by D. D. Scott
Bootscootin’ Blahniks
D.D. Scott
Copyright © 2010 by D.D. Scott
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from the author or publisher.
Edition: August 2010
Ebook design by Rob Siders
Table of 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
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
About the Author
Preview: STOMPIN’ ON STETSONS
Preview: Chapter One
Preview: Chapter Two
“Line dance history is like human history — there’s pre-history and then there is written history…”
Bill Bader
Chapter One
The nanosecond the light turned green, Roxy Rae Vaughn pressed the gas pedal toward the floorboard of her Mercedes. She didn’t have time to jack around. Her boutique opened in an hour. It took twenty-two more minutes to get there, thirty-three minutes to make everything perfect before she unlocked the doors for customers, and she counted on five minutes to spare. Apparently, the driver in the beat-up pick-up truck in front of her had all kinds of time for lollygagging. But she didn’t and took-up her speed another notch.
Dipstick yelped. His pudgy Puggles’ body slid across the passenger seat’s pashmina-covered, leather cushion then propelled off the heated lumbar rest. Not to be outdone by her litter brother, Darling whined from the backseat, followed by an odd, panic-laden pant.
A bit worried by her dogs’ unusual behavior, Roxy cracked the windows a smidgeon. Normally, her dogs were good riders. Perhaps they needed some fresh air. Maybe the stress in her life had reached her dogs too. She’d read that animals can sense their family’s upheaval. So yeah. Maybe that was it. She certainly had enough mayhem to share.
For starters, not every Fifth Avenue-raised woman gave it all up for Nashville Tennessee. But she did. And even though she was on the path to becoming the next starving artist, she was determined to make a success of her new life and her new boutique. Maybe she was crazy like her mother insinuated. Must be an inherited trait.
Maybe. Maybe. Maybe. Roxy sighed, inhaling the possibilities ahead then exhaling her increasing trepidation. Her life was one gargantuan Maybe.
No wonder Dipstick and Darling were going ape-shit hoisting their bodies toward the top of the slit windows. They needed to come up for air too. Unfortunately for them, Roxy had also read that a ton of fresh, direct air wasn’t good for dogs. So no matter how much she admired their tenacity, they were only getting a tease of the Tennessee summer morning breeze. Roxy couldn’t stand the thought of being responsible for hurting them or any animal.
Something else the driver in front of her obviously wasn’t aware of or the least bit conscientious about. His mangy mutt, although kind of cute in a disheveled take pity on me way, had free roam of the bed of his truck. Except for what looked to be tomatoes lined-up in well-used baskets, the man’s dog owned his space. Must be nice to have that kind of freedom. Scary. But nice.
“It’s okay, Babies,” Roxy attempted to soothe Dipstick and Darling. “Mommy’s right here. You love going to work with me. What’s wrong?”
In her rearview mirror, Roxy noticed Darling moving her snout in large circles followed by loud, disturbing smacks of her tongue against the roof of her mouth. And was that a bit of frothy drool bubbling around her muzzle? What the hell was going on?
Roxy stole another quick peek in the mirror then glanced back to the road in case Grandpa Jones slowed down again. Another paranoid look in the mirror revealed Darling was now anxiously pawing at the cashmere blanket covering the backseat as if trying to find a perfect spot to…
Like lightening punctuating the green screen of a budget-pinched movie set, Roxy mentally story-boarded the grotesque scene coming to fruition. She finally understood the red herring for what it was. “Oh no, Darling. Don’t do that to Mommy. We’re almost to the boutique. Please wait, Honey. Not in the car.”
Roxy pounded her fist against the steering wheel, silently cursing her luck. Her determination to live and succeed outside her once classy, now chick-gone-country, lifestyle seemed to kick her in the ass every choice she made.
Darling made a larger-than-life whimper then let loose a super smoothie-sized barrage of pre and partially-digested cheap dog treats — all over Roxy’s backseat.
Between the agonizing sounds of her poor sick Puggles and the stench, Roxy was thrown for a loop her stomach and nerves were at a loss to rectify. Before she could get her wits about her, Dipstick took his turn at bat and went nuts in the front seat. He paced the floorboard. Jumped back into the seat. Then pounced into Roxy’s lap and out again, his anxiety-heavy yips and yaps turning into awful half wails, half barks before dissolving into fits of desperately help-me-please, my-little sis-back-there-just-majorly-heaved growls.
Keeping one hand on the wheel, Roxy reached out to comfort him. Evidently, however, Darling needed her master’s touch too. Hanging her wet muzzle over Roxy’s arm, she whimpered then sneezed sending God only knew what else blowing out her nose.
Although abhorred by the unfolding drama, Roxy’s heart filled with pity for her ill puppy and wigged out partner-in-mischief. Composing her psyche for her latest challenge, Roxy searched the street ahead for a decent place to pull-over. Good thing she’d taken this alternate route to work. Not much traffic traveled this old road. And thank God today was no different regarding that now vital detail. It appeared she’d have a good spot just up the road a tad.
