Page 97 of Flirty Dancing

“That’s it. That feeling. You love dancing. Yoursoulis dancing. You need to share that with the others. They need to feel that love.”

Their eyes met again. Mateo seemed to be searching for something in Archer’s gaze. Then he nodded. “Thank you, Archer.”

“For what?”

“For being you.”

Archer floundered, unable to make any words leave his tongue, as Mateo whirled and spoke to the room. “Everyone grab a seat. Let’s talk.”

They were all there, even Ben and Beau, who sat on opposite sides of the room, both of them far from Caleb.

“I just wanted to say,” Mateo started, once everyone was settled, “how proud I am of all of you. Last night went to shit, let’s be honest. And yet, here you all are, ready to go back out there.”

The other dancers shifted in their chairs, sitting a little taller. Archer’s heart swelled as Mateo continued.

“We have some things we need to sort out, for sure. Ben, Beau, it must be hard for you, but we appreciate that you’re here. There’s been a lot going on for all of us, so let’s take a minute right now. I want you all to close your eyes and think of a time when you were dancing and you were happy.Reallyhappy.”

The room stilled as everyone—even Caleb—closed their eyes. Archer shut his too and thought about dancing their pas de deux in the moonlit clearing.

“Really feel it—when there was nothing but you and music and joy,” Mateo continued. “That’sthe feeling I want you to remember. That feeling is why we’re all here. You areallamazing dancers, every single one of you, and I know we can put on a good show tonight. Right?”

“Right,” most of them replied in murmured agreement.

“So…” He looked over at Archer and smiled. “Let’s fucking dance.”

“Good job,” Archer whispered to him after the other dancers scattered. “Look at you, leading.”

Mateo shrugged, the corner of his mouth lifting. “I asked myself what you would say.”

Archer’s stomach flipped on his way to go find his damn shoes.

Was the show perfect? No. There was still some tensionbetween Beau and Ben, not to mention Caleb. At least twice, Archer had been prepared to drag those two apart based on the looks Beau was throwing. But, in the end, no one cried or fainted or bled, so it was miles better than the night before. The troupe agreed to gather at ten o’clock the next day for a meeting and rehearsal so they could talk about any adjustments that needed to be made and to polish up the choreo.

Archer was surprised and also somehow not when they arrived in the greenroom the next morning and saw Stewart talking animatedly to Mateo, Judy tucked under his arm.

“Stewart! You’re back. Again.” Archer hugged him and gave Judy a scritch behind the ears.

“Archer, darling.” Stewart squeezed his arm. “How lovely to see you.” He greeted the rest of the group as they hugged him and fussed over Judy before taking seats around the room.

“We missed you,” Archer said to Stewart, addingand that’s putting it mildlyin his head. He wondered if Stewart had heard about the dumpster fire he had run out on.

“Oh, I’m so sorry, it was an emergency that required my immediate attention. We’ve settled the matter, but it put Judy out of sorts, didn’t it, Judy?” Judy licked at his hand. He patted her head as he continued. “We needed some time to recover. I hope things didn’t go too badly after”—his voice dropped to a whisper—“the breakup.”

“Uh…” Mateo hemmed, exchanging glances with Archer. “What was it you wanted to tell us, anyway?” he asked.

“Did I not tell you before I left?” Stewart frowned. “How odd.”

“Well, the…” Archer waved a vague hand around the room. “… and then you left. I hope the emergency wasn’t too serious?”

“Oh, yes, that’s right. Would you believe that Judy’s food supplier up and moved to Canada? Ridiculous! Just when I found a suitable organic high-protein whole-meat, whole-grain food with glucosamine and probiotics, they relocated! And they canceled the rest of my orders, if you can believe it. Anyway, I spent half the night on the phone, but it’s all sorted now. They’re going to charge me an arm and a leg for shipping, of course, but Judy’s worth every penny, aren’t you, my darling?”

“Stewart. What was the news?” Mateo asked patiently.

“Oh, yes. I’m terribly sorry.” He cleared his throat, and the few bits of chitchat around the circle quieted as everyone paused to listen. “I have been informed, from the most reliable of sources—you may know Cici McLannister, I directed her inThe Sound of Musicin ’92, she made a lovely Maria, if not a touch platitudinous on occasion…” He paused for dramatic effect, relishing the rapt attention he had. “Cici’s agent told her that Breckon Galloway is coming to our end-of-season show.”

There was a collective gasp. “Breckon Galloway?” Caleb repeated. “You’re kidding!”

Everyone knew who Breckon Galloway was, of course. Producer of last summer’s smash hit,Great Scott!, a musical adaptation ofBack to the Futuretold from Doc Brown’s perspective, which was still almost impossible to get tickets for.

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