Only in Texas

by Christie Craig

  ON HER WAY TO WORK, LeAnn drove by Tony’s apartment—admittedly not for the first time. At least once a week, she’d find herself cruising his street, hoping to get a glimpse of him. Today she wasn’t looking for him, but for exterminator trucks or guys in hazmat suits. Not that she expected to see them. She might have been born yesterday, but it wasn’t that early in the morning.

  As expected, she saw no sign of bedbug extermination and so she drove on to the hospital. What was Tony up to? Was he moving back in because he was afraid she’d try to take the house? Hadn’t he read the divorce papers? She planned to move out in three months. She wasn’t going to steal his house out from under him, but maybe he wanted her out sooner than ninety days.

  No. That wasn’t like Tony. Heck, every month when she sent in the mortgage bill, she’d get notified it was already paid. She’d told the bank to just let the check go toward the principal.

  After clocking in at the hospital, she headed for Ellen Wise’s room. Hearing laughter, she knocked and poked her head in the door. Nikki and Ellen’s mom were in the room, visiting.

  “Is this a party?” LeAnn asked.

  “They’re making me laugh and it hurts,” Ellen said, smiling.

  “She was in here.” Nikki spoke to Ellen but was gesturing toward LeAnn. “Ask her.”

  Ellen looked at LeAnn. “Did I really offer to have sex with a couple of guys yesterday?”

  LeAnn grinned. “I’m afraid so.” She moved in and fit the blood pressure cuff around the woman’s arm. “But don’t worry. You explained yourself.”

  “That I was blitzed on morphine?”

  “No, that it had been too long since you got lucky,” LeAnn said.

  They all laughed again.

  Once LeAnn updated her chart, she started toward the door. Nikki said her good-byes to Ellen and her mother and walked out with LeAnn.

  “How are things?” LeAnn asked Nikki.

  Nikki shrugged. “I haven’t been arrested yet.”

  “Tony won’t let that happen.”

  Nikki frowned. “I’m not so sure. I don’t think he’s on the pro-Nikki team.”

  LeAnn considered it. “If I can see you didn’t do it, I’m sure he can.”

  “Thanks. Maybe you could put in a good word for me… I mean, if you see him.”

  “I will.” LeAnn paused by her next patient’s door, but her curiosity about Nikki kept her standing there. “You don’t have to answer me, but… are you and Dallas more than friends?”

  After a brief hesitation, Nikki sighed. “If I told you I didn’t know what we were, would you think I was crazy?”

  “Not really. Life’s peculiar sometimes.” Tony was back home, and LeAnn didn’t know why.

  “I just… everything is happening at once. And I’m not sure what he wants… Crappers, I don’t know what I want.”

  LeAnn grinned, but she felt the same stirring of panic. Did she know what she wanted? Somehow, she’d stopped thinking about what she wanted and started doing what she thought was the right thing. “Sounds like you’re confused.” And LeAnn could really relate.

  “I’d say.” Nikki looked at her watch again. “I’m already late opening the store, so I’d better run.”

  Before Nikki could leave, LeAnn said, “Hey. About Dallas. He’s one of the good guys.”

  “Like his brother?”

  LeAnn inwardly flinched, but it was a fair question, especially considering she’d been the one to start the personal line of questions. “Yeah. Like him.”

  “Then why…” Nikki studied her and LeAnn could guess what she was about to ask.

  “It’s complicated,” LeAnn answered, not wanting to say more.

  “Yeah. The same here,” Nikki said.

  LeAnn hesitated and, while she wasn’t ready to share her own issues, she did want to help Nikki. “I couldn’t believe Dallas’s wife divorced him when… Oh, you do know about his being accused of—”

  “Murder.” Nikki nodded. “He told me.”

  “Dallas thought the sun set and rose on Serena. But personally, I never liked her. She was just… I don’t know, too high falutin’.”

  “Then I’m really not Dallas’s type,” Nikki said and walked away.

  LeAnn watched her. “I’d beg to differ,” she said to herself. She’d seen the way her brother-in-law looked at Nikki. LeAnn remembered the same look on Tony’s face when he’d sat beside her in the cafeteria.

