I peeked my head out the door and into the hall, twisting the bottom of my pajama top between my fingers as I checked to make sure Mom and Dad had gone to bed.

Noting the fact that the house was quiet, and I could hear a slightly muffled snore coming from my parents’ bedroom, I decided to make a run for it.

I tiptoed across the wooden floors, leaping from one foot to another in order to avoid the boards that creaked. The hallway was quite wide, but my sister’s bedroom was on the other side, and we never went to sleep anymore without a nightly trip across the hallway.

At first, we’d always taken turns. One night she would make the run for it and the next I would risk it. But the last couple of years, it had always been me crossing the hallway to Sophie’s bedroom, simply because to get from the hall to inside the bedroom and the soft carpet, I’d have to make a leap which had taken me a long time in dance class to perfect.

I bit my lip as I did just that, landing right inside Sophie’s doorway and grabbing the frame, so I didn’t fall backward. Her bedside lamp flicked on, blinding me for a moment until I spotted her grinning face as she pulled back the blankets for me to climb in. I rushed over and dived in beside her, tucking the blanket underneath my armpits and grabbing her hands in mine.

“Tell me, Sophie,” I whispered, eager to hear about the adventure she’d been on that day.

She giggled, tucking her dark hair behind her ears and laying her hands in her lap. There were four years between Sophie and me, yet, she’d always been my best friend.

“I had to kiss Malcolm,” she said on a gasp, her body wriggling around under the blanket.

My mouth dropped open, and I stared at her with a mixture of horror and jealousy.

Sophie was on a Nickelodeon television show called Terifficness. She was the best friend to the main character and acted with my crush, Malcolm Dennis. He was so cute, I even had pictures of him plastered up on my bedroom wall, but I made Sophie promise that she would never tell him.

“Was it… good?” I asked, curiosity getting the better of me. Sophie was fifteen, so she’d already had her first kiss. At eleven, I still wondered sometimes whether it was possible for boys to have cooties.

She shrugged. “It was okay.”

I raised my eyebrow, I could always tell when Sophie was lying to me. “Sophie…”

She sighed and fell back onto the bed, grabbing hold of my hand. “I know you like him, I don’t want you to get mad at me.”

I frowned at her. “I could never get mad at you.”

“Never?”

I shook my head. “He’s just a boy. Why would we let a stupid boy come between us?”

She grinned back at me, her soft brown eyes warming me inside. “Nothing will ever come between us, Emmy. You’ll always have me, and I’ll always have you. Nothing else matters.”

I felt comfort knowing that no matter what happened, Sophie would always stand beside me. I knew growing up would be hard. There would be boys who would probably break my heart, there would be school work and university, and dance too. I was learning new tricks every day, and it made my muscles hurt sometimes so badly that I would cry at night.

I couldn’t tell Mom or Dad, though, because I knew they would use it as an excuse to pull me out of dance class, and dance was everything to me. I loved the music, the way I could use my body to tell a story and how happy it made me feel when I was on the dance floor.

I could make it through anything with Sophie by my side, though. We were two different people, but sometimes I felt like we shared a soul.

“You’ll never leave me right, Sophie?” I asked her, just needing to hear her say the words.

She stared at me for a moment like I was absolutely crazy, but soon she smiled and without warning leaped on top of me, her arms wrapping around my neck. I started to laugh, unable to keep it in as she smothered me.

“Okay, okay, I get it,” I protested through giggles, trying to keep my voice as low as possible.

“I’ll never leave you, Emmy. I promise.”

 

My body shivered as a cold chill ran up my back, and my eyes flicked open. I could feel wetness on my cheeks, and my breathing was labored. Shaking my head, I wiped them away, memories of Sophie making me want to scream out loud and throw something at the wall. She had always been my rock, even when we were kids. Sophie was years older than I was, but she never once treated me like I was an annoying little sister that she didn’t want to spend time with.

She would give up time with her friends and other famous kids to come home and hang out with me or come to my recitals. Looking back, it almost seemed as though Sophie was somewhat taking the place of my parents, encouraging me to follow my passions when my parents would prioritize my studies.

She was never supposed to leave me.

It should have been me.

It was meant to be me.

Would this kind of guilt ever go away? Sophie seemed to have so much more to bring the world. People everywhere loved her, cherished her, and looked up to the amazing woman that she was.

