The Wedding Fling

After a pause, the older child demonstrated her moves, a hip-thrusting motion accompanied by a rolling of her narrow shoulders, bawdy if not for the fact the kid was only about ten. Leigh mimicked the choreography, earning herself a hesitant grin.

“Look, look,” said the younger girl. She offered her own signature moves, something equally raunchy she must have stolen from a music video. Leigh gave it a go, until the little girl dissolved into giggles.

“What?”

The child pointed to Leigh’s butt.

“You got no ass,” said the older girl.

Leigh laughed, faking offense. “Sure I do.”

“You all flat back there. Like all them skinny, rich white ladies.”

“I can’t help that.”

“You oughta eat more,” the smaller girl announced loudly, earning a reprimand and waggle of grill tongs from her mother. “Sorry.”

“Anyhow,” Leigh said, “you can dance with whatever size butt you’ve got. Show me any moves you have, I bet I can do them as well as you.”

“Bet you can’t,” the older girl taunted.

“Bet I can. Go on, let’s see what you’ve got.”

Will wandered over. “Careful, girls. She was in a movie about a dancer and everything.”

For a stinging second, his comment made Leigh feel like even more of an outsider, but she was grateful for the credibility it seemed to earn her with this tough crowd. Two sets of eyes widened. “You was in a movie?”

“I was. And I was the star. It was about a girl who learned how to tango. You want to see?”

Vigorous nods answered her.

Leigh demonstrated a flourish of moves, and her skeptical audience warmed before her eyes.

“That’s cool,” the bossy girl said. “How you do that?”

Leigh offered lessons, accepted tips in return from her young acquaintances. Before long the grown-ups were finishing their dinners and fetching fresh drinks, dancing in pairs on the sand. Seeking a partner of her own, Leigh scanned the growing crowd, but found Will busy at the grill, giving their pregnant hostess a break. No matter.

Leigh danced by herself, enjoying the beat and the atmosphere, the flicker of firelight and the deep indigo of the sky overhead. She shut her eyes, absorbing the laughter and music, feeling free in a way she hadn’t in years. Feeling a high no vice Hollywood traded in could ever touch. Just some nobody girl, dancing on some nowhere beach. Just Leigh, for the first time in forever.

Across the sand, Will caught her eye again, laughing at a friend’s joke. That damnable smile… Her energy shifted, dropping low in her belly, warm and curious, and Leigh wondered if maybe it wasn’t high time to get busy making some bad decisions.

4

WILL DITCHED HIS PLATE in the kitchen. Leigh ought to get herself some dinner before they ran out… or maybe she was planning on a late-night call to room service, not this lowbrow fare. Still, at the moment she was doing a fine impression of lowbrow herself. She was dancing with Rex, one of the younger drivers, and watching gave Will a funny pang.

Jealousy was too strong a diagnosis, as was concern. Let the girl have her fun. He only hoped she didn’t go too nuts, as celebrities seemed so fond of doing.

He wandered closer, if only to keep an eye on her. Well, fine—to have a better view of her. This not-quite guest, his not-quite date, the answer to his financial prayers… though he had yet to do a thing with what she’d told him in the plane. Just now it was hard to remember who she was supposed to be to him. Skin pale as the sand, smile bright as the torches. The hesitant, haunted girl he’d met on the mainland was gone, along with her street clothes, a vibrant creature now inhabiting her body. Will couldn’t for the life of him put his finger on who this woman really was, and until he did, he couldn’t bring himself to sell any details to the press, not even harmless ones.

But whoever she was, it was exciting to watch her body moving this way, at once rhythmic and chaotic, like the waves. Will knew better than anybody how intoxicating this place was. He’d been high for seven years now.

What would those stupid tabloids make of her? Runaway Bride Dances the Night Away with Resort Staff. Some picture of her, long hair whipping wildly. Some shot that made her look drunk despite the fact she’d yet to open a second beer. No photo would convey what he saw—a woman lost in her own infectious joy. The way a bride ought to look, dancing at her wedding.

Will remembered how he’d felt the first time he’d set foot on a beach like this. He’d been eight when his father had taken him to Mexico—a future pilot’s first plane ride, a city kid’s first trip beyond the bounds of the subway. All that brown Bronx slush forgotten the second they’d lifted off, winter gloom eclipsed by the thrill of flying. He’d known from the moment his toes sank into the warm sand that he was going to live somewhere like that. Just a shitty little seaside town, but the best his dad had been able to afford. All Will had known was that for the first time since his mother took off, the world had seemed beautiful again.

He wondered if Leigh had left some sad soul heartbroken in her wake. Will didn’t think so. She was an actress, maybe a decent one, but even a guy as simple as Will could sense the pain behind the performance. He wasn’t the type to pry or question, but he wanted answers from this stranger who’d managed to invite herself along on his evening. He was also a master of playing the free spirit himself, and if Leigh’s front was anything like his, he wondered what burdens it was designed to hide.