Title: The Naked Dancer
Author: Emme C. Taylor
Publisher: NineStar Press
Release Date: 12/19/2023
Heat Level: 1 – No Sex
Pairing: Male/Male
Length: 61300
Genre: Contemporary, contemporary, gay, romance, artist, dancer, arts/performance art, bonding over art, meeting your hero/idol, grieving, depression, forgiveness, healing and recovery, second chances, moral choices
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Description
“I want you to paint my naked body.”
A strange proposal made early one morning sparks the artistic collaboration of a lifetime.
Morgan barely makes it through each day, weighed down by depression and loss. He’s a well-respected artist, but he hasn’t stepped into his studio in months. He’s become more acquainted with the feel of his bathrobe than his paintbrush.
Lu knows depression well. He still struggles with it three years after a disastrous performance ended his long-term relationship and his illustrious dance career. He and Morgan are battling different versions of the same demon.
Lu decides to vent his pain and his past through a naked dance, and he asks Morgan to paint his bare skin for the performance. New love can’t cure depression. But when two intensely artistic men unite to make something unprecedented, it sparks creativity and passion and hope—things neither man has felt in a while.
After months of driving through the oppressive night, the sun is finally peeking over the horizon for Lu and Morgan. And it all starts with a dance.
The Naked Dancer
Emme C. Taylor © 2023
All Rights Reserved
After Morgan redid the bacon, he set four large plates of food on the table. “I present sustenance.”
“I accept your offer of sustenance,” Lu said, reaching for the bacon.
Morgan filled his own plate and picked up his fork. “I hate to bring it up, but I need to know. Is Per going to show up at my door because of this?” He wasn’t sure if he meant the nude dance he was going to have a hand in or the possible dinner date they might share. Either way, the last thing he wanted to deal with was an angry six-foot-three Nordic athlete at his door.
Lu paused, a large bite of scrambled egg hanging off his fork. “How’s your security system?”
Morgan’s butter knife slipped from his loose fingers and clattered onto his plate. “What?”
“Kidding, kidding. Nah, Per doesn’t give a shit about me.”
Slightly taken aback, Morgan said, “After three years together?”
Lu shoved the egg into his mouth and chewed through his answer. “It’s sweet that you think I’d inspire both stalking and murder in someone, but trust me, he has no interest in me now. There’s no care there.”
Morgan leaned back in his chair, food forgotten. His stomach let out a burble of protest. “Even though you were together for so long?”
“I think he stopped caring long ago,” Lu said, chewing thoughtfully. “There were…signs. But I ignored them. Maybe he never cared.” Lu took an overly long time slathering a chunk of butter on his toast, his eyes dark despite the window’s morning light, the hollows beneath even darker. “He was always finding these intense adventures for us, always searching for the next source of excitement. Life was too dull for him. I was in denial that I was just another diversion. Anyway, I haven’t seen him since that day on the stage, in the moments right before I passed out.”
“Seriously?” Morgan stared at Lu in shock. “He never visited you in the hospital?”
“Hospitals aren’t fun, and I was all played out.”
Morgan’s scalp prickled uneasily at Lu’s choice of words. There was a disturbing emptiness to this glamorous relationship the world had watched play out, like a glossy placeholder photo that would eventually end up in the trash. Morgan had never liked Per anyway. Sure, the man had dated Lu for years—and that had everything to do with his dislike.
“He called me once,” Lu said, “right after I got out of the hospital. It ended in a shouting match.”
“The call?”
“Our relationship.” Lu’s toast was beyond buttered. He was about to put a hole in the bread, but the distraction kept his expression veiled. “He told me I was too melodramatic that day, screaming on the floor. I disagreed. As it turns out, bleeding out on a stage is pretty damn painful, and the screaming kind of just happens as a result. He insisted I overreacted to make him look bad, and he was upset that I cried out for my mom instead of him. I told him to take the ceiling beam he shoved me under and jam it up his ass. And that was that between us.”
“Jesus. I’m sorry.”
“I’m not. It should have ended before that.” Lu paused. “Long, long before. I’m ashamed it took that to make me realize how toxic our relationship truly was.”
Per didn’t deserve Lu. He didn’t deserve to share a stage or a bed with Lu. But all of that went without saying.
“Besides,” Lu added, “there was something we disagreed on in the last phone call. I saw him clearly after that. It finally made me understand what kind of person he is.”
Morgan couldn’t keep his curiosity at bay. “What was it you disagreed on?”
“A line he wanted to cross, but I wasn’t willing to cross with him.” Lu plucked at the hole in his sleeve. “I’m not usually this candid. I just want you to know you don’t have to worry about him coming to your door. He’s long gone.”
Butter melted off the side of Lu’s toast and pooled onto his plate, surrounding the poor bread. “I think I might need another piece of toast. I’ve killed this one.”
“You stabbed it and then drowned it. One might call that overkill.”
“I had to make sure it was really dead,” Lu said.
“It had no chance.”
“It deserved better, like maybe some raspberry jam.”
“I think it was over the moment I put it on your plate,” Morgan said. “Its fate had been sealed. You’re dangerous.”
“No, but really,” Lu said. “Do you have jam?”
“You come into my house, kill my bread, and then ask for jam. Outrageous. Unbelievable.”
