by Louisa Trent
Just as well he was getting out of his apartment. No sense waiting around for a call that never came.
Surprisingly, he found The Flamingo in total darkness when he rushed through the bright pink door.
Odd, to keep a job applicant waiting in an unlit deserted club, he thought.
He called out, “Tomas, I'm here. Let's get this audition on the road. Where's the applicant-”
No answer.
Now he was annoyed. What? Was this Ruiz's idea of a practical joke? There was no one here—
Before he could flip the main electrical switch and do some investigating, the spotlights on stage came up.
Okay, someone was here.
He kept waiting for the stage lights to come all the way up, but the beams stalled at dim. Whoever the job applicant was, she was evidently going for romantic ambience rather than bright lights and flash. Fine with him if she preferred the quiet approach. Generally speaking, he didn't like a dancer's sensuality to clobber him over the head. At least he wouldn't have to suffer through another loud rendition of one of Gypsy Rose Lee's striptease classics, Lou thought, removing his gray wool overcoat and settling into a chair on the floor to observe the performance.
When the movie soundtrack to “91/2 Weeks” kicked in, Lou smiled; the music got to him every time.
The dancer slowly and suggestively swayed her way to center stage, a pink feather plume hiding her face. She had a tall and willowy build, and an extraordinarily feminine demeanor. Sexy, but not flaunting it. Elegantly attired in a white lace cocktail dress, she conducted herself like lady up there one stage-no bawdy bumping and grinding for her-and her routine was all the more alluring because of it.
Blue never did anything in half measures.
But why was she doing this? Why the masquerade?
The routine looked effortless, the hallmark of hours spent rehearsing. Like a real pro, she swapped her plume from hand to hand, making sure her face was hidden at all times, as she did a peek-a-boo tease with the loose neckline, letting it slip down to reveal some demure cleavage. When she finally got to the point where she untied the wispy knot at the neck and the cocktail dress gaped open, he was enthralled.
With a genteel shimmy, the lace slithered, inch by slow inch, off her shoulders.
Holding the plume vertically between her teeth, so that her face remained hidden, she wiggled her wide shoulders and the white lace slid all the way to the floor, leaving her in a tiny pink bra and matching G-string.
Slack-jawed and mouth watering, he gawked, enticed.
Thigh-high lace stockings, five-inch stilettos, perky breasts, flat belly. It was one sexy package, and he was getting hot. Blue was stripping for him, all for him!
When the tempo picked up and she twirled, her heart-shaped bottom titillating, undulating-he had to hand it to her, she knew how to shake her booty in a refined ladylike manner-he sat up straighter in the chair. Then leaned forward in his chair. Then vacated the chair and paced back and forth in the shadows. He couldn't master the nearly overpowering sense of lust that had descended upon him, and his arousal was making sitting down uncomfortable.
He wished she'd show him her face!
But no. She glided toward a chair on stage, her prop, and gracefully raised a leg up on top of the seat. Using only one hand-the other still held the plume in front of her face-she rolled the garter down her endless leg and over her stiletto. She tossed it at him.
He caught it, brought the wisp of lace to his nose and inhaled the sweet scent of Blue.
The music stopped.
Her cue to finish the act?
Looked like it, for she was reaching for the front clasp on her tiny pink bra.
He didn't want it like this! Not up on a stage, and not with her face hidden. And did she really think he wouldn't know who she was?
“Hold on,” he shouted from the shadows. “My dancers don't go all the way.”
“No topless numbers?” she said, the plume muffling her voice.
“Not in this club!”
“How about a private show? I could make it worth your while.”
“Absolutely not!” he blustered.
“Why not?”
“Because I don't do that sort of thing.”
The plume lowered. “I'm glad you don't.”
He wanted to rush the stage, take her in his arms, never let her go, but he had a sick feeling in his gut that what she'd just put him through was just another one of her tests, and so instead he said coldly, “Did I pass?”
“Pass what?”
“Listen Blue, I can't take any more of these games.”
“I'm not playing any game.”
“Oh, no?”
“No! I'm on this stage only to show you I've changed my mind about The Pink Flamingo.” She hung her head. “I'm sorry if it backfired. I'll just leave.”
To give her some privacy while she gathered up her clothes, he turned his back.
