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“Will you dance?” he asked formally.
“Yes, thank you,” she said automatically. Sylvia started the CD player again. She’d picked a different disk this time.
They waltzed first, moving so smoothly that Rue felt she was gliding across the floor without her feet touching the wood. “Swing next,” he murmured, and her feet did truly leave the floor, her black skirt fluttering out in an arc, and then she was down again and dancing.
Rue enjoyed herself more than she had in years.
When it was over, when she saw that his eyes were still cool and impersonal, it was easy to turn to Sylvia and say, “If you decide you want me to work for you, I’d like to dance with Sean. ”
The flash of petulance on Thompson’s face startled Rue.
Sylvia looked a bit surprised, but not displeased. “Great,” she said. “It’s not always easy. . . ” Then she stopped, realizing any way she finished the sentence might be tactless.
Julie was beaming. “Then I’ll dance with Thompson,” she said. “I need a partner, too. ”
At least I made Julie happy, Rue thought. Rue’s own partner-to-be didn’t comment. Sean looked neither happy nor sad. He took her hand, bowed over it and let it go. She thought she had felt cold lips touch her fingers, and she shivered.
“Here’s the drill,” Sylvia said briskly. “Here’s a contract for you to sign. Take it home with you and read it. It’s really simple. ” She handed Rue a one-page document. “You can have your lawyer check it over, if you want. ”
Rue couldn’t afford that, but she nodded, hoping her face didn’t reflect her thoughts.
“We have personnel meetings once a month, Blue Moon and Black Moon together,” Sylvia said briskly. “You have to come to those. If you don’t show up for an engagement, and you’re not in the hospital with a broken leg, you’re fired. If you fight with Sean, it better not show in public. ”
“What are the meetings for?” Rue asked.
“We need to know one another by sight,” Sylvia said. “And we need to share problems we have with clients. You can avoid a lot of situations if you know who’s going to be trouble. ”
It was news to Rue that there could be “trouble. ” She crossed her arms over her chest, suddenly feeling cold in the plum leotard. Then she looked down at the contract and saw what she would be paid per appearance. She knew that she’d sign; she’d have the contract in Sylvia’s hands the next day, so she could start work as soon as possible.
But after she’d gotten back to her cheap apartment, which lay in a decidedly unsafe part of Rhodes, Rue did study the contract. Nothing in the simple language was a surprise; everything was as Sylvia had told her. There were a few more rules, covering items like giving notice and maintaining any costumes she borrowed from the company stock, but the contract was basic. It was renewable, if both parties wanted, after a year.
The next morning, Rue bundled up in the brisk midwest spring morning and set out early to the campus so she would have time to detour. There was a mail slot in the door of the old building that housed Blue Moon/Black Moon. Rue poked the folded paper through the slit, feeling profound relief. That night Sylvia called Rue to schedule her first practice session with Sean O’Rourke.
Chapter 2
Wearing cutoff sweatpants and a sleeveless T-shirt, Sean waited in the studio. The new woman wasn’t late yet. She would be on time. She needed the job. He’d followed her home the night she’d auditioned. He’d been cautious all the years he’d been a vampire, and that had kept him alive for more than 275 years. One of his safety measures was making sure to know the people he dealt with, so Sean was determined to learn more about this Rue.
He didn’t know what to think of her. She was poor, obviously. But she’d had years of dance lessons; she’d had good makeup, a good haircut, the good English of privilege. Could she be an undercover operative of some kind? If she were, wouldn’t she have taken the opportunity to work for Black Moon, the only remotely interesting thing about Sylvia’s enterprises? Perhaps she was a rich girl on a perverse adventure.
His first fifty years as a vampire, Sean O’Rourke had done his best to conceal himself in the world of humans. He’d stayed away from others of his kind; when he was with them, the temptation to explore his true nature had grown too strong. Sean had been abandoned by the man who’d made him what he was. He’d had no chance to learn the basic rules of his condition; in his ignorance, he’d killed unfortunates in the slums of Dublin. Gradually, Sean had learned that killing his victims wasn’t necessary. A mouthful of blood could sustain him, if he had it every night. He’d learned to use his vampiric influence to blot out his victims’ memories, and he’d learned to blot out his own emotions almost as successfully.
After fifty years, stronger and colder, he’d begun to risk the company of other vampires. He’d fallen in love a time or two, and it had always ended badly, whether the woman he loved was another vampire or a human.
His new partner, this Rue, was beautiful, one of the most beautiful women he’d seen in centuries. Sean could admire that beauty without being swayed by it. He knew something was wrong with the girl, something hidden inside her. He hadn’t watched people, observed people, all these years without learning to tell when a human was concealing something. Maybe she was an agent for one of the fanatical organizations that had formed to force vampires back into the darkness of the shadows. Maybe she suffered from a drug addiction, or some physical condition she was hoping to hide for as long as possible.
Sean shrugged to himself. He’d speculated far too much about Rue’s possibilities. Whatever her secret was, in time he would learn it. He wasn’t looking forward to the revelation. He wanted to dance with her for a long time; she was light and supple in his arms, and she smelled good, and the swing of her thick mahogany hair made something in his chest ache.
Though he tried to deny it to himself, Sean looked forward to tasting her more than he’d looked forward to anything in decades.
* * *
The practice room was a larger studio behind the room in which she’d met Sylvia and the others. “Sean/Rue” was scrawled on the sign-up sheet for the six-thirty to eight o’clock time slot. Julie and Thompson would be practicing after them, Rue noticed.
