Rumor (Renegades #4)(16)
Author: Skye Jordan

“I want to help,” he murmured in that low rumbling voice.

Again, too little, too late.

She knew she should let go and step back, but, God, she needed someone to lean on so badly. “There’s nothing you can do. There’s nothing anyone can do. It just…is.”

His hands stroked across her shoulders, those big warm hands on her skin, sliding intimately over her Lycra tank, curving over the small of her back, and traveling up her spine to the back of her neck. She wanted to lift her face to his neck, to breath him in, to taste his skin, to lick his lips the way she had last night. Craved the pressure of him between her legs, the sizzle of skin on skin.

“Let me take over the expenses here,” he murmured, cupping her head and kissing her temple. “I have the money, and you can’t keep running these crazy hours. You come here, then you go to cheer practice, then you’re at the club until an ungodly hour. You’re going to make yourself sick, then where will you be?”

The heat glowing at the center of her body immediately cooled, and she pushed away. “You realize that when you tell me I can’t do something, it just makes me want to prove you wrong, don’t you?”

“I didn’t mean can’t as in can’t, I just—”

“Mom worked two jobs and raised me for over twenty years. I sure as hell can do it for as long as she needs me. And dammit, there’s more to the club than just money. Didn’t you hear what I told you last night?”

“I did—”

“I may have taken the job to pay for Mom’s care, but I’ve built it into something different and special. Something unique. I would still work at the club even if I didn’t need the job for Mom.”

“I know,” he said, gently, seriously. “I talked to the owner last night. He thinks of you like a daughter. Brags about how much business you’ve brought in. How much the girls love you. How you’re the damn glue that keeps that place together.”

She pressed her lips together, not sure how to feel. Or what to believe.

“I don’t want to tell you what to do,” he said. “I just want you safe and happy. And I want Carolyn comfortable. I love her too.”

A mixed flurry of emotion swept in, whirling into chaos. He was able to say he loved her mother but not her. His offer, while sweet and generous, was also ignorant and shortsighted. And the bottom line was…she couldn’t depend on him in any way that mattered.

“I know you mean well, Josh, but that’s unrealistic in more ways than I have time to explain right now.”

He blew out a breath, shifted on his feet, and put his hands on his hips. “What can I do?”

She crossed her arms. “You can leave,” she said, in her gentlest voice, even though a sense of loss raged inside her. “Because we both know you’ve created your life somewhere else, and you’re going to leave eventually anyway. It would be better for all of us if you left sooner rather than later.”

She opened the driver’s door, and Josh caught the top in one big hand. “I’m not leaving like this.”

“Like what? Like this?” She gestured between them, indicating the conflict brewing. “This is how you left it a year ago. And nothing’s changed.”

She sat and pulled on the door, but Josh didn’t let go. “Everything’s changed. And I’m going to find a way to help—both you and Carolyn.”

She heaved a sigh, struggling to hold on to her patience while gathering her last whisper of strength to meet his eyes deliberately. “I’m late for cheer practice. Please let go, I need the money.”

5

Grace pulled her car around to the back of the club, her mind calculating where Josh might be. If he’d left town directly from Safe Haven, he could be waiting on his flight home to Philadelphia. Pushing him away had been heart wrenching, but she had priorities, and he’d chosen not to be among them. She’d just have to find a way to get over it. Eventually, she would. Her mother’s Alzheimer’s had forced Grace to face a lot of tough times and heartbreaking choices.

She stopped beside the back door, which had been propped open. Drywall leaned against the building, and tools were lined up along the wall.

“Oh jeez,” she muttered, glancing around the lot for a work van. “What’s broken now?”

She only hoped the cost to fix whatever it was wouldn’t interfere with the planned storeroom renovation. Dean had already put her studio on hold once, waiting for his lousy brother-in-law to get his shit together and do the job. Grace had finally convinced him to move forward with a different contractor, but their bids had come in on the high side. Any extra expense or dip in revenue would delay the project again. And she needed that space—one she would lease from Dean to start her own dance school.

Dread snaked down her spine as she pulled the groceries and giant Costco lasagna out of the trunk.She stepped through the back door and scanned the massive dressing room, already buzzing with a dozen dancers pulling out costumes, applying makeup, and styling their hair.

“Hi, ladies,” Grace called, her greeting echoed from the others as she set the food down at the other end of the only table, where one of Jasmine’s four-year-old twins was sitting, coloring. A mix of African-American and Hispanic, the twins were the most beautiful creatures Grace had ever met. They were also as sweet as sugar and as gregarious as their father. “Hi, Dillon. Where’s your mom?”

He looked up with those huge, innocent brown eyes, twirling a blue crayon between his fingers. “Don’t know.”

Grace nodded at his drawing. “What’s that?”

“Transformer. Santa’s gonna bring me one for Christmas.”

“Cool,” she said. “Where’s your brother?”

“Helping the builder man.”

Grace looked left, toward the storeroom she already considered her dance studio. The double doors were open, and more tools and power cords lay at the threshold. The rattle of a tape measure caught Grace’s ear, and she frowned. What the hell could be broken in there?

“Does anyone know where Jasmine is?” Grace asked the room at large. Jasmine was the dancer with the longest history at Allure, and often acted as the house mom when no house mom was around.

“Right here.” She came around the corner from the club’s main stage. She was the most stunning black woman Grace had ever met, with one of those killer, Amazonian bodies—tall, muscular, and built. She’d pulled her long black braids off her face and wore workout tights and a tank. “Rocco will be here in ten minutes to pick up the boys.”