“I'm all dressed,” she said, stepping around to face him.
She looked different. More womanly. Softer too. It wasn't just the new hairdo and makeup. Or the dress. Something inside her had changed.
Sweat broke out on his forehead. “Why did you come back, Blue?”
“It doesn't matter now. Please just know it wasn't to catch you in a lie.”
He digested this. Maybe he'd taken her striptease the wrong way. Maybe he'd always been just a little sensitive about his job, a little defensive. Maybe, if he had taken her dance at face value, trusted her motivation, maybe Blue would be in his arms right now instead of looking hurt and sorrowful and mortified.
A woman who puts it all on the line, who sets out to seduce a man in a dance, should never look the way Blue was looking now.
He'd screwed up.
He took a tremulous breath, tremulous because he was scared that he'd lost her, that he wasn't doing this right, and he wanted so much to do this right, the way it should be done when a man loves a woman.
“After all that exercise, you must be hungry,” he said. It was lame, but not knowing what else to say, he figured he'd suggest eating; they could talk over dinner. “I know this quiet restaurant that serves vegan food.”
“Sprout's?”
“Yeah. Will you do me the honor of having dinner with me there? That is, if you're not just passing through town?”
“No,” she said, her blue eyes shimmering, and moving toward the coat closet. “I'm not just passing through town. I've rented a studio on the Southside, so I'll be here for a while. And I'd like very much to have dinner with you.”
She was in town for a while?
Time to get some things settled. Make it all nice and neat and orderly.
“It's a dinner date,” he said, emphasizing the last word so she would understand what his intentions were and that they were honorable.
“I see. A date. Then, yes, I accept your date,” she said formally.
“Here, allow me,” he said as she reached for the only garment inside the closet.
As he helped her on with the coat she said, “I thought I should learn to use hangers. The man I would very much like to get to know better is a real stickler when it comes to taking care of his belongings.”
His heart hammered against his ribs. Because they were emotion-filled, his words came out sort of garbled, not clear and crisp, like they should've, like he wanted them to “A man's most precious belongings are the people he loves.”
She smiled. “Apart for the sex specific phraseology, which I must say is sexism at its very worst, I couldn't agree with you more. It's only love that counts.”
Lou remembered thinking once that it worked out better if a man and a woman had a few dates before falling into bed. A few getting-to-know-you conversations after the movies. A few respectful kisses exchanged outside the door before moving into lingering kisses inside the door. Maybe some beginning petting in the living room. Followed by some intermediate petting. Then lots and lots of advanced petting. Then foreplay. Light, med
ium, heavy foreplay. Steamy, all-night-long foreplay. Hands. Mouths. Tongues. After weeks of this, when the Big Night finally arrived he was thinking along the lines of some fine wine, possibly bubbly, chilling beside a table in a dimly lit restaurant. Soft music playing in the background. No damn arguments going on in the foreground. No need, because by that point in the relationship, they'd hammered out all the basic differences and they'd reached some sort of mutually acceptable understanding.
Blue and he had a few differences, and maybe they should go slow and learn everything there was to know about each other, iron out those differences before they got serious.
Then again, maybe life is short and messy, and when it's right, nothing else matters.
He took Blue's hand in his. “I love you. Will you marry me?”
He added quickly, because women like such things, “After a romantic courtship, of course.”
“I love you too, and yes, I'll marry you.” Her blue eyes twinkled merrily. “But as to a romantic courtship-I'll give you a week, and that's it.”
“Fuck that,” he replied, pulling Blue close and kissing her lips, laughter rumbling through him. “A week is about seven days too long. I say we fly to Vegas after our dinner date. I'll romance you after we married. That way, the courtship won't ever have to end.”
THE END
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Louisa Trent is happiest writing and so she writes all the time, even when the veggies are in need of peeling and the dust bunnies are in need of vacuuming. When she was far too young to contemplate anything as serious as marriage, she snatched up a boy with a sense of humor and led him right to the altar. Somewhere along the way, she picked up a couple of academic degrees which she uses each and every day, though certainly not in the way she intended to use them. Blessed with three funny sons and a husband who still makes her giggle, she lives in a quaint New England town in a messy home surrounded by flowers and laughter.
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