Read Stripe Search: BBW Paranormal Shape Shifter Romance (Furocious Lust Shorts Book 5) for Free Online Page B

inside purr with the delight. “Sort of boring, really. I expected you to be in the office, trying to cop a feel or something.”
    He shook his head, a smile on his lips. “Sorry to have disappointed you. I’ll make sure to meet your expectations tomorrow.”
    “All right… Dancing. All through my childhood I was a shy wallflower. My mom and dad tried to raise us to be responsible from an early age, so I was always more adult than kid.” She said, her gaze trained on the road ahead. “My brother was always the one getting into some sort of trouble, so I tried to make sure I didn’t bring my parents any more headaches. Being in the lower middle class meant they lived from paycheck to paycheck. There were no real vacations or money for any extras.” She glanced at him and grinned. “Until one day I was in school and my teacher sent me to run a note to the dance instructor.”
    He loved the way her face lit up at the memory of the dance instructor. “You liked her?”
    “I caught her in the middle of a lesson. She was so...amazing. You see, she was a big woman. But she moved with so much grace. I was floored by how much I wanted to move that way.”
    “So what happened?”
    “I was a big girl then...still am. And my parents didn’t discuss my weight with me, other than to tell me I needed to do more to try and lose the weight. The other kids in school didn’t notice me, because I was the unpopular, shy, fat girl. I didn’t have friends. I was alone.” She shook her head. “No, I was okay with that. Don’t feel bad.”
    He couldn’t not feel bad. He imagined the young version of Gabriella feeling lonely, and it did something to him nothing ever had. It tore him up thinking of her having ever felt alone.
    “Anyway, I continued passing by the dance classes, just to stop and watch for little bits at a time. Then one day Ms. Glenda invited me inside. She asked me why I wasn’t in her class.”
    “You already knew you wanted to dance.”
    She nodded. “I’d known from the first day. I think she saw it in my face. I told her my parents said I needed to take classes that would help me get a job in the future, and dance wouldn’t do that. So instead of messing with my school schedule, she contacted my parents and suggested I stay after school and take a new fitness routine she was going to teach.”
    “Ah, smart woman,” he laughed.
    “Very. It ended up being just me and her. She taught me the basics of ballet, mambo, street, hip-hop and pretty much every dance out there. We had so much fun. Just dancing. Me learning how to move my body and control it. Did I lose weight? A little, which pacified my parents into letting me stay for the next two years.” She cleared her throat, and the smile slipped off her face. “Then when I graduated high school, I continued the classes, but mixed things up with other things like pole dancing and belly dancing. By then, my brother was getting into all kinds of trouble, and so I started trying to control him more and had less time for myself.”
    “When did you become his caretaker?”
    There was a moment of silence. He’d driven past the hotels and reached a not-so-nice area in Vegas, north of the hustle and bustle of the strip but still poverty stricken. Unlike the nicer section where she lived, this was where the achingly poor lived.
    “I lived in this area when I was a kid. Not far from where Jill and Janie are now. It reminds me every time I come of how much I’ve done to try and better myself. Sometimes, it doesn’t feel like enough.” She sighed and glanced at the street. “My parents died when I was in college. I tried to be Wonder Woman at first: going to school and working, but with Joel, you can’t do that. He needed me to be on his ass all the time.” She sighed. “It got to the point I got fired from work for constantly having to go searching for him in the slums. Then I left school. I went to work at Charlie’s and haven’t looked back. That’s