still going on vacation with your girlfriends?” she asked as she held the door open for Belana.
“Oh, most definitely,” Belana said. “Elle and Patty and I are going to Greece for a girls-only getaway. What are you planning to do over the break?”
“I can’t tell you,” Suri said in a whisper. “It involves that guy you warned me about.”
Frowning, Belana stepped back into the room and shut the door. She could spare five more minutes for a friend. “Look, Suri, I know you’re young and carefree and you think dating a married man is daring and you’re having the time of your life. But married men rarely leave their wives, especially rich men who have so much to lose. His wife is going to take him for everything he has and ever will have if she finds out about you two. If she still wants him, she’ll bring him to heel. And the first thing he’ll do is drop you.”
Suri shrugged nonchalantly. “I’m having fun. I’m not in it to break up his marriage. It’s just nice to be pursued by such a rich, powerful man.”
Belana dropped her bag on to the floor, grabbed Suri by the arm and dragged her over to a mirror. “Look at yourself!” Suri smiled at her reflection. She was a brunette beauty with wavy hair that fell to her waist, a perfect dancer’s body with long, shapely legs. “There are so many men out there who would treat you just as well as Mr. Moneybags, without the inevitable heartache. Get a grip. Drop him before it stops being just fun and turns into love.”
Suri sighed deeply and stopped smiling. “He says I’m the best thing that ever happened to him.”
“They all say that!” Belana cried vehemently. She turned Suri around and looked her in the eyes. “Has anything I’ve said gotten through?”
Suri lowered her eyes shamefully.
Belana knew when she was beaten. Suri would have to learn the hard way. She threw her hands up and turned and walked away. “Just be careful,” she said in parting. She was gone before Suri could say anything else.
As she quickly walked through the mostly abandoned backstage area and headed to the front of the building where the lobby was located, Belana wondered if anyone actually listened to advice from well-meaning friends when they were involved in illicit love affairs. She supposed the excitement of an affair was simply too hard a thing to resist. To say nothing of the forbidden sex and the subterfuge needed to meet for their assignations without being caught. It was too much drama for her, which was why she avoided married men. Let a married man come on to her and she was quick to cut him off at the knees.
Chapter 2
“I’m sorry your father couldn’t make it,” Belana said to Nona after they’d hugged hello.
Nona, who was five-six, two inches taller than Belana, shrugged her slender shoulders regrettably. “We invited him, but he had to travel for work.”
Belana had once asked Nona about her father’s occupation and the girl had told her he was a lawyer. She had then quickly moved on to another subject, which made Belana think her father was a sore topic of conversation. To further make her suspicious that things were not going well between Nona and her father, one day, when they were practicing in the studio at the community center, Nona had mentioned that she didn’t live with her father. She lived with her grandmother, while he had an apartment in the city. Belana wondered why that was, but didn’t ask. She only knew that if she had a daughter as wonderful as Nona, she wouldn’t palm her off on her mother.
Belana smiled at Nona’s grandmother. “I’m glad you could make it, Mrs. Reed.”
Yvonne Reed was a petite, golden-brown-skinned beauty with silver, naturally wavy hair that she wore cut short and tapered at the nape. She was sixty-eight, but looked years younger. “I wouldn’t have missed it,” she said, dark brown eyes sparkling with excitement. “You were wonderful!”
“Oh, thank you,” Belana said with a warm smile.
“There you are!” Belana heard her brother, Erik, call behind them. She spun around and there he was hurrying toward her and the Reeds. When he reached her he hugged her tightly. “Great job, sis!”
“Thanks, Erik,” Belana said after he’d let her go. She gestured to the Reeds. “I’d like you to meet Nona Reed and her grandmother, Mrs. Yvonne Reed.”
Erik, six-one and athletic, was dressed in a black tailored suit, white shirt, dark gold tie and black wingtips polished to a high shine. He and Belana shared the same dark golden-brown skin tone and coppery brown eyes. He wore his black natural hair shorn very close to the scalp and was clean-shaven. Belana often told him he was ugly as sin, but that was simply a sister bringing a too-confident brother down a peg or two. He was a handsome devil, as both Nona’s and her grandmother’s reaction to his presence attested. They were smiling widely and gazing up at him with open admiration.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, ladies,” Erik said as he smiled down at them.
“Did Mom and Dad already leave for the airport?” Belana asked Erik. Her stepmother, Isobel Jones-Whitaker, whom she called Mom, had phoned her to tell her she and her father would have to fly to Zurich for a scientific symposium right after the performance, but wouldn’t dream of missing her final bow as Odette.
“I’m afraid so,” Erik answered, still smiling at the Reeds. “I told them I would wait around and take you to a late dinner.”
“That sounds good,” said Belana. “I’m starving.” She looked at the Reeds. “Would you like to join us? My treat, it would give us more time to chat.”
“I’d love …” Nona began. But her grandmother grasped her arm, stopping her. Smiling, Yvonne turned to Belana. “You’re very sweet, but we should be getting home.”
Nona sighed with regret. She would’ve loved to share a meal with Belana and her gorgeous brother. How often did she get to dine with a ballet star? Better yet, how often did she get to practice her flirting skills, which needed a lot of work since she had just discovered she had flirting skills, on a real man? The guys she went to school with were no challenge at all. However, her grandmother delivered meals to elderly shut-ins on Saturday mornings, a task Nona helped with and it was more important to her not to disappoint her grandmother than socializing with one of her idols.
“Yeah, we have to get up early in the morning,” she said to Belana. She gave Belana another hug. “Thank you for inviting us tonight, we really enjoyed it.”
Belana hugged her back, thinking that even if her father couldn’t be with her as often as she wished, he had certainly chosen a good substitute in his mother. It was obvious Yvonne Reed was a good influence on her granddaughter.
“You’re welcome. I’m glad you enjoyed yourself,” said Belana. “See you at the center in a couple of weeks, okay?”
“I wouldn’t miss it,” Nona assured Belana, and she took her grandmother’s proffered hand. They bade Belana and Erik good-night.
As they walked away, Erik said softly, “What a nice kid.”
“Yes, she is,” agreed Belana with a wistful tone to her voice.
Erik put an arm around her shoulders and they began walking toward the exit. Most of the two-thousand-plus theatergoers had left the theater so the lobby was fairly deserted now.
“You sound like you want one of those,” Erik joked.
Belana knew he was referring to her desire to have children one day. But that meant putting her career on hold and Belana, at twenty-eight, still felt she had a lot of years left in her body. Some dancers continued to perform well into their forties. Occasionally, you found one who was still dancing in their fifties, but they were the exception. The human body wore out. Joints became arthritic, muscles lost their tone, and bones became brittle with age. Dancers were constantly fighting to stay healthy.
“Someday,” Belana said softly. She looked up