Love is a Dance Step

1 DREW There was nothing better than a rock tour. Crowds of screaming fans. Music. Fancy hotels. Yet, it was the quiet time between concerts Drew Stone craved. The hours on his bus hanging out with his people, the sleepy afternoons in hotel suites. The days off spent in the dance studio preparing for the next spectacle. That’s what the media called his shows. He wasn’t merely a rock star who could dance, more like a dancer with a set of pipes. Drew bent to crank the music up louder. His voice filled the room. No, he wasn’t one of those people who got off listening to their own songs, but today had a purpose. One month. That was how long he’d been on the road, and already, his mind ached for something new, something exciting. Not the same old parties, the same old people. He took up his stance in front of the mirror at the small dance studio in Tennessee. The owner had been beside herself when Drew’s assistant called to arrange some practice time. He paid for the entire studio, not wanting to be interrupted by interested dancers. Normally, he enjoyed meeting fans. But today, he just wanted to dance. He lowered his head as the beat started. His feet moved of their own accord, going through the dance steps he’d performed a million times by now. Muscles aching from sitting too long on the bus, he pushed through it, not stopping as his lungs cried out for breath or his legs begged for reprieve. This, right here, gave him life. One song changed into the next, and he launched into more familiar steps, following the heavy beat like it had been written for him. He supposed it had. He didn’t notice when the music stopped until a slow clap ripped him from the trance he’d entered. He turned on his heel to find Leah Baker leaning against the back wall. Drew wiped sweaty blond hair off his forehead and sucked in a long breath. “When did you come in?” Leah pushed away from the wall and dropped a duffel at her feet. “I’ve been here long enough to see the show.” She waggled her eyebrows, her eyes skimming down his bare chest. “Stop it. You’re creeping me out.” He laughed. “Just because I’m taken doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate.” “It does when it’s me.” He bent to grab his water bottle and squirted it over his face before taking a gulp. “If you had a shirt on, you’d be a walking wet t-shirt contest right now.” “I’m telling Amy you were ogling me.” He lowered himself to the ground and leaned against the wall, still trying to catch his breath. “She’d probably just tell me I have good taste.” Amy was Leah’s girlfriend, but she wasn’t on tour with them. They weren’t the only long distance relationship this tour created. His assistant Piper was away from her rock star boyfriend, Ben Evans, lead singer of the band Fate. “Okay, serious time, why did you rent out an entire dance studio today? Something on your mind?” “Did Piper tell you I was here?” His assistant had a big mouth when she thought she was helping. Leah lowered herself to the floor at his side. “Spill.” He sighed. How did he explain his restlessness? That he was on one of the biggest tours of his life—and would be for almost a year—yet, something didn’t fit. It wasn’t enough. If he voiced the words, he’d sound like a spoiled rock star, and no one wanted to hear things had gotten too good. So, instead of spilling his guts to his best friend, he shrugged. “Just feeling antsy. I needed to move.” She laughed. “You always need to move, Drew. It’s one of the things that makes you perfect for this life.” She pushed to her feet and extended a hand down. “That’s why we’re friends. You and I aren’t so different. Well, except for the fact that I can walk down a street without getting assaulted by screaming pre-teen girls.” She winked. Drew took her hand and let her help him up. “My fans aren’t all pre-teen girls,” he grumbled. Leah flashed him a grin. She wasn’t completely wrong. Drew heard the young feminine cries when he took the stage for each concert. Not all of them were young, of course. He’d been performing since he was eighteen. Now, eleven years later, many of the original fans were still with him. “Come on.” Leah walked to where his phone lay on the ground and switched the song. “I’m not dancing to Ben.” Ben was a friend of his. That was just weird. Leah stomped her foot. “Drew Stone, get your rock star butt over here and dance with me.” She looked so adorable with her braided black hair and wide imploring eyes he couldn’t turn her down. Stepping behind her, he put a hand on her waist. “One of our routines?” She shook her head. “Let’s just dance, Drew.” He nodded and spun her toward him, stepping back and drawing her with him. Dancing with Leah had always been easy. Their bodies knew each other in a way he’d never experienced with another dancer. That was why she was his lead dancer, why she’d been with him on every tour for the last five years. When he turned, she turned. When she spun away from him, he followed like a beacon called to him. Despite her ogling from moments before, there’d never been anything more than friendship between them. Their movements were charged with trust rather than s****l energy. He didn’t know what he’d do if he didn’t have her by his side concert after concert. Drew Stone wasn’t one to serenade his crowd while playing guitar like Ben. He couldn’t wow them with a drum solo like his friend Jo Jackson. There was nothing complex about his singing. The one thing he knew how to do was