Dropping his beer to the ground, he began to make his way doggedly through the crowd and toward her. Her voice was quivery and her legs unsteady as she poured out her heart in a surprisingly clear and poignantly pleasant wail, “Oh, baby, do you wanna dance?” And the whole time she sang, she danced in place, her hips and shoulders swaying from side to side, her arms outstretched in a beckoning manner.
She’s dancing for me, was the second thing he realized.
From the time they were kids, Luc had been teasing Sylvie about how someday she would dance with him. Well, she was sure as hell doing it now, except that she was dancing for him. With tears in her eyes and her heart in her wavering voice, she was making a monumental effort—monumental, for a timid, publicity-shy person like Sylvie—to prove something to him.
She loves me, was the third thing Luc realized, and it hit him square in the heart.
Now, she was exhorting her “baby” to squeeze her all night long, followed by the refrain “Oh, baby, do you wanna dance?”
He’d almost reached the stage after shoving aside two security guards, who were probably calling for backups. He saw the moment that Sylvie saw him. Her eyes went wide with pleading and her arms, which would appear beckoning in a sexual way to the audience, were clearly beckoning him to rescue her before she had one of her anxiety attacks in front of five hundred people.
He wanted to whack Charmaine and Claudia and Blanche on their heads. They’d probably talked Sylvie into doing this, not realizing she wasn’t up to this kind of exposure.
But, God, he loved Sylvie for doing it.
With hands braced on the edge of the stage, he vaulted himself up and rushed to Sylvie’s side.
“Dance, dance, dance,” the crowd shouted, misinterpreting his actions as those of a lover coming to join Sylvie in her act… a rehearsed culmination to the stage show.
He did just that, but only as a means to dance her off the stage. Pulling her into his embrace, he whispered against her ear, “Hold on, babe. Everything’s gonna be okay now.”
She pulled away slightly, even as they danced slowly toward the back of the stage while the three Dunce-ettes shoobee-doo’d the lyrics. Gazing up at him, Sylvie smiled and said, “I did it, Luc. I actually got up on a stage and sang. I guess that proves something, huh?” Her voice was choked with pride and emotion and a vulnerability that tugged at his heartstrings.
“You did great, darlin’. But why?”
She said something, but he couldn’t hear over the clapping of the excited crowd and the continued harmonizing of the Dunce-ettes.
“What?” He leaned closer. In her killer high heels, Sylvie was almost eye-level with him, and now that he thought about it, their body parts were perfectly aligned. That, of course, gave him ideas for later.
“I did it to prove to you that I wasn’t pitiful.”
“Huh?” he exclaimed, and whisked Sylvie through the stage curtains and down the back steps.
The Dunce-ettes doo-whopped on without them, “Do you do you do you… oh, baaaby!”
Luc pulled Sylvie close to his side and walked her toward the trees, away from the people who hung around in clusters, even behind the stage. Once she was leaning back against the wide tree trunk, she wilted.
God, he wanted answers to so many things, but more than anything he wanted to take Sylvie into his arms and kiss her and kiss her and kiss her till no questions and no answers were necessary. Then, he’d like to kiss her some more.
“Why are you smiling?” Sylvie asked. Now she was calmed down somewhat. God, I can’t believe I actually got up on that stage and sang. And danced. Lordy, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to regress into shyness again. Then she began to notice her surroundings. Had Luc really “rescued” her like that? My very own Cajun Knight!
“You’re smiling, too, babe,” he said in a husky voice that did wonderful, fluttery things to the pit of her stomach,
“I’m happy,” she whispered.