Page 12 of Dirty Dancer

“You don’t,” I said, and at his frown, I shrugged. “You don’t. You be Freddie. That’s who she needs you to be. Who she wants you to be. She doesn’t want us to be anyone else. So just be you.”

“But…” His frown deepened. “What if I want to be more romantic for her?”

I didn’t laugh. In a way, it was funny, but not in a humorous way. Freddie was so goddamn hard on himself. “Freddie, you had yourself committed to a place that tested your sobriety and could have killed you, to be there for her and to get her out. Trust me, you could write the book on romance.”

“It’s not the same thing,” he argued.

“No,” I said. “Maybe not. But you showed her in far more than words, that there is nowhere she can go that you won’t follow to be there for her and you’re willing to go through hell with her. It’s better in some ways. Don’t beat yourself up—that’s my job.” With a light bump of my fist to his shoulder, I left him to chew on that and headed toward the lead tech.

We had a lot to do.

CHAPTER 5

EMERSYN

The sound of the alarm going off penetrated the shroud of sleep with an annoying amount of chirpiness. Groaning, I swam up through the drowsy layers of comfort and warmth wrapped around me. An arm tightened around my middle, tugging me back and then another arm reached past me and the alarm silenced.

Oh.Muchbetter.

I sank back into the pillows when a second alarm jarred my eyes open. Rome stretched past me again. This time, he yanked the whole alarm off the nightstand, unplugging it from the wall, before he sent it flying. It landed with a thump somewhere across the room.

The sudden silence landed like a heavy blanket and I groaned. As much as I did not want to get up, I needed to shower and stretch or I wouldn’t be able to move today. Sully had spent the last four days being the most grueling of taskmasters. I’dspent between eight and ten hours each day creating, adjusting, and then fine-tuning three new routines.

Despite his statement that we would probably only have time for one, we’d actually tackled five. The last two weren’t ready yet, but they would be for the next tour stop and I couldn’t wait to perfect the final one—it was a secret even from the guys. Rome hadn’t cared for the idea and Freddie had liked it even less, but after three days with Sully, they were a little more trusting.

Pushing upward, I forced my eyes to open. Every muscle in my body ached. With a groan, I made it halfway before Rome curled an arm around me and dragged me backwards. He curved his body against my back. That elicited another groan from me cause he was so warm. I just wanted to burrow into him.

“I have to get up,” I told him, though my eyes closing and the fact I was rubbing his arm made a bit of a liar out of me. I wasn’t even sure where Vaughn was. He’d been in bed the night before when I’d crawled up between them to watch the movie, and Freddie had been sprawled in one of the chairs the suite boasted.

Lifting my head, I swept a squinted glance around. They weren’t in here. Ugh.

“Sleep,” Rome said, flattening his palm against my abdomen. The drowsy notes in his voice gave it a huskier quality.

“I have to train.”

“No,” he replied.

“No?” I tried to twist to face him, but he locked his arm and slid a leg over mine. “Rome…”

“Rest. You are tired.”

“The show must go on.” This was what I did. We opened in three days. I had just this week to train before we would be doing performances every day and twice on the weekends for the next two weeks. I would cycle the crew in and out. The other performers, however, were like me, we were used to the longer stretches.

And honestly, the performances weren’t eight to ten hours, so those days were actually lighter than training.

Skating his hand up my abdomen, Rome slid it right under the tank top I’d gone to bed in. He cupped one of my breasts and my nipple went taut at the contact.

“Rome…” I groaned as he massaged my breast before he caught the nipple and gave it the barest of tweaks. I went from struggling to get up to waging a battle with the desire he ignited with a few gentle strokes. He pressed his lips to my bare shoulder and when I twisted this time, he let me roll over.

“Starling,” he said, bracing a hand on either side of me as he blanketed me. I shifted my thighs to cradle his hips automatically. Someone was naked already and the thick weight of his cock was teasing along the seam of my panties. Maybe I should have gone to bed naked. I did more often than not, but I’d fallen asleep while we watched movies.

All thoughts of getting up fled as I stared into his gorgeous eyes. The sun was up already, the light filtering through the curtains though we were still mostly in shadow. “Rome…” I cupped his cheek. The bite of stubble stung my palm.

“We’re taking a day off,” he said.

“We are?”

“Yes.” Then he dipped his head to kiss me. The massage of his lips was a question and an entreaty all at once. Morning breath was absolutely a thing, but I didn’t care as his tongue swept in to tease mine. The scrape of his stubble on my cheeks left a trail of electric heat as he made a path from my mouth to my throat. His hand glided beneath my tank top again.

---