Million Dollar Cowboy

by Lori Wilde

  She took a second look, brushed her hair back from her face, and reapplied her lipstick. Good enough.

  The other assistants would be here soon and they’d need the dressing room. Time to clear out.

  Carefully, she minced her way down the stairs, went past the stage where the stagehands were setting up, and into the auditorium.

  The Twilight Playhouse was one of the oldest existing theatres in the U.S. that still hosted performances, and it was the only building on the town square to have kept its primary function since the town was founded in 1875.

  The theatre in fact predated the township, having been built the previous year, next door to what was then a saloon. Now, it was a fine dining restaurant nostalgically called 1874.

  A few years back, when Emma and Sam Cheek took over as owners, the Playhouse had undergone a historically correct renovation, so while everything looked the way it had almost a century and a half ago, and the exterior was one hundred percent original, the auditorium was essentially brand new.

  The theatre held three hundred people, and during the month of the December, every performance sold out. This year’s Christmas play was Elf and on Saturdays and Sundays they held a two p.m. matinee.

  Numerous green wreaths, with red velvet ribbon streamers connecting them, hung from the white limestone walls, festive and inviting. Stacks of programs sat on the apron of the stage, waiting for Santa’s helpers to pass them out to theatregoers at the door.

  From the slip of light filtering in through the open side doors, the Italian crystal of the colossal chandelier aggressively created rainbows, dappling the stage and orchestra pit in luminous prisms that twinkled and danced when the heating/air conditioning unit stirred the dangling glass.

  Someone had suspended a wedding-bouquet sized clump of mistletoe from the chandelier’s central branch, inviting the audience to indulge in stolen kisses. Aww, Christmas in Twilight.

  Paige picked up an armful of programs, tucked them into her elbow, and bobbled her way over the thick rose-patterned carpet to the theatre lobby. No one was at the main reception desk, but rummaging sounds came from the closet on the other side of the room.

  “Emma?”

  “Nope.” Colorfully tattooed, multiply pierced, purple-dreadlocks Jana Gerard popped her head out from the closet.

  “Oh.”

  “Sorry to disappoint. Emma hopped over to Caitlyn’s flower shop to replace the blooms.” Jana waved at the wilted poinsettia baskets on the long marble countertop.

  From the closet, Jana dragged out a life-sized cardboard cutout of an acoustic guitar protected by a sheet of thin clear plastic that the Playhouse had used to decorate the lobby for last summer’s performance of Oklahoma.

  “What’s that for?” Paige asked.

  “Sesty’s spearheading the Cowboy Christmas music fundraiser, and Emma said we could borrow the guitar.” Sesty Langtree was a local event coordinator, and one of Jana’s two bosses.

  A few years back, Jana had moved to conservative Twilight from keep-things-weird Austin, and with her flamboyant appearance she stood out like a scarlet rose in a planter box of white lilies.

  No one knew much about Jana and rumors dogged her heels, usually clad in leather spiked motorcycle boots. The speculating about her past ran the gamut from the absurd; she shot a man for cheating on her. To the sublime; she’d donated a kidney to a sick lover, friend, parent, sibling, child, but alas, they’d tragically died anyway.

  While the truth of Jana’s abandonment of the state capital for the close-knit lake town of Twilight was probably much more mundane, she did nothing to quell the gossip and at times actively flamed it with sly smiles and knowing glances.

  Paige understood the temptation toward mysteriousness. Even though she had relatives in Twilight, and was not nearly as exotic as Jana, she too had been the topic of lively conversation when she’d taken up residence in Uncle Floyd’s houseboat.

  “Need any help?” Paige asked, as Jana hoisted the cardboard guitar onto her back.

  Jana eyed her. “You’ve got your hands full, and I’m not real confident in your ability to walk a straight line in those heels.”

  “Me either,” Paige admitted, but she set down the programs and moved to open the left side exit door. “Excuse me,” she called to the crowd packing the sidewalk. “Woman coming through.”

  The throng shifted, cutting a narrow path for Jana to join the flow of foot traffic.