“There there, guys. It’s okay. Hang with me just a wee bit longer and we’ll get you cleaned up,” she coached the dogs, having no unearthly clue how exactly she was going to do that.
Never one for organization, she could only hope while God was hee-hawing about her predicament, he’d have the decency to pitch down a roll of paper towels or produce a magical box of tissue. She couldn’t have fallen that far from grace. Could she?
She may have gone against her parent’s orders, at the tender age of thirty-four, and moved eight hundred eighty-six miles away from their Manhattan penthouse. But she’d just wanted to make it on her own, instead of thriving embarrassingly well thanks to their over-charitable hand-outs.
Her current string of luck, however, was turning out to be way beyond bad-karma overkill. She couldn’t imagine what wrath would befall someone who’d actually done something unreasonable and wrong.
Increasingly shallow pants and gross gurgles once again consumed Darling’s body and brought Roxy very much back to her less-than-stellar situation. She hit the panic button.
“Nooooooooooo…�
�� Before the air even left her lungs carrying her message in a Hollywood-worthy cartoon voice-over, Darling was at it again.
Roxy grabbed the pashmina from the passenger seat and used it as a shield, making an impressively decent effort to keep the latest party foul from landing on her neck, shoulders, and vintage-inspired couture t-shirt. Needing an emergency exit and fast from the roadway, she punched the brakes. But instead of a Nascar-qualifying pit stop, the heel of her Blahnik caught between the floor mat and the accelerator, forcing her car square into the rear-end of Grandpa Jones’ truck. Riding out the impact in bumper car fashion, the two vehicles careened off the side of the road and came to an abrupt stop.
“Damn.” Roxy lowered her head against the wheel, forgetting to make sure none of Darling’s snacks had taken up residence prior to her landing. “I’m such an idiot. How could I have thought I could make it on my own? I can’t even drive to work.”
A hullabaloo of noise emanated not only from her dogs going canine crazy after the crash but also from Grandpa’s mutt sounding off too. Roxy wished with everything in her she was just an unwitting participant in some way too vivid nightmare. Taking a deep breath, the stench from the car filled her nostrils and brought her oh-so-back to reality.
Oh, God. What if the guy is hurt? Or what if his dog is too? Roxy jerked her head from the wheel so fast a dizzy fog overtook her mind. She may have much more to worry about than coming up with cash to fix her car and Grandpa’s truck. She could have injured him — and his dog too.
She rested her head once more on the steering wheel. Images of Judy Garland swirled through her mind in Technicolor splendor, as if she, Roxy Rae, cowgirl wannabe, not Dorothy, were on her way to Munchkin Land in the midst of a tornado. She could hear the Wicked Witch taunting her and her “little dogs too”.
She shouldn’t have tried to save a few bucks buying Dipstick and Darling the tractor supply store’s off-brand treats. Look where that had gotten her. How could such financially responsible, terrific ideas end up going so wrong?
She took a chance and looked away from the wheel at what she was convinced would be another nightmare in front of her. But she couldn’t see through the smoke rising from underneath the crumpled hood of her way-too-pricy, compliments-of-Daddy sedan. She’d wanted a pick-up truck and gotten a Mercedes. Go figure. Luxury was the Vaughn M.O. But only a recessive trait in Roxy’s genetic make-up. If she didn’t look so much like her dad, she’d swear she was adopted.
Trying to peer through the haze, she panicked. She still couldn’t see Grandpa or his dog.
A brisk tap against her driver’s side window sent her heart racing like a Triple Crown champion. She was sure she’d look through the glass only to find the man and his dog dripping with blood. She shivered. She’d seen way too many scary movies cuddled-up alongside one nanny after another.
Afraid to take another deep breath for fear on the inhale she’d succumb to the hurl hell surrounding her, she looked through the window.
Grandpa Jones had morphed into a hunky-hot cowboy, complete with a sexy-as-all-hell square jaw. A single strand of straw precariously dangled from his sinfully ornery grin. And one lock — one beautiful lock — of unruly, jet black hair fell over his beyond flirtatious, dark mocha eyes.
Roxy’s insides shook, but this time not from fear or exasperation. Perhaps God was guffawing at her misstep. But Roxy might just have the last laugh. It seemed her luck had changed.
Chapter Two
Roxy fumbled to lower her window and unlock the doors. Something she never would have done at a stranger’s beckoning when she lived in Manhattan. Once considering such precautions a survival instinct, the instincts now heightening her pheromones were of something else entirely. Yeah, they were survival instincts, but survival as in procreation, survival of the fittest, take-me-straight-to-your-bed tactics. And taking stock of the denim drawn tight across this guy’s groin, she’d love to survive long enough to get a feel for such Darwinian urges.
“Are you okay?” The sultry-sweet, Southern cowboy formed the question never allowing the straw to slip from between his gorgeous teeth.
“Yes. Yes. I’m fine. But what about you and your dog?”
