Page 47 of Ice Dance

It was late, but not ludicrously so. “I can stay.”

“Alright, pizza? Top notch. Very good.” She patted Navarro on the shoulder. “Good work today. I’ll see you both bright and early in the morning. Do not stay out too late. And behave.”

“Yeah, mom,” Navarro called.

Now it was just Navarro and me, in someone’s back yard, aching from the day’s work, but warm and content.

“We must be doing something right if Dylan’s happy,” Navarro said.

“Indeed.”

He straightened, and looked at me oddly, assessing. His gaze dropped, then came back up. “Hey . . . do you wanna dance?”

I wasn’t sure what he meant. “At the studio?”

He leaned closer. “No, not there. A place. Somewhere close, to enjoy dancing. Not training, just fun.”

“A place?” That sounded ominous. Not a club, or a bar? A place. Was it also someone’s back yard?

“You do know how to have fun?” he asked.

“Now you’re baiting me.”

“Only if you don’t want to be caught.”

There was a dare in his tone. That same little nudge, a tease, a curl of the finger in his voice that he’d used when he’d asked me if I could dance, that day in the conference room. His eyes sparkled in the glow from the backyard fairy lights. The part of me I kept in check wanted to say yes and go anywhere with him, but we had to be at the studio early, and it was already late. And that part of me that wanted to say yes was all tied up in the part of me that was enjoying the tease in his voice, and the twitching smile on his lips, and the way he’d leaned closer.

“Forget it. It’s been a long day,” he said, when I took too long to answer.

“It’s been a good day.” I leaned closer because, like him, it seemed I wasn’t ready for the day to be over just yet. “I want to dance. Yes.”

His smile grew again, and my breath hitched, as though my heart had snagged. I wasn’t thinking too much about that. It was just residual good feelings left over from the day.

“Okay. Let’s go,” he stood, and beckoned me to follow with a wave.

We left the friendly pizza place and walked down the block, passing under puddles of light cast by the streetlights. Navarro led us into quieter residential streets, where brick buildings pressed close to the pavement. Air conditioner units rattled.

“You’re quiet.”

He smiled again. “Is it a crime?”

“No, I just noticed you’re quiet.”

“I was thinking. Your father was some big name in the Olympics, right?”

“Yes.” I walked on, hands in my pockets, and dropped my gaze to the cracked, uneven pavement ahead. “He won gold in Sapporo and Vancouver, then retired from professional skating to teach.”

“That must have been hard?”

“How so?”

“I’m guessing you didn’t see him much?”

“No, I didn’t. He traveled and my mother was gone by then, so it was just me and the nanny, who was strict, to say the least.”

“Wow.”

“What about you?”