We stay like that for a moment. I can feel his strength and the solid warmth of his chest beneath my fingers. His heart beating in slow, steady thumps. I don’t want to, but I let my hand fall, and I walk away.
Once inside my wagon, I’m relieved to find I’m alone and burrow beneath the blankets. What a crazy evening, from excitement and delight to soul-crushing despair. Maybe Cale won’t want to workshop an act if I behave like a liability. I’ll have to show him tomorrow that I’m serious, and I can do this.
I wake in the pre-dawn light, and the first place my mind goes is to the act. Well, to Cale. I think back to last night, and how it felt when his body was pressed against mine with his arms tight around me. The way his black shirt felt beneath my cheek. What if our act involved me holding onto him in some way?
I punch the pillow and turn over in bed, because now I’m being ridiculous. Cale will want me to keep a safe distance from him at all times if he’s even looking a knife.
By the time I get up, pull on a dress and head out across the dew-damp grass, the sun is up and I think I have a germ of an idea.
“Penny for your thoughts?” Gorran asks, holding out a tin mug of coffee to me as I approach the fire.
I look up at the big, tattooed man. Blue ink decorates his arms and neck, and his white T-shirt probably conceals even more tattoos. I accept the mug with a smile. “Trying to figure out an act.”
“You girls are amazing with your horses. You’ll figure it out.”
I’m too sunk in thought to tell him I’m actually thinking about Cale’s knives. I recognize a large pair of booted feet in my peripheral vision, and my eyes snap up.
Cale is standing next to me, a look of concentration on his face that must be mirrored in my own. Instead of saying good morning, we both start talking at once.
“What if we—”
“I was thinking we could—”
I stop, and grin at him. “You first.”
“No, you. Go on.”
I take a deep breath and launch into the idea I had. “Okay. So. I don’t think rubber balls would work. They’d just bounce all over the place and it’s not that impressive. What about a big wheel that rotates and it’s got numbers or pictures on it? It starts slow and I get audience members to draw numbers out of a bag and you hit those numbers on the wheel with your knives.”
Cale blinks and doesn’t reply.
“You don’t like it,” I say miserably.
“No, I think it’s great, actually. I had a messy idea with balloons and glitter. Your idea is much better. We could do it three times, and each time you spin the wheel faster.”
I bounce on my toes, suddenly elated. “So you think you could hit moving targets like that? Even if the wheel is spinning fast?”
He takes a sip of coffee, and his smile is self-satisfied. “Sparkle, it’ll be easy.”
There’s always a lot to do in the mornings so we can’t get started right away. Cale goes off to see to the horses. I eat some porridge with Elke and Anouk, and then we practice our routine. After, I do stretches to keep myself limber, and run Dandelion through some things I’ve been wanting to try. It’s our turn to sell tickets so just before lunch me, Elke and Anouk dress in bright clothing and walk up and down the main streets.
In the early afternoon I find Cale by his wagon, sawing a large piece of plywood on a foldable workbench. He’s fashioning it into wheel shape, and there’s the beginnings of what might look like a stand. When he’s done with the wheel, he gets to work on the stand while I divide the wheel into twenty-four sections and paint each wedge red or white. When that’s dry and the stand is ready, I help Cale fix the two pieces together.
“Hey, nice,” he says with a grin, watching it spin. Then he holds it steady while I paint on the numbers.
As I work, my eyes land on Cale’s long, muscled forearm. He’s rolled his sleeves back to his elbows and as well as ropey tendons and veins, he’s scarred, too. Slender scars that make me want to stroke him with my fingertips. My awareness of him is making me tingly in places that don’t usually tingle.
“Ryah?”
I realize that I’ve finished and he’s asked if I want to take it through to the big top to try it out. “Oh! Yes. Let’s do that.”
Under the lights, we set up the stand so that it’s in front of the entrance into the arena so most people will be able to see it. I spin it slowly, and then move out of the way and call out random numbers while he throws his knives. He hits the right number every time.
“Hey, you’re pretty good at that.”
Cale just casts me a smile. He’s not an arrogant person, but I can tell he’s proud of what he does and he knows he’s good at it. He doesn’t have any problems when I spin it faster the second time, or when I really crank it.
“We’ll need a more durable board before we take this out in front of an audience, but for now, not bad at all. I think this could be a great act.”