She was nervous about being alone with the vampire. He was waiting for her, just as still and silent as he’d been two nights before. As a precaution, she’d worn a cross around her neck, tucked under the old gray leotard. The black shorts she’d pulled on over the leotard were made out of a shiny synthetic, and she’d brought ballet shoes, tap shoes and the T-strap character shoes she wore for ballroom dancing. She nodded to Sean by way of greeting, and she dumped the shoes out on the floor. “I didn’t know what you’d want,” she explained, all too aware that her voice was uneven.
“Why are the initials different?” he asked. Even his voice sounded dusty, as though it hadn’t been used in years. To her dismay, Rue discovered that she found the slight Irish accent charming.
“What do you mean? Oh, on the shoe bag?” She sounded like an idiot, she thought, and bit her lip. She’d had the shoe bag for so many years, she simply didn’t notice anymore that it was monogrammed.
“What is your real name?”
She risked a glance upward. The brilliant blue eyes were just blue eyes; they were fixed on her at the moment, but he wasn’t trying to rope her in, or whatever it was they did. “It’s a secret,” she said, like a child. She smacked herself on the forehead.
“What is your true name?” He still sounded calm, but it was clear he was going to insist. Actually, Rue didn’t blame him. She met his eyes. She was his partner. He should know.
“I go by Rue L. May. My name is Layla LaRue LeMay. My parents liked the song? You know it?” she asked doubtfully.
“Which version? The original one by Cream, or the slower Eric Clapton solo?”
She smiled, though it was an uncertain smile. “Origi
nal,” she said. “In their wilder years, they thought it was cool to name their daughter after a song. ” It was hard to believe now that her parents had ever had years of not being afraid what people would think, that once they’d been whimsical. She looked down. “Please don’t tell anyone my name. ”
“I won’t. ” She believed him. “Where do your parents live now?” he asked.
“They’re dead,” she said, and he knew she was lying.
And though he would need to sample her blood to be sure, Sean also suspected that his new partner was living in fear.
* * *
After they warmed up, that first practice session went fairly well. As long as they both concentrated on the dancing, the conversation was easy. When they touched on anything more personal, it wasn’t.
Sean explained that they were almost never called on to tap dance. “People who hire us want something flashy, or something romantic,” he said. “They want a couple who can tango, or a couple who can do big lifts, for the charity balls. If it’s something like an engagement party or anniversary, they want a sexy, slow dance, always ending with the bite. ”
Rue admired how impersonally he said it, as if they were both professionals in this together, like actors rehearsing a scene. In fact, that was exactly appropriate, she decided.
“I’ve never done this,” she said. “The biting thing. Ah, do you always bite the neck?” As if she didn’t care, as if she was quite matter-of-fact about the finale. She was proud of how calm she sounded.
“That’s what the audience likes. They can see it best, and it’s traditional. In real life, of course—if I can use the phrase ‘real life’—we can bite anywhere. The neck and the groin have the big arteries, so they’re preferred. It isn’t fatal. I’ll only take a drop or two. We don’t need much as we get older. ”
Rue could feel her face flood with color. This matched what she’d learned from the university’s computers, though she’d felt obliged to have Sean confirm what she’d read. She needed to know all this, but she was embarrassed, just the same. It was like discussing sexual positions, rather than the more comparable eating customs: missionary vs. doggy-style, rather than forks vs. chopsticks.
“Let’s try a tango,” Sean said. Rue put on her character shoes. “Can you wear a higher heel?” her partner asked impersonally.
“Yes, I can dance in something higher, but that would put me too close to your height, don’t you think?”
“I’m not proud,” he said simply. “It’s all in how it looks. ”
Aristocrat or not, he was a practical man. To Rue’s pleasure, Sean continued to be a great partner. He was very professional. He was patient, and since she was rusty, she appreciated his forbearance. As the session continued, Rue grew more confident. Her body began to recover its skills, and she began to enjoy herself immensely.
She hadn’t had fun in forever.
They ended up with a “cool-down” dance, a dreamy forties romantic song performed by a big band. As the music came to a close, Sean said, “Now I’ll dip you. ” Then he lowered her, until her back was almost parallel with the floor. And he held the position. A human couldn’t have sustained it for long, but his arm under her shoulders was like iron. All she had to do was keep her graceful alignment with his body. “Then, I bite,” he said, and mimed a nip at her neck. He felt her shiver and willed her to relax. But she didn’t, and after a moment, he assisted her in standing up again.
“We could have a booking this weekend, if you feel you’re up to it,” he said. “We’d have to practice every night, and you’d have to have your costumes ready. ”
She was relieved to have a safe topic to latch on to. Julie and Thompson were standing by the door, waiting for their turn in the practice room. They were listening with interest.
“Sylvia said there was a wardrobe of costumes?”
“I’ll show you,” Sean said. He sounded as calm and indifferent as he had at the beginning of the session.
After she’d glanced in the room off Sylvia’s office, where costumes were hanging in rows on rolling racks, she went to the ladies’ room. As she was washing her hands, Julie came in. The young blonde looked especially happy, with flushed cheeks and a big smile.
“I gotta tell you,” Julie said. “I’m really glad you picked Sean. I always thought Thompson was pretty hot, and Sean is as cold as they come. ”
“How long have you been dancing for Sylvia?” Rue asked. She wanted to steer clear of discussing her partner.
“Oh, a year. I have a day job, too, clerking at an insurance agency, but you know how hard it is to get along. I settled in Rhodes because I thought a city in the middle of the country would be cheaper than either coast, but it’s hard for a girl to make it on her own. ”