Night Child, page 13
Everything? she thought. The brand-new black suit and tie Kirk wore gave him a cultured look, but it didn't conceal the latent power of his body. Nor did it soften the harsh edges of his bronzed face. Her eyes devoured the broad shoulders, the narrow waist and hips, the thickly muscled thighs of the man she loved. A stark longing for something that could never be hers threatened to consume her.
No, dear Lincoln. Not everything... Never again will life be so simple that you can give me everything. I will have to give up something.
"If you'd listened to me and never gone to Ali Naid—" Lincoln began.
She cut him off. "I know. You're right. You always are."
He smiled his most charming smile. "See that you remember that."
She smiled back at him, but now that she was no longer looking at Kirk, hers was a sad smile without enthusiasm.
"You are different," Lincoln said, and for the first time an uneasiness crept into his voice. He too cast a nervous look at the dark brooding figure at the opposite side of the room.
"Anyone would be."
"I suppose so. After what you've been through. And yet it is dangerous for a performer to change."
"Yes. But without change, there cannot be growth."
"You were wonderful before."
"But not wonderful enough to dance Beauty," she murmured.
"A man who is never wrong cannot very easily admit his mistakes," Lincoln whispered. He was his most charming self. "I'm glad you're back."
"So am I," she replied listlessly.
"Without you, there was no one to fight with. Life was too easy. It's good that you left. Now, because of the publicity, you will be a sensation. They will say you're the greatest ballerina on earth. Your heart's fondest dream will come true."
"Yes..." She smiled faintly, thinking it odd that she felt so hollow inside.
Pale northern sunlight slanted through the skylights and through the long windows of the studio as Dawn warmed up for her rehearsals. Kirk had been in New York a week. It was Friday, and tonight Dawn was to dance the role of Aurora in The Sleeping Beauty to a sellout audience. Afterward Lincoln was throwing a party for the whole company in her honor at his loft. Though Kirk hadn't told her, the Jacksons would be in the audience.
Kirk sat in the shadows watching Dawn's pink toe shoes whirl lightly across the wooden floor, marveling that she could dance with her ankle wrapped. He had watched her pack it in ice, warm it up again, suffer treatments from the sound machine time and time again. It was a chronic sprain, she had told him. She had danced with the pain for so many years, she scarcely felt it anymore.
A dozen girls dressed mostly in pink sat along one wall, sewing ribbons onto their toe shoes for their performance that night, cracking their necks, stretching their toes, braiding their hair as they watched. A few stood at the barre. They were thin girls that could do with a man who would feed them a steak or two, pretty girls with smiling, powdered, look-alike doll faces, and all of them were more conscious of him than they were of Dawn.
He wore jeans and boots, a blue cotton shirt open at the throat and a leather bomber jacket. Virile and masculine to the core, he might have felt out of place in such a feminine environment had not all the ballerinas made him feel so welcome. If Lincoln loathed Kirk's constant presence in his theater, the ballerinas spoiled Kirk with constant attention, bringing him cokes, potato chips, cigarettes—these even when he informed them he didn't smoke.
"You have acquired a harem," Dawn had teased, slightly jealous.
"There's more to ballet than I thought," he'd agreed.
"You just like all the pretty girls."
"What man wouldn't?"
"I thought you didn't like skinny girls."
He had just laughed and swept her into his arms.
He must be getting soft, but the week in New York had not made him nearly as crazy as he'd thought it would. Dawn had attended two classes a day and rehearsals; the rest of the time she'd spent with him. He'd gotten into the habit of jogging in Central Park every morning. One afternoon she had taken him out to Montauk where there were windswept dunes and boats for hire. On another day, she'd taken him to Fire Island State Park where he'd taught her to fish. Twice they'd taken a train to Connecticut where friends had a house in the country and kept Arabians. Kirk had persuaded her to ride with him again... on her own horse... without openly trying to make her remember her past. Although he tried to make her remember in a thousand little ways.
