Building the Life (The Dancing Wolf Book 3) Read online

  Book Three

  The Dancing Wolf Series

  Building the Life

  By: Amy DeMeritt

  Building the Life

  Book Three of The Dancing Wolf Series

  Copyright © 2017 Amy DeMeritt

  All Rights Reserved.

  ISBN-13: 978-1976331473

  ISBN-10: 1976331471

  This book may not be reproduced in any form, in whole or in part, without written permission from the author.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or events is entirely coincidental.

  Cover designed by Amy DeMeritt

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Coming Soon…

  Other works by Amy DeMeritt

  Chapter One

  I’m sitting on the edge of the bed staring at the rings on my left hand and I just can’t stop smiling. Tomorrow, we fly back to Maryland for the summer family gathering and state pow wow. This has always been my favorite time of year because I get to see Awenasa, family, and friends, and I become deeply immersed in our culture. But this year is especially important to me. Up till November of last year, being in a real relationship with Awenasa had just been a dream. She finally made that dream come true after telling me she’s ready to leave the reservation and come home to my heart and start living the life we always dreamt of together.

  After Awenasa told me she’s ready to be in a real relationship, I was worried I would lose Sam, but she’s been really great. It was rocky at first, and every so often her jealousy comes out in little pouty moments, but we haven’t fought about it since I gave her, Madison, and Shannon promise rings just before Christmas.

  The dance competition I did with Sara, Keira, and their friends caused more problems with Sam than the fact that I’m married did. Our video submission won an invitation to the live competition in New York in May, and we actually won the competition and will be making the music video in a couple months. Getting there wasn’t easy though. Symone wouldn’t stop her flirting and occasional inappropriate touching.

  Symone actually almost cost us the entire competition when we were in New York. Sam came with me and wouldn’t leave my side for nothing because she didn’t trust Symone at all. There were a few times she wasn’t allowed to be with me because of competition rules, but otherwise, Sam was with me the whole time.

  The night before the last dance battle, Sam and I were alone in our big suite hotel room we were staying in with the entire dance squad. Sam was out on the balcony reading, and I was taking a nap on the couch. I felt gentle fingers and lips on my neck, arms, lips, and stomach, but I thought it was Sam at first. I groaned something in my sleep about being too tired, but the lips pressed more firmly against mine. They didn’t feel right and the scent wasn’t right, but it wasn’t till I felt the weight of the person laying on me that I woke up and came face to face with Symone laying on top of me.

  I had tried to get her off me and screamed at her to get off, but she had me pinned down and was laughing. She was enjoying my struggle. Sam rushed in after she heard me scream and came over and ripped Symone off of me, throwing her to the floor. Symone lunged for Sam and I had to quickly dive on top of Symone and wrestle with her to keep her from getting her hands on Sam. Sara and the others came in while we were fighting. I thought Sara was going to kill Symone.

  Apparently, Sara had several private arguments with Symone even before the squad was formed. Sara called Symone a “trophy hunter”. It’s a sport for Symone to reel in unavailable mates that are “highly desirable”. According to Sara, I’m in Symone’s top tier of trophies to capture. She’s not interested in a relationship; she just wants to say she was able to seduce me into having sex with her. The fact that I’m married and promised to three more girls only made her want to break me even more, which I guess is why she basically molested me in my sleep.

  Unfortunately, Symone is still in the squad and I’ll have to deal with her a little longer. Sara wanted to replace her, but competition rules wouldn’t allow it unless of injury or illness that prevents a member of the squad from staying in the group. If we had gotten rid of her, we would have been required to give up the music video opportunity to the runner up. None of us were willing to do that.

  The rehearsals and recording for the music video start just before the fall semester, so my plan is to take Awenasa with me so Sam and Madison won’t miss school. I had to get special permission from the dean’s office to be able to start the semester late – something that I know they won’t allow Sam or Madison to do unless they are in the video.

  Part of me had hoped that the location would have been someplace really exotic, like an island or Mexico or something, but we’re going to be filming mostly in an old abandoned playhouse in Los Angeles, California and an old western style bar. The locations seem odd to me for an R&B music video, but I guess it’s not too uncommon with music videos for the location to not match the song well. Going to California is still exciting and I’m hoping we get to go to the beach at least once. It’s probably a good thing a more exotic location wasn’t selected because I would feel bad about not being able to take all of my girls with me.

  Sara is really excited. This will be the biggest gig she’s ever done. She’s done backup dancing for smaller named artists at concerts and she’s done some different plays that needed backup dancers, but this is a really big win for her dancing resume and could open up so many doors for her.

  It’s exciting for me too and could lead to a real career in dancing, but I’m still up in the air on what I want to do career wise. Mostly because I need to be able to provide for four women and hopefully children in the near future.

  “Hey, baby.”

