one hand finding his shoulder, the other his back.
For a shocking moment she was pressed against him, breast to chest, hip to groin.
She froze.
The soft fabric of his T-shirt brushed against her breasts. She inhaled pure Max—soap and sandalwood. She could see each individual hair of his morning stubble, the whiskers black against his olive skin, and feel his warm breath on her cheek.
Her heart began to pound against her rib cage. If he moved his hand, he would be cupping her breast in his palm.
The thought made her tremble with sudden, hungry need. Her nipples tightened in anticipation.
“You okay now?”
She could feel his deep voice vibrating through her body.
“Yes,” she said, even though it was a big fat lie.
His grip slackened and he stepped away from her.
The loss of his heat and hardness was a shock. She blinked and tried to pull herself together. She was afraid to look at him, afraid he would see only too readily the thoughts that had been racing through her mind. She ducked to collect her robe, painfully aware of her aroused nipples. Only when she’d tied the sash did she dare look at him again.
He was studying the drawing he’d completed, an expression of concentration on his face. He seemed utterly unaware of the fact that he’d just held her naked body pressed against him and that she was vibrating with the aftershock of the contact.
“I think we’re done for the day,” he said. “That last pose was great, Maddy. Thanks.” He looked up, his face unreadable. “Sometimes I forget what it’s like when you dance.”
She stared at him for a long moment. How was it possible that she’d felt so much when he held her while he was completely unaffected?
You don’t want him to be affected. He’s your friend. Sex is the best way to destroy that. Remember how every relationship you’ve ever had has ended?
She tightened the sash on the robe again. For the second time in as many days, Max had reduced her to incoherent jelly. It confused the hell out of her, as well as being damned embarrassing. She could only imagine how he’d respond if he knew what was going on in her head. Since when did old friends suddenly want to jump each other?
She crossed to the camp bed and scooped up her clothes. In the bathroom, she dressed quickly, ignoring the sensitivity of her skin and the telltale heat between her thighs. She stared at her reflection in the bathroom mirror.
“What are you doing?” she asked herself, her voice low and serious.
She’d come to Max seeking sanctuary, not sex. She was on the verge of making a mistake she knew she would regret for the rest of her life.
He was at the kitchen table working on one of his sketches when she emerged.
“I’m going out,” she said, hovering awkwardly at a distance. “I need to buy some things. A coat, another pair of shoes.” And get away from you for a few hours.
“Sure. I should be around but take the spare key. I want to do some more work on these sketches.”
“I’ll bring something back for dinner. Maybe some chicken fillets,” she said vaguely.
He surprised her by laughing.
“What’s so funny about chicken fillets?”
“Have you had cooking lessons or bought a cookbook since we last lived together?” He was grinning at her, highly amused.
“I signed up for some classes, but I never got there,” she admitted.
“So what were you planning on doing with the chicken?”
“Something.”
He looked so damned familiar, sitting there with his eyes alight with laughter as he teased her. Her old Max, the friend she’d instinctively turned to in her most desperate hour. Which only made it even more confusing that five minutes ago she’d been ready to jump his bones.
“Tell you what. Why don’t I take care of dinner? In the interests of it being edible,” he said.
She stared at him, utterly bewildered. Why was she suddenly having these feelings for him, after all these years?
“Fine. I’ll buy some wine,” she said.
She grabbed her purse and headed for the door. Out in the street, she blinked and wrapped her arms around her body.
She had to get a grip. Stop thinking about Max in any terms other than as a friend, and start thinking like a normal person.
A normal, really, really cold person. She shivered and hugged herself tighter. It was damned frigid, and she was too used to the blue skies and searing heat of home.
A normal person would go buy herself a coat rather than stand freezing in the street. A coat, some shoes and maybe some jeans. And, while she was at it, some underwear and toiletries.
She kept herself occupied with a mental shopping list as she walked along the cobblestone street and out into the main thoroughfare. Traffic whizzed past as she looked left, then right. She shrugged. It didn’t matter where she went. She was just getting away from Max. She knew Paris well enough to know that she would find
