“Yes,” she said, her voice normal and even. “You passed.”

Chapter Seven

“A good beginning for learning lifts is what we rather inelegantly call the fish dive, though if you’ve ever watched a school of fish dive, there’s nothing inelegant about it. They swoop fearlessly toward the ocean floor, with unconscious grace.”

Max sat at the back of the class. The community center’s room for the dance lessons had a wall of mirrors that sported a long bar for warm-ups. The wooden floor was worn shiny and smooth by the many feet that had pounded, tapped, scuffed or tripped across it. Janet had said it was used for everything from Pilates to yoga to Zumba.

As she’d predicted, he’d been treated to a lot of shy looks and giggles. He expected she was fully aware that such behavior was pretty intimidating to a man, especially when he was the lone male among a pack of teenage girls. Eventually she took pity on him, however, calling the class to order with a commanding tap of a cane. The girls responded with the same mixture of terror and respect that Janet generally inspired at K&A.

They’d done warm-ups, and Janet had groups of three show her how they were doing on combinations they’d learned in previous classes, correcting where necessary with a tap of the cane or demonstration. She was sparse with praise, but as such, a simple nod or lack of correction was enough to make a girl glow. When she showed them a step or movement, the skill she possessed was evident. He thought of the picture of the soaring ballet dancer over her couch. Had she once been able to do that? If so, not any more. As the dance class progressed, the cane she used to tap time or point for correction became a prop for subtle leaning as well. He’d definitely be sure to give her that foot massage tonight.

Thinking about it, he realized even her sheerest stockings had a glimmer to them, the kind of thing that would hide scars. When he’d put on her tights, he hadn’t done a thorough exploration of her skin, much as he’d desired to do so. The problem could be joint pain or those foot problems she’d mentioned, but he felt a desire to find out. He was starting to have a desire to find out everything about her.

Bringing his attention back to the class, he found Janet had moved on to the routine they were putting together for a Christmas recital. By the time the dancers were in the last thirty minutes of the two-hour class, they were sweating, but not a one of them slacked off. He didn’t think they would dare. At one point, a student had forgotten to turn off her cell phone. When it chirped from the tote bag hung on the back wall, the offending student had practically flown over there to silence it beneath Janet’s withering look. “So sorry, Madame, so sorry.”

He found that curious, how they all called her that. He didn’t know enough about ballet to know if it was a typical address for a teacher or not, but it suited her quite well.

“You’ve worked hard tonight.” Janet stood at the front of the class now, continuing her discussion of the lift. “Once we combine with the male class to bring together our recital routine, several of you will be chosen to perform the ‘fish dive’. As such, we’re going to spend the last thirty minutes introducing you to it.”

There were excited murmurs, the girls catching hands to squeeze and express their pleasure with the idea. Janet gave them precisely ten seconds to settle down, then quelled any further reaction with her look. “You’ve all noticed I’ve brought a friend tonight. He’s here to help teach the lift, given that he is far better equipped to lift you than I am.”

When she glanced back at Max, her lips quivered as the girls giggled. Max did his best not to humiliate himself with a damn blush. The woman was a sadist.

“The first hurdle you must overcome with lifts is your fear of falling. You must have utter confidence in your partner. If you cannot have that, you must overcome that regardless and be like the fish, diving fearlessly, concentrating on the execution of the move itself, stepping outside of yourself. However, tonight I want the confidence portion to be an irrelevant issue, so you can focus on the form.” Her gaze swept over them. “As you know, your well-being is always my primary concern.”

Despite her strict demeanor, tiny smiles appeared on several girls’ faces, some reflecting adoration. It told Max they trusted their teacher, believed in her regard for them. She had that effect on people.

“Max will keep you safe. He has my complete confidence.” Her gaze touched him briefly, then moved back to her class. “To assure you of that, he’s going to demonstrate the lift with me first. Since I am a heavy old broad, this will prove to you how easy lifting each of you will be for him.”

The girls laughed, making faces, and Janet allowed them a small, tight smile. Max shook his head at her but rose, coming to the front of the room.

“He should be wearing proper attire, but being that he is male and therefore entirely stubborn, we shall have to deal with him in this.” Janet cast a disparaging look at the jeans and T-shirt he’d donned from the bag of spare clothes he kept in his trunk.

