Dance Away with Me(66)

*

The next morning, she showered, dressed, and even put on makeup to armor herself against the day. It was barely seven o’clock when she finished, and the Dennings weren’t due until ten. She made her way downstairs. The door to the geode bedroom stood slightly ajar. Without glancing inside, she knew it was empty. The energy that charged the house when he was present had gone missing.

She glanced at the schoolhouse clock. What would she do with herself for the next three hours? She was too agitated to read, and she’d go crazy if she stayed inside, so she put on her sneakers, added a windbreaker, and went out.

She needed to dance away the tumult rumbling inside her, and she started to head for the cabin only to turn around and walk in the opposite direction. That last time she’d climbed toward the ruined church, she’d been carrying Wren. This time she walked alone.

He was there, standing in the misty meadow. She slipped into the trees. The power in his stance mesmerized her. His arms extended in measured thrusts, then his legs came into play. He wore only a T-shirt and a pair of gray shorts. Even from her hiding place, she could see the musculature of his calves, the power in his thighs.

She was spying on him like a fifteen-year-old lurking in the shrubbery in hopes of catching sight of her teenage crush. Enough of that. She stuffed her hands in the pocket of her windbreaker and walked out into the sunshine.

He was so engrossed in his practice that it took a few moments before he noticed her. She selected the flattest tree stump as a viewing place. He lost his rhythm. Picked it up again. But he didn’t continue for long. Wiping his forehead on the sleeve of his T-shirt, he approached her.

She was a full-grown woman, and playing the blushing virgin didn’t suit her. “Very nice, Mr. North. You should charge admission.”

“What do you want?” He didn’t say it rudely. More warily.

“Just avoiding that awful morning-after awkwardness. Not that we’re really having a morning after. Since somebody chickened out.” She hadn’t planned to be so brash, but it felt exactly right.

“I did not chicken out!”

“Could have fooled me.”

One dark eyebrow arched. “You don’t have to look so proud of yourself.”

“Unlike you, I got what I wanted.” Her brazenness made her feel as though she was unearthing the woman she was meant to be all along.

Unfortunately, he didn’t share her high regard. “I must have been crazy.”

“Playing the man of honor is a real drag, right?”

“Jesus, Tess . . .”

“Speaking of Jesus. And since we’re practically in church . . . I know I should forgive you for not sharing your goodies.” She pretended to think it over. “But no. It’s not happening.”

He grinned. “You are one of a kind, Tess Hartsong.”

That grin melted her. This is how he would have looked if he’d been raised in a different kind of family, free from all the childhood baggage he seemed to believe he’d left behind but that he still carried around like a sleeping elephant. The father who’d abused him, but even worse . . . The mother who hadn’t loved him enough to keep him safe.

“How long have you been doing whatever it is you do up here?”

“Mainly tae kwon do. About ten years. I also practice in a backwater dojo over in Valley City.”

“So that’s where you disappear.” Valley City was about fifteen miles away, and only marginally larger than Tempest. She nodded toward his backpack. “Do you have your sketchbook with you?”

“Of course.”

“Draw something for me. Something that’s not me.” She pointed. “That window. The one with the vines growing around it.”

He looked at the place she’d indicated, a narrow side window capped with a pointed arch. The glass was gone, and the remaining wooden grille pieces hung at odd angles.

He shrugged and walked over to fetch his sketchbook.

“Don’t forget to sign it when you’re done,” she called after him.

“Still working on your sales strategy for eBay?”

“A woman’s got to plan for retirement some way.”

He snorted and headed back toward her. “Give me your tree stump.”

She rose and stepped away to let him work. As he drew, she circled the church through the weeds and wandered toward the creek that ran behind the building. Much of the church’s once-white paint had chipped away to reveal the weathered wood beneath. She imagined the voices of the Pentecostals speaking in tongues from behind these walls. The believers wading into the burbling headwaters of Poorhouse Creek to get baptized in the Holy Spirit.

She considered their absolute certainty that every word in the Bible was true. Their ability to dismiss the centuries of oral tradition that had existed before a word of scripture was transcribed. It would be comforting to have a belief that strong, but she preferred a more encompassing brand of Christianity. Still, she felt a kinship with these Pentecostals. Didn’t they believe in spontaneous dancing?

She found a clump of tall grass and made a braid. As she tried to fasten it around her wrist, Ian called out from the tree stump. “All done.”

She dropped the braid and went over to see. “Oh, my . . .”

She wasn’t sure what she’d expected, but it wasn’t this exquisite rendering. The window and the vines were executed in such impeccable detail they could have been a medieval engraving. But standing tall inside the window . . .