Calore Dance Academy// Red Queen AU

Chapter 66

Hello friends! I'll attach another ballet video that inspired this chapter. I hope that ya'll are having a good week and that this chapter makes it a little better if you aren't! 

As always, star and comment! Love ya'll!

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At some point in the last couple of seconds, Cal put his arm around my back. His hand rests at my hip, sprawling across it, and his forearm, corded as it was when he guided me away from the pole, tells me that I'm not going anywhere.

His body is a warm presence at my side, and with nowhere else to go, my head leans against his shoulder. Even through his leather jacket and sweater, I feel the broad outline of his shoulder, the unnecessarily big and strong muscles in his biceps. If he moved a little closer, he could perch his head right on top of mine, put his other arm around my waist and envelop me completely. Whatever cologne he has on is very, very nice, smelling of wood and exotic spices.

"Mare and I were just leaving," Cal tells Bracken, who stares back at us with glitter in his eyes.

I have to twist my head over my shoulder to glare at Cal.

We've been here for over an hour, but there's still more to see. We haven't snuck back to the dressing rooms, haven't peaked at the stage from its wings, haven't walked into any more poles.

Alexandret grins, his teeth glaringly white. "Well do tell us, Cal, why you were here with Miss Barrow in the first place."

All three of these men are overtly charming with their pretty grins, perfect skin, and eyes that glisten like black stones. Bracken, donned in a very expensive tuxedo, doesn't belong in this plain stairwell, made of grey cement and bland walls.

"Cal and his brother took me to see your ballet," I chime in, feeling Cal's shoulder tense up. "I've never been to the Met, and they wanted to bring me here a few weeks before I start performing." I direct a hand at Alexandret. "Your dancing was . . . amazing. I loved the ballet so much."

Alexandret's grin only broadens. Displeased to hear me compliment Alexandret, Cal shifts his grip a little. Somehow, his hand splays across more of my hip, his fingers finding purchase at my lower stomach.

"Maven had to leave, but I promised to take Mare backstage. I didn't think that we'd be a bother. We haven't run into any of your ballerinas and have steered clear of the stage. She wanted to see everything, and I think that we covered everything. So we'll just be leaving now and—"

"But it sounds as though Miss Barrow hasn't seen the stage," Daraeus chimes in, his accent equally thick and dripping with French.

Yes, these three men are clearly wolves.

They've been whispering about the Academy's new prima ballerina for weeks, reading about her in The New York Times and seeing her photos that the Calores flash across their social media pages. She came out of nowhere and rose to the top in a matter of two months, and now all the ballet world talks about is her Giselle debut.

Mister Calore thinks that they think that I could be persuaded to leave the Academy in exchange for a place at the American Ballet Theatre. The New York City Ballet, apparently, has similar thoughts.

They want to steal me from the Calores.

And in the meantime, these three men seem very inclined to keep me a while longer at the Met.

Bracken's eyes light up a little. He smiles at Daraeus.

"Yes, indeed. Miss Barrow, would you like us to show you the stage?"