Chapter 55: Have this Dance

ELRETH

His eyes were so fierce and… full. It stole her breath. She was terrified she would say the wrong thing, or not know the right answer and he'd walk away again. But when she said that, when she begged him not to leave again, his eyes softened.

He huffed a sound she'd only ever heard her father make and it startled her, twanging in her belly and making her breath come faster.

"That's the thing, El… You don't have to do it alone." Then he stepped right up to her, offering his hand. "I can show you. If you'll let me."

He was devastating. How had she never seen him like this before? It was like she'd been blind for twenty years, and here he was. No longer simply her best friend. Suddenly he was this… male. The light in his ice-blue eyes, the strength in his brow, the hard line of his jaw—the steel strength of all of him when he pulled her into his chest.

Both of them breathed too fast. She stared at his throat when it bobbed.