Myths, Murder & Love

Chapter 9

The moment Leon and Thallia stepped onto the dance floor, the guitarist looked up. His eyebrows rose.

The bass player followed his gaze and grinned.

Before the song had ended, the band eased into something slower. A warm country melody settled over the room.

Leon looked toward them. The guitarist smiled innocently.

Leon shook his head.

Thallia caught the exchange and looked up at him. "Did they just change the music?"

Leon glanced toward the band. "They did."

Her eyebrows lifted. "For us?"

Leon caught the guitarist's poorly hidden grin. "I'm going to pretend they didn't."

Her smile widened. "Do they always interfere with your evening?"

"Only when they think they're helping."

A voice drifted from somewhere near the bar.

"I've never seen Leon ask a woman to dance."

Leon closed his eyes for half a second.

Thallia looked back at him, delight brightening her expression. "Never?"

Leon sighed. "I was hoping you didn't hear that."

"Oh, I definitely heard it."

Leon glanced around the familiar room. "Small towns."

Thallia laughed.

Leon stopped in front of her. Their hands remained joined, but his other hand paused near her waist. "May I?"

Thallia looked at his hand, then into his eyes. "You've already asked."

"I asked you to dance."

Understanding dawned.

He was asking permission to touch her.

Something warm unfolded inside her that had nothing to do with the strange heat between their hands.

"Yes," she said quietly.

Only then did Leon's hand settle against her waist.

Thallia rested her hand against his shoulder, and their joined hands rose between them.

For a heartbeat neither moved.

She became acutely aware of his hand at her waist. The strength beneath her palm. The warmth passing between them.

The strange sensation from their first touch was still there, deeper than ordinary heat, settling beneath her skin.

Leon felt it too. She could see the question in his eyes, but he didn't ask.

He simply moved, and Thallia followed.

One step became another.

Then Leon's eyebrows lifted with unmistakable surprise. "You dance."

Thallia laughed. "Was I supposed to warn you?"

"No." Leon guided her smoothly through a turn. "But I was prepared to spend the first minute making sure you didn't regret saying yes."

"And now?" She came back toward him without missing the rhythm.

The surprise in Leon's expression gave way to unmistakable appreciation. "Now I'm trying not to look impressed."

Thallia grinned. "You aren't doing very well."

Leon laughed. "I was afraid of that."

He turned her beneath their joined hands.

The turquoise skirt swept around her knees before she came back to him smiling.

A quiet thrill moved through Leon's chest. He had danced with enough women to recognize skill. Thallia was different.

She seemed to feel where he was going before he moved. He changed direction, and she was already there. He offered a turn, and she completed it as naturally as breathing.

Dancing with her didn't feel like leading. It felt like discovering something they already knew how to do together.

Leon guided her through another turn. "Where did you learn?"

"In college."

His eyebrows lifted with surprise. "Really?"

Thallia laughed. "I needed an elective."

"So you accidentally became a dancer?"

She settled comfortably into the next step. "I accidentally discovered I loved it."

Her smile faded as the pleasure of remembering gave way to a quieter realization.

She had loved dancing once. She hadn't realized until tonight how much she'd missed it.

Leon caught the change in her expression. "When was the last time?"

Her gaze dropped toward his shoulder. "It's been a while."

He could have asked why. Instead, his hand eased at her waist, giving her room.

"I'm glad you danced tonight."

Thallia looked up.

There was no demand for an explanation in his expression. No question she was expected to answer.

Just Leon.

And the dance.

Her shoulders relaxed. "I am too."

Leon smiled and guided her into another turn. When she came back, Thallia moved a little closer.

Leon noticed. He didn't close the remaining distance which surprised her.

Most men she'd danced with treated every inch surrendered as permission to take another. Leon simply gave her room.

And because he didn't take it, Thallia wanted to give him more. She moved closer on her own.

The change brought her near enough to feel the warmth of him, and her pulse quickened.

Thallia looked up.

The amber lights caught the gold in his hazel eyes. She had been trying not to stare at them since she'd walked into the Red Coyote, but this close, resisting became much harder.

The Peach Mule probably wasn't helping.

"You have extraordinary eyes."

The words escaped before she could stop them.

Her own eyes widened. "Oh, I cannot believe I said that out loud."

Leon laughed. "I'm glad you did."

Thallia searched his face. "You are?"

"I've been thinking the same thing about yours since you walked through the door."

Heat rushed into her cheeks.

She looked down. "That doesn't make this less embarrassing."

"It wasn't meant to."

Thallia looked up again.

He was still flirting with her.

But something had changed. At the table, he'd been bold enough to cross the room and tell her exactly what he wanted.

Here, with his hand warm against her waist, the confidence remained, but so did the patience. He seemed content to let her decide how close they became.

Thallia liked both sides of him.

They moved through another turn before she smiled. "We've done this backward."

Leon raised an eyebrow. "Have we?"