  “Thanks.” And Jana was off, swallowed up as the crowd closed ranks again. The only visible sign of her was the bobbing cardboard guitar surfing heads.

  The other five assistants came bustling in through the door Jana had just exited from, red-cheeked and laughing. They greeted Paige merrily, and trundled off to the dressing room.

  All the Santa’s helpers had been told to get into costume early so the actors could have the dressing rooms. The helpers would work the lobby before the performance, greeting guests, passing out programs, selling refreshments from the bar.

  The doors opened at one-thirty. It was now twelve fifty-five.

  “You’re gonna do great,” she said, giving herself a first-day-on-the-job pep talk. “Don’t trip and break your neck in the dang boots and you’ll be fine.”

  She glanced around for something to do, spied the droopy poinsettias. A little water and time out from under the heating system and they would rebound. Taking the initiative, she whisked the five baskets away one-by-one to the closet, filled with posters, signs, and various stage props, that Jana had just vacated.

  The side door of the Playhouse opened again, this time ushering in a red-cheeked Emma Cheek carrying a giant basket of white winter flowers. Emma was in her mid-thirties, barely five foot, two inches shorter than Paige. She possessed flame-red naturally curly hair, peaches and cream skin, and an easy smile.

  Emma had once been a Broadway actress, and still occasionally starred in a movie, but mostly she kept busy running the Twilight Playhouse, and riding herd on her veterinarian husband Sam, Sam’s teenage son Charlie from another marriage, and their six-year-old daughter Lauren.

  Emma stopped short and peered around the basket. “Where did the poinsettias go?”

  “I moved them to the closet to make room for the new flowers.”

  “Why thank you, Paige. That was considerate.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  Emma hefted the basket onto the marble counter, moving it this way and that, cocking her head to assess her handiwork, attempting to find the most strategic spot for all angles. “I would have taken care of the flowers sooner, but when I stopped by the clinic to drop off Sam’s lunch, he had a whole different kind of meal in mind.”

  “Oh.”

  Emma wriggled her auburn eyebrows. “Word to the wise, a quickie on an exam table is not as sexy as it sounds.”

  “I … um … never thought … well … um, okay.”

  “Sorry, was that too much information?” Emma grinned as if she wasn’t the least bit sorry. Her husband was one smoking hunk and she didn’t mind letting everyone know they had a spicy sex life.

  In all honesty, it wasn’t Emma’s frank talk that gave Paige pause, rather it was the realization that she’d not ever done anything as halfway intrepid as have a quickie on an exam table.

  The bravest thing she’d ever done was to take up residence on a houseboat. And as far as sex went, well, she wasn’t exactly a femme fatale. Never mind the Santa Baby costume she had on.

  “Now if you want to talk sexy …” Emma winked.

  No, no, Paige did not want to talk sexy with her employer.

  “Room nine at the Merry Cherub has a seven foot jetted tub. Fun!” Emma paused, her face turning dreamy at a hot memory. “Or try midnight under the Sweetheart Tree in Sweetheart Park. And do bring a blanket.”

  “Um, doesn’t that violate public nudity laws?”

  Emma looked like a sly cat that had slurped up all the cream. “Sometimes a girl has to let down her hair and take a walk on the
wild side.”

  Wild side, huh? Yeah, well about that … not her strong suit. Paige was more the look-both-ways-ten-times-before-crossing-the-street type.

  “But I shouldn’t be standing here gabbing about sex. Got lots to do. Would you guard the doors and not let anyone unauthorized in until one-thirty? The town council has been my riding my butt about letting people in early.” Emma rolled her eyes as commentary on the town council.

  “It’s five-after-one,” Paige pointed out.

  “Right, so keeping ’em out for twenty-five minutes shouldn’t be hard. You’ll only have to monitor the side door. All the rest are locked. You can unlock them all at one-thirty.” Emma disappeared into the theatre in a float of red hair and the scent of violets.

  Guard the door for twenty-five minutes?

  Sure, she could do that. Paige marched over to monitor the side door at the same moment a guy pushed his way in, bringing a bracing breath of cool December air. She was just about to reroute him when their eyes met.

  They both stilled.

