The Cirque Read Online Free

when he was near. But his reaction obviously didn’t match mine at all. He was practically handing me over to Dmitri.
    Dmitri’s hand on the small of my back guided me away before I had the chance to decide between them. But a sharp whistle quieted the room and we followed the others into a circle around Del. I found Sasha and went to stand by her, not wanting to pick sides between the guys.
    “Welcome back!” Del’s voice boomed. “Our fifteenth season is going to be our best yet. We have some new members of the team to introduce today.”
    My cheeks threatened to turn pink in preemptive embarrassment. He introduced the couple from the hand-balancing team – Nikola and Ana, from Croatia. Del turned his head, looking around at the crowd spread around him. “Where’s my little ballerina?”
    I knew then they were going to know I didn’t belong here. That I had no business among these people.
    “Ah! Ariel.” He’d spotted me.
    “Ari,” I managed.
    “She’ll be working with Gabriel,” he added, pleased with himself. The scowls on the faces around me at the mention of Gabriel’s name told me he was an outcast. I fought the urge to look for his face in the crowd, and instead became fascinated by the floor in front of my feet.
    Del went through some announcements and a few more introductions of the newly hired staff – there were lighting techs and production assistants who were also new. When he started going through the list of tour cities, my ears perked up. We would start with Toronto in two weeks, and then move on to Chicago, Minneapolis, and Fargo before heading out west, where the list of cities grew longer. Anticipation at escaping my former life bubbled up inside me, threatening to overflow. But the other half of me was terrified of the unknown. What was I getting myself into? Could I really pull off lying to my parents while they were away? Dmitri and Gabriel’s attention was already flustering me…and oh, and there was that little detail of surviving my act.

Chapter 3
     
     
    In the two weeks that led up to our opening show in Toronto, I gained a little more confidence about my decision. And as it neared time to begin our summer tour, I packed and got my apartment ready for my time away. Luckily when I graduated school a few weeks earlier, I’d talked my parents into letting go of the nanny they’d hired to check on me several times a week while I completed high school in the city. And of course I didn’t breathe a word of all this cirque business to anyone. It sounded strange even admitting it to myself.
    As I boarded the huge tour bus for the nine-hour drive to Toronto, I started to believe I could actually pull off this summer of freedom. If I continued the weekly phone calls to my parents while they were away, maybe this would work. They’d never suspect me of stepping out of line. In fact, my mom had actually been encouraging a level of independence recently, even asked me if I was seeing anyone. I doubted my old dance instructor would call my mother…. One, because he despised her, and two since I was no longer a student there – I’d been an employee when they let me go.
    The Aerial Mystique show traveled toward Toronto with a fleet of thirty-two vehicles – twenty-five RVs, five semis, and two tour buses. I felt like a celebrity, only our bus was pretty old and the drive was pretty boring. Sasha and Tanner sat with me in a booth. We urged Gabriel to join us so we could play cards, but he preferred to listen to music, read, or just stare blankly out the window.
    Gabriel was like no other guy I’d been around before. With his tattoos and bad-boy image, the way his hair looked like he’d fought with his clothes, and the fact he didn’t give a rat’s ass what anyone thought of him was intimidating and sexy all at the same time.
    The more I tried not to think about him, the more I found myself focusing on him. I stole a glance in his direction. His eyes were closed, his head tipped