Page 2 of Love is a Dance Step
“I’m not dancing to Ben.” Ben was a friend of his. That was just weird.
Leah stomped her foot. “Drew Stone, get your rock star butt over here and dance with me.”
She looked so adorable with her braided black hair and wide imploring eyes he couldn’t turn her down. Stepping behind her, he put a hand on her waist. “One of our routines?”
She shook her head. “Let’s just dance, Drew.”
He nodded and spun her toward him, stepping back and drawing her with him. Dancing with Leah had always been easy. Their bodies knew each other in a way he’d never experienced with another dancer. That was why she was his lead dancer, why she’d been with him on every tour for the last five years.
When he turned, she turned. When she spun away from him, he followed like a beacon called to him. Despite her ogling from moments before, there’d never been anything more than friendship between them. Their movements were charged with trust rather than sexual energy.
He didn’t know what he’d do if he didn’t have her by his side concert after concert.
Drew Stone wasn’t one to serenade his crowd while playing guitar like Ben. He couldn’t wow them with a drum solo like his friend Jo Jackson. There was nothing complex about his singing. The one thing he knew how to do was excite, to get the crowd up and moving.
To dance.
He grinned as he caught Leah around the waist before throwing her and catching her once again. He took pride in his strength, a strength developed over a lifetime of training for a future in hockey.
The first dance class he’d taken as a teenager was to improve his agility on the ice, to build up strength in his ankles. He’d have done anything to make it into the National Hockey League, even if it meant taking a class his teammates teased him for.
He’d never expected to fall in love with it or for dance to eclipse even his love for hockey. The day the Nashville Predators drafted him in round one should have been the happiest day of his life. But no, that came weeks later when his dance teacher got him in front of a music producer.
No one understood his decision to quit hockey, but they’d stopped questioning him when he signed his first record deal.
The song ended, and Leah stepped away from him with a grin. “You’ve still got it, hockey boy.” She reached for his phone to pause the next song and handed it to him. “You have a missed call.”
He checked the screen, a smile curving his lips. “My mom.”
“Momma Stone?” She bounced on her toes. “Call her back. I want to say hi to my girl, Lizzy.”
“Excuse me? Lizzy is totally my girl.”
“Totally?” She snorted. “All those pre-teen fans are really rubbing off on you.”
“Shut it.”
“No.” She snatched his phone and unlocked it.
“How do you know my password?” He wasn’t upset about it. There was no one he trusted more than Leah.
“I’m a snoop.” She laughed. “Kidding. It’s Lizzy’s birthday.” She dialed Drew’s mom before he could stop her.
His mom answered on the second ring. “Drew?”
“Hold on, Momma Stone. I’m switching you to FaceTime.” Leah waited for his mom to accept.
A moment passed before her face filled the screen, the corners of her eyes crinkling as she smiled. “Hey, kiddos.”
To his mom, he’d always be kiddo, and he didn’t hate it. She was his favorite person. “Hi, Ma. We saw you called.”
Her smile widened. “You caught us at a good time. I’m here with the girls.” She turned the camera to show his three sisters sitting at the counter.
Lizzy noticed him first and hopped off her stool. “Drew!” There were twenty-four years between Drew and his youngest sibling, but he barely remembered a time she wasn’t around. He’d been an only child for ten years—being that his parents were sixteen when he was born—and then his brother, Asher, came along. Nora, now seventeen, was next, followed by Penny, his twelve-year-old sister.
Five years ago, they’d had what they claimed was their final kid in Lizzy.
Nora looked up from her phone. “Ew, bro, put a shirt on. We definitely don’t want to know what you and Leah have been up to.”
