THE DARE (G!P Freenbecky)

Chapter 20

"Becky?" He was watching her carefully, and for a moment she felt like a tiny mouse, looking up and seeing a powerful hawk swooping down on her.

"Meet someone? Me?"

"Yes, you."

"I met a lot of nice people, including Lookkaew's niece, Aylin," she went on to describe Lookkaew's seventeen-year-old niece and the dances they'd shared at the reception, trying to ignore the slight frown on her grandfather's concerned face.

"She was such a nice girl, she even drove me to the airport when the reception was over."

"No one closer to your own age was at that wedding?"

She thought frantically. "No. Most of them were paired off—"

'Oops! She'd slipped up big time.'

"I've been meaning to discuss something along those lines with you," her grandfather said, smoothly changing the subject. "You see, Becky, one of these days, between your dancing and your own charity work, you're going to wake up and realize that all of the really outstanding young men and women are already spoken for."

She hesitated, then said, "I suppose you're right."

He smiled at her, a smile so full of love that she couldn't be mad at him.

"Grandpa, I know what you're getting at. But I want it to be exactly like you and Grandmother, where you took one look at each other and you knew—"

"It's different these days. Men are different. There are no rules, not as much as structure as in the old— as in the days when—"

"Not true!"

"But I want you to know that I'm concerned about what's going to happen to you when I'm no longer around."

This was a subject she absolutely hated to think about.

"Can we please not talk about—"

"My darling, we have to. When I pass away, you're going to be left an extremely wealthy woman."

'Then maybe I could just never get married.'

Marriage was a hot button emotionally for Becky, because of all the stories she'd heard about her own mother. Elizabeth Armstrong had been a dancer as well, a classical ballerina with immense talent and potential, when she'd fallen inlove and married Becky's father.

The marriage had been a disaster, and Elizabeth had come home to her parents house one rainy winter night, a broken woman with an infant daughter in tow. And while Phillip and Megan Armstrong had taken exquisite care of their granddaughter, Elizabeth had gone into a long decline from which she'd never really recovered.

That left Becky terrified of marriage. She didn't want anyone holding her down, keeping her back, making her suitable, or deciding what was best for her.

Hence, her new idea of one-night stands.

No, she thought as she studied her grandfather, that isn't really true. She'd had no idea she was even capable of a one-night stand until many things had conspired that evening. Lookkaew's impassioned plea, the actual party, dancing on that table, wearing the mask and the wig and the makeup, throwing her bra into the crowd—

'And Freen Chankimha.'

"Becky?"

She blinked and stared at her grandfather.

"Where did you go just now? What were you thinking?" He seemed genuinely curious.

"I was just thinking, where do you think I could get a pony?"