  Man. O. Man.

  Snow dusted his thick ebony curls and broad shoulders clad in a faded denim jacket over a red plaid flannel shirt. He was average height, five ten or eleven, but he had a presence about him that made him seem much larger.

  He was lean and narrow-hipped in a pair of well-worn Wranglers, and only the Patek Philippe watch at his left wrist and his handmade James Leddy cowboy boots said he was anything more than an ordinary cowboy.

  But his smile!

  Dazzling. White. Killer Diller.

  Oh, that smile was the dangerous thing!

  Sprung from full, angular lips that twitched irresistibly as he stared at her—into her—with laser beam focus.

  It was a dynamite, TNT, nitroglycerin kind of a smile that detonated every nerve ending in Paige’s body, firing off round after round of tingly, breathtaking explosions.

  “Hi,” he said and she forgot that she was supposed to say, Doors don’t open until one-thirty.

  Instead, her jaw dropped and her tongue welded to the roof of her mouth, and she made a guttural sound. “Um … um …”

  His smile deepened, moved up to crinkle around his heart-stoppingly gorgeous gray eyes.

  He came nearer, walking with a sauntering, old-west gunslinger gait, the door closing behind him, the sound of his boots reverberating across the polished marble floor.

  And still she did not tell him to leave, mainly because she couldn’t find her voice. It had gotten tangled up in his smile like a lasso around a bull’s heels.

  The way he moved, smooth and easy, slammed in her chest and snatched her breath from her lungs.

  Couldn’t talk. Couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t think.

  She was a fish on a hook. Well and truly caught.

  “I’m here for the performance,” he said.

  Wait outside, she should have said, but her tongue remained glued to the roof of her mouth, peanut butter stuck.

  Her first day on the job and she couldn’t complete one simple task. Tell this red-hot stranger to wait outside with everyone else until the doors officially opened.

  But it was clear he was not a man accustomed to following the rules. What applied to regular folk didn’t apply to Greek gods in cowboy clothing. Did it?

  C’mon. Snap out of it.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, meaning to sound firm, but somehow her words came out alarmingly shaky. “But we’ve got a strict schedule to keep and we’re not opening to the public until one-thirty.”

  “It’s one-ten.” He turned his wrists so she could see the face of his expensive watch. Show off.

  “Rules are rules.”

  “Even in my case?” He gave her a look that said, are you kidding me right now? As if she should know who he was. As if he was somebody.

  Cocky. He was amazing and he knew it.

  His attitude rubbed her the wrong way. He wasn’t different than any of the other people lining up waiting to be let in. Peeved and vowing not to be swayed by his lively eyes and knowing grin, she pointed to the sidewalk. “Out, mister.”

  “But—”

  “No excuses.”

  “I’m—”

  “Go.” She snapped her fingers, gave him her fiercest scowl, even though her knees were shaky. He didn’t have to know that.

  Instead of leaving, he strolled closer. Paige’s heart hopped onto a trampoline and flipped into her throat. Now what?

  The stranger observed her with half-lidded eyes and intense interest, as if she were the most fascinating creature he’d ever seen. The hair at the nape of her neck tickled and her heart hiccupped. She wasn’t accustomed to this kind of scrutiny from a gorgeous man.

  “No one has to know you let me in twenty minutes early,” he whispered.

  He was fully in control. He knew it. She knew it. They both knew she was putty in the glare of his sexy stare.

  Damn him.

  “Leave,” she said, and added unsteadily, “please.”

  “What do I have to do to get you to bend the rules?” he coaxed, dipping his head, lowering his lips. “Will a kiss do the trick?”

  He was teasing, trying to get her goat. She could see it in his eyes, but the joke tumbled into the pit of her anxiety, pinged off her every nerve ending, chaotic as bouncing flippers in a pinball machine.

  She supposed he was trying to scare her off, get her to back down. Standing here smelling his stunning scent, feeling the heat from his rock-solid body radiate into her, she wanted, more than anything on the face of the earth, to turn tail and run.

  But she wouldn’t.

  Couldn’t

  For one thing, she’d promised Emma she’d guard the door. For another, if she took off running in the stilletoes she’d certainly fall and bust her ass.