  Closing her eyes, she tried not to hope. What she needed to do was decide what she was going to do about tonight. Tony’s note said he planned to cook dinner. Could she sit across a table from him and not break down because of all they’d lost—each other and Emily? Maybe she should just go to a hotel.

  Dallas parked behind Venny’s Restaurant, ran a hand through his hair, and tried to lose the frustration from the last half of the meeting with Nance and Tony. You said coming here would help me! Nance, who’d guessed he’d scratched his knuckle when he’d changed the oil in his grandmother’s car, had left the police station more frightened than when he’d arrived.

  The CSU officer had said it was unlikely a baseball bat had caused the scratch on Nance’s knuckle, but nevertheless it would go into the report. Tony had even tried to calm Nance down, but he was scared and for good reason.

  Dallas hoped that Tony would get Detective Shane to take another look at the case. If not, Dallas would take the story of Shane going after Nance for revenge to the press. But even that might not hold water. It depended on how the judge saw it. And if it didn’t hold water… Dallas remembered the promise he made to Nance’s grandmother.

  “Shit.” Could he give her the heads-up that Nance should run to Mexico and become a fugitive for the rest of his life? And if he ran, and they didn’t find a suspect in the second robbery, the system would try to pin it on Nance just to close the case.

  Dropping back in his car seat, Dallas released a gulp of frustrated air. He needed to get his mind off that case and onto Nikki. Or rather her case.

  Every few minutes he’d think back to his bedroom—how soft she was, how it had felt when he’d first entered her and the sound she’d made when she came. But mostly he thought about her saying it had been a mistake.

  Thinking about it, he didn’t believe she’d meant his lack of food in the house. Hell, the more he thought about it, the more he wondered if she hadn’t been right. One part of him said nothing that good should be considered a mistake. Another part of him said he knew it would be a mistake from the moment he found himself being pulled into her soft, blue eyes.

  Then his brother’s words played in Dallas’s head. Nothing’s wrong with it if you both know that’s how the game is being played.

  Christ! He wasn’t playing games with Nikki. He liked her. Liked her a lot. If he didn’t he wouldn’t be so damn worried about her thinking their having sex had been a mistake.

  His one-day-at-a-time approach felt weak. Frankly, he didn’t know what scared him more, falling for Nikki and falling hard, when he’d vowed not to become another candidate for the fool-in-love award, or falling for a woman who very well might be going to prison. But holy hell, he knew she didn’t see prison as a possibility. Decent people had a tendency to believe in the justice system. He knew differently.

  He’d called her twice. Both times, the conversation felt awkward. He tried telling himself she’d had someone in the gallery. Everything was fine, but he wanted to see her. Mind made up, he decided when he was done here, he’d grab them some lunch and drop by the gallery.

  Getting out of his car at Venny’s, he looked around, his mind turned to another direction. What had brought Jack Leon back here?

  Had the person on the phone asked to meet him here? Near the Dumpsters? Not likely. Did that mean Leon had come looking for Nikki’s car? And if so, why? Leon had his own vehicle. Dallas recalled the cops having said his car had been towed from valet parking. Could Leon have wanted to hide something in Nikki’s car?

  Tony hadn’t mentioned C
SU finding anything in her car. Considering they planned on releasing it this afternoon, Dallas would bet it was clean. But damn, a piece of the puzzle was missing. He reached back inside his own vehicle for a pen and notepad. He saw the newspaper, which had a picture of Nikki in front of her store and named her a person of interest in the case. He’d already suffered through the article, but needed it as a conversation starter.

  When he stuffed his pen in his shirt pocket, Dallas wondered if Leon had come back here to leave Nikki a note. Puking, the man wouldn’t have wanted to go back into the restaurant. But why not call Nikki? Had she changed her cell number? A good question to ask Nikki later.

  Walking past the Dumpster, he planned his approach. People didn’t care much for talking to cops, or even PIs for that matter. But for some reason they loved talking to reporters. He just hoped the day employees weren’t the same people who’d been there the other night.

