Page 90 of Love is a Dance Step
“Joey…” He pulled on the back of his neck.
“Don’t get involved with people on tour. Isn’t that what you’ve always said?”
“Yeah, but…”
“Does Piper know you’re sleeping with one of your dancers?”
“We aren’t sleeping together.”
Jo didn’t look like she believed him. “Why now, Drew? Are you bored? Can’t you find some nice fangirl after one of your concerts? This is all going to blow up on you, and for what? A girl who will be gone once Leah is better?”
“Leah isn’t coming back to the tour.”
“But what about after the tour? Leah is still your partner, not Lola.”
Drew kicked his foot back against the wall and sighed. “She’s not just some girl, Jo. I’ve known her since I was fifteen years old.”
“When she was five, right?” Jo shook her head. “She’s too young for you, too much a part of this tour’s success, and too much a part of your family.”
Ah, there was the dagger. Lola’s connection to him wasn’t supposed to be through dance but through Asher.
“I know.” His shoulders dropped. “I know all of that, but…” He didn’t know what else to say.
“But you did it anyway. Why?”
“It’s like I can’t stop myself, Jo.”
“You can always stop yourself. Next excuse.”
“I dream about kissing her. When we’re dancing, it’s like there’s no one else. Just two people dancing in an empty world. I think…” He blew out a breath. “I didn’t realize how much I needed that. She clears my mind, Jo. She makes me love it again.”
Jo uncrossed her arms and stepped toward him to wrap him in a hug. He rested his chin on the top of her head, soaking in the rare comfort from the hardest of the Rockstars Anonymous crew.
“Does this mean I’m forgiven?” he asked.
She looked up at him. “It means I want you to be careful. It means we all want someone to say those things about us.” Sadness entered her gaze.
Jo was the strongest person he knew, but she was going to have a baby on her own. No, not on her own. She had him and the rest of their friends.
“You know we love you, right?” He wiped a tear from her cheek. “Always.”
One corner of her mouth lifted as she nodded and stepped back. “Yeah, I know.”
Only last year, going to Rockstars Anonymous meetings was a chore, but now he couldn’t imagine his life without this group of people. Without Jo yelling at him and Noah making him laugh. Without Ben’s calming influence and Dax’s quiet laughter.
Yet, they weren’t the only ones who mattered.
Jo’s lips hooked up into a smile. “You want to go find her, don’t you?”
“I think I have to.” He looked over his shoulder.
“Go go.” She waved him away. “At least one of us needs to be happy.”
He dropped a kiss on her cheek. “You will be too.”
She pushed him with a shake of her head. “What are you doing still standing there?”
He flashed her a grin before walking back toward the ballroom. Dinner had been served, but it wasn’t the food that caught his eye. An empty chair sat where Lola should be.