“We’re fine,” he said then smiled in that way a guy does when he thinks a girl’s cute but stupid.
Well she was stupid and deserved his cocky, smug grin.
“God, I’m soooo sorry. I went to press the brake and my damn heel caught under my accelerator.” Roxy started to step out of the car, only to realize after inquiring about the cowboy’s dog that she had two of her own to secure. “Wait. Let me try to find my dogs’ leashes. They’re not used to being out without them.”
What was she thinking setting herself up like this, she chided her go-for-the-gusto self while searching the back floors. Growing up in Manhattan, even if on the privileged Upper East Side, meant this kind of innate trust in mankind eluded her. On a gut level, though, without knowing why, and while still wandering what the hell was wrong with her, Roxy wanted to get to know this absurdly slow-driving but sexy-down-to-his-scuffed-boots cowboy.
Too bad her miserable luck had her sitting in her dogs’ cheap treat rejection asylum. Real attractive meet-and-greet, Vaughn. Way to impress the finest male specimen you’ve seen. Rear-end him while covered in nothing close to a sweetly seductive French perfume. Nice. Real nice, Ace.
“Let me help you,” the cowboy said, a deep and husky but warm and inviting drawl smothering his offer. He opened the back door of her car. “Yikes, you’ve got yourself one helluva mess, Princess.”
He covered his nose and mouth with the sleeve of his plaid flannel work shirt. “I’m not real good with the whole puke thing but I’ll give it a go.”
His kindness — given Roxy’s failure to provide him with anything worthy of it — tugged at her heart and conscience. Why would he want to rescue a mess like her plus the one to which her dogs contributed?
Her city chick luxury sedan may have stereotyped her as way too upper-class sophisticated to deal with this kind of secrets-of-the-body humiliation, but she wasn’t too persnickety or helpless to see her way through this catastrophe. Judging by the cowboy’s truck full of tomatoes and the fact he chewed straw instead of gum, he was a farm boy, and should be well-suited for dirty, clean-up jobs. But he’d indicated dog puke wasn’t his forte. And it certainly wasn’t his responsibility. It was all hers. She’d hit his truck pretty darn hard, almost hurt his dog and hers too. This was her baby to make all better…somehow.
The least she could do was keep her inner, spoiled-rotten childhood appearance — if-I-make-a-mess-someone-else-my-parents-pay-not-so-well-will-clean-it-up — hidden, conjure up some guts and a super-strong stomach, then pitch-in and tackle her latest upset. Given what she’d done, the cowboy of her dreams was certainly more than considerate. If at all in the realm of possibility, she wanted to reciprocate and redeem herself.
“Okay. Look, uhm, let’s try this again. What’s your name?” She asked while searching her glove box for extra napkins.
“Zayne. Zayne McDonald. And you are?” He asked then turned his head away from her, sucked up some fresh air, and recomposed his attention, albeit still with his shirt covering his nose and mouth.
“I’m Roxy and well…horribly humiliated by the circumstances under which we’ve met…to significantly understate it. But yeah…this kind of scenario…soooo not right by a long-shot…seems to be my destiny lately,” she said twisting in her seat, still scrounging the back floor for the leashes she’d made for her dogs.
Finding them, she retrieved both, handing them to Zayne. “If you wouldn’t mind looking after Dipstick and Darling, I can try to clean up some of this. Although with what, I’m not sure.”
She rummaged the open glove compartment again, only to find one lousy, crumpled up Fido’s napkin stuck to her vehicle owner’s manual.
“If it helps, since I’m sharing in your bit of hell, I’ll tell you a secret. You’re not alone. This is a mutual hu
miliation. I’m actually quite embarrassed for you,” Zayne said, then chuckled before removing his flannel sleeves one-by-one leaving farm-rippled muscles in their wake. “Here, use my shirt.”
He took the leashes while Roxy handed him her squiggly dogs. “My shirt, though, ain’t gonna do much for that disaster.”
He hooked each dog to a leash. “What the hell made them so sick?”
“Me trying to be a cheap ass, I suppose,” Roxy said, highly disgusted and growing more so each minute at the beyond catastrophic result of her attempt to conserve money she desperately needed. “I saved two whole dollars a box by trying an off-brand. Not a very good return on investment. You think?”
“What I think, Princess,” Zayne said stepping further away from the car, “is that you’re a snazzy-dressed lady in a Mercedes. Why would you be interested in saving a couple bucks?”
Roxy opened both driver’s-side doors, not just to air out the putrid odor but to come up for air after Zayne’s question. Her mind stumbled on the implications of his inquiry. How much should she tell him? She certainly didn’t want his pity or, worse yet, his charity. But how was she going to pay for the damage she’d caused?
He’d asked a fair question, she thought, while composing a decent answer that didn’t give him her entire, pathetic sob story. Truth be known, part of her, a very small part, wanted to give in and cry on his well-toned shoulders. But the Vaughn pride she’d inherited would in no way let that happen, regardless of Zayne’s great biceps. No Vaughn showed weakness.