Did I have anything like that to offer?

No, not at all.

I had nothing spectacular or amazing to offer the world. Lawyers were one in a million, so were dancers. What else did I have?

Feeling frustrated, I tossed the blankets off me and climbed out of bed. The clock on the nightstand read 6:00 a.m., but I was wide awake. I often got up early for training if I had a competition coming up, or occasionally when my body ached to get out there and dance.

Like it did right now.

I ignored it though.

Dance brought me joy, happiness, and I knew for those moments that I would be free and that all of this crazy atmosphere surrounding me would disappear. The idea was enticing, it was something I actually did often—used dance to escape.

Right now, though, I didn’t feel like I deserved it.

Making my way down the hall, I was careful to keep my footsteps light, not wanting to wake the beast. He was probably cranky in the mornings. I was surprised when I reached the open plan living room that the balcony doors were already pushed wide open, the morning sun shining in through them. Curiously, I peeked outside, my mouth going dry when I spotted Angelo standing at the edge of the balcony looking out over the street. A pair of suit pants hung low on his hips, but he was naked from the waist up and held a coffee cup in his hand.

I licked my lips.

The man had the body of a fucking god. While he looked mighty fine in a suit, the outfit matching his harsh character, it definitely did not do him any justice. I wondered how often he worked out because a body like his took effort, it took strict diet and hours upon hours at the gym.

I should know, being a dancer, I was pretty lucky with my body shape, but building muscle strong enough to do the things I could do on stage, it took work. A lot of fucking work. And you have to watch the kind of food you take in, or you become that girl who isn’t willing to make sacrifices and fight for her craft.

“Do you have any tattoos?” I asked, not surprised when he didn’t flinch at the sound of my voice. Angelo knew everything, who was where and at what time.

He turned his body toward me, leaning back against the brick surrounding. “Tattoos are easily identifiable.”

He made his point without saying it, and I nodded. “Right. Point taken.”

Angelo started walking toward me, and I hurried inside, making a beeline for the kitchen as my stomach growled loudly. I’d given Andre a list of the types of food I liked the night before, and my smile grew as I spotted the grocery bags waiting for me on the counter top.

The first thing I did was search the kitchen for a bowl, finding one just six cupboards later, with no help from Angelo who simply stood in the doorway, watching me struggle. Of course, I could have asked, and he probably would have told me, but apparently we were both a little fucking stubborn sometimes.

I smiled as I poured myself a bowl of Coco Pops, my mouth almost watering. I usually wouldn’t buy this kind of stuff for myself, but last night I’d gone full on fuck-it-all and told Andre to bring me the biggest box they had.

“How can you eat that shit for breakfast?”

I frowned and looked back up at Angelo who was staring at my full bowl, one eyebrow raised.

“What do you mean? Coco Pops are awesome,” I defended.

“You’re eating a bowl of sugar,” he said, staring at the contents as I poured my milk and dropped a spoon in.

I dug out a huge spoonful and shoved it in my mouth, smiling as I did so and then shrugged. “It tastes so good,” I mumbled around the crunchy cereal.

A smile pulled at the corner of his mouth as he pushed off the glass of the door and walked around to the fridge. He grabbed a bottle of water, unscrewed the top, and chugged back half of its contents before placing the bottle down on the counter. “I thought dancers had to be careful about what they put in their bodies.”

I shoveled another spoonful in my mouth, chewing for a few seconds before I answered, “I have good genes.”

He laughed, and I relished in the sound.

Catching Angelo carefree and smiling was rare. I took the moment as I could and committed it to my memory for later. He may seem like he’s hard and scary most of the time, but deep down he was human just like the rest of us. It was this side of him that made things so hard. Knowing that there was a man deep inside there which was capable of feelings and emotions, despite the hard exterior that he displayed.

The sexy bad boy with dark tendencies pulled me in, but it was the man beneath the mask that held me captive. I wanted him so bad my heart ached. But it seemed like the closer I got, the further he moved away.

“I hope you like pizza then,” he commented as he tossed the now empty bottle of water in the trash.

I rolled my eyes. “That’s not even a question. Who doesn’t like pizza?”

“Good,” he replied, heading down the hallway to his bedroom. “Because today you’re going to taste the best pizza in New York, and learn a little bit about your family history.”

Oh, joy.