Taming the Country Star: A Hometown Heroes Novella (Entangled Bliss) (4 page)

Chapter Six

“You can’t wear that.”

“Why not?” Cole ran a finger around the neckline of the mask that covered his entire head. It was even hotter than the serape had been, but sweating through the black, red, and silver Lycra might be worth it for the look of sheer horror on Kylie’s face.

“We’re going to a Mexican restaurant,” she said.

“Then it’s perfect.”

“You cannot wear a Mexican wrestling mask to a Mexican restaurant. It’s…it’s…” Kylie spluttered, clearly trying to find a word bad enough to cover his actions. “It’s disrespectful.”

“It’s a lucha libre mask,” Cole said in a haughty tone. “And it’s not disrespectful at all. I love lucha libre. This mask was given to me by El Diablo Demoníaco. He’s a fan. And a hell of a wrestler.”

“Seriously? The Demonic Devil? What kind of name is that?”

“A famous one in certain circles,” he said, dropping back into his normal voice. He reached up and pulled the mask off one-handed. “And apparently a sweltering one, if this mask is anything to go by.” Cool air from the vent brushed across his head and he turned his face up toward it.

“Really? You traded being a famous guy for being a famous guy in a mask?”

He laughed. “Different fan groups. Anyway, I didn’t put on the mask until right before I walked in the door. I’m pretty sure I’ve ducked the paparazzi for the moment. I’m staying at the Worthington, but my tour bus is parked outside a Hyatt.”

“Does that actually work?”

“For a while.” He shrugged. “My manager, Billie, is staying there, and says there are photographers hanging around. They’ll catch on eventually, but in the meantime, I think I could probably go without the mask. And anyway, maybe you could be the one in disguise,” he suggested. Kylie laughed and shook her head, but he persisted.

“I get it,” he said. “Wrestling’s not really your style. How about”—he glanced around and plucked a hot-pink cowboy hat with “I heart Texas” across it in rhinestones—“this,” he said triumphantly, dropping it on her head.

“No, no, no.” Kylie removed the hat and put it back on the stand, but she was smiling, too.

“You’ll need something to cover your face, too, of course,” he said, holding out the wrestling mask.

“Not that,” she protested, still laughing. “I’ve got some old Mardi Gras masks in the back. I much prefer feathers to sweaty old Lycra.”

“Oh, really?” Cole’s eyes darkened.

“I don’t want to have to wear a mask at all. I don’t want to have to hide.” Kylie’s voice came out huskier than he expected, and he hid a smile as she cleared her throat. “Let me grab my purse,” she said, moving away from him, toward the storeroom.

When she came back out, he was staring up at the Talk of Texas display. He had folded the mask and tucked it into the back pocket of his jeans, letting half of it dangle out behind him.

“That’s Trent Andrews, isn’t it?” he asked, gesturing toward the center photo.

“My father.”

“I remember seeing him in the nationals when I was a kid. He was one hell of a rider. Kind of nice to see my own face up there next to his.”

Kylie’s answering smile was strained, her eyes shadowed.

“So why ‘Talk of Texas’?” he asked.

“Alliteration,” she said. “A touch of irony, maybe, given the tendency you’ve both demonstrated to land me in the tabloids.” She pursed her lips as if considering whether or not to continue. “I was going to call it ‘Hometown Heroes,’ but since this isn’t your hometown…” Her voice trailed off.

And since I’m not a hero? Ouch. Well, that will have to change.
For now, though, time to change the subject.

“So where are we going?” he asked. “You promised me a tabloid-free dinner.”

“Azteca. It’s about two blocks away. You sure you can make it there without a disguise?”

He glanced around the store. “You got any sunglasses?”

“With or without rhinestones?”

“Preferably without. But I’m the man who was willing to wear a superhero wrestling mask to be able to go out to dinner with you, so really, either is fine.”

“Nice of you to be so accommodating.” She leaned over the cash-register stand and reached into the cabinet behind it. He admired the curve of her hip as she bent sideways and down, twisting to grasp at something beneath the register. One foot came off the floor as she balanced across the counter.