With every passing day his feelings for her seemed to deepen. The week in New York was the first real vacation Kirk had taken in years.
Once, as Dawn was leaving the theater early, Lincoln had chided her in front of Kirk. "You used to work twelve and fourteen hours a day."
"I will again—after Kirk is gone."
Lincoln's expression had darkened skeptically. "And when will that be?"
Kirk's expression was as grim as Lincoln's. "After she dances."
"She needs to concentrate."
"I need something else—something more than that," Dawn had said quietly, holding onto Kirk. "I'm only following the advice you yourself once gave me."
Lincoln had stalked into a nearby studio.
"I—I'm sorry if he offended..." Dawn had begun.
"Do you think I give a damn about anything he says or does? He's your boss, not mine. As long as you're happy."
"Just don't shut me out. We have so little time," she'd whispered, clutching his hand.
In the studio beneath the white northern light Dawn returned to the barre and did plies and tendus and stretching exercises. Now that the time was all gone, never had she seemed more beautiful to Kirk. Now that there was no more time to laugh, to love, to make memories.
Tonight she would dance.
Tonight he would leave her.
Never again would he make love to her.
From the barre, she glanced toward him expectantly, her face flushed and radiant, and blew him a kiss.
He felt a sudden tearing pain in the middle of his gut, and for a moment his whole being ached for things to be different.
She saw his pain, left the barre and danced toward him. He held out his hand to pull her close, and she came eagerly into his arms. Then he kissed her in front of all the other ballerinas, something he had never done before, and as the other girls watched, they felt a jolt of pure envy for Dawn Hayden.
"What you thinking about, Dawn?" Sonya cried from the wings, interrupting the dress rehearsal for The Sleeping Beauty for the tenth time in less than an hour.
The conductor's baton stopped in the middle of a measure, and Dawn almost fell. Lincoln was scowling darkly at both Sonya and Dawn, but he clamped his lips into a thin line and combed his fingers through his flaxen hair, struggling to say nothing.
His raging silence was more eloquent than words. Dawn knew he didn't want Sonya in his theater any more than he wanted Kirk sprawling in one of the front-row seats watching. Lincoln considered them both interlopers in his own private domain. But for the moment, until he was sure of his power over Dawn, he was going to be lenient with her and let her have her way in such small matters.
Sonya rushed toward Dawn, and Dawn smiled fondly at her slightly eccentric teacher. Though Sonya's long, silvered hair was half hidden by a gypsy scarf, she retained the aura of a Russian aristocrat. As always, she wore her gray leotard, tights and pleated skirt. She took a deep drag from her cigarette holder in desperation. Her once handsome narrow face was lined with age and the sadness that seemed to linger forever in the faces of all dancers who can no longer dance. The sadness was less now, as it always was once she was caught in the passion of teaching her most prized pupil steps that she had once been able to dance herself.
"Take force from your left arm," she said, gesturing with her cigarette holder.
Dawn sailed effortlessly in a pirouette, and Lincoln's scowl deepened because his rival had been helpful.
"Better! Now ven you bend back, let your breath out. It will be easier."
And it was.
"I remember when I danced Aurora..." Sonya began, and her face softened and became lovelier and younger and dreamier.
Dawn always indulged Sonya's sentimental anecdotes.
"You have not danced in years," Lincoln thundered. "You waste time with these stories. We must get on with rehearsal."
Sonya crumpled, and the perpetual sadness in her face deepened into one of her dark impenetrable Russian glooms as she retreated to the wings in defeat.
"Did you have to be so cruel?" Dawn whispered so that only Lincoln could hear her,
"Sorry." He waved his hand carelessly toward the conductor. "I only spoke the truth."
But such a cruel truth. Dawn felt the tragic sadness of her teacher. Was Sonya's present not Dawn's own bleak future? The time would come, too soon, as it did for all dancers, when Dawn's frail body would fail her. Already she suffered chronic pain in her ankle. That would only worsen. There would be new injuries. She would have only a few years, and then she would be the poor, despised creature in Lincoln's eyes that Sonya was. He would move on to newer, younger ballerinas.
