Total pages in book: 166
Estimated words: 157273 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 786(@200wpm)___ 629(@250wpm)___ 524(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 157273 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 786(@200wpm)___ 629(@250wpm)___ 524(@300wpm)
I scoured the theater, both dreading and hoping for sight of Allie’s mother, but didn’t see her. “Fuck,” I muttered as we slipped past the others in the back row, making our excuses until we reached the dead center, and then I sat, settling the tissue-paper-wrapped bouquet in my lap.
“Who are you looking for?” Caroline asked. “Maybe I can help.”
“Sophie Rousseau.” The judges’ tables were still empty, so maybe Allie was wrong and she’d show.
“You really going there?” Gavin leaned forward in his seat and lifted his brows.
“Don’t really have a choice.” Fear and determination were dangerous when combined, and I’d walked hand in hand with them for the last few weeks, ever since I changed my preference list for duty stations. “If I want a shot at making it work with Allie, I’m going to have to have it out with her mother. The school she teaches at said she’s not interested in speaking with me, and I’d like to get it over with.” Before Sophie realized I was in Allie’s life to stay and destroyed whatever chance Allie and I had. “And I know Allie said she wasn’t coming, but how do you not show up to watch your daughter’s comeback?”
“She’s always been a viper. Sophie, not Allie.” Caroline glanced at the pink roses in Gavin’s lap. “Do you really think it’s appropriate to bring your brother’s girlfriend flowers?”
Shit, those were for Juniper.
“Allie deserves two bouquets.” Gavin shrugged.
“Weird, but whatever. Okay, explain . . .” Caroline set her purse down and gestured ahead of us. “How this works. I never got to this stage.”
“Dancers compete in their division.” I readied my CliffsNotes explanation and searched the theater for any sign of Allie. “Youth all the way to senior. In this case, ten to nineteen. Official judges sit there.” I pointed to the line of judges’ tables four rows down, the empty chairs lit by small table lamps, each marked for the companies who’d been invited to send judges. The others were scattered around the theater, clipboards in their laps, and from experience, I knew it was only a portion of the ones who would show up for the finals tomorrow. “Winners get prizes.”
“Like scholarships to Madeline’s,” Caroline said with a nod. “I know that part.”
“No.” A corner of my mouth quirked. “Madeline will award some scholarships to the local dancers who come in around the top twenty.” Which would hopefully be Juniper. Nausea made me shift in my seat. “Pretty sure Sophie Rousseau only ever invited them to give the appearance of being inclusive. The top winners get to move on to the Grand Prix, where the actual prizes are.”
“And some of them get contracted right out of this theater,” Gavin added.
“So it’s like an opportunity for a team to sign someone before they actually enter the draft.” She nodded. “Got it.”
“Eh . . .” Gavin’s head tilted and his face puckered.
“Close enough.” I smiled for the first time in six days, but it quickly fell as judges and professionals filed in. London, Paris, New York, San Francisco, and Houston all took their places, leaving the center table empty.
“Excuse me.” Eva and a few of the soloists from MBC worked their way down the row below us. She startled, then froze when she saw me and sat immediately, taking the seat in front of Gavin.
“Et tu, Brute?” Gavin flashed a smile when she looked over her shoulder.
“And Allie is competing in this?” Caroline’s brow knit. “Isn’t it . . . you know . . . a little beneath her?” She finished in a whisper.
“Allie’s doing an exhibition,” Gavin said loudly.
Eva whipped around, her mouth falling open as her frightened gaze met mine. “Allie’s what?” Her outburst drew the attention of the other Company members.
“Doing. An. Exhibition,” Gavin said slowly, dragging out the last word.
“That’s not in the program,” Harlow Oren noted, flipping through the pages. “And why are there only three local studios? I thought we usually accepted four.”
“Quinn Hawkins shut down,” Jacob Harvey answered from Harlow’s right, bent over his phone. “Whole big drama about a month ago, remember? Ate up the Haven Cove Classic hashtag for like three days.”
“Oh, right.” Harlow nodded, still searching the program. “Something about NASD getting a complaint about abuse, and you know if NASD is getting involved, someone big in the community filed it.”
Allie. I bit back a smile. She’d handled the teacher who’d thrown the water bottle.
“Seriously, Allie’s exhibition isn’t anywhere in this.” Harlow waved the program and turned to Eva. “Is she even healed?”
“Of course not,” Eva snapped. “So why is she performing?” She aimed the question at me, but I didn’t trust myself to speak to her.
“Because you’ve entered the find-out portion of your relationship,” Gavin answered. “You know, because you fucked around, and now—”
“I know what that means,” she snapped. “Hudson?”