Single Wide Female: The Bucket List Mega Bundle - 24 Books (Books #1-24) (85 page)

In her view, I should be married and pregnant. In my view, I wanted to make sure that I lived my life before I walked down that road—if I walked down that road.

I pulled myself out of bed and thought of Blue. I still hadn’t replied to his e-mail. He had to be sensing that I was upset. I rarely let one of his e-mails go answered for more than a few hours. I wasn’t ready to reply just yet. I wanted to get through my day and get to my session with Raul.

After a shower—to ease my aches—and breakfast, I got to work on some writing. I knew I was drawing heavily on my own life experiences, but I felt that was what made it easier for my readers to connect with my characters. Real life couldn’t be wrapped up in a few chapters. It was ongoing and expansive.

When I finished my writing for the morning, I headed out for my session with Raul.

“Samantha, it’s so good to see you. Are you ready to let that passion loose?”

“I think so.” I smiled at him.

“Great.” He grabbed my hand and whisked me out on to the dance floor.

Within moments I was laughing. Raul awakened more than just my sensuality—he reminded me to laugh at myself.

“Nothing is serious in salsa, except for the hips and the lips.” He grinned as he snapped me away from him and then back into his arms. “As long as you have those two things down, you’re going to be phenomenal.”

“Thanks, Raul.”

“I think you’re learning very fast. I’m surprised you’ve never taken lessons for this before.”

“I guess you’re just a great teacher.”

“Well, that may be true.” He winked at me.

I felt his hand slide along my hip and then my lower back. The way he commanded and steered my body was very intoxicating to me. Even though I knew that at any moment I could break away from him, he made me feel as if he had complete control.

“So when you turn like this, you want to tilt your head this way. It creates this line. Here, let me show you.” He guided my body into the position he wanted. Then he tilted my head to match it. “See this line?” He ran his fingertip from the curve of my chin down the side of my neck, further along the slope of my side, and settled it at the lift of my hip. “That is the line that you want.”

He could have said he was the King of England and I wouldn’t have had a clue. My body was on fire from his touch.

By the time the session had ended I was close to drooling.

“You’re amazing, Raul.”

“So I’ve heard. Same time tomorrow, hm?” He winked at me.

I left the dance studio with a brighter outlook. I liked what Raul was teaching me. I liked the way I responded to his touch.

Chapter 8

That night, as I fell asleep, I didn’t think about Max or Blue. I thought about Raul and what he had taught me about my own body. As I drifted off to sleep my mind filled with images of his smile, his deep brown eyes, and the way he’d guided my body.

Not long after drifting off, I found myself in Raul’s arms. At first we were just dancing. Then suddenly we were kissing—and more than kissing.

My eyes sprung open.

“Oh, no.” The light was barely spilling in through my window. It was far too early for me to be awake. However, there was no way I was going back to sleep. “Am I falling in love with Raul?”

The question hung in the air around me. I wasn’t sure that I even wanted to think about it, but the dream forced me to. Up until then, it had been easy to dismiss my little warm fuzzies with Raul as a consequence of working with a handsome teacher. Now I wondered—was I just in denial?

I closed my eyes against the surge of concern that filled me. I didn’t think I was ever going to find a way to stop my desire for love. Raul was my teacher and I didn’t want to feel for him the way I did, but there it was—a subtle ache in the pit of my stomach at the very thought of him. The way he’d spun me across the dance floor was fixed in my mind.

“Oh, Sammy, what kind of mess have you gotten yourself into now?”

I forced myself out of bed so as not to invite another dream.

I showered and tried to wash away my thoughts of Raul. Then I made breakfast and tried to crunch away my thoughts of Raul. Finally, I sat down at the computer and tried to type away my thoughts of Raul. I wrote quite a bit, but when I stopped typing, I instantly thought of him again.

I dreaded going to our session, but I was also excited. I thought about what the psychic had said. Was it possible that she was talking about Raul? He had come right out of the blue. He was tall and very handsome. I certainly was longing for him. Did that mean that he was longing for me too?

I decided that I would choose to be bold. I was going to find out if Raul felt the same away.

