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Her eyes went wide. “Oh I would never tell a soul. I know you wanted to get away from all that scandal and I would hate for any of that to get out—”
“Are you trying to fuckin’ blackmail me?” he bit out.
“No!” she exclaimed and for once she sounded genuine. “I wouldn’t want any of these other bitches getting a hold of you. Besides,” her voice softened. “I know what it’s like to be rich when everyone around you is poor. Daddy owns half the land in this county and people have been jealous of me my whole life. But I knew you’d understand me completely. It was like,” she shook her head, “like fate brought you to me.”
“What a crock of shite.” Liam glared at her. “I didn’t come halfway around the world just to pick me up another damn stalker. This,” he waved between them, “is never happenin’.”
With that he pushed past her and headed for the door. He unlocked it and swung it open, zipping up his fly as he went.
Only to find a thin lad standing on the other side reaching for the handle, a surprised look on his face when he saw Liam. Coming out of the women’s restroom.
Then again, he was a dude reaching for the ladies, so he was obviously confused in general.
“Hey man, wrong bathroom. This is the ladies.”
The lad just stared at Liam. He was wearing a thick flannel shirt underneath overalls and a dirty trucker’s hat. Liam had seen him at the bar a few times. One of the sad little ranchers who lived around here. When he just kept standing there without saying anything, Liam wondered if he was slow. Jaysus, sometimes this little backwoods town was depressing as fuck.
“Ladies bathroom,” Liam said slower, pointing to the stick figure with a skirt on the door.
“I am a lady. Um, a woman, I mean.”
Oh. Shite. Liam’s eyes immediately dropped to her chest but the flannel was too bulky to make out if there were any breasts hiding underneath. “Sorry.”
When he looked up at her face, he could see that though her features were angular, if he tilted his head just right… yeah, she was female. Especially considering the way her cheeks were turning pink.
“Do you mind?” She glared at him.
Liam held up his hands. “Sorry. Sorry.” He moved out of the way. She shoved the bathroom door the rest of the way open and disappeared inside.
Liam ran his hands through his hair. Way to feckin’ step in it. He headed for the bar. He needed another drink. Or ten.
3
CALLA
Having her crush think she was a man was just the last in a long line of shitty things that had happened to Calla that day.
But nope. The universe wasn’t done screwing her over. Because as soon as she got in the bathroom she saw Bethany Cunningham doubled over laughing and pointing a finger at her.
Calla’s eyes shot back to the door. So that was why Liam had been coming out of the women’s restroom. He’d been in here with Bethany. She thought of how his hair had been mussed and he’d been buttoning his fly.
“He thought you were a guy!” Bethany laughed even harder.
Great. So Bethany had heard the whole thing. The one person in the world who could make that humiliating experience even worse.
Calla knew how stupid it was to have a crush on a guy she barely knew. Lord, even the word crush made her cringe, but she didn’t know what else to call it. She’d talked to Liam a couple times when he and the other guys from Mel’s ranch came out to Bubba’s. Granted, he’d been very drunk both times.
But she was done for the first time he’d flashed that gorgeous smile of his. Dimples. It wasn’t fair. That accent plus dimples? Come on, God, couldn’t you be a little fairer when you’re distributing things? Why was it always people like Bethany who got the looks and the money? And the guy.
“You’ve really lived up to your potential. Weren’t you voted ‘Least Likely to Ever Get Boobs’ in high school?” Bethany cracked up like it was the best joke she’d ever heard, wiping at her eyes. At least Calla had managed to make her smudge her perfect make-up. Bethany had little black mascara tracks running down her cheeks.
It was on the tip of Calla’s tongue to shoot back: weren’t you the bitch on the yearbook staff who gave me that name?
She and Bethany had hated each other ever since they started facing off in barrel racing competitions throughout high school. Bethany couldn’t stand the fact that a nobody like Calla could wipe the floor with her in the arena. Out of all the times they went head to head, Bethany only beat Calla once. And even then, the bitch had done it by cheating.
But did Calla confront her or kick her teeth in like she wanted to after finding her horse overfeeding on an extra hay sack drenched in applejuice? This on top of the year when she was a freshman, all courtesy of Bethany starting rumors about Calla and the English teacher being in a lesbian love affair.
No. Calla had been an adult about it. Always. She’d turned the other cheek and gone on to compete as well as she could with her hay-heavy horse. Bethany’s smile had been vicious as she claimed her blue ribbon.
