Brody looked down at her, this small woman with more muscle and balance than he’d ever imagined, a hand on her hip, staring down a man nearly a foot taller than she. She was surprisingly blunt, a quality he very much enjoyed. Still, he wasn’t quite ready to say he couldn’t stop thinking of her and had sought her out.

“I was at my bank. It’s just a few blocks away. I go to this little Indian place for lunch afterward. Like a little ritual, I suppose. Anyway, I was there, eating way too much naan, when I looked up and saw your name on the door across the street. I wandered in, came up the stairs, looked at the photographs of you in all that ballet tutu stuff, realized you were like some ballet superstar. When I walked through and saw you, I just watched for a bit. I hope you don’t mind.”

She had all that glorious, pale blonde hair twisted into a high bun. Her graceful neck was exposed, set off by the straps of the leotard she wore. His hands twitched with the need to brush fingertips over the edge of her collarbone. She wasn’t wearing a tutu or a skirt. He’d sort of been expecting that. Instead she wore a leotard with longer shorts over it and the prettiest shoes—toe shoes he figured, with the way they laced around her ankles. All that strength in such an elegant package. He found himself impressed and yet put off by it. She was culture and classical music, and he . . . was not.

“No, of course I don’t mind. I had a morning class. It’s a small one, but serious. These students are very good. I’m lucky to have them. I came to Seattle at the right time. A school closed and two of the preeminent teachers here have retired. My old dance partner at NBT, his mother was one of those teachers. I inherited many of her students.”

“I imagine your history helps too. Can’t be too many principal dancers offering classes.”

She laughed. “Well, we dancers don’t like to just walk away if we don’t have to. I don’t want to stop dancing. I just can’t do it at the level I had before. So this is a wonderful opportunity for me. And yes, it helps that I was at the level I was when I . . . retired.”

The weight of all they left unsaid hung between them. “Will you dance for me? I’ve only seen The Nutcracker. My mom, she took us every year. I didn’t see much of you when I came in.”

“I’m not . . . not what I was in those pictures. My right leg was broken in two places. I’m older now. I’m not her anymore.”

He stepped closer, so close she scented the soap he’d used that morning. “You’re you. Please. I’d very much like to see you dance.”

She paused, taking his measure. “All right. You can sit over there if you like. How about something a little nontraditional? Before I left, one of the choreographers did something for me. It’s one of my favorite pieces.”

“I’d like that.”

She moved away and he settled into a nearby chair. She bent in half, and he had a brief but very vivid image of bending her over just that way and sliding his c**k into her from behind. Christ, the woman did things to his mind.

But when she hit the remote and moved into position, and a few moments later Tito Puente came through the speakers, he was a goner.

Shoulders rolling, she moved slowly, sensuously, across the hardwood floors. She opened herself up to the music, to the movements, until it was all one thing. Like breathing. She was the dance. The beat was cha-cha, so the choreography was all about sensuality, grace, balance and movements from the toes up. So many times every day she failed to find the words, but when she moved she didn’t need words, she spoke with her body.

His eyes on her were a brand. The tension between them was taut, exciting. She felt him watch her, his gaze a heated caress of her neck, her arms. In his eyes, she felt beautiful and sexy. Elise was, right then, a siren, a seductress with her body and her grace. It was rare to feel that anymore, and the confidence of it roared through her. She knew her leaps were beautiful, her grand jetés precise and her pirouettes spot-on. Part of her wanted him to see how good she was, wanted him to realize she was more than a broken dancer who’d run from the spotlight, but a dancer who’d held it for good reason for many years.

It burned within her, that recognition, that beauty, until she stepped back on her left foot, rolling her shoulders to set her head when the music died.

Time slid by as she stood tall and met his gaze. Silence, thick, charged, hung between them. Everything unsaid, everything said and done, it was all there in his gaze, in the one she returned. Oh, how she wanted this man. He simply continued to watch her without speaking. He stared for so long, she wondered if she’d misinterpreted those looks from him as she danced.

“I’ve never seen anything like you before.” He moved to her slowly, not gracefully; he was too big for that. But enough to let her step back or run. The heat in his eyes, the memory of his lips on her wrist, of his taste on her tongue, held her there, rooted to the spot.

“Is that a good thing, or a bad thing?”

“To be honest with you, Elise, I don’t know. Here’s what I do know. I can’t stop thinking about you. Thinking about those kisses we shared, about the way your pulse at your wrist beat against my lips. The hollow of your throat.” He drew a fingertip over that very sensitive skin and she drew in a shaky breath. “The way you smell. Christ, so feminine. Not flowery, not vanilla, but so female. Drives me crazy.” He leaned in and took a deep breath, his lips hovering just above her shoulder.

“I probably smell like female sweat just now.” She tried to joke, but his nearness put her on edge. Not with fear but with desire, with wanting things she’d never imagined she’d want. Of wanting him to give her exactly what he said he wanted to deliver. Of wanting him to take.