Lu’s eyes were on him, his lips slightly parted. “You’re cute.”
“And here I am…not even trying.” Morgan’s mind slowed, a waterwheel spinning only slush. He wasn’t even trying because he thought there was no way he could compete with the caliber of man Lu no doubt usually dated, no chance he could physically appeal to someone like Lu. “Says the man who dates Nordic gods.”
“He was no god. He was an asshole. What does he have to do with this?” Lu stood, and for a moment, Morgan thought he was leaving, that he’d offended Lu. But he only walked into the kitchen, saying, “Where do you hide your jam?”
“In my vault, as any sane man would do.”
“Of course. And is that vault the fridge?”
“In the door, top.”
Lu disappeared behind the open fridge door, but his sound of disappointment said it all. He reappeared with the jam jar in hand. “I have to leave. This isn’t going to work. I can’t associate with someone who eats apricot jam.”
“It’s the best. This brand has little bits of apricot in it.”
Lu made a face. “You disgust me.”
“Raspberry disgusts me.”
“Clearly this could never work.” Lu flashed that impish little smile of his as he slipped back into his chair. “Our jams must never touch.”
Morgan had to work his jaw to get his mouth to function again. When he finally spoke, his voice came out rough, his tongue too dry. “You’re actually kind of terrible, aren’t you?”
“Definitely,” Lu said, liberally adding apricot jam to the disaster of toast on his plate. His toast appeared to have given up, flattened into a soggy, holey mess—now with jam. “Please don’t kick me out of your house because of that terrible joke.”
“Which one?”
Lu paused over his food. “The worst one, I guess.”
Might as well go ahead and state the obvious. Poke the elephant that lounged between them.
“Why are you flirting so hard with me, Lu?” Morgan asked.
Because beautiful celebrities didn’t walk into homes and flirt with short-statured men with gray-streaked black hair and a soft middle. That wasn’t real life. Real life was mistakes and heartache and dating at your own level. As much as it pained Morgan to admit it, he probably couldn’t even see Lu’s level.
“Because I like you,” Lu said.
“You don’t have to flatter me,” Morgan said with a sigh. “I’ll do the project with you even without the flirting, though it is pretty fun.”
Lu winced. “Okay. Look, I’m not used to doing the pursuing. Maybe I’m not good at it. But I never would have agreed to a dinner date with you tomorrow night if I wasn’t feeling you.”
“Oh.” Morgan blinked. “I thought I’d dreamed that. Wait. You’re pursuing me?” He’d sure as hell daydreamed similar scenarios plenty of times, but never anything this realistic.
“See? I told you I might not be any good at it.”
Lu piled scrambled eggs onto his jammy toast, smashed the eggs into the bread in a way that alarmed Morgan, and then draped his bacon over the eggs. He put his second piece of toast on top of the whole mess and smooshed the sandwich together.
“My God,” Morgan said, “you’re a freak. Who in the hell eats breakfast like this?”
“Things taste better together.” Lu took a gigantic bite that hinted at his ability to eat a table. He chewed through his words. “Why wouldn’t I flirt with you?”
How to put it nicely? Morgan didn’t exactly want to trash himself but… “I’m not in the same league as a Nordic athlete.”
Lu’s food seemed to get stuck in his throat. He made a soft sound and took a gulp of coffee. “All right. This is the last time we’re talking about Per. So, here it is.” He sighed. “Honestly, Morgan, I was taken in by his stupid face—”
“And his stupid body, I’m sure.”
“—even though our personalities constantly clashed. He had no sense of humor. He didn’t like it when I said goofy shit, and I say goofy shit often.”
“Personally, I think that’s one of your best qualities.”
Lu’s smile flashed, sudden and diffident. “I’m pretty sure only someone who says equally goofy shit would understand.”
Morgan swept his arms out. “Then you’re in good company.”
“Anyway, yeah, I dated a man for three years because he was hot, and he knew how to make life more fun, and it was easier to go to an event with him at my side than it was to break up with him. And I paid for it. If he cared for me at all, he wouldn’t have pushed me under a collapsing ceiling on his way out the door. I would have been a thought in his mind instead of just something in his way to safety. My bad choices ended up getting me thrown aside—literally—and physically injured in a way that sent me into a depression for several years. So, trust me, you don’t want to be in whatever league Per is in because it’s a crappy place to be. He was the biggest mistake of my life, so please stop bringing him up.”
“Understood.”
“Talking about him is ruining the flavor of my delicious breakfast sandwich creation.”
Morgan twirled his fingers at the monstrosity on Lu’s plate. “Add more jam. I’m sure that’ll save it.”
“Not if it’s apricot.”
“Because you’re eating it shoved up against bacon, you goof. That’s so wrong.”
Lu grinned. “So wrong it’s right.”
“Next time, just slather the jam directly on the bacon and be done with it.”
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Emme C. Taylor can be found wandering stormy beaches with a pen and notebook in hand, waiting for inspiration or lightning to strike. She believes the atmospheric environment helps her to write the grittiest parts of her stories. Crochet and dark chocolate ease her mind when her characters aren’t cooperating. Emme will happily talk about almost anything to avoid having to talk about herself. How about this weather, huh?
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