  I look up from my rings to see Sam standing in front of me in a pair of short blue and white stripped shorts and a blue tank top. Her golden blonde hair is laying softly over her delicate pale shoulders that are slightly tinged pink from the summer sun. I smile and grab her hips, pulling her in close so I can wrap my arms around her and lay my head on her stomach.

  “You look beautiful and smell amazing.” She giggles a little and runs her fingers through my hair. “Thank you. We’re running to the store to buy a couple new memory cards and batteries for the camera. Do you want to come?” I squeeze her closer and kiss her stomach. “No, I’m going to workout. I’ve been slacking off the past couple weeks.” Sam laughs hard and lifts my face to look at her. “Yeah, right. You’ve been making us exhausted just watching you kill yourself in your workouts and running so much. Why don’t you come with us and then you can workout when we get home?” I nuzzle my face in her stomach and she laughs. “Because, if I don’t do it now, I might just want to lay on you when we get back.”

  “And that would be a bad thing?” I lift my face off of her stomach to see she’s smiling really big. “No, it would be wonderful. Ok, I’ll go, but you have to make me workout
when we get home.”

  “Ok, baby. I’ll be your boot camp drill sergeant for you.”

  “Good. I like when you boss me around.” Sam laughs hard and pulls me up from the bed. “Put a shirt on, baby.” I smile and kiss her lips. “Yes, first sergeant, whatever you say, first sergeant.”

  I snap my heels together and raise my arm in salute to her and she laughs and playfully smacks my stomach. I quickly grab a tank top from my dresser and slip it on as we walk down the hall to meet Madison and Shannon.

  “We didn’t think you’d give up your workout to come with us since you probably won’t get to work out at all tomorrow.”

  “Sam promised to be my drill sergeant when we get back and whoop my ass into shape. So, I’m ok with the schedule change.”

  While we drive to the store, my eyes fall back to my rings and I smile as I trace them and turn them on my finger. Less than twenty-four hours and I’ll have my wife in my arms. This sitting still and going shopping is a bad idea. I need to be moving. I have so much excitement and energy coursing through me that I feel so restless. Madison reaches over and grabs my knee. I hadn’t realized I was bouncing my leg on the ball of my foot. I look over at her and she’s smiling in a kind patient way. I just smile and lean back and try to breathe slowly to calm my excitement.

  I’ve been working out and running a lot more to increase my strength and stamina for dancing for the competition and to be prepared for the music video, but the closer the date gets to going back home, I’ve had to increase my workouts and their intensity. I just can’t sit still. I’m having a hard time sleeping at night and I’ve been waking up an hour or two before them every day. The past couple weeks, they’ve found me in the living room quietly working out or my notes that I went running more often than they’ve found me lying next to them when they wake up. It’s been so bad that Sam bought me a magnetic white board and dry erase marker for the fridge because she said I was wasting too much paper to say the same thing every day.

  The board is actually an awesome addition to the apartment. I like leaving them little notes on the fridge and then coming home to see a return note from them. It’s cute.

  We’ve been going through a lot of memory cards with how many videos we’ve been filming, so we’ve become experts on navigating the electronics store. After passing at least four polo wearing men with eager smiles asking if we need help, we make it to the aisle with the memory cards.

  After we posted the first video, I had to open a separate account for business stuff to make it easier to do taxes. Turns out most of what we buy to do the videos can be written off as business expenses. The dance channel has been doing really great with bringing in some income and we’ve been playing with some other ideas to cash in on my dancing without me having to jump from one dance job to the next like Sara likes to do. We’ve also been planning on a singing channel for Madison with the occasional duet with Shannon, and hopefully, Awenasa when she comes to stay with us.

  We’ve been trying to find new and creative ways to bring in money with the talents we have without having to go work for someone so we don’t have to take any focus off of our schoolwork or each other. Shannon still hasn’t allowed us to get jobs because she says the dance channel and our parents “reallocated dorm housing” money is more than enough.

  I’ve actually been receiving a lot of emails and inquiries from people and dance studios wanting to take dance lessons with me or have me come teach at their schools. We’ve been researching what it would require legally for me to go to dance studios to teach a choreographed dance to the students and give one on one lessons. I don’t want to be under anyone’s payroll, but if I can host events charging a fee per participating student, it could be an easy way to make a few hundred dollars at once.

  We’re still working out the details and we need to pick a school to pilot the idea with to see what the feedback will be, but it seems like a very likely next step in my dance career. With each event that I host, we’re going to record the whole thing and post it on my channel online. We’ll edit it so it’s not so long with the boring buildup of the students learning the routine, but we’ll show some snippets of that and then the full dance routine with me leading them and them performing behind me.

  “Sweetie, they only have four memory cards left. Is that enough?” I turn around from looking at some weird bending camera tripod and lean my head on Shannon’s shoulder to look at the shelf with her. “That stinks. Maybe we can get more while we’re in Maryland.”

