A Slow-Burning Dance Read Free Page B

running smoothly in the background, but he was able to
communicate with every department and each employee in a friendly, helpful
manner.
    What
would happen now? Would Sela tell her brother about Damien asking her out? He had
never approached Santino about dating Sela, and he didn’t want this to become a
source of discomfort for them. Even worse, he’d hurt Sela today without meaning to. He had to fix this. It was the right thing to do.
    Sela
was a business owner, or soon would be, and she’d proven herself to be an
intelligent, resourceful woman this morning. She deserved his respect, not some
hound-dog attempt to get her alone in a box seat at the Music Pavilion.
    That
was the old Damien, and he had stopped being that person a long time ago.
    ****
    As
soon as Sela returned to her apartment, she rescheduled her own dance lesson
for the following week because she was in a terrible mood, and she knew it
would take more than a few days to get over it. She still took lessons with one
of the professors at SouthWest University so she kept her skills current, but
she knew her concentration wouldn’t be at peak level for the next couple of days.
    She
considered calling Santino to discuss what had happened, but then realized that
would be the worst thing to do. She no longer lived in the same apartment as
her brother, but they talked all the time. Santino never shut up about Damien.
He worshipped the man, and adored working for him.
    If Sela told Santino that she’d made an ass out of
herself with his boss, merely because he’d asked her out, it would bring down
trouble that Santino didn’t deserve because her brother would feel compelled to
say something to Damien.
    The
best thing to do would be to go to the gym and work this out on the machines,
but she wasn’t in the mood for that, either. Instead, she paced her tiny
apartment and wished she could start over again from early this morning. This
time, she’d leave the area as soon as she’d spotted Damien instead of standing
there gawking at him while he spoke with the foreman.
    ****
    By
the following morning, Sela was still sulking over the events of the previous
day. She decided to work on finalizing her schedule of private students for the
next month, as well as send them each email reminders that the studio was
scheduled to open in three months. Work kept her mind occupied and off Damien
Rivera, until an email came through from his company late in the morning.
    Santino
sent them so often that she didn’t glance twice at it but instead opened it
right away, thinking it was from her brother. It was from Damien, and it
contained the paperwork he’d promised on the corner unit. He hadn’t mentioned
their conversation from the prior day, or the upcoming concert. The email was
all business. Sela had been hoping to have a chance to speak with him about
yesterday, but now it looked like she’d blown that chance. Instead of brooding
about it all evening, she should have contacted him.
    As
Sela looked over the documents, she had an overwhelming urge to cry, and she
hated the sign of weakness. It’s not as if they had any kind of a relationship
and had quarreled. She hadn’t seen him since shortly after settling underground
with Santino.
    So
he’d flirted with her yesterday and invited her to see her favorite band in the
entire world … so what? Having him check her out and missing a concert she’d
kill to attend wasn’t what bothered her. It was the way she’d behaved.
    He
barely remembered her, and in the end she’d dredged all that up once more for
no reason. Nothing had changed the past, despite all her misery during the past
twenty-four hours. Obviously Damien wasn’t thinking about it, if his email was
anything by which to judge his mental state.
    She
forced herself to concentrate on the paperwork he’d sent. The contract for the
corner suite at the same rent she’d have paid for the interior unit was only
for one year. Tomás would likely raise her rent