“The only attire you had available were tights,” he muttered. The girls tittered and Janet’s lips twitched.

“Even so.” She set aside her stick and came to stand before him. “To start, you will be in arabesque en pointe. No toe shoes tonight though. The ball of the foot will be sufficient. There’s enough to think about without making it that complex.” She assumed the proper position and nodded without looking at Max. He bent his knee to give added support to the move, just as she’d instructed him during their warm-up before the class arrived.

“He’s putting his arm around my waist, just below my rib cage. His right arm goes over and around the right thigh, just above the knee. Now he will dip me toward the ground, arms in this position.”

As she demonstrated, reaching out with graceful arms and fingertips, Max lifted her and dipped her to the floor. The girls oohed softly, and he could see the more ambitious ones already imagining themselves in the same position.

“You’ll bend the straight leg and touch your toes to your right knee,” Janet continued from her suspended pose. “This is the parallel passé. Be sure and use your core muscles to pull you upright.” She passed her fingers over her upper and lower abdomen, drawing their eyes to that. It seemed like second nature to her to be held nearly upside down, feet nowhere near the ground. “As always, I expect to see clean lines. The arch of your back curves you in toward your partner. The moment you are dancing with another, there should be a romance to the bodies working together. It’s what your audience wants to see, and it will draw them into the movement, win their hearts.”

When she stopped instructing to show the move, arching back into Max, she looked up at him. Though he knew their sexual intimacy helped, he felt what she was describing, her body fitted into the angles of his, conveying her trust in his hold. As he glanced at the mirror, their position reminded him of the melded sculpture idea that had crossed his mind earlier. It gave him a far greater appreciation for ballet choreography, as well as the strength it required. He felt a brief quiver beneath his hold now, telling him she couldn’t hold this pose indefinitely. But her ease and skill in demonstrating it suggested that, at one time, she could have.

“You’ll exit the lift by straightening the left leg when he begins to dip you down again. Finish in arabesque en pointe as you started. And there we are. Yes, Tasha, we may begin with you.”

For the next thirty minutes, he took each girl through the lift, with Janet circling them, using taps of the stick to encourage a lifting of the body here, a straightening of the leg there. From having a teenage sister, he knew how, when it mattered, they could go from an apparent complete lack of focus, giggling and chattering, to this. Though most fluttered and blushed a little if they met his gaze, once they started working on the lift, all of them focused on Janet’s instruction.

Thinking of the repetitive activities his instructors had inflicted on him in BUD/S to teach focus and attention to detail, he realized Janet’s pre-class clothing exercise might have been to determine if he had the attention span to do this. He had to follow the same form, over and over, and adjust as needed. He felt almost as proud as her students when Janet only had to correct his form twice.

By the end of class, he also had a much keener respect for the strength and balance of a male ballet dancer. He’d had the stamina to get through, but he knew it would take someone with his level of fitness to lift and hold twelve different girls in the prescribed position multiple times over thirty minutes. A few of those guys might have what it took to get through BUD/S. Despite the tights.

Over the last fifteen minutes of class, parents started arriving. The way they tiptoed in, lining up against the back wall to watch, immediately checking their cell phones to ensure they were off, it was obvious Janet didn’t limit her severe chastising on proper behavior to her students alone.

The last student had hung back until the end. During the class, he’d noted she worked as hard, perhaps harder, than everyone else, though she didn’t have the same aptitude for it. She was a year or so younger, maybe twelve, and though she wasn’t precisely overweight, she was suffering from the baby fat that could be normal for girls in their early teens. She was hesitant when they got started, but by the time they’d been through the lift several times, she had it, and she positively glowed when he high-fived her. Amanda smiled like that, when she was unexpectedly pleased by something.

“Madame, I felt like a feather.”

“You looked like one. Good form. You’ve been working on your lines, and it shows.” Janet put a brief hand on her red hair. “All right, class, that’s it for tonight. Practice your recital moves and the new moves I’ve taught you, with the exception of this one. Until we’ve performed it a few times here, I do not want you enlisting a male friend to help you work on this elsewhere. Mr. Ackerman received thorough instruction from me. Anyone doing a lift must have similar instruction or they could injure you. They could also injure themselves if they haven’t warmed up properly. I know many of you have a great deal of initiative—it’s why you are in this advanced class—but I want to hear each of you promise me not to practice this move outside of class.”