Closer to Paradise: Dancing Romance, #1

By H Stinington

Daniel and Isabella are partners in every single way but one. As popular competitive dancers who live in the eye of the eye of the public, they are unable to express their desire for one another for fear that it might ruin their careers. However, between grueling practices at their dance studio and a competition circuit that seems never ending, Daniel and Isabella manage to keep their attraction concealed despite the sparks that burst out into the open and fly when they’re together. Although they can’t fully contain their chemistry, they know they have to put the dream they worked so hard for before anything else.

• Language: English
• Publisher: H Stinington
• Release date: Jan 20, 2018
• ISBN: 9781386800149

Book preview

Closer to Paradise

CHAPTER ONE

Daniel was 20, Isabella 18, and they had won their first major dance competition. They had ended up booked on a late afternoon flight from Vancouver to Toronto; somehow everyone else heading that way had left earlier, and even Camille had flown home the day before. And so it was just the two of them, travelling alone together for the first time, going home to the small Toronto apartment they’d furnished with mementos and hand-me-downs and the boxes they hadn’t unpacked yet.

They were more than an hour delayed departing YVR, apparently due to congestion on the runways and the late arrival of the inbound flight. Daniel and Isabella had sat, side by side, in the stiff and uncomfortable chairs that had probably been designed to prevent all but the desperate from loitering in the airport. He bought them both coffees; she read a magazine and then thumbed through a discarded newspaper, getting up from time to time to gaze out the window into the dimly lit, gloomy world. Aircraft lights gleamed through the darkness, their liveries distorted but still recognizable. Air Canada, Air Transat, WestJet, a seemingly constant parade of domestic flights on the move, just not for them.

By the time they finally boarded - choking down the last mouthfuls of their tuna salad sandwiches, the only thing left to buy in their vicinity for people who chose not to pay extra for meals - Daniel was almost too tired to care about how late they were. He let Isabella lead the way. She always had the energy to smile and wave at the flight attendants, to look as though she was listening as they directed her to her seat, and all he had to do was follow along behind.

She had a window seat, which made her happy, and there was no one sitting on his other side, which made Daniel happy. Isabella always liked looking out the window, trying to figure out where they were; she’d finally accepted that Daniel couldn’t identify random bits of Canada just by peering out the window and she’d taken up quizzing unsuspecting flight attendants instead. Tonight, though, it was dark and cloudy enough that there wasn’t much worth seeing, and soon after take-off she closed her eyes, her head tilted toward the window and her breathing steady.

Daniel was less lucky. The ability to sleep on planes eluded him - he had too much leg and not enough space for it - and so he was stuck flicking through the in-flight magazine and through Isabella’s airport magazine, not quite following the movie but glancing at it from time to time.

He was remembering, in the back of his head, that he should probably wake Isabella up when the drink service came around just in case she wanted some juice or something. (If she didn’t, he’d drink hers for her quite happily.) It was weirdly late, as was the food, and there’d been no announcements about it. He picked up the in-flight magazine again, to read about places he’d never thought of going and noticed, out of the corner of his eye, a pair of flight attendants making their way back to the galley.

Across the aisle, a small girl sitting in her mother’s lap was driving a Matchbox car in circles on the tray table. An elderly couple was talking quietly, and ahead of them two teenage girls were sharing a set of earphones. A kid said I’m hungry and was told to wait, they wouldn’t starve.

Daniel closed his eyes. A delayed meal service, late drinks: odd, but nothing to worry about.

He hoped.

It was unfortunate that he had been known to spend his free time watching documentaries about plane crashes. It gave him ideas, and it wasn’t worth having ideas when there was no evidence to go on.

In the end, it was actually a relief to hear the ‘ding’ of the intercom, the this is your captain speaking. Beside him, Isabella blinked and sat up and stretched, looking confused, the way she always did when she woke up. What?

Daniel caught her fingers and held her hand. Shh, he said, feeling better already.

The flight attendants were making their way back down the aisle, their best smiles on their faces.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I guess today’s just not our day. As a cautionary effort - and I stress, this is just a caution - we’re going to be diverting this flight into Calgary so the experts down there can take a look at an issue we’re having with one of our engines."

Isabella squeezed his hand, looked at him and then out the window where the engine looked perfectly normal.

I know, Daniel whispered, not at all sure what he was even telling her or what he even knew.

Across the aisle, unconcerned, the little girl was crashing two cars into each other. Her mother put a hand over hers and took the cars away.

Right now, that engine’s up and running just fine but if necessary, folks, we can fly and land this plane on one engine. Now, we’re beginning our final approach to Calgary and plan to have this plane safely on the ground inside of fifteen minutes. Ladies and gentlemen, at this point could you please ensure...