The prospect was hellishly frightening. What would she have then? Who would she be? She might not fare as well as Sonya. Sonya was a realist who'd begun to teach as soon as her career was finished. Dawn knew quite a few dancers who had been forced to stop dancing. Many of them were like lost children without direction, without knowledge, without goals. They had absolutely nothing with which to confront the world of real life. There were sad stories of years of accomplishing nothing, of illegitimate babies, divorces, drugs, breakdowns.
Dawn's eyes sought Kirk's, but she could not see him beyond the glare of the stage lights. Yet she knew he was life, real life. He wanted her to face real life. Suddenly she knew that if she didn't do so now, there would come a day when the reality she faced might be infinitely more grim than the present one. No matter how brilliant her career might be, inevitably it would end. Her energy and ability would be gone. There would be no more limousines, no more galas. Who would want her then?
And yet she was afraid. Some part of her wanted to follow the old pattern of her life and run away into her dreamworld. It would be so easy to lose herself in the hard work and frantic pace of her demanding career.
The music began again, and with it the rehearsal. Dawn began to dance, and though her feet and body performed all the steps and movements with flawless perfection, her heart and soul were depressed and not involved in the process.
"Stop!" Lincoln thundered, utterly exasperated. "What's the matter now?"
"What did I do wrong?"
"Nothing!" Lincoln threw up his hands. "Everything! You know as well as I that it is not enough to dance the steps perfectly. You have to feel them. You have to make the audience feel the passion of the ballet. You know what I felt when I watched you? Nothing!"
"That's what I felt, too!" she cried, her frustration even greater than his. "Nothing. No spark. I've never felt so empty, like I have no place here, nothing to offer. I'm afraid to dance on stage tonight. I've never been afraid of dancing before, but I am now."
"It's only stage fright," Lincoln said more gently. "All performers suffer from it from time to time."
"But I never have, and I can't deal with it. You'll have to get someone else. Marguerite, perhaps."
"The hell I will."
"Kirk..." Her soft voice was a plea.
Kirk, who'd been watching the entire exchange with dark furious interest, sprang to his feet and rushed up the stairs onto the stage. Dawn flew to him, and he folded her into his arms, holding her so tightly that her pink satin-and-tulle costume was crushed against his leather jacket. The pleasant familiar scents of old leather and his musky after-shave enveloped her. She felt safe, stronger, with him near, with her cheek pressing against the heavy rhythm of his heart.
Lincoln regarded his rival with pure malice. Before Kirk, Dawn had been his dancer. She had wanted nothing but to dance.
"You want her to fail, MacKay. Because you know that's the only way you can have her—if she can't dance anymore."
For a long moment Kirk said nothing. He just looked at Lincoln steadily, his green eyes suddenly vivid and piercing. At last he said, "And will you want her when she can't dance anymore?"
"We're talking about now! This minute! Not some faraway time in the future! You can't give her anything compared to what I can give her—stardom, wealth, fame."
Kirk's arms tightened convulsively around Dawn. "Aren't those the things you want her to give you? You need a brilliant ballerina so people will be dazzled and say Lincoln Wilde is a brilliant choreographer. All you want her for is your own self-aggrandizement."
"Why you—" Lincoln took a step toward Kirk and then stopped and shifted uncomfortably beneath Kirk's narrowed hooded gaze.
The two men were the same size, and yet Kirk's hard body of rippling sinewy muscle seemed infinitely more lethal. For all his talents as a choreographer, Lincoln wisely sensed he lacked the fighting skills a man such as Kirk possessed.
"Dawn needs a break," Kirk said quietly, and yet with complete authority.
"This is my rehearsal. I'm the one who calls for a break," Lincoln hissed.
"Then call one."
Kirk did not wait for Lincoln to do so. He simply led a limping Dawn offstage to her dressing room.
