A Slow Dance Holiday Read online

  “Nope,” she answered. “Have you?”

  “I’ve managed one for nine years. If you’ve got a mind to leave, then pack up your pretty little pillows and your Christmas-tree shower curtain, and sell your half to me.” Cameron met her cold stare and didn’t blink.

  “I haven’t worked in a bar, and only know how to mix up a daiquiri and a margarita, but I have a degree in business management, cowboy, and if I can take care of a multimillion-dollar corporation for eight years, I expect I can run the Honky Tonk,” she answered with a definite sharp edge to her tone. “That said, if you don’t want to own this bar with a girl,”—she put air quotes around the last two words—“I will gladly buy you out, and you can scoot right back to the beach.”

  “I didn’t mention that I managed a tiki bar on the beach in Florida.” He eyed her even more closely.

  “Granny just now told me. She thinks this predicament they’ve put us in is funny. I don’t,” Jorja told him.

  “Neither do I, but I’m damn sure not selling my half of this place to you.” Cameron’s stomach grumbled, reminding him that he hadn’t eaten since noon, and it was now nearing midnight. Mingus didn’t have a café, and the one in Thurber, just a mile or two down the road, had been closed when he came past it. “I’m hungry, so before I unload my things, I’m going into the bar to grill a burger or make an omelet.” He stood up and headed toward the door he figured went out into the bar, but the one he opened was a walk-in closet, and her things were all lined up on the left-hand side. Shoeboxes five deep were stacked on the shelf above her clothing, and there were at least twenty more pair on the floor. “You figure you’ve got enough shoes?”

  “That’s my business, not yours,” she smarted off at him. “And you can keep your dirty old boots on your side. If I find them mixed in with my things, I’ll toss them in the trash.”

  He shut that door and tried another that opened on the bar. He reached around the wall and flipped on the light switch. A single bulb above the grill lit up, and he headed in that direction.

  “How did you even know that they’d installed a grill?” Jorja asked. “And we have a kitchenette in our apartment.” She followed him and switched on another light that showed tables with chairs turned upside down on them, two pool tables, and a jukebox over in the corner.

  “I was here last Christmas, and the bartender made me a burger and some fries. Is there food in the apartment refrigerator?” he asked as he turned the knob to heat up the grill.

  “It’s empty,” she admitted, “but I checked things out when I arrived and there’s food in the refrigerator in the bar. Evidently, the last managers were here until closing last night from the look of things.”

  “No use in taking the food from here to there, and besides, the grill is bigger than that tiny stove I saw in there.” He went to the refrigerator and brought out bacon, eggs, cheese, and a bag of onions and peppers chopped up together.

  Jorja hiked a hip onto one of the barstools and watched him like a hawk. Did she not know how to make an omelet or use a grill? Cameron wondered. Dammit! What kind of partner had Merle stuck him with?

  When the green light said the grill was ready to use, he cracked four eggs into a bowl and whipped them with a fork. Before he could pour them out on the grill, Jorja hopped down, rounded the end of the bar, and headed for the refrigerator.

  “What do you think you’re doin’?” he asked.

  “I’m going to make myself an omelet, but I want bacon in mine, and maybe a hash brown and some grilled toast to go with it. If I’m going to eat this late, I’ll just call it breakfast, so move over and let me have my half of the grill,” she said.

  Granny had damn sure been right when she said the redhead could hold her own. She’d be a force to deal with for sure, but after ten years of bartending, Cameron figured he’d seen about everything. One curvy, feisty little lady didn’t scare him, not unless she was pointing a pistol at his chest, anyway.

  Chapter 2

  Jorja whipped the eggs in her bowl as if she were trying to beat them to death, but then she was still fuming inside at her grandparents and Merle for putting her in this situation. Not only was she going to have to share the Honky Tonk with the sexiest cowboy she’d ever seen, but their beds were going to be only ten feet apart.

  She glanced over at him in time to see one little jet-black curl escape his otherwise perfectly cut hair and come to rest on his forehead. When she finished with the bacon, he reached across to her side of the grill and started to pick the package up, but she slapped his wrist.

  “What’s that for?” he asked.

  “I’m not finished with that,” she informed him.

  “You’ve got half a pound on the grill,” he said. “How much are you planning to eat?”

  “Two more slices, and the package only weighs ten ounces so half of that is five ounces, which is a far cry from eight. Don’t judge me. I like bacon.” Did he think she was fat