She seemed shocked, but recovered quickly, "So, what happened with you and the little girl?"
"Oh, nothing much," he smiled to himself when he saw Candy's face brighten.
He figured that what he had with Joanne would prove itself very shortly. Whatever hopes Candy still harbored would be gone oh too soon. He thought he saw the side of Joanne's face as she moved through the crowd.
"It was nice to see you, Candy."
He walked out to find her. He saw that she'd straightened her hair, and she was wearing a pair of gold hoops. She didn't usually wear earrings, unless it was a special occasion or Jesse asked. When he got close enough to see all of her, he froze. The air went out of him in a puff. The gold lace covered cream dress hugged her every curve. There was something about the way that her bottom swayed when she was just standing there. She held a tissue under the long lashes on her right eye as she arched to listen to what Jesse was saying. The little dress accentuated the long, chocolate legs that ended in a pair of gold laced heels. He had this sense that Jesse picked out the outfit by the way that Jo kept tugging the hem down. The thought was confirmed when she turned around. He tried to make his mouth work, but he couldn't. Joanne smiled slightly at him She put her hand over the diamond that was exposing her cleavage and gave him a hug.
"I thought you had to work," she said to him as he put his arm around her.
Daniel tried to sound coherent, "Well, can't think of an excuse, right now. Beautiful woman. Skimpy dress."
She showed him the dress in a slow turn, "It was Jesse's idea. What do you think?"
He thought better of it, but he said anyway, "I think, I want to take it off you." 'Rip it off! Maybe just bunch it up at your waist as I...' He gave himself a mental slap and gave her a quick kiss on the cheek. He knew she wouldn't mind. She'd heard him say lots of things more suggestive than that. Joanne just seemed to get embarrassed if he said it in a public place.
"So, how'd you like the song," he asked her.
He watched the happiness fade from her face as she said, "It was beautiful, Dan."
He put his fingers to her cheek. "Hey, no sad stuff. I redid it so it would be a good thing."
"It was a good thing," she buried her face in his chest.
*
Joanne hadn't been paying attention to the other acts. She kept having to avert her eyes from some man that was staring at her. She hated the dress. The hole in it made it impossible to wear a bra. She knew what the men were waiting for. If she leaned over, a breast would pop through that hole. When the mc said his name, she looked up at the stage. Daniel went over the keys quickly, then stopped playing. He seemed to not pay attention to how long he sat there with his eyes closed.
The crowd was starting to get nervous when he started to play again. "Crush" by Gavin Degraw. He'd been humming the song. He'd also been singing some strange twangy thing recently. She hoped that wouldn't be the next song. She didn't think the public would be ready for Dan's country debut, especially if it involved the booty shaking that he happened to be prone to doing at the time. She smiled to herself at the memory. He finished the song with a vibrato.
His eyes were still closed when he shook his arms and went into a strange intro that she'd never heard before. It was slow and intricate. It moved into a more intense tone then descended into something she started to recognize. His voice started out in a low tentative hum. She saw him settle in and his voice built into this strong sexy baritone. She'd never heard him sing like that. She felt this trembling in her gut as he got to the chorus. She looked over at Jesse. Her friend reached out and rubbed at her hand in concern. She looked down at her hands, because she was afraid of what she would do if Dan suddenly opened his eyes and looked at her.
He lapsed into French as he sang the third chorus. She closed her eyes, and felt him breathing next to her ear while they were in bed together. He moaned where the song required it, but it made her thighs start to tingle. Jo jumped when he did it again. She crossed her thighs and then her ankles as the tingling turned into a burn. When he finally finished, he let out a slow ragged sigh. She looked up at his calm face.
She watched him sit back from the keys and slowly stand up. The cheer was like a slap in the face. She knew exactly why she was crying, but that didn't stop her mascara from running. She covered her face with her hands. 'My god. Why did he have to do that with this song? Why'd he have to do it in public?'