When I arrived at class, all of my determination faded. I didn’t think I was going to be able to go through with actually asking him. Raul noticed that something was different about me.

“Samantha, did you have a good night’s sleep?” He frowned.

Oh my god, why did he have to ask me that?
Yes, Raul—I had a great night filled with dreams of you.

I looked at him nervously.

“Samantha, why are you so tense?” He looked at me with concern.

“I’m sorry, I’m just having a hard time relaxing.”

“Maybe if I rub your shoulders a bit?” He stepped around behind me.

I was quite certain that was not going to help matters, but I decided not to mention it. I enjoyed the feel of his hands on my shoulders. Did he really do this for all of his students? Wasn’t it possible that he was the tall handsome stranger that would come out of the blue? Maybe for once—just once—a psychic had been right.

I was still so preoccupied with these thoughts minutes later that I could barely focus on the dance. I kept smashing into Raul when I should have been spinning away from him. I stepped on his feet at least three times. I was fairly certain I had seriously injured one of his toes.

When he drew me up against him, instead of snapping my head back as I was supposed to, I lifted my head so that my lips could meet his. It was just a brush of contact, but it sent a thrill through my entire body.

Or maybe that was the sensation of falling. Not falling in love, but falling straight to the dance floor. I landed with a hard thump on the floor.

“Samantha! Oh, I’m so sorry. Are you okay?” Raul dropped down to his knees beside me. “I was just surprised and shocked.”

I looked up at him from the crumpled pile I found myself in. Had my kiss been so repulsive that he had dropped me on the floor? “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have done that.”

I blinked quickly to combat the tears of embarrassment that threatened to form.

“Oh, Samantha, I’m the one that should be sorry. Maybe I gave you the wrong impression.” He offered me his hand and helped me to stand up.

I couldn’t even look at him.

“Samantha, this is such an intimate dance. Feelings can be stirred up, confusing feelings.”

I shook my head and started to walk away. I wasn’t confused, just rejected. He caught my hand with his and pulled me back as if we were still dancing.

“Don’t do that, Samantha. Don’t be embarrassed. This is not the first time this has happened. When I help a woman embrace her sensuality, it can become complicated.”

“I get it, okay? You’re not interested.” My voice was harsher than I’d intended. I pulled away from him.

“Wait, Samantha. It’s not what you think. What you’re feeling for me—that’s not really for me. You think I’m the one that stirred your sensuality, but I’m not. It was all you.”

I turned back to look at him.

Chapter 9

Raul was handsome. There was no question about that. But beyond that there was no real reason for me to be infatuated with him. I knew nothing about him. The more his words sunk in, the more I thought they might be true. Had I fallen in love with the dance, with expressing my sensuality, and mistaken it for feelings for him?

“I’m sorry. I should go.”

“Please just remember, Samantha, you did this. You discovered yourself. Don’t let the confusion cheapen the experience that we’ve had here. Hm?” He smiled at me.

I felt the urge to punch him, but I knew that it was not his fault. I had allowed myself to get caught up in the sensations of the dance and had embarrassed myself as a result.

As I left the dance studio, I felt pretty miserable. It wasn’t just about Raul. My heart ached with disappointment about Blue. My mind kept flashing back to Max dancing with Anisa. I allowed myself to believe that there might be someone new in my life—Raul. Because of that I’d trodden on very dangerous ground. Now I couldn’t escape the hurt and shame that trampled all over my self-confidence.

Without really thinking about it I found myself turning into the grocery store parking lot. I needed a few things, but as I walked up to the sliding doors I knew that wasn’t why I was there. I picked up the few items that I thought I needed and then headed straight for the chips and snack aisle. It was an aisle that I had taught myself to avoid.

At first I’d been determined to find all of the healthy snacks I could, but I tended to overeat on those too. So, eventually I’d made the decision to eliminate snack foods and instead snack on vegetables or fruit throughout the day. It had made a huge difference in not only my calorie intake but the amount of healthy whole foods that I was eating instead of processed foods. Once I’d begun to see results, it was much easier to just bypass the snack aisle. Once I was drawn in, though, I could become dazzled by the assortment of goodies.

