Page 100 of Love is a Dance Step
Drew stood. “Sorry, I need to cut out of this meeting. You guys can talk about me and my poor relationship choices once I’m gone. I’m sure you’ll come up with a plan of action before I get back.”
He turned away from them and snatched his phone off the kitchen counter. He didn’t say a word as he shut his bedroom door. Large windows looked out on Manhattan, but he ignored the view and flopped onto his king bed.
He tapped his sister’s name, and she answered after one ring.
“He’s there, isn’t he?” Nora said as her greeting.
“What is Asher doing in New York?” Drew rolled onto his back and stared up at the white ceiling.
Nora sighed. “We didn’t know where he was going. He left a note that he’d be home in a few days, but I suspected you’d see him. Asher has been doing nothing but focusing on all this media stuff about Lola. I think he just needed to see her.”
Which confirmed everything Drew feared.
And still, he couldn’t stop himself from asking the question. “Why did he need to see her, Nora?”
“Oh, no.” Nora exhaled. “Don’t tell me you’ve fallen for Lola.” She issued a pathetic sound. “Oh, Drew.”
“I can’t stop thinking about her.” It was starting to affect his tour. He never separated himself from his dancers like this, he never took space. But he couldn’t think around Lola, not logically.
“She told me she kissed someone. I didn’t know it was you. If I had… I just thought she needed to have a little fun on tour. Drew, this won’t end well for you. I love you, and that’s the only reason I’m telling you any of this. Lola has been in love with Asher for years. We’ve all known and have just waited for the day he’d wake up and realize she was what he needed.”
“Don’t say it.”
But Nora went on. “I think that day is here, Drew. And those two… Lola will always choose him. No matter how poorly he treats her or how many other girls he dates, she always comes back to him.”
Drew closed his eyes. “So, what do I do, Nora?”
“You let her go.”
If he didn’t realize how deep his feelings had run so quickly, he would now. Because a fissure opened up in his heart at his sister’s words.
And he didn’t know what to do next.
30
Lola
Lola was not a bar person, nor did she enjoy being packed into a room with a million strangers.
And yet…
Here she was standing beside someone who thrived in this kind of place, someone who always had. She’d known how different she and Asher were, how much their friendship didn’t make a lick of sense.
What she didn’t know was why he’d stayed with her? Why he’d spent the last fourteen years insisting she be with him?
And she’d seen herself falling deeper and deeper, thinking it was love.
Now, as she watched him laugh with Brooke and the other dancers, watched his eyes light up inside the New York bar, she realized she’d only held on so tightly because if she didn’t, they’d drift away. She wouldn’t have only lost Asher but his family as well.
That wasn’t love, or at least the kind of love stories were written about.
Instead, she saw herself through the eyes of a stranger. She was pathetic. A girl who’d tricked herself into thinking friendship could turn into more, that it wasn’t okay to let go.
Asher rested his arm on the back of her chair and nudged her shoulder. “You okay?” He’d barely spoken to her since using Drew’s name to get her into the bar and a fake ID to prove he was twenty-one.
No. She wasn’t okay. The noise crowded in on her, and all she wanted to do was get some air, some much needed space. Instead, she smiled and nodded. “Yep, I’m good.”
He returned her smile. He wanted to believe she was comfortable in this scene, so he did.