excite, to get the crowd up and moving. To dance. He grinned as he caught Leah around the waist before throwing her and catching her once again. He took pride in his strength, a strength developed over a lifetime of training for a future in hockey. The first dance class he’d taken as a teenager was to improve his agility on the ice, to build up strength in his ankles. He’d have done anything to make it into the National Hockey League, even if it meant taking a class his teammates teased him for. He’d never expected to fall in love with it or for dance to eclipse even his love for hockey. The day the Nashville Predators drafted him in round one should have been the happiest day of his life. But no, that came weeks later when his dance teacher got him in front of a music producer. No one understood his decision to quit hockey, but they’d stopped questioning him when he signed his first record deal. The song ended, and Leah stepped away from him with a grin. “You’ve still got it, hockey boy.” She reached for his phone to pause the next song and handed it to him. “You have a missed call.” He checked the screen, a smile curving his lips. “My mom.” “Momma Stone?” She bounced on her toes. “Call her back. I want to say hi to my girl, Lizzy.” “Excuse me? Lizzy is totally my girl.” “Totally?” She snorted. “All those pre-teen fans are really rubbing off on you.” “Shut it.” “No.” She snatched his phone and unlocked it. “How do you know my password?” He wasn’t upset about it. There was no one he trusted more than Leah. “I’m a snoop.” She laughed. “Kidding. It’s Lizzy’s birthday.” She dialed Drew’s mom before he could stop her. His mom answered on the second ring. “Drew?” “Hold on, Momma Stone. I’m switching you to FaceTime.” Leah waited for his mom to accept. A moment passed before her face filled the screen, the corners of her eyes crinkling as she smiled. “Hey, kiddos.” To his mom, he’d always be kiddo, and he didn’t hate it. She was his favorite person. “Hi, Ma. We saw you called.” Her smile widened. “You caught us at a good time. I’m here with the girls.” She turned the camera to show his three sisters sitting at the counter. Lizzy noticed him first and hopped off her stool. “Drew!” There were twenty-four years between Drew and his youngest sibling, but he barely remembered a time she wasn’t around. He’d been an only child for ten years—being that his parents were sixteen when he was born—and then his brother, Asher, came along. Nora, now seventeen, was next, followed by Penny, his twelve-year-old sister. Five years ago, they’d had what they claimed was their final kid in Lizzy. Nora looked up from her phone. “Ew, bro, put a shirt on. We definitely don’t want to know what you and Leah have been up to.” “Nora Renee Stone.” Their mom swatted her with a towel. Lizzy chewed on her hair. “What have they been up to?” She looked from the screen to Nora. Nora choked on a laugh. “Dancing.” Drew offered her a smile. Lizzy nodded in approval. “Good. You need to practice.” Nora was rolling in laughter now. “You girls.” Lillian Stone loved her children more than life. Despite having a big family, there was always enough to go around. And she was better at keeping them in line than their dad. “Your brother is going to stop calling home if you tease him so much.” She turned the phone away from his sisters to her face. “How have the last few stops been? We haven’t connected in a week or so.” Leah jumped in. “He’s been great, seriously. Right now we’re in Tennessee but only driving through since we hit Nashville already. We’ll be in Florida in two days.” “Yeah, Ma, they have this tour schedule super screwy. I know it has to do with when arenas could be booked since the tour is so huge, but we’re doing a lot of backtracking.” “Where are you now?” “Chattanooga. We decided to give everyone a half a day off the buses, and then we’ll drive through the night to reach Florida.” Penny popped up beside their mom, her blonde hair falling in her face like it always did. “Will we get to see you before the concert?” “Sorry, Pen. There won’t be time. You can come backstage and say hi, but I won’t be able to really hang until afterward.” Her face fell. Drew hated disappointing his sisters. “But look, we scheduled it so there’s a week off after the concert in Tampa. I’ll be sticking around for a few days.” Her expression brightened. He’d planned it as a surprise, but seeing her excitement made telling her early worth it. “Oh, Drew.” His mom covered her mouth. “Really?” It had been months since he was last in his hometown of Gulf City, but that was a long time in his family. They were close… well, most of them. “Is Ash there?” She shook her head. “He spends more time over at Lola’s house these days than ours.” He tried not to be disappointed. He and Asher were close when his brother was a kid, but things had changed in recent years. “That’s okay, Ma. I can’t wait to see you guys.” She smiled. “We’re excited you’re coming home, kiddo.” “Tell Dad I said hi.” His dad was a night manager at one of the local resorts, so it was rare he caught him home during the day. “Sure, honey. Girls, say goodbye to your brother.” A chorus of goodbyes came from the most important women in his life, and by the time he hung up, he wanted to hear them again. Leah understood without him saying a word. She squeezed his hand. “Soon.” Drew had few people in his life he trusted. His family. Leah and the guys and gal of his rock star support group. But they were all enough.