Joanne stood up and raced for some tissues, but she saw the line of women waiting to use the too small facilities. She felt the tears start to run down between her fingers. She thought, 'Oh, great! I'm gonna ruin this dress for sure,' which only made her cry harder.
She stood there bawling for a few seconds as she tried to figure out how to stop the dripping black stream from hitting the dress. A girl in line gave her a napkin and pulled her forward in line.
She yelled up toward the front of the line, "Hey, let this girl wipe her face! CAN'T YOU SEE SHE'S CRYIN?"
It took her longer than expected to get herself together. When she got back to Jesse, she tried to smile and laugh at the joke she was telling. She looked around for Daniel, but she couldn't find him in the dense crowd. Then Jesse pointed over her shoulder and he was standing very still just a few feet away. His mouth was slightly open, and he didn't seem to notice that people were knocking into him.
'I guess, the dress worked. Jesse told me he'd probably stop dead in his tracks when he saw me.' She couldn't help teasing him a little bit about the surprise, but the shock was over, now. 'He needs to stop these surprises, or he won't have two pennies to rub together.'
When he asked about the song, she couldn't hide the jumble of emotions anymore. Danny was so sweet to want to do that for her. She squeezed him so tight, she could hear his heart beating over the canned music in the bar.
*
Daniel Langier sat down carefully across the table from Joanne's parents. Karen bore into him with those penetrating eyes. He knew this was coming. He wasn't sure how she knew what was going on at Joanne's place, but she seemed to know for a fact that he'd spent the weekend with Joanne. She'd kept her mouth shut when he got back home that day. Shed' pressed her lips together and didn't say a word. His father tried to say something to smooth things over, but she gave David a withering glare. That was coming up on a month ago.
Karen Croix was now sipping the mint iced tea out of a straw and drilling a hole into his face.
"So, whose idea was it to scare the hell out of me, yours or hers?"
"Uh," Dan tried, "we didn't mean to..."
"You had to have been using protection, or I would be seeing a ring on her finger, by now," the frown deepened. "You couldn't wait, could you? I didn't think you could, anyway. You and those puppy dog eyes, don't fool me. From what I've been hearing from Jesse, you've been nothing but conciliation, so I guess, I'm not that mad. Jerry, on the other hand," she sucked on her teeth. "He'd have been removed from this earth, before he knew what happened."
Daniel looked at the condensation on the glass and thought, 'Ask her, now, before she gets on a roll.' "Uh, Mrs. Croix..." 'Say it! Say it!'
Karen raised a hand to stop him from talking, "Don't say something stupid, like it's over. It's not over. I don't care if the statute of limitations says he can't be charged. I've been talking to every newspaper I could get a number for. He's going down for hurtin my baby."
Daniel sat back and let the woman vent. He knew the words were meant for a man that was currently on a European tour. James just sat there and downed his tea. When he'd finished it, the older man set the glass down and said as though Karen hadn't been rambling for a good twenty minutes, "You love my daughter?"
Karen stopped talking. Daniel nodded in the affirmative.
The low gravely voice seemed even more menacing than usual, "That's what this sit down is, right?"
"Yes, sir," Dan tried to make his face relax. He hated when he gritted his teeth. "I wanted to talk to you about our relationship."
James raised one side of his lip and said, "Boy, we don't have a relationship. You obviously don't have any brains if you think you can just go to bed with my daughter."
Dan's cheeks started to burn, "Mr. Croix, I don't go to bed with Jo, unless she wants me to. And, I don't think it should be any of your business."
"You made it our business when you took off with her for three days without so much as a phone call," Karen cut in.
"I didn't take her. We both made a decision." 'Whoa, they're still this mad?' He took a breath and said, "I'm sorry. She should have called you. I should have thought about that, but we spent so much time apart..." 'This sounds so stupid, right now.' "It took us so long to get to where we are, now, it felt like the right thing to do at the time. It was. You'd still be where you were a couple moths ago, if we hadn't spent that time away from everything and everybody. You've probably been hearing more from her, now, right?" He saw the confirmation in Karen's glance toward the pastry bar.