“Where’s LeeAnn when I need her?” Her muffled voice floated back toward him. “She makes this kind of thing look easy.”

“Here. Let me help.” He stepped forward and placed his hand on her hip to balance her. She froze when he touched her, and heat sparked from his palm. They remained perfectly still for one breathless moment.

Then Kylie wiggled back across the counter.

He held his palm motionless so that her body skimmed lightly under it as she stood back up, then left it at her waist when she stopped moving, enjoying the warmth through her shirt.

“Here,” she said, slightly breathless. “One pair of rhinestone-free sunglasses.”

“Thanks.” His own voice was rough. He didn’t move to take the glasses until Kylie pressed them into his fingers. With a mental shake, he straightened them across his face.

“There,” he said. “Disguise in place. Ready to go?”

“Wait.” Kylie snagged a red baseball cap with “Texas” embroidered across it. She stood up on her tiptoes to tug it down onto him. “There. Now you’re ready.”

…

Sweat beaded across Kylie’s upper lip as she pulled the door to Cowbelles shut and locked it behind her. The Texas heat was certainly part of the reason for it—the sun hadn’t set yet, and it was still almost a hundred degrees outside—but Cole’s presence was contributing, too. She could still feel the imprint of his hand on her hip, the track of heat it left behind, gliding up to her waist.

As she turned to face him again, a ragged piece of the poster by the door fluttered in a momentary breeze. Cole’s gaze followed her own, and his eyebrows lifted as he recognized the remains of his concert advertisement.

“Your handiwork?” he asked.

A hot flush crawled up her neck and she shrugged. “When I first opened the shop, I petitioned to have the no-flyer ordinance extended another block. I lost.”

“You saying you take down
all
the posters?”

“Maybe not quite so vehemently.”

“Vehemently,” Cole echoed with a chuckle. “That’s one word for it.” He lifted a tattered poster remnant with the toe of his cowboy boot. “I don’t know that I’ve ever been quite so thoroughly defaced.”

“Can we go now?” Something about his easygoing reaction to her poster desecration provoked equal parts embarrassment and attraction in Kylie. And his low laugh at her obvious discomfiture went straight to her abdomen, setting up a quiver that she quickly tried to smash back down.

Cole followed as she crossed the brick-paved street and moved down the sidewalk, but he kept talking. “I don’t get it,” he said. “You rip my concert poster down outside your store, but inside you’ve got a whole display with my face all over it.”

Kylie shrugged. “Your stuff sells. The concert poster doesn’t do me any good.”

He narrowed his eyes at her. “Not necessarily true. A concert poster outside could bring customers in.”

Her face burned. “I’m changing the subject now.”

“Okay.” His voice was pleasantly bland, but it didn’t match the look in his eyes, dancing with amusement as they were.

Air conditioning blasted out the door of Azteca when Cole reached around her to open it, contrasting with the heat of his arm brushing against hers.

“We seat ourselves,” Kylie said. She waved at the owner, Benito, who was standing behind the dark-paneled bar, polishing a glass with a bar cloth. It was still early, so the restaurant was relatively deserted, but Kylie steered them toward a booth in a dark corner anyway.

Benito tilted his chin toward her in response and draped the towel over his shoulder. Gathering menus from the wooden box attached to the end of the bar, he met them at the booth as they slid in.

The old man leaned in and brushed a light kiss across Kylie’s cheek in greeting. “Hi, sweetheart,” he said. “How have you been?”

“Hi, Benito. This is my…” She paused, searching for the right word. “Um. My…friend.” A flicker of recognition crossed Benito’s face, as if he were trying to place Cole’s face.

“Nice to meet you, sir,” Cole said, holding his hand out to shake Benito’s.

“I brought Cole here because he loves caldo de pescado, and yours is the best.”

Cole’s gaze brightened. “I can’t believe you remember that,” he said. “I haven’t had it since…” His mouth hung open as he surveyed her. She knew he was about to say—that he hadn’t had it since Cozumel—but he finished vaguely, as if the awkward moment had never happened. “I can’t remember the last time I had it.”

