didn’t really make her feel better, his little speech. After all, he wasn’t here with her because he cared for her. He’d sort of taken her in, like a stray cat. A stray cat who had to earn her milk and catnip by posing as his fiancée. But that was a whole different ball game to being the woman he desired.
But his speech did resonate with her. People wanted him because of what he had, because of his influence, and just like her, if it was all gone tomorrow, his popularity would be too.
And how empty was that? No wonder he was willing to get married to inherit the resort chain. He had to get everything he could to cling to the things that made him special.
It was relatable on a bone-deep level. It was what she wanted too. She was trying to get what she needed back. The things that made people look at her, acknowledge her.
If she couldn’t have the fame and the glory she’d accept just not being homeless. She wasn’t feeling particularly picky.
“I know all about that, Ethan,” she said, taking a glass of champagne from a passing waiter’s tray. The time to have a drink was now.
“Do you?”
“Look around us. Look at all the friends I have. Didn’t you see my support crew rallying around me back at the house that day you first came? People ready to hold a bake sale to help me hold onto my home? Oh, no, there was no one. Because I’m no one. At least as far as everyone else is concerned.”
Ethan looked at her, his dark eyes locking with hers. He pressed his palm to her lower back, dipped his head low. Any of the people around them would be forgiven for thinking that he was going to pull her to him and kiss her right there in front of everybody. She didn’t think that. She didn’t. It certainly wasn’t why her lips were dry and her pulse was pounding.
“Let me tell you something, Noelle. It’s these people—anyone who believes that. They’re the ones who don’t matter.”
She swallowed hard, her eyes stinging with a sheen of moisture, threatening to turn into a source of real embarrassment. She pulled away from him and looked at the stage. There was a piano there. She wondered who was playing tonight.
Her hands itched all of a sudden. Flexed as she thought of playing a slow, smooth song
Because she couldn’t look at Ethan. And she couldn’t think about what he’d just said. It was contrary to everything she’d ever been taught about life. About what was important.
And he was just trying to make her feel better, because who wanted a cranky-looking woman on their arm all night?
A woman, a very young woman in a long red dress, came floating out onto the stage and sat in front of the piano, a string quartet sitting down the stage from her. The first strains of the music started to filter through the room and Noelle closed her eyes. Let them fill her with longing, with an ache that she was afraid would never go away.
“Care to dance?”
She opened her eyes and looked at Ethan, his eyes hot and intent on her. She cleared her throat. “You dance?”
“My mother insisted I learn. And anyway, I found it quite instrumental in picking up women back in the days before my bank balance was quite this healthy. Back in the days when I had to rely on charm and skill to get a date.”
She looked back at the stage, at the performers. She’d always been the one up there. Separate and removed. The mood of the room. A part of the parties, an integral part, but never in them.
“For the press?”
His lips curved up slightly. “Yeah, of course.”
She accepted his offered hand. It was hotter than she’d imagined it would be, his palm a bit rougher. He led her to the dance floor and her heart started tripping on itself. She’d never danced with a man before. She’d never danced. Not even at her own CD-release parties. But she’d even performed at those, even then more the entertainment than the guest of honor. And dancing wasn’t essential to piano, which meant it was a skill she’d never acquired.
“I don’t really know how to dance,” she said, when they stopped at the edge of the dance floor and he pulled her gently into his arms.
“But I do. And you can let me lead.” He laced his fingers through hers and wrapped his other arm around her waist. “Put your hand on my shoulder,” he said, his voice soft, enticing.
She obeyed the instruction and immediately had to fight the urge to slide her hand, palm flat, down to his hard-muscled chest. She knew it was muscular because her breasts were crushed against it, her heart raging, and she was certain he could feel it.
She looked back up at the stage as Ethan moved back. She felt it all flow through her, the music and his movements, and her feet seemed to obey the prompting from Ethan’s body. Everything just seemed to work.
“So tell me, why don’t you know how to dance?”
“No time,” she said, her words short and breathless, not from the exertion of dancing, but from being in such close proximity to a man. To this man.
“Ah, right. The drills.”
“Yeah, the drills. They took up—take up—a lot of time.”
“I see.”
“A person can’t be great at everything. You can be great at one thing, if you work at it. If you want it badly enough.” She repeated the words of her former piano teacher, slightly shocked at how quickly the words rolled off her tongue, even after all this time.
“I don’t accept that,” he said, pressing his hand more firmly against her lower back, moving the lower part of her body closer to his. It made her tingle, made her uncomfortable … aware of her breasts. It was the strangest thing. Not completely unpleasant.
“Doesn’t matter whether you accept it, it’s true. It takes hours and hours of dedicated practice to claim proficiency at anything. It takes true commitment.”
“Hmm, commitment I’m not so good with.”
Her pulse pounded harder. He flexed his fingers and the slight motion against her back made a shock of sensation skitter through her veins, lighting up every last part of her body, from her head to her toes and every inch in between.
“Are you sure? Because you asked me to marry you only twenty-four hours after meeting me.”
“Commitment with a catch I can deal with. Commitment with a defined end date, I actually think that’s quite perfect. But then, that’s why I don’t make commitments. Because I know I wouldn’t want to keep them.”
“Well, then your proficiency must be in something other than relationships.”
He smirked. “I have a major in business with a pretty accomplished minor in bedroom skills. And I only claim a minor because you insist a person can’t have a double major in life.”
She felt her face get hot, her blood pounding in her temples. She didn’t know how he could say things like that so casually, like it didn’t mean anything. As if it didn’t throw his mind straight into the bedroom with all kinds of sweaty, half-formed visions.
She’d
