Dancing In His Arms

Chapter 16

It's the thursday before the party Luke agreed to go to with his friends. All week he has been working even harder to sweeten Aria up since he hasn't had the nerve to ask her for time off yet. Yes they had discussed this before they ever started working together but over the past month nothing has come up.

As well Luke has made it his mission to learn more about her. All he got was that she is an only child, year younger than him, and her parents own a hardware store an hour and a half drive away.

"Alright so we got the basics of our Cha Cha down, I say tomorrow we start on either the Paso Doble or the Tango. Later we can fine tune what we already have." Wiping off the sweat from her chest and hanging the towel around her neck Aria waits for him to pick which dance they start next.

Out of time he bites the bullet and just goes for it. "Ah, ok ya see..." sighing he stops beating around the bush "My friends want me to go to a party with them tomorrow night and I know they will want to stay out late. Is there anyway I can have tomorrow off and most of saturday too? I can put in extra time if need be."

"Hey hey it's fine. I have been taking up most of your time since we started this. If you need to take time off to hang out with your friends don't be afraid to ask. I've been keeping you up with mine, you should be able to hang out with yours."

Smiling in appreciation Luke grabs her hand and kisses it "Thanks. They have been hassling me about not going out with them even less than usual and not telling them what I'm doing."

Swinging their still joined hands "Not much of a partier are ya? And they don't know your dancing?"

Rubbing his thumb over the back of her hand he loves holding when they dance he responds. "No to both. Parties are always full of girls who are barely dressed, grinding on strangers in the hopes of a one night stand they are too drunk to remember. That's not my kind of woman. I prefer women like you." Taking a chance at flirting with her. Luckily he was rewarded with a slight blush.

"You do realise that I have to wear slightly scandalous outfits for dancing right?" Aria teases back, bound not to be affected by his words.

"Exactly. Have, not want. You do it for your profession not cause you want to attract a man for sex. You have more self respect for yourself than all the girls at those parties ever will. Now that is attractive in a woman. At least in my opinion."

Deeply flattered by his sweet words, Aria lets go of his hand and pretends to do something important on the other side of the room to hide how it affected her. "So, uh why don't they know... That you dance I mean." Turning back around she sees Luke followed her and and is standing near her. Not so close that he is invading her personal space but enough to affect her breathing pattern to accelerate slightly.

"They wouldn't understand. At least not yet. They'll find out eventually. I just want to prolong it as far as I can." He says quietly.

"What wouldn't they understand?" She asks just as quietly, unknowingly taking a step towards him.

Softly running the back of his hand across her cheek "What it means to me. How important it is I do this."

Leaning into his hand she asks "Why so?" breathlessly as they both lean in. As their lips are barely an inch away the house phone suddenly goes off, breaking them out of their moment. Stepping back from each other, Luke clears his throat "Maybe I'll tell you another time if you're lucky."

Walking backwards with a smirk like he just won the lottery, Luke winks at Aria and says "See you saturday afternoon." and turns around entering the house to leave for the day, leaving a speechless Aria on the backyard dance floor.