Page 67 of Last Dance, Second Chance

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Sarah headed off back to the estate agent’s an hour later armed with sandwiches for her husband and having completed an impromptu photo shoot for her daughter in the garden.

Jessica told Monty firmly to behave himself and got back on the laptop, uploading the pictures her mum had taken, and then went through her phone to find some more of her dancing.

The afternoon passed as quickly as the morning had, with Jessica only stopping to refill her coffee cup. Monty generally stayed by her feet, wandering into the garden for a sunbathe occasionally when he got bored.

Aware of how engrossed she was, she set an alarm on her phone for five. As much as she was enjoying working on her Substack blog, she was looking forward to seeing Nathan even more.

She brushed her hair and reapplied her make-up and then headed off to Nathan’s house, taking a detour via the supermarket to pick up some snacks for them.

Nathan opened his door almost as soon as she’d knocked.

“How was work?” she asked when they finally pulled apart.

“A bizarre number of ingrowing toenails today,” said Nathan, laughing. “What have you been up to?”

“I’ve been starting a Substack!” Jessica declared. “About ballet and being a ballerina, basically. Can I show it to you?”

“Absolutely.” Nathan smiled broadly at her evident excitement. “Let me turn my laptop on.”

He put his laptop on the kitchen table and logged in. “I’ll grab us a couple of beers while you get it up.”

Jessica pulled up what she’d done, and Nathan came up behind her, kissing her on her neck before focusing on the screen.

“That looks brilliant,” he said as she showed him the fruits of her labour. “Really professional. I like the design you’ve used.”

“Thank you,” Jessica said. “I’m hoping to make it appeal to ballet lovers as well as people who dance.”

“That’s a gorgeous photo,” Nathan commented, hovering the mouse over a professional photograph of Jessica taken during a performance of Giselle. “It doesn’t look like you, though.”

“I’ve got a lot of stage make-up on in that, and my hair’s got so much product in it wouldn’t move if I was in a hurricane!”

“I like you best with your hair down like you had it on Saturday night,” said Nathan, kissing her neck.

“Noted,” replied Jessica, pulling her hair out of the ponytail it was up in.

Nathan smiled. “Do you want to go out to eat?” he asked.

“Nah.” Jessica shook her head. “I just want to hang out with you here. I can’t do so many of the things I want to do to you if we’re in public.”

“That sounds very good to me,” said Nathan.

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As much as Jessica would have liked to stay the night with Nathan, her parents’ suspicions about the two of them would go into overdrive if she did, so they reluctantly said goodbye to each other at ten. Nathan and Dennis insisted upon walking her home, which was lovely but meant they couldn’t say the goodbye they wanted to in case someone was watching.

Sarah and Joe were still up watching television in the sitting room.

“Hi, love,” Sarah called. “Come in here, we’ve got something to tell you.”

Jessica came into the sitting room and smiled at the sight of her mum and dad holding hands on the sofa.

“What is it?” Jessica said. “You two look like naughty school kids.”

“Your dad’s taking me away for the bank holiday next weekend!” said Sarah. “We’re leaving as soon as your dad finishes work on Friday and we’re going to a country hotel near Oxford for three nights!”

“How lovely!” said Jessica. She couldn’t remember her parents ever going away for a weekend together when she was growing up. Probably because of all her dance commitments and them needing to drive her around all the time.

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