  Not. Going. To. Happen.

  He must have seen something on her face, in her body language, because he stepped back, put his hand on the door. “Only eighteen more minutes now.”

  “And that’s when you can come in.” She pointed, surprised by how forceful and commanding her words shot out like a drill sergeant.

  He grinned at that, devilishly, frankly amused, and latched onto her gaze with eyes the color of San Francisco fog. Not that Paige knew firsthand. She’d never been out of Texas. But she had dreams.

  Big dreams.

  Dreams she believed long out of her reach.

  Those dusky eyes held the promise of landscapes she yearned for—windswept moors and craggy mountains, foamy ocean waves and red-rock deserts, stony castles and petal-strewn gardens.

  He’d been around. Seen the world.

  And his magnificent, experienced eyes left her winded and wondering and wanting.

  Wanting so much more than she had a right to claim.

  Dear Lord. She clicked the lock on that pitch of desire. Slammed it shut. Spun the tumbler. Steeled her gaze. Offered him nothing.

  His eyes gentled, no longer filled with daring mischief, and nonchalantly shifted his attention to the door. Which she was grateful for because it meant he was going.

  And when he turned, she had an unobstructed view of his butt cupped so enticingly in those faded Levi’s. A cowboy’s butt—firm, muscular, built for endurance, a masculine butt that dared her to touch.

  She hauled in a short, shallow breath, and ignored her tingling fingers.

  The sleeves of his denim jacket were pushed up enough to reveal tanned wrists roped with strong veins. Long, calloused fingers took hold of the knob. No adornment on his hands. No rings or tattoos. Plain. Durable. Bare.

  Simple but not simplistic, he was a man of rugged style and surprising grace.

  He opened the door. Going. Leaving.

  Yay. So why did she want to throw herself onto the marble tile floor, throw her arms around his ankles, and beg him to stay?

  “One more thing.” He turned back to her, eyes twinkling, and stared at her a long moment without saying a word. But his mouth, oh his knowing mouth, quirked up at the corners
as if to say, I know you’re as intrigued by me as I am by you.

  She gave him a polite, noncommital smile in return. He might be interested right now, but he wouldn’t be if he knew the truth.

  “What’s this sweetheart legend I’ve been hearing about?” His voice was low, sexy, and cozy as a fleece blanket in front of a roaring fire on a cold winter evening. There was a lazy lilt. As if he’d spent time in the Deep South where words were stretched out slow and sultry.

  But there was something steely as well. It was in the way his tongue hit the back of his teeth hard on the “t” sounds. Determined. Stubborn. A quality and tone that said when this man set his mind to a goal, come hell or high water, he would never, ever give up.

  Paige shivered. Just a little. Barely.

  But he noticed. His eyes darkened and narrowed, taking leisurely measure of her.

  “Huh?” she said because she was so distracted by his potent sexuality she couldn’t remember what he’d asked her.

  “The wishing well, the old tree with lovers’ names carved in it, the statue of a hugging couple in the park. What’s that all about?”

  “Uh,” she said. “Rebekka Nash and Jon Grant, childhood sweethearts from Missouri. They separated by the Civil War. She was a Southern Belle and he turned Yankee solider. But they never stopped loving each other. Fifteen years later they met accidentally on the banks of the Brazos River at twilight, and they were reunited.”

  “Hence the name of the town?”

  “Indeed.”

  “Ah.” He laughed. A beautiful sound that sent her heart thumping. “There’s nothing like a good romantic legend. Bet it stirs tourism.”

  “You got it.”

  His eyes drilled into hers. As if she meant something.

  And then he left without another word. Opened the door. Walked out. Disappeared into the crowd. Gone forever?

  Goodbye.

  Good riddance.

  Oh no, don’t go.

  Emma popped back into the lobby. Paige shifted her gaze from the door, where the cowboy and his world-class butt had just vanished, back to her employer. Emma wore a green-and-red elf costume that complimented her auburn curls and pixie smile. She was playing the role of Jovie that Zoey Deschanel embodied in the movie.