However, in all my time with Remi, I’d never heard of her taking dance classes, either. Though, short of a few tear-filled slow dances under the moon, which I’d guilted her into just to get her out of the house and fill her lungs with fresh air in the thick of her spiral down, there hadn’t been a lot of time for dancing in our tragic time together before the crash.
I quirked an eyebrow. “Is that real or not real?”
Hooking her arm with mine, she pressed into my side and guided me down a long corridor with signs pointing toward Ballroom A. “What do you mean?”
“The whole dancing thing?”
She smiled up at me. “It’s real. Aaron and I won second place in the star-studded sixth-period competition. If it hadn’t been for Taylor Wakes and Brad Goodman, who practically taught the class, we’d have won. He may seem quiet and unassuming, but Aaron is a beast when it comes to a competition. The man does not like to lose.” She laughed softly. “He was so mad he recruited Mark to—” She slammed her mouth shut.
Fuck.
I released her arm, but only long enough to slide mine over her shoulder. I’d spent a lot of nights wondering and worrying how she was doing after losing Mark. Logically, I knew she wasn’t Sally anymore, but the memories of her fading into the darkness were too vivid for me to forget. Still, I’d respected her choices and given her space even on the days when it had felt like the Earth would swallow me whole.
Pride swelled in my chest when she didn’t miss a step. She simply changed the subject and carried on. “So, anyway. I can teach you a few things. Though I doubt there will be a Waltz competition. Tonight’s optional embarrassment is brought to us by an eighties prom theme.”
“Are we expected to dress up?”
She pointedly slid her gaze down my gray tailor-made suit. “Wait, you mean…you didn’t wear this specifically for the nineteen hundreds decade-themed lame-o party you knew nothing about until now?”
Glowering, I tickled her side. “So you’re a funny girl tonight?”
Ducking under my arm so it once again wrapped around her, she hooked her fingers with mine as they dangled over her shoulder. “A few drinks and a dance or two and I’ll be whatever girl you want.” She winked.
As much as I loved our game of no-strings-attached shenanigans, there was only one woman I wanted to be with and she didn’t make hats for birds.
We stopped at a white plastic table under a large blue-and-yellow-balloon arch. A woman was sitting beneath it, sporting a side ponytail and large neon hoop earrings. “Hi there!” she greeted. “Do you have your badges?”
“Ugh, I left mine at my hotel across the street.” She tapped her chest. “They told me this name tag would be all I needed for the day.”
The woman leaned from side to side. “What name tag?”
“Shoot,” Remi whispered, patting down her chest. “I just had it.”
Searching, we both looked down at the floor and then came up empty.
“Aha!” Remi said, peeling it off the bottom of my jacket. “You thief. You stole it again.”
“You know I have a faulty sticker fetish and you promised you wouldn’t bring it up,” I teased under my breath.
“Remi Grey,” the woman said, scanning a guestlist on her clipboard. “Okay, then this must be Bowen Michaels. Give me one minute.” She walked to the corner and bent down, searching through a long line of sparkling blue-and-chartreuse bags.
“So, who is this Bowen Michaels guy?” I whispered.
Keeping up the act, she whispered back, “I’m not completely sure, Harley. From what I can piece together, he’s an accountant who could be taken out with a single handful of Reese’s Pieces and the love of Remi Grey’s life.”
My back shot straight and the sound of my heart roared in my ears. She loved me. It wasn’t a secret.
But this was different.
Bigger.
An admission that had not one fucking thing to do with Charlotte, North Carolina, and everything to do with our entire future together. It was probably just semantics that I was reading way too much into but, she hadn’t said that Remi was the love of my life, which we both already knew. She’d said I was the love of hers. Something we also both knew, but she’d finally offered a confirmation.
I stared at her, desperate for a glance into her eyes. To silently tell her I loved her too and that I’d wait for all of eternity if that was what she needed.
She avoided my gaze though. If patience and no pressure were what she needed after a confession like that, I could give them to her too.
The woman finally returned with two gift bags and placed them on the table between us.
“Ooooo,” Remi cheered, and to the novice Remi enthusiast, her sarcasm would have gone unnoticed. “Goodie bags and everything. I bet you don’t get that kind of luxury treatment over at the IBALS.”
