LITMIR.BIZ

       1

      KIRBY MONTGOMERY ADJUSTED the long blond wig that seemed to be crawling off her scalp with each step. It was almost as if the ridiculous thing were warning her not to follow through with this supremely bad idea.

      As if she needed to be warned.

      She’d come to this club specifically in search of “bad.” Her reputation depended on it.

      Three young men dressed in Wrangler jeans, tight T-shirts and cowboy hats puffed menthols and sipped longnecks near the front entrance of Deep in the Heart, but they paused long enough to gift Kirby with an appreciative once-over.

      Ordinarily, she’d welcome such validation. But validation wasn’t what she was after tonight.

      She clenched the valet ticket as she would a set of winning lottery numbers. She needed that piece of paper—to claim her Volvo at the end of the night and to access the part of this joint where the real action took place.

      The first step of the process was a no-brainer: present the valet ticket to the gentleman directly inside the door and say, “I have a reservation and here’s my number.”

      Problem was, as soon as the phrase spilled from her lips, she wasn’t sure whether she had nailed the sequence. At least, not until the doorman texted someone, returned her ticket and said, “You’re good to go.”

      Damn dyslexia. Even though she’d all but conquered the beast, it still had the power to trip her up and strip her confidence bare.

      Step two proved to be a bit more challenging: locate the red door in the back of the club. That meant maneuvering around the dance floor, past the tables overflowing with people.

      The scents of beer, drugstore perfume and good-ole-boy arrogance made her stomach roil as she dodged the drunks and the dreamers who came to the club to either get laid or find true love.

      She’d almost made it around the first curve when one of the drunken dreamers grabbed her arm.

      “Dance with me, darlin’,” he said as the deejay cued up Alan Jackson’s “Mercury Blues.”

      The valet ticket slithered from her hand as he twirled her onto the dance floor. She immediately lost sight of it beneath the trampling of boots.

      Her own feet tangled beneath her, and her emotions became tied in impossible knots as she tried to get oriented. The whole club spun round and round in all its wood-beamed, high-ceilinged, taxidermy-deer-headed glory. She couldn’t even make out the face of her partner, who, to his credit, maintained an abundance of patience with his two-left-footed partner.

      Then again, this was his fault for assuming she could dance, much less wanted to.

      She somehow made it through the song without breaking the guy’s foot or crushing his ego with the well-chosen words she’d managed to squelch. Once safely grounded on the sidelines, she exhausted every drop of remaining focus to identify a landmark.

      Thank God, she’d somehow ended up about where she started, logistically.

      Emotionally, the whole unplanned two-step had wrecked her. She couldn’t even bear to think about the physical damage. Was her wig still on her head? If so, how bad did it look?

      She reached up. Fortunately, the beast had remained reasonably intact. She scanned the dance floor for the ticket. What was her number anyway? Was it 181, or 818? Or neither? As she was about to go up front and beg for help, someone tapped her shoulder.

      Not again.

      She spun around and said, “No, I do not want to dance.”

      As soon as she saw the man’s face, she wished she could take it back. Sure, it was dark in this place, but that didn’t shroud certain details, such as the pale blue tint of his eyes. It sure as hell didn’t detract from the sensual shape of his lips. And damn, he looked good in a black Stetson.

      At such proximity, the part of her that had been refused, rejected and turned away reawakened with unexpected force. It tugged at her like an iron hand, clad in satin. Forceful and sensual, all at once.

      “I don’t recall asking,” he said. “I believe you dropped this.”

      He produced the ticket, along with a curious half smile and a tip of the hat.

      Oh. Of course he wasn’t going to ask her to dance. Why would he?

      She accepted the ticket and held it up to the only light she could find. It had somehow survived the stampede, even though boot scuffs and indentions had scarred the surface and ripped the edges.

      Her number—181. She was almost certain.

      By the time she thought to thank the man, he’d disappeared into the crowd. Just as well. She had work to do.

      After dodging more easygoing cowboys, she finally located the red door.

      The no-turning-back-once-you’re-inside door.

      She positioned her purse so that the miniature camera, disguised as a zipper bauble, pointed forward.

      Moments after punching her valet number into a keypad next to the frame, the door buzzed open and the world changed from honky-tonk to urban lounge.

      The only design thread connecting the two different businesses was the cowhide rug beneath her feet, though this one was black and white. Colorless, like everything else around her. Like the stark white podium with only an iPad on top, the glossy white IKEA-inspired cabinet and the white semitransparent scrim of fabric that separated the entry from a darkened room beyond.

      An antique chandelier overhead added a touch of romance, but the bulbs were much too bright. All of a sudden she felt overexposed. And far too obvious.

      Time to lose the wig. No one would recognize her anyway. Nor would they recognize her name, since she remained eternally stuck behind the scenes at the television station. Shivering in the shadow of Seth Wainwright’s reporter-slash-celebrity ego. But this assignment had the power to change all of that.

      She deep-sixed the wig in a tall black trash can situated in the corner, then unleashed her long brunette hair from the strict confines of the elastic ponytail holder, which she slipped around her wrist.

      Before she had time to retrieve a comb from her purse, a man parted the scrim and approached.

      He looked as though he’d been interrupted in the middle of getting

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