I stared at the variety of crackers, chips, and candy. All of the delicious treats were calling out to me—or more specifically, to my thighs and midsection. I tried to remind myself about how much progress I’d made. I thought about how being successful on my weight-loss journey was so much sweeter than anything on those shelves.

But it had been such a rough night. I didn’t care about my journey, I didn’t care about my thighs; all I cared about was chocolate chunk cookies as big as my face. Raul had let me down gently, but he had still let me down.

Max avoided my calls. Blue hadn’t even bothered to check in on me. I was lonely. I was feeling as if I would always be lonely. No, food wouldn’t fix that, but at least it was something that I could enjoy.

I reached for the bag of cookies. Just as I was about to grab it, salsa music began to play over the PA system.

“Hot and spicy salsa on sale in aisle five! Don’t forget to pick up some chips to go with it!”

As I stood hovering in front of the snacks with the salsa music playing in the background, a group of people began converging on the same aisle. Apparently between the music and the announcement everyone thought it was a great idea to pick up some salsa.

I was just about to give in and grab the cookies when my hips began to sway. Somehow I had an image of Raul standing right behind me with his hands on my hips.

“I can make you that woman.” I heard him say.

He had shown me my power, my feminine seduction, yet here I was ready to sacrifice all of the progress that I’d made to the cookie gods.

My hips began to sway more. Without really deciding to, I began to dance. I began to salsa all alone in the middle of the crowded aisle. I wanted to feel that passion rise within me once more—to know that it had nothing to do with cookies and everything to do with being confident in who I was.

I didn’t even notice that just about everyone had stopped looking for jars of salsa to stare at me. I didn’t noticed because my eyes were closed and my body was finding its rhythm. I could feel it flowing through me as clearly as I had when Raul was dancing with me. This was the core of me that didn’t need cookies to make me feel better. All I needed was that connection with my sultry self.

To my surprise, I felt someone take my hand.

Chapter 10

I opened my eyes to see a tall thin man in thick glasses swaying his hips right in front of me. He was the furthest he could get from the type of man that I was attracted to, but when he began to dance with me I saw the core of him. We danced down the aisle with the rest of the shoppers watching us. When he spun me around, I narrowly avoided a display of cheese sauce.

As I caught my balance I noticed that we weren’t the only ones dancing. Other people in the aisle had begun to dance too. Most weren’t following certain steps—they were just having fun. I smiled at the sight.

Then someone grabbed my hand again. This time it was a woman—a bit taller than me and a bit rounder than me. She grinned shyly at me.

“Okay!” I laughed.

We began to dance. The dynamic was a little different, but it was also rather liberating. It reminded me of a movie I’d once watched of women discovering their feminine wiles by dancing in the woods under the moon.

As we really engaged in the rhythm I bumped into a man who was dancing. He bumped me back with a sharp sway of his hip. It sent me right into a stack of potato chips. The bags scattered in all directions. Some slid under the people who were dancing. When they put their feet down on the bags they popped. The chips scattered in all directions. The salsa music stopped and a voice came over the PA system.

“Will the people in aisle five please stop dancing so that we can clean up.”

I giggled at being caught, and at apparently instigating a surprise salsa flash mob.

I hurried out of the aisle. I didn’t even notice that I’d left the cookies behind. Maybe the entire event had been a bit silly, but I really enjoyed it.

It had reminded me that I was a seductive force, not just when I danced with Raul, but at any given time.

Back at my apartment, I felt ready to update my blog. I was sure that there were other women out there who had experienced a similar kind of confusion. It was easy to confuse attraction with the awakening of sensuality.

Just because Raul had introduced me to my sensual side, that didn’t mean that he was the man I would share that part of myself with. I was glad that I’d gotten to know it and grateful that he had been so gentle in the process.

I lit a candle on my desk. I selected some salsa music to listen to. I wanted to be in that place of passion when I posted the update to my blog. I wanted to share with my readers the intense experience that I’d had. It wasn’t about dancing salsa. It was about discovering my own sensuality.