“That’s all I need to know,” Lottie said and walked back to the corner table. She laid a hand on Rusty’s shoulder. “See that table of women over there? That pretty little brunette with the brown eyes thinks you are sexy.”
He was on his feet in a split second and hurried across the dance floor. In less than a minute, they were dancing to a slow country waltz. And surprisingly enough, the guy was smooth on his feet.
“Hmmph,” she muttered. “Bernie doesn’t have a thing on me. I can play matchmaker too.”
* * *
After framing the house for more than half a day, driving from the lake area to Nocona, and working at the bar until the last customer finally left, Knox felt like he had been dragged through a knothole backward. He chuckled at the memory of his father saying that same thing when he came in tired from a long day in the office.
“How can you laugh?” Lottie asked. “My feet hurt. No, that’s not right. My whole body is in pain. Who would have thought waiting on tables was such hard work?”
“Get Knox to give you a foot massage when you get home,” Bo suggested and led the way outside. “Thanks for helping with the cleanup, and for offering to come back tomorrow night. Let’s all go home and get some sleep.”
“A foot massage sounds heavenly,” Lottie said.
“If you can keep me awake, I’ll be”—he covered a yawn with his hand—“glad to oblige.”
“I’ll take a rain check for a later date,” she said. “I just want to find a bathroom, take a shower, and fall into a bed.”
Knox looked over his shoulder at Bo and then back at Lottie. “Together?”
Lottie bumped him on the shoulder. “Not tonight, honey, and tomorrow night ain’t lookin’ too good either.”
Bo giggled and locked the door behind them.
“Great acting back there,” Knox said on the way across the parking lot.
“If we were for real dating, the answer would have been the same,” Lottie told him. “I could sleep standing up in a broom closet.”
Knox nodded in agreement, helped her into the truck, and hoped that he didn’t fall asleep on the way back to Spanish Fort.
You are getting old. You used to be able to work all day, party until two o’clock in the morning on Saturdays, and go to church on Sunday morning.
“Maybe I was just young and stupid,” he muttered on the way around the truck.
Lottie’s eyes were closed when he slid behind the steering wheel, but they popped open the second he closed the door. “I’ll stay awake and talk to you the whole way back. I know how hard it is to drive at night with no one to keep you from falling asleep.”
“I’m not so old that I can’t stay awake for fifteen miles,” he protested.
“Who said anything about being old?” she smarted off. “And I’m not doing this for you. It’s for me. I’d like to get there alive and in one piece, not end up lying half-dead in a ditch.”
“Are you saying that you don’t trust my driving?”
“I’m too tired to fight with you tonight.”
“Well, damn!” He grinned. “I thought we’d argue all the way to the Paradise and then have wild makeup sex.”
“In your dreams!” she snapped.
That bit of banter jacked up his adrenaline level enough to wake him up. It had been a while since he’d been to the bar, and he had forgotten how eerie a small town was at that time of morning. No vehicles on the street. Not a single store open. No people out and around. Not even a patrolling police car.
“Kind of makes you wonder if the world came to an end, and we’re the only ones left,” Lottie whispered.
“Would you still be my fake girlfriend if that was the case?” he teased.
“Probably not.”
“But if we were the only ones on earth, and it was up to us to repopulate the place…”
