Read In the Zone (Portland Storm 5) for Free Online Page B

foot—remember your heel lead—and ladies will be stepping back with your right foot, toe hitting the ground first. On my count. One, two, three, one, ready, go.”
    I took a step and immediately trampled Jennie’s toes.
    “Ouch!” she shouted at me.
    “Why didn’t you move?”
    “I was waiting for you to lead me, to give me an indication of how I should move.”
    Brie had fucking counted us off and outlined who was supposed to move in what way. What more indication did she need?
    “All right,” Brie called out, staring with a bothered expression at me and Jenni. “Everyone hold up for a minute.”
    The other couples came to a stop, and everyone joined her in staring at us.
    “Do we have a problem over here?” Brie asked.
    “Only if you consider this big oaf bulldozing my toes a problem,” Jenni muttered.
    Brie met my eyes, and I wished she would never look away. “So tell me, Keith. Have you ever taken dance before?” she asked.
    I shook my head. “Never.” I wanted to hear her say my name again. My name, not Jacob. I’d heard her call me that plenty of times the one night we’d spent together.
    “Then, Jenni, you’re going to have to help him out. He doesn’t know how to lead.” Brie crossed over to the pair of us, and she put the flat of her palm on my lower abdomen—close enough to certain other parts of my anatomy that I had to fight back a groan. She patted her hand over that spot. “This is your core. This is where you move from, not your feet. You start here, and the rest of your body follows. Feet, arms, torso—they all have to wait. It all begins here. Once you start moving from your core, your hands will give Jenni a slight nudge, and she’ll follow. Just don’t start it with your feet or you’ll step on her, and don’t start with your hands and arms or you’ll knock her off-balance and she’ll fall over. Got it?”
    The only thing I got out of all of that was the sensation of having her hands on me again, but I nodded. I could do this. If Colesy could fucking do this, then I could do it, too. “Got it,” I replied.
    Her eyes flashed up to meet mine again for the briefest of moments, and then she backed away. I immediately felt the loss of her hand on my abs.
    “Okay, let’s try it again,” she said to the whole class, lifting her voice so it would travel through the studio. “One, two, three, one, ready, go.”
    This time, I tried to move from my core first, as she’d told me. It didn’t feel too awkward, actually. In hockey, we need a strong core for everything we do—skating, hitting, shot blocking, shooting. I supposed, if I took the time to think about it, we tended to move with our core first a lot. I’d never thought about it in those terms before. When I stepped forward, I felt Jenni moving backward in sync with my motion.
    I stepped to my right, and she followed. Then feet together, then back, then left, then feet together again, and repeat.
    We kept doing this box step, and with each reiteration of the motions, it got a little easier and less uncomfortable. I wouldn’t say that it was starting to feel comfortable, though. I was still the newest of newbies in this class, and it showed in the way my feet were clomping across the floor. I definitely didn’t have the easy dancing gait, the one Brie called a heel lead, and the idea of rocking from one foot to the other went straight over my head.
    Brie was moving through the couples, correcting an arm placement here and straightening a head there. When she finally came back to us, my entire body tensed as she moved behind me. I’d seen her do this with most of the other couples, but that didn’t come close to preparing me for the heat of her hovering behind me, or for the strong but gentle touch of her hands as she adjusted my frame and straightened my spine. She stayed behind me dancing along with us, kind of like that scene in Dirty Dancing when the female dance instructor danced behind Jennifer Grey, all three