“Well, then,” Benito said, “I will make sure it is perfect for you,
mija
Kylie.”

The endearment brought a smile to her face as she watched Benito head back to the kitchen.

“I didn’t know you could get anything but standard Tex-Mex in the Stockyards,” Cole said. “At least, you couldn’t the last time I spent any time in Fort Worth.”

“Azteca’s a bit of a local secret,” Kylie said.

“So you lived here all your life?” Cole asked. “Did you ever want to leave?”

“Not really. It’s home. And I like the idea of contributing. And I get the best of both worlds—I mean, Fort Worth’s a city, but the Stockyards District is more like a small town, and I’ve always been part of it, ever since Daddy rode the rodeo circuit.”

His eyes narrowed. “Your ex—the one whose honeymoon I took—does he live here, too?”

“Ugh. I thought this was a first date. I’m not sure that’s first-date material.”

“Then think of it as background information. I only barely refrained from asking while we were on said honeymoon—I promised myself I would find out this time.” He sat back, looking at her expectantly.

“Fine.” Tenting her hands in front of her, she chewed on her lip for a long moment before she spoke. “Tom and I grew up together. His father was a rodeo clown—one of the guys who draws the bull away from thrown riders. We knew the same people, went to the same schools. Dated in high school, broke up in college, got back together after.”

She paused. When she didn’t resume, Cole prompted, “And then?”

“And then everyone assumed we should get married. Including us.” She tapped her fingertips together, then rearranged the napkin and silverware. “I probably would have gone through with it. Lucky for both of us, Tom figured out it was a bad idea.”

“Why bad?”

“Oh, nothing horrible. But there was no…spark. We were comfortable. Too comfortable, I think.”

“You seemed pretty upset about it when I met you,” he said.

“I’ve had a lot of time to think about it since then. And I think I was more embarrassed than anything.
Dumped at the altar
was never in my plans. Even if it was for the best.” She shrugged.

“And since then?”

“Since then, I’ve had a lot of time to work on Cowbelles.” She technically answered the question, although she was fairly certain he wasn’t really asking about work. But her lack of a love life since him was none of his business.

“Your store.” One corner of his mouth quirked up, as if he were reading her mind.

“Right.” Damn him for noticing her change of topic, anyway. “Cowbelles is small, but it’s something I’ve built for myself, and it means that I’m a contributing member of my community. I can give back a little.”

Cole leaned forward. “How so?”

“Well, I joined together with several other shop owners in the Stockyards and we sponsor a couple of Little League teams for local kids. Every couple of months, Cowbelles hosts the midnight food run—some of the local churches deliver food to the homeless and LeeAnn and I help out with that.”

“So it’s all charity work sorts of things?”

Kylie laughed. “No. I’m also a member of the Stockyards Small Business Coalition, so some of it gets pretty political.”

“Like what?”

“Well, like I said earlier, three years ago, I tried to get the city council to extend the ban on posters and flyers another block.” She tried to ignore the flush she felt climbing up her neck at the reminder of Cole’s defaced advertisement.

“Why another block?” He sounded truly interested, as if this were more than simply polite dinner conversation.

“Cowbelles sits at the very edge of the Stockyards, so on the left side of the store, no flyers are allowed. But the wall to the right of the door is always plastered. I think it’s tacky, so I tried to get it banned.” Leaning back in her seat, she watched him carefully. Would he be offended? He relied on those kinds of ads, after all.

A dimple flashed at the corner of Cole’s mouth. “So do you tear down all of the posters that show up there?”

She shrugged and the blush crawled across her cheeks. “Some of them bother me more than others.”

Cole laughed out loud, then sat back in his seat as Benito placed their dishes in front of them with a flourish.

Watching him dig into his soup with evident enjoyment, Kylie marveled at his reaction to her concert-poster vandalism. She didn’t know that she would be so calm—so amused—if she learned that Cole had ripped up pictures of her.

Something about that made her feel strangely safe, as if he might always take her actions in stride. As if he would accept even the worst parts of her, help her turn her fear and anger into joy.