  Stepping inside the restaurant, relieved the hostess wasn’t the brunette he’d already spoken with, he hesitated at the door. The hostess obviously didn’t hear him walk in because she didn’t take her eyes off the newspaper she held. No doubt, she was reading about Leon’s murder.

  Dallas waited patiently. She glanced up and quickly hid the newspaper. “Sorry,” she said.

  “No problem.” He showed her his newspaper.

  “Crazy, isn’t it?” she said, and Dallas saw the way her green eyes swept over him with feminine appreciation.

  He smiled. “You got that right.”

  “Table for one?” The flirty way her eyes moved over him told Dallas she might just be the person he needed to talk to.

  “Unless you can join me,” he said, upping his wattage of smile.

  She grinned. “I’ll bet you say that to all your hostesses.”

  “Only the pretty ones.”

  “Aren’t you the charmer?” She started moving into the dining room.

  Dallas glanced back at the bar. “Why don’t I sit up there? The scenery is nicer.” He let his gaze move over her again.

  She smiled. “Fine with me.”

  She walked to a small table by the empty bar. “The bartender is running a little late setting up. Can I get you something to drink?”

  “Coke would be nice. But do you know what would be even better?” He forced a touch of seduction in his voice.

  She moved closer. “What’s that?”

  “A little information.”

  “About me?” she asked.

  “And the interesting story you were just reading.”

  Suspicion colored her eyes. “Are you a cop? The boss said if you guys came in you’d have to talk with him first.”

  “Nope.” He pulled out his pad and pen. “Just looking to add more to the story. Information that could be quoted as from an anonymous source.”

  “I wasn’t here.” She sounded disappointed.

  “But I’ll bet you’ve heard all about it.”

  “True.” She perked up a bit. Glancing around as if to check for any of her managers, she started talking. She told him the cops had taken a bunch of knives to see if any of them were the murder weapon. And they were looking at waiters and the cooks for putting something in the guy’s gumbo.

  She shifted closer. “But all of them are willing to take a polygraph test. They’re innocent. I don’t know why the cops are doing this—the waiter told the cops that the man’s wife admitted she was going to kill him. What else do they need?”

  The right person, Dallas thought. Another customer came in and she stepped away.

  Dallas got up and went to peek into the kitchen, hoping to see where the soups were located.

  “You looking for something?” someone behind the stove asked as Dallas poked his head through the doorway.

  “Bathrooms?” he lied, his gaze shifting around.

  “To the left of the entrance.”

  “Thanks.” Before he turned he saw two big soup warmers on this side of the kitchen, along with a stack of soup bowls. So anyone in the kitchen had access to the soup.

  He went back to his table where a Coke now waited on him. The hostess looked over from her post as if she’d wondered where he’d gone. He smiled and, after glancing at her empty front doorway, she started over.

  “How many people do you have working here on one shift?” he asked.

  She hesitated. “Maybe twenty waitstaff. Two hostesses at night, and two bartenders on weekends. I think there’re ten cooks and prep people in the back.”

  “Has anyone quit lately?”

  “No… wait, there was that weird busboy.”

  “When did he quit?”

  “All I know is he didn’t show up yesterday.”

  The day after Jack was killed.

  “I had to clean tables during rush hour,” she said.

  “Any chance you remember that busboy’s name?”

  She grinned. “As a matter of fact, I do.” Reaching into her pocket, she pulled out a sticky note. “His girlfriend called today and wanted me to ask the manager when she could pick up his check.”

  He looked at the note. It had the girlfriend’s name and the busboy’s. More customers walked in. “Can I keep this?”

  “Sure.” She glanced at the waiting patrons. “And in case you need to ask more questions… or anything else.” She snatched his pen and wrote her telephone number on his pad.

  “Thank you.” He pulled out his wallet. “For the drink?”

  “It’s on the house.” She looked at the two twenties he placed in her hand.

  “Nah. Keep the change for helping me.”

  “I’d rather you call me.” She brushed her hand over his.

  “As tempting as that is…” His eyebrow arched up. “You should keep the money.”