  “It would be nice if the camera could recognize the higher memory cards. They have a ton of those.”

  “Excuse me. Do you need help with anything?” I lift my head off Shannon’s shoulder and look over at the newcomer. It’s a store polo wearing guy with one of those annoying eager smiles on his face. “Do you have any more of these stashed away somewhere?” I hold up the memory card and he shakes his head. “No, sorry. They’re on back order. Does your device accept the larger card? I can offer a ten percent discount on them to make up for the inconvenience.”

  “No, our camera won’t take these, but thanks for the offer.”

  “You know, we have some really great deals on cameras right now. All of the latest models accept the larger cards, so if your camera doesn’t accept them, you may want to consider upgrading for the best quality images and video. Do you have a few minutes and I can show you some nice options?”

  I look at my girls and they shrug a shoulder, but don’t say anything.

  “Sure, but we probably won’t be buying a camera today.” He smiles and waves us forward to follow him. “No problem. If you end up liking something, but need more time to think on it, I can give you my card and you can come back when you’re ready.”

  We follow him over to a display with a bunch of different cameras and video cameras with a TV and computer to hook up the cameras to so we can see the true quality of them. He sets up a camera and instructs us to walk in front of it so we can see the quality on the screens. Its good, but not any better than what we get now.

  “How does it handle with capturing fast movement and with it being held in a hand and walking around?”

  “Do you record a lot of sports games?” I laugh and shake my head. “I dance.” He looks me up and down confused. “You dance?” All of my girls laugh a little and he blushes. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to insult you. Uh, you can do whatever you want to test the camera out as long as you don’t drop it.”

  I smile and take the camera he’s offering me. I point the camera at my feet and start dancing to the song over the sound system. After a minute, I stop.

  “Play that back for me, please.”

  He makes some clicks on his computer and the image is jumpy, but there’s no stalling in the footage like we sometimes get with our camera if we’re moving around too much. I hand the camera to Sam and back up to an open area on the floor and start dancing and putting a lot into it as if I’m really making a video to post. When I stop, my girls are smiling really big, and some customers who had stopped to watch applaud. I laugh and wave.

  “Thanks.”

  I walk back to my girls and the guy plays the video back. It actually is a lot better than what we’re working with now. I stare at the screen for a moment trying to figure out what to do, but Sam bumps my arm to get my attention.

  “I think you have a fan.”

  She nods to a young girl, probably ten years old, and her dad watching from behind a display case. She looks like she wants to come talk to me and he’s pushing her forward, but she’s acting shy and shaking her head. She notices me watching and she squeals and tries to hide behind her dad. I laugh a little and pretend to go back to watching the video, but watch her out of the corner of my eye. The girl slowly takes a few steps closer and then her dad pushes her the rest of the way so she’s standing right in front of me on the other side of the display case. Her eyes are huge and even under her light milk chocolate complexion, I can see she’s blushing.

  “Hell
o.” She squeals and moves to stand behind the TV screen, slightly obscuring her face. With a shaky voice, she asks, “Are you The Dancing Wolf?” I smile and nod. “I am, but my friends call me Kayla.” She smiles really big and moves out from behind the TV. “I can call you Kayla?”

  “Sure. What can I call you?” She hops up a little and her smile is amazing. Her dad walks over looking very amused and waves, but doesn’t say anything. “My name is Trudy. I dance too. I want to be able to dance like you. I’ve seen all of your videos and I watched you on TV. You are amazing. You’re my favorite in your group.” I laugh a little at her sudden fast bursting when she was too shy to even walk over to me a few minutes ago. “Thank you, Trudy. Do you study dance on your own or in a dance studio?”

  “I study at Blue Moon Dance. Would you come dance with us? My teacher said she would try to get you to come in, but she said you probably wouldn’t. We all love watching you. Oh my god, they would love me if you came in. Please.”

  “I’d love to.” I pull my wallet out and pull out one of the business cards that Madison designed and ordered for me. “Here, ask your teacher to call or email me and we’ll set something up in a couple weeks.” Her eyes get so big as she squeals and hops in place before kissing the card. “Oh, my god! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! No one is going to believe I met you. Can I take a picture with you?”

  I smile and start to walk around the display counter. All of my girls are watching with big smiles and are trying not to laugh. Trudy’s dad pulls his phone out and I move to stand next to her, but she jumps with excitement and wraps an arm around my waist and cheeses really big at her dad. I put an arm around her shoulders and her dad takes a couple pictures. When he lowers his phone, Trudy turns to look at me with a big smile.

  “Thank you. This is like the best day of my life.” I laugh a little and rub the back of my neck, feeling a bit awkward and not knowing what to say. We experienced a lot of this in New York, but I’m still not used to it. “Ok, Trudy, don’t smother her. Let her get back to shopping.” She looks up at her dad and pouts a little and then looks back at me. “Will you really come dance with us?”