That Special Smile/Whittenburg by Karen Toller Whittenburg Page A

bring the evening to an end, and Sylvie frowned at her own restlessness
    It was Max, she decided. Max and the way he talked to her, the way he’d kissed her, that made her feel unsettled, even a little reckless.
    She turned toward him in sudden decision, ready to trade the disquieting tone of their conversation for the uncertainty of being in his arms on the dance floor. Max was watching her, his expression oddly serious.
    “Let’s show them how dancing ought to be done, shall we?” she suggested, the words coming out breathy and uneven.
    Max nodded and stood, keeping his hand on the back of her chair as she rose. “What happens, Sylvie,” he asked softly. “…if a relationship comes looking for you?”
    His warm breath stirred her hair, and his husky voice created a low ache inside her. She denied the significance of both with a nonchalant lift of her shoulders. “I suppose I’d start losing sleep. Not an appealing prospect.”
    “Oh, I don’t know. There could be certain advantages in that.”
    As they walked toward the dance floor, Sylvie shot him a teasing glance over her shoulder. “Positive thinking is your forte, isn’t it, Max?”
    He turned her into his arms. “Among many other things, Sylvie Anne.”
    Dancing was one of them, Sylvie decided within a few minutes. His steps were smooth and effortless, and the deliberate distance she maintained seemed awkward and unnecessary. With a soundless sigh she relaxed into the rhythm of the music and the pleasant discovery that he was hardly an amateur.
    “You constantly surprise me,” she said with a smile. “I would never have guessed you’d spent your adolescent Saturday afternoons at Miss Wattenbarger’s School of Dance.”
    “In my hometown, it was Miss Harper, Miss Harpy to those in the know, and there wasn’t a boy within fifty miles who would have stepped foot inside her studio.” Max smiled wryly at the memory. “Elisa had no qualms, though, about sharing what she was taught. It was one of her favorite pastimes. Actually, I learned all I know about dancing under duress.”
    “Elisa?”
    “Mmm. A redhead, like you.”
    “My hair isn’t red,” Sylvie corrected firmly. “It’s nutmeg blond.”
    Max pulled back to look. “Oh,” he said dubiously. “Well, Elisa’s is the same color, but hers is red.”
    Sylvie ignored that. “Was she your first love?”
    “Worse. My sister.”
    “I didn’t know you had a sister.” It was an inane statement, and Sylvie frowned as she said it.
    “There are a lot of things you don’t know about me.” He pulled her close, but she had the oddest impression that he kept an intangible distance between them, as if he resented the fact that she didn’t seem to want to know more about him.
    Her question came involuntarily in response. “Tell me, Max, how have you escaped?”
    “Escaped?”
    “A serious relationship,” she explained. “Why aren’t you involved in a matter of the heart?”
    He looked down at her, but his expression and his smile were mysterious. “What makes you think I’m not?”
     

Chapter Six
     
    Max’s question kept Sylvie awake for some time that night.
    It was her first conscious thought the next morning.
    Then, like an annoying commercial jingle, it occurred to her at odd moments throughout the day ... and that night and the next morning.
    It didn’t mean anything, she told herself. It was just a moment that had stuck in her memory.
    By the end of the week, it had become a litany of sorts, a ritual that passed through her mind several times before she fell asleep at night and a riddle to start her thoughts percolating first thing in the morning.
    What makes you think I’m not?
    She had laughed at the time and said she could tell by the way he parted his hair.
    But it had made her wonder about the type of woman Max would find attractive.
    He seemed to find her interesting. After all, he’d kissed her.
    Twice.
    Ridiculous. The whole thing was ridiculous. She didn’t care