  Dallas hadn’t gotten out of the restaurant before he’d dialed Tyler and given him the names to run down. Then he took off to pick up lunch. On the way, he found himself remembering this morning with Nikki and he smiled the whole way.

  “I can’t go lower,” Nikki told Margo Preston with Preston Interior Designer as she added a shadow under the tree of her painting in process. Nikki had started the painting of two young boys fishing by a pond two weeks ago, but for some reason the boys now reminded her of Dallas and Tony. Was she subconsciously putting Dallas into her painting? Why? Because subconsciously she knew she’d have the picture longer than she’d have him?

  “I’m offering you a twenty percent discount.” I’m not asking you for forever. Dallas’s words played in her head.

  Nikki’s cell phone rang, followed by her store phone. With the brush in her hand and a customer underfoot, she let both go to voice mail. Fridays were her busiest day, she didn’t normally attempt to paint, but today she’d longed to lose herself on the canvas—to forget. She eyed the face of the littlest boy and confirmed her suspicion.

  “Fine,” Margo said. “I’ll take it.”

  Setting her brush on the easel, Nikki felt the thrill of making her third sale for the day—Nana’s cable was safe—even if the reason downright depressed Nikki. Who knew that being suspected of a murder made you a cause célèbre?

  Her first customer had actually brought in the newspaper article for her to read—“Local Downtown Artist Person of Interest in Murder of Ex-Husband.” The newspaper had run an old picture of her standing outside the front of her store when she’d first opened the gallery. Nikki was tempted to tell everyone the sale wasn’t dependent on the guilty verdict.

  As Nikki rang up Margo’s purchase, her cell phone rang again. She ignored it.

  “I need to hurry,” Margo said. “Can you have it ready to pick up this afternoon?”

  “I’m closing at five,” Nikki told her.

  The door to the gallery swished open and Dallas—an unhappy Dallas—stormed inside. Every nerve ending in her body jumped up and down with glee.

  “You stopped answering your phone,” he said, stopping just inside the door.

  Nikki shot him a don’t-be-rude look and
tried to ignore the racing of her heart and hormones. “I’ve been busy.”

  Margo leaned in. “Is he the reason you’re closing early? If so, I don’t blame you.”

  Handing her the receipt, Nikki smiled. When Margo walked out of the shop, Nikki found Dallas studying her unfinished painting.

  He looked up. “I was worried.”

  “I told you if I’m busy I don’t answer my phone.”

  “It didn’t stop me from being concerned.” He gazed back at the painting and she feared he’d recognized her version of his younger self in her work. “You’re really good.”

  “You’re an art critic as well as a PI?”

  “No, but I know what I like… when I see it.” His gaze shifted and he moved toward her—slow, sauntered steps, like a lion about to pounce on his prey. She was the prey and, in spite of the wisdom of doing otherwise, she wasn’t running. She pressed her hands on the counter, wanting him to touch her, and afraid that he would.

  He moved behind the counter and, glancing back at the door as if to make sure no one had walked in, he slipped his hand around her waist and pulled her against him. His lips found hers in a soft kiss that quickly went hot. His tongue slipped between her lips, and Nikki felt her nipples tighten against him when she recalled their morning rendezvous.

  “Did you miss me?” he asked, pulling his head up but holding her against him. “Did you think about this morning?” His knee shifted ever so slightly between her legs. Instantly, the tightness in her breasts spread lower, which she suspected was his intent.

  “Yes.” She didn’t lie. “But…” She put her hand on his chest to hold him off. Immediately she recalled touching him there this morning without a shirt. Then she recalled touching him without his pants, and she didn’t have what it took to push him away.

  Nikki wasn’t what you’d call experienced. With fewer sexual partners than she had fingers on one hand, and two of them ending without… satisfaction, she wasn’t exactly up on proper after-first-time-sex behavior—especially after the awesome sexual partner jumped in the shower and left her in his bed with only half a chocolate doughnut. Oh, he’d apologized profusely, both for leaving and eating the doughnut, and promised to make it up to her later. Some of the promises had included very explicit language of what he planned to do to her when he saw her next. Her cheeks warmed as she realized this was the next time. Surely, he didn’t plan on…