"I usually learn a man's name before I let him put his hand on my waist."

Leon's gaze dropped to his hand. His touch immediately lightened.

Thallia felt the change. No embarrassment or attempt to laugh away her comment.

He was giving her the chance to change her mind. She didn't.

Instead, Thallia let her fingers settle more comfortably against his shoulder and kept herself exactly where she was.

His gaze returned to hers. "My name is Leonidas Argos."

She blinked. "Leonidas?"

"My mother had strong opinions."

Thallia smiled. "I like your mother already."

"Most people call me Leon."

She let the name settle around her tongue. "Leon."

It suited him.

The corner of his mouth lifted. "And you?"

"Thallia Laskari."

He repeated it slowly. "Thallia."

Her step faltered.

Leon adjusted instantly, turning the hesitation into part of the dance. Concern touched his expression. "Did I say it wrong?"

Thallia shook her head. "You got it right."

His brow furrowed. "Most people don't say it right?"

She laughed under her breath. "Most people shorten it before they've even learned how to say it."

Leon held her gaze and said it again. "Thallia."

Something about hearing her name in his voice sent a small shiver across her skin.

She covered it with a grin. "Now you're showing off."

"Maybe a little."

There was the boldness again.

Thallia shook her head, smiling. "My great-grandmother chose it."

"Then she chose well."

The music carried them into another slow turn.

For several measures neither spoke.

They didn't need to.

Thallia had expected silence to become awkward once they ran out of easy things to say. Instead, it drew her attention to everything else.

Leon's hand at her waist. Her fingers against his shoulder. The warmth of his body now that she'd chosen to move closer.

And his eyes. Every time they met hers, that strange sense of recognition returned.

She had never seen this man before tonight. She knew that.

So why did being in his arms feel less like meeting someone and more like remembering him?

The thought should have unsettled her. Instead, Thallia moved with him as though the answer might be hidden somewhere in the dance.

Leon felt it too.

He had lived too long to confuse attraction with fate simply because a beautiful woman interested him. He knew desire and affection. He knew the intoxicating beginning of a romance when everything about another person waited to be discovered.

This contained all of that. But beneath it ran something deeper. A kind of recognition.

Thallia fit against him with an ease that made no sense. Her laughter delighted him. Her name already felt familiar on his tongue.

And Lydia had sent him here.

Leon had known from the moment Thallia walked through the door that she was the reason. He was only beginning to understand how much that might mean.

Thallia caught him studying her. "What are you thinking?"

Leon smiled. "I'm trying to decide something."

"Whether asking the strange woman eating a hamburger to dance, was a mistake?"

His answer came without hesitation. "Not that."

Thallia studied him. "What, then?"

Leon wanted to answer.

He wasn't sure he understood the answer himself. "I'll tell you when I figure it out."

Thallia tipped her head. "That's irritating."

A quiet laugh escaped him. "So I've been told."

The final notes began to fade.

Thallia noticed only because Leon slowed with the music.

Neither stepped away.

His hand remained at her waist. Hers stayed against his shoulder, and the space she'd surrendered between them remained gone.

For one suspended moment, neither seemed willing to break whatever had formed between them.

Then applause rose around them.

Thallia blinked and looked toward the band. The guitarist was grinning.

Leon sighed. "Don't encourage them."

Thallia laughed. "I didn't do anything."

His gaze brought her attention back to him. "You danced with me."

Her eyebrows lifted. "That was enough?"

Leon glanced toward the bar. "In this room? More than enough."

Thallia laughed again.

Leon looked down at her.

He had crossed the room because Lydia had sent him to Moab and because a beautiful woman had almost asked him to dance.

Now the music had stopped, Thallia was still in his arms, and walking away from her was the last thing he wanted to do.

A few canyons away, someone stood alone in a darkened hotel room, staring through the window without seeing the view.

Dinner had gone exactly as expected. They had laughed, joined the conversation, answered questions about tomorrow and listened while everyone debated breakfast plans.

No one had noticed anything wrong.

They had gotten very good at that.

Ten years was a long time.

Long enough to build a career and become someone important people listened to.

Long enough to stop being the frightened college student whose future had been ripped apart by someone else's choices.

At least, that was what they had believed.

Then this afternoon happened.

They had imagined that meeting countless times.

Sometimes there had been an apology.

Sometimes an argument.

In darker moments, they had imagined the fear that might appear when recognition came.

They had never imagined being greeted with a polite smile and no recognition at all.

To the person who had changed the course of their life, they were a stranger.

Their eyes closed.

It had taken years to rebuild what one careless person had destroyed.

And today...

Nothing.

Not a flicker of recognition. Not even the hesitation of a face that seemed familiar.

They had been forgotten.

That hurt more than hatred ever could.

Their eyes opened.

The reflection in the window barely resembled the frightened student they'd once been.

That should have felt like victory.

Tonight, it didn't.

Because the person responsible for changing everything had looked directly at them...

and remembered nothing.