Dance to the Piper Read Online Free PDF Page A

eyes.
    "Hello again." Maddy slung her towel around her neck, then gently eased him out of the way of the hungry dancers. "Did you see the whole thing?"
    "Whole thing?"
    "The dance."
    "Yes." He was having a hard time remembering anything but the way she had moved, the sensuality that had poured out of her.
    With a laugh, she hung on to the ends of the towel and leaned against the wall. "And?"
    "Impressive." Now she looked simply like a woman who'd been hard at work—attractive enough, but hardly primitively arousing. "You've, ah… a lot of energy, Miss O'Hurley."
    "Oh, I'm packed with it. Are you here for another meeting?"
    "No." Feeling a little foolish, he pulled out her hairbrush. "I think this is yours."
    "Well, yeah." Pleased, Maddy took it from him. "I gave it up for lost. That was nice of you." She dabbed at her face with the towel again. "Hang on a minute." She walked away to stuff the brush and towel in her bag. Reed allowed himself the not-so-mild pleasure of watching her leotard stretch over her bottom as she bent over. She came back, slinging the bag over her shoulder.
    "How about some lunch?" she asked him.
    It was so casual, and so ridiculously appealing, that he nearly agreed. "I've got an appointment."
    "Dinner?"
    His brow lifted. She was looking up at him, a half smile on her lips and laughter in her eyes. The women he knew would have coolly left it to him to make the approach and the maneuvers. "Are you asking me for a date?"
    The question rang with cautious politeness, and she had to laugh again. "You catch on fast, Valentine Records. Are you a carnivore?"
    "I beg your pardon?"
    "Do you eat meat?" she explained. "I know a lot of people who won't touch it."
    "Ah… yes." He wondered why he should feel apologetic.
    "Fine. I'll fix you a steak. Got a pen?"
    Not certain whether he was amused or just dazed, Reed drew one out of his breast pocket.
    "I knew you would." Maddy rattled off her address. "See you at seven." She called for someone down the hall to wait for her and dashed off before he could agree or refuse.
    Reed walked out of the building without writing down her address. But he didn't forget it.
    Maddy always did things on impulse. That was how she justified asking Reed to dinner when she barely knew him and didn't have anything in the house more interesting than banana yogurt. He was interesting, she told herself. So she stopped on the way home, after a full ten hours on her feet, and did some frenzied marketing.
    It wasn't often she cooked. Not that she couldn't when push came to shove, it was simply that it was easier to eat out of a carton or can. If it didn't have to do with the theater, Maddy always looked for the easiest way.
    When she reached her apartment building, the Gianellis were arguing in their first-floor apartment. Italian expletives streamed up the stairwell. Maddy remembered her mail, jogged back down half a flight and searched her key ring for the tiny, tarnished key that opened the scarred slot: With a postcard from her parents, an offer for life insurance and two bills in hand, she jogged back up again.
    On the second landing the newlywed from 242 sat reading a textbook.
    "How's the English Lit?" Maddy asked her.
    "Pretty good. I think I'll have my certificate by August."
    "Terrific." But she looked lonely, Maddy thought, and she paused a moment. "How's Tony?"
    "He made the finals for that play off-Broadway." When she smiled, her young, hopeful face glowed. "If he makes chorus he can quit waiting tables at night He says prosperity's just around the corner."
    "That's great, Angie." She didn't add that prosperity was always around the corner for gypsies. The roads just kept getting longer. "I've got to run. Somebody's coming for dinner."
    On the third floor she heard the wailing echo of rock music and the thumping of feet. The disco queen was rehearsing, Maddy decided as she chugged up the next flight of steps. After a quick search for her keys, she let herself in. She had an