Saving Cinderella! by Myrna Mackenzie Page B

was…accidental, the guests signed up for a tour, and they deserve something special.”
    “I agree. So we’ll dance, Alexandra.” As he placed his hand at her waist, he was instantly aware of the warmth of her body, the subtle jasmine scent of her hair, those pretty blue eyes gazing up at him as he twirled her around the floor.
    “I didn’t actually plan this part beforehand. Us dancing together, I mean,” she confessed. “I should have asked first, before roping you into this dance.”
    “Don’t apologize. That’s an order. Besides, I consider myself lucky. This may be my last chance to dance in the Blue Ballroom before it becomes the Beating Heart Ballroom,” he said, surprising himself once again by teasing her. What was it about Alex that made him do such unwise things?
    She chuckled. “I never thought about that. What if all the names submitted are hideous?”
    “Then we’ll have another contest.”
    “You’re being very nice about being dragged into this,” she said, but he shook his head.
    “I believe I’m the one who dragged you into this job.”
    “I could have said no,” she whispered as the music became slower. And without thinking, without a trace of common sense, he pulled her closer and tried not to think about how soft she felt against the hard planes of his chest.
    She could have said no and left him in the lurch. But she had said yes, he thought, and now she was in his arms, and he was in danger of doing something stupid…like pulling her even closer against his body, right in front of the tour group.
    But the music ended. Alex smiled and thanked him.
    “There’s nothing to thank me for. We danced. I enjoyed it.” End of story. At least his mind wanted it to be the end. His nerve-endings, however, were still remembering Alex in his arms.
    “Could we have another longer dance some evening?” someone asked.
    “Why not weekly?” Alex suggested, and a new McKendrick’s tradition was born.
    The rest of the tour followed the same pattern, with Alex thinking of some new idea, such as having movies running constantly in the theater, complete with popcorn. But when they came to the solarium, she asked Wyatt to explain the history of the room.
    “It was simple,” he said to his audience. “When I first came here I missed green. So I tried to create a green haven.”
    “You succeeded,” Alex said. “Tropical plants, comfortable chairs, private nooks and the sound of bubbling water. I could find a happy escape here.”
    “I hope you will come here when you need some downtime,” Wyatt said, looking directly into Alex’s eyes.
    “Thank you,” she mouthed silently, and he wasn’t sure if she was thanking him for talking to the group or for suggesting a private escape for her. It didn’t matter. What mattered was that for a moment he’d felt intimately connected to her. That wasn’t safe for either of them.
    By the time the tour ended, Alex was on a first-name basis with every person, and they had all promised to recommend the tour to others, to show up to her dances, to watch her movies and start submitting names for the ballroom. Within less than a week Alex had charmed his customers and promised to tip McKendrick’s operating procedures upside down.
    And, Wyatt mused as he insisted on walking her to her room, she had threatened the even keel he liked to maintain on his emotions. “You won them over easily,” he told her as they made it to her door.
    “Well, I have a lot of practice shepherding people around, and I enjoyed doing this. Helping people can be pretty rewarding most of the time.”
    “But not always?” There was that fleeting shadow in her eyes again.
    “Nothing works one hundred percent of the time,” she said. “Sometimes I get a little overzealous or overly involved and that can have a downside.”
    He wondered if she’d been “overly involved” with any of those jerks who had made her swear off men. But of course she had. Even from the short time