Into the Spotlight Read Free

technique, daring and danger. When the last dancer cleared the last hoop, the flames vanished and darkness whispered along Jeannie’s skin.
    Her hips rolled as she strode onto the stage. This was what had brought her to Vegas the first time.
    The love of adventure. The arts. The performance.
    It held her hostage.
    Jeannie swayed to the left and the dancers to her left pulsed. She swayed to the right and the six girls on her right pulsed, their fists toward the audience, heads snapping back. They were sprawled against the stage, like so many broken dreams.
    They rose and fell at the extension of her arms. Here. In this moment. She was the ringmaster. Her gaze drifted across the darkness until she found the twin flames of blue waiting for her.
    He was still here.
    A smile teased the corners of her mouth, a break in character and a provocative invitation in one. Jeannie gave into the temptation and openly smiled at his gaze in the dark. The music faltered a note as she extended her arm toward him.
    She kissed the air and blew, directing the kiss with her arm so that Blue Eyes would know the kiss was his. A draft of air stirred the mist around her, her skin throbbing as though caressed in return. Her smile grew and her arms shot upwards, palms to the ceiling. The music crescendo struck, and the dancers exploded to their feet at her command. Jeannie gave herself to the dance.
    A dance meant for Blue Eyes.
     
     
    The stage makeup came off easier than it went on. Jeannie applied the cold cream, lathering it to soften the makeup before using a cotton cloth to wipe it off. The ritual activity remained important long past the days of ticking off time or caring who and what she’d been before she came to serve her sentence in this desert purgatory.
    Two and a half hours on the stage, ten pounds of water weight lighter, and she performed the ritual out of necessity, as exhaustion and exhilaration swam inside of her.
    “Pandora.” Heidi again. The stage manager and keeper stood at the door, her little minion curled around her neck with one hand on Heidi’s hair. The little creature was cute, but forever chattering, so Heidi tucked her away during show preparation and brought her out when they could all relax.
    Jeannie schooled her features into faint boredom, wanting to smother the bouncing balls jiggling inside her stomach. “Yes?”
    “A customer wishes you to join him for a drink.”
    The chattering across the room ceased. Heidi couldn’t have created a larger silence if she’d smashed two large cymbals together.
    “What?” Jeannie studied Heidi’s reflection in the mirror. But the woman’s dark eyes and sardonic expression gave nothing away. Heidi had served in the Midnight Mystery Lounge longer than any of her performers. She cajoled. She coaxed. She ordered. She listened. But she didn’t tease.
    “A customer has issued an invitation to join him for a drink.”
    Jeannie avoided looking at the other dancers. They’d kill for an opportunity to walk out into the theatre, to sit and dine with a wealthy patron. At least they would until he turned out to be a scale demon or a blood-bound sorcerer, or worse—a shifter with animalistic appetites stimulated by the show.
    She opened her mouth to say no.
    “Let me change” slipped out instead.
    Heidi glanced at the other girls who stood in light groupings, staring as though someone hit a pause button on the Pit’s players. “Finish cleaning up. Your suppers will be served downstairs in thirty minutes, and we have no more encores this evening. Pandora, Stan will wait for you at the door and escort you.”
    Jeannie tried to blot out the reason why her “no” had become a “let me change”, but she couldn’t hide from the knowing eyes staring back at her in the mirror. She couldn’t hide from the frisson of anticipation that bounced more enthusiastically than Heidi’s chattering minion.
    The invitation was from Blue Eyes.

Chapter Three
    The crowd in the Midnight