Seat backs upright, tray tables locked, cabin baggage stowed in the overhead lockers or under the seat in front. Daniel kicked his backpack further under the seat, as all around them a panicked flurry of activity and whispers set in.

Isabella twisted in her seat.

What are you doing?

Counting the rows to the exit, she said, quietly. It’s five rows behind us. Just in case. She pulled the safety card out of the seat pocket, read it, looked upward as though checking for an oxygen mask. Do you think he’s telling the truth?

The pilot? Daniel asked, grateful, at least, that his quiet worries weren’t unique to him.

The little girl was crying for her cars, kicking and screaming while her mother tried to distract her with a lurid pink teddy bear. The elderly couple had gone quiet.

The wheels went down with a thud that seemed to echo through the plane, and somebody gasped behind them.

Yeah, Isabella said.

I don’t know.

It’s probably true, though. It’s probably nothing to worry about. I bet this happens all the time. They have to be careful. I guess we’ll just spend a couple of hours sitting in the airport and get home late, right?

Isabella talked a lot when she was nervous. Actually she talked a lot all the time, but there was a certain kind of talking she did when she was anxious. Daniel had figured that out about three weeks into dancing with her. Yeah. I mean, flights get diverted all the time, he said, able to pretend confidence for her if not for himself.

There was no one waiting for them at home, no one to know if they got in late, no one to ask where they’d been. No one to leave the lights on, no one to make sure they’d eaten, no one to ask if they’d had a good flight. They’d been living in Toronto two weeks, and until now those thoughts had made Daniel feel grown up.

Now they made him feel like a child.

Isabella was still holding his hand, and Daniel had no intention of letting go. He sat bolt upright in his seat, looking past her out the window. They were coming through the cloud now, the lights of the city smudged and blurry. He wondered how close they were to the ground, and if that dodgy engine was still doing what it should.

Nearly there, Isabella said, bright and cheerful. I’ve never been to Calgary.

It’s nice, he said, grateful for the distraction. You’d like it, I think. There’s a river running right through the middle of the city. Not that we’ll get to see any of it.

Maybe another time.

I hope so. I mean, yes. Daniel was aware, again, that he was straying into the ridiculous. More than likely, this plane would land safely, they’d all go sit in the airport for a few hours, and head on to TO later tonight, tired and hungry and annoyed. Making a promise for the future wasn’t going to change that but it felt like the thing to do anyway.

His stomach was churning with that pre-competition kind of feeling. Someone was squeezing someone else’s hand very tightly, and he wasn’t sure which of them it was. Probably it was mutual.

The engine pitch changed. It seemed lower, somehow; less intense.

It’s just landing, Isabella said. It’s just landing. This is really weird.

Yeah.

I can see the runway. She was rubbing the back of his hand with her thumb now; that was definitely all her, but Daniel wasn’t about to complain. Nearly there. Nearly there.

She seemed to count them in, repeating nearly there, nearly there. Daniel held on to the soothing rhythm of her words, eyes closed now. He trusted her.

There, Isabella said.

A moment later they bumped and skidded, wheels down in Calgary. Daniel opened his eyes, saw the runway lights and the terminal lights rolling past the windows, and breathed properly for the first time in a while. Good, he said.

A few people were clapping.

Isabella puffed out a long breath and turned to him, cheeks pink and eyes bright. She looked like she’d been on a rollercoaster and was giddy and gleeful with surviving the trip. She didn’t say anything. She just looked at him, and she was grinning.

Daniel’s heart went thud. Daniel’s heart had gone thud many a time when it came to Isabella: in the times she put her hand in his when he was having a rough day, in the sideways smiles and shared jokes, in the triumphs, in the disappointments, in the messy hair mornings and the competition glamour. He should have been getting used to it.

He was not.

That might have been because it was getting worse.

He grinned back at her.

Then she was leaning into him, pressing her forehead against his. Her skin was damp, or Daniel’s was, and they were still gripping each other’s hands. Daniel had nowhere to look but into her eyes, nothing to feel but relief and her and - and love, the kind of love he wasn't supposed to feel for her.

It’s okay, Isabella said, her words almost delighted. What were we worrying about?

I wasn’t, Daniel said, without much of a grasp on what he was saying. He only knew that he had to say something, and he needed to make them both laugh before the intensity made them explode. Not me. Never. Never ever ever. Not about anything.

Isabella giggled at him, and then the moment was lost in the warning to please keep their seatbelts fastened until the sign was switched off.

***

It began there, and didn’t end there.

Daniel had thought that once they arrived safe in Calgary, someone would give that