Behind them Lincoln yelled explosively, "Break! Break, everyone!"
In Dawn's dressing room, Kirk held her loosely within his arms for a long while and said nothing. He just stroked her lovely neck and her back soothingly. She thought how pleasant it was to lean against the reassuring beat of his heart. How pleasant it was to have someone stand up for her, just for her with no thought of self-gain. Just this once. These thoughts were followed by one infinitely more treacherous. How pleasant to have this... always.
At last Kirk released her, tilted her chin and stared into her eyes. "So, what's wrong? Why can't you dance?"
"I don't know. I just feel scared and unhappy."
"You're the girl who isn't scared of anything," he said gently.
"Oh, Kirk, you're wrong," she said in a voice choked with emotion. "I'm scared of everything. I don't know who I am anymore. What I want."
"Maybe you're scared, but you're the bravest woman I've ever known. Why, you're braver than most soldiers I've fought beside. You saved my life. You endured two brutal kidnappings and survived." He wrapped his arms around her again. "You know something? Lincoln was right in a way. You're not the only one who's scared. I'm scared, too. I'm scared of you dancing because I know it means I'll probably lose you. I'm scared of never feeling like this again for anyone else the rest of my life."
"And yet... you want me to dance?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
His gaze moved over her face. "Because I love you."
He started to say something else, but she pressed her fingers against his lips. "Hush," she breathed, her touch feather light. "I want to savor that."
"You must have known."
Gently she touched his bronzed cheek. "But you never said it."
"And are words so important?"
"Very," she whispered, blushing with happiness.
He laughed softly. "Then I love you."
"And what does that mean?" she murmured.
"It means I want you with me always. I want you to marry me. I want you to come to Texas and stay there forever. With your family. With me."
"But you never asked me."
"Because I know you think you belong here."
She bit her lip. "How can you know that, when I don't even know that myself anymore?"
"Dance tonight. For me. Forget Lincoln, the audience, stardom. Just dance for me. More than anything, I want you to be wonderful."
"But, I thought you just asked me to marry you."
"I did. But if you say yes, I want it to be because you want me more than you want this. I don't want you to come to me only because you failed."
"Why, you're an even bigger egotist than Lincoln."
He nuzzled her hair and laughed gently. "Dance for me, darling. Then the choice is yours. Your career, your life here or..."
"Or the man I love."
"So.. .you said it, too."
"I said it before."
He grinned. "I know." Kirk pulled her closer, and she cuddled against him, her head pressed against the curve of his shoulder. One of her hands moved up to this throat.
"And are the words so important... even to a fierce he-man?"
"Very." He smiled down at her. "Dance for me tonight. For me alone. If I can be brave enough to ask that, surely you can be brave enough to dance."
Confused emotions coursed through her. She saw the same confusion of emotion in his eyes before he enfolded her in a crushing embrace.
"I'll dance," she whispered, "for you."
"Thank you," he murmured against her hair in an odd voice. "I wish—" he began quietly. Then he stopped himself, clasping her tightly, burying his face in her hair, taking in the scent and feel of clean, silken hair and sweet tender flesh, the exquisite sensation of her body fitted to his. "No, the choice has to be yours."
As Dawn clung to him, tears ran freely down her cheeks, whether of happiness or sadness she did not know. She was lost to the world in his arms, oblivious to the Tightness or wrongness of her love for him. She was aware only of a thrilling happiness coupled with a soul-numbing sorrow.
She loved him. Tonight she would dance.
Only for this fleeting instant could she have everything.
"Make love to me," she whispered.
She felt him start.
He lifted his head, looking down into her face. "What? Now? Here?"
She touched him in their intimate nighttime way, and his blood ran like fire in his veins.
"Here," she murmured in a soft voice tinged with desire. "Now..."
* * *
Ten
Every nerve in Dawn's body seemed to vibrate with tension. She felt hot and cold with dread and anticipation, and it was not only the thought of dancing again that had her on edge. Her whole life was hanging in the balance.
