A Broken Soul(7)

"Quinn," Lilly started, her face a mask of surprise to see me standing before her. "Hi. What are you doing here?"

I struggled to keep my expression blank, all the while, unwanted images of the woman before me filtered through my head on warp speed. I wanted to ask her what had her so upset last week, I wanted to know what had made those whiskey-colored eyes look so desolate as she danced that morning with tears streaking down her beautiful face. I wanted to push to find out what had happened in her life that made her look as broken as I felt. 

But I wouldn't do any of that. We weren't friends, and despite feeling a kindred spirit in her the other morning, I knew staying back was my only option. Because I was drawn to her in a way that was wrong on so many levels.

Luckily, Sophia was so amped up she answered for me. "I wanna be a ballerina!"

With one last quizzical glance in my direction, Lilly turned her sights on Sophia, bending forward and placing her hands on her knees. "You do?" she asked with a brilliant smile that made my stomach tighten. Sophia nodded eagerly. "Well you're in luck. You've come to the right place, because I love turning pretty little girls into ballerinas."

Sophia looked at her in wide-eyed wonder and asked on a breath, "You do?"

"Uh huh. Tell you what, why don't you peek through that window right over there," she pointed to one of the closed doors off the main corridor, "and watch that class for a bit while I talk to your dad about getting you all signed up."

"Is that a ballerina class?"

Lilly gave a light giggle and I swear to fucking God, I felt it in my gut. "No. That's a hip-hop class. My girl Samantha teaches it."

Sophia took off in that direction, and the much needed buffer between me and Lilly disappeared.

"How have you been?" she turned back to me and asked, like we were long-time friends. I couldn't really blame her, we knew each other by association considering our friends were married to each other.

I opened my mouth to reply but stopped myself, thinking the best option was to keep my answers short and sweet, to the point to move this along so I could get the hell out of there, I simply stated, "Good. Busy."

One of her eyebrows quirked up. "Have you talked to Ethan lately? Eliza said it's been a pretty brutal season so far."

"Nope." That was a lie. I'd talked to Ethan just the other night, but she didn't need to know that.

"Uh..." She looked off to the side like she was trying to think of something, anything she could say to break through my animatronic behavior. "How are things at the fire department?"

"Fine."

She let out a small, defeated sigh, and I knew she'd finally given up on small-talk and was resigned to getting down to business. Christ, why did she have to be so goddamn pretty? And why the fuck did she have to remind me of Addison? "So, has Sophia ever been in dance class before?"

"No." And I was willing to admit that my tone came out gruffer than I had intended.

Her head jerked back just a bit, and I knew she read the tension in my voice. "Well that's all right. We have beginner, intermediate, and advanced level classes for every style. We could put Sophia in the beginner class to start with to gauge her skill level. If need be, she'll stay there until it's time for her to advance to the next class. We have three teachers here. I handle the Classic Style classes. Samantha teaches the Street Style ones, and Kyle handles our Latin Ballroom and Jazz."

It was like she was speaking in a different language. "I don't know what any of that means. I just need to enroll her in the beginner's ballet class. I don't really care about any of the other stuff." Yes, I sounded like an asshole. I was well aware of that, but I couldn't help it. It was like I didn't know how to fucking function around her. I forgot how to behave like a normal member of society.

"Uh …  okay," she dragged out, her face pinched in confusion and a little bit of anger. "I'm sorry, but …  have I done something to offend you?"

"Nope." I stuffed my hands in my pockets, keeping my tone flat as I added, "Just got things to do is all."



       
         
       
        

She looked like she wanted to push, possibly go off on me for being a dick. Instead, she sighed and walked around the back of the front desk, taking a seat in the chair before pulling open a drawer and grabbing a packet of papers. "Fine. Just fill this out and we'll get you on your way, since you're so busy." There was no missing the sarcasm in her tone, she made it loud and clear, and a large part of me respected the hell out of her for letting me know she wasn't happy to be taking my shit. "The class schedules and payment information is all listed on the last page. You can leave it on the ledge when you're done."