Victor
I clucked my tongue in disappointment as the Cartwright girl continued to waver during her sixth pirouette. Training the two of them made it so clear that Sophia was the better dancer. She wasn't perfect, but she was getting there. Lily, on the other hand, didn't have the same dedication or talent, and it was frustrating to watch her stumble through her expensive private training. She was like a newborn deer compared to Sophia.
All legs and no grace.
Still, it was a lucrative arrangement.
"You need to push through it," I chided her, wishing I had my riding crop to swat against her wobbling knee. Wishing that was allowed in a place like this. "Find your center first, and then spin. Try again."
"I'm trying," Lily snapped, wiping sweat from her brow. "But I'm tired."
She gives me a look that I know well. It's the one that tells me she's going to ask to take a break, and then make that break last long enough that there's no real point in continuing with how little time is left in our session.
Sophia would never pull this. She'd be begging me to keep going, to keep pushing her until she got it right. I'd seen her do that very thing, to the point of risking her own safety, twice this week alone.
I closed my eyes against Lily's pleading expression, imagining Sophia instead. The way her hair twisted around the black velvet scrunchie I'd given her on her fourth day under my tutelage. The way she wore her new ballet slippers with pride and laced her pointe shoes with precision. The joy in her eyes when I'd brought her several changes of clothing at the end of the first week.
Her things, the things I'd given her over the course of the two weeks we'd worked together, were precious to her. They were all meticulously placed beneath her bed and well cared for, organized by color and purpose. Because that was the kind of person Sophia was. Organized, poised, determined.
Nothing like the spoiled child pouting in front of me.
"Why don't we call it early?" I asked, already looking away from her, my mind focused on returning home.
"Really?" Lily asked, sounding delighted. Of course she was. It was Friday, after all, and ending her lesson early meant that Lily had all that much more time to focus on her true passion - cocaine.
"Why not?" I said, trying to keep the venom out of my voice. It wouldn't do to have the girl complain to her father that I'd been rude to her and kicked her out of her session. The extra income I earned from her father wasn't the kind that you gave up for one brief moment of satisfaction.
Still, it was difficult to keep my frustration in check as she gathered her things and flounced toward the exit with more grace than she'd shown during our entire lesson. I watched her go, wondering if there was any way to push her to translate that grace into her performances or if -
She stopped suddenly, shoulders tense, and I watched as a young man approached her. I couldn't see her face, but I could tell from her body language that she wasn't pleased to see him. I took a few steps closer, just in case she needed an intimidating presence on her side. She might be hopeless as a dancer, but she was still my student and I wouldn't stand for one of my students being harassed within the walls of Précis Pointe.
"-haven't seen her," Lily was saying as I came close enough to hear the two of them. "I don't know why you think I'd know. I don't keep tabs on your little girlfriend."
"You knew each other," the young man said. Now that I was closer to him I could see the mess of dark, greasy hair that needed a good cut. The watch on his wrist was a contrast to his poor self-maintenance and obviously worth more than most kids his age could afford. Even the Cartwright girl, with her father buying her top of the line lessons, dancewear, and designer bags to carry it all in, wouldn't be sporting a Rolex like that. It told me all I needed to about this young man. He was all flash and no discipline. "You recognized her two weeks ago."
"That doesn't mean I know where she's been," Lily replied dismissively. "She's not even in the corps. She's just some wannabe who practices in the same building I do. I haven't seen her at all since your party, Ezra."
"That's the problem," the young man said, looking furious as he loomed over Lily. Both of them remained completely unaware of me standing off to the side, fists clenching as I began to put the pieces together about just who they were talking about. "I haven't seen her since that night either."
"Maybe she got sick of you pawing at her all night and decided to find somewhere new to -" Lily started to say, but Ezra's expression darkened and she cut herself off, hands going up in surrender. "Or not."
"If you see her, if you hear anything about her," Ezra said, shaking his head. There was real worry in his voice and I hated it. It wasn't difficult to figure out who he was talking about. There was only one dancer at Précis Pointe who hadn't shown up at least once in the past two weeks, after all. He pulled a card out of his back pocket, handing it to Lily, who took it with the tips of her fingers like it was contaminated with something she doesn't want to touch. "Anything at all that could lead me to her, and I'll give you twenty percent off your next score."
"I'll see what I can find," Lily assured him, clearly interested in cashing in on that kind of deal. "But she's not here right now, and frankly I don't blame her. I have places to be, Ez."
She turned and walked past him towards the locker rooms. He turned the other way, heading back out the front doors, and I was left standing in the dark hallway with my hands balled into fists as I stared after him, seething.
"I don't keep tabs on your little girlfriend." That's what Lily had said, wasn't it? She had called Sophia his girlfriend, had seen them together at a party where he'd put his hands all over her. He'd probably done a lot more than that, too. He'd touched what was mine and now he was going to the trouble of tracking her down. I couldn't have that. Not at all.
Storming towards the front doors, I pushed them open with the intention of following him back to whatever rock he'd crawled out from under to make sure that he stayed there. Sophia was mine. She'd agreed to my lessons, accepted my gifts, had begged me to fuck her. She was mine, and this -
I stopped short at the sight of him standing on the sidewalk beside a police car, leaning into the window to talk to the officer inside.
He wasn't just looking for Sophia, he was getting the police involved.
Fuck.
The officer was saying something, and Sophia's boyfriend nodded and waved back at the studio. He was still talking, hadn't seemed to notice me, but with both of them looking in my direction, I couldn't keep standing there forever.
I turned to the left and calmly walked to my car, my mind racing. No one could prove what I'd done, there was no reason to suspect me of all people. Dancers went missing all the time, after all. The number of amateur dancers who gave up on their dreams and moved back home was high enough to assume that's what Sophia had done as well.
Just because this Ezra fellow knew that Sophia practiced at Précis Pointe, that didn't mean he knew that was where I'd taken her. There were no cameras along this street, no whitenesses to what I'd done. As far as anyone knew she left the studio late that night like she did every night, and had never met me in her life.
Except, Lily had called Sophia his girlfriend, and that implied a level of attachment and determination to find her that could come back to bite me in the ass.
And Sophia hadn't said a word about this guy, either. She'd gone along with my training, had succumbed to my authority and played the perfectly obedient student, all the while biding her time. Had she been waiting for this fucker to figure out what happened to her all along?
Of course she had. She'd known that a rescue was possible, that this Ezra character was coming to save her and yet she had sat there next to me eating the food I'd bought her, listening to my experiences and instructions, accepting my gifts.
Begging me to take her.
And none of it had been real. She'd been waiting, that whole time. Just waiting for her knight in greasy hair to come crashing through the door and save her from my wicked ways.
I sat at a red light, those thoughts chasing each other through my mind as I fought the urge to blow through the intersection in order to get home sooner. Instead, I let out a guttural scream as I slammed my hands against the steering wheel once, twice three times, unable to stop myself from imagining that little punk showing up at my house, finding Sophia there, putting his imperfect hands all over her perfect body.
Taking her from me.
I couldn't stand it.
The light turned green and I slammed the gas.
Sophia Hawkins was mine, and no one was going to take her from me.
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Oh no! Now that Victor knows about Ezra, what do we think he'll do to keep Sophia with him?
And with the police involved it's only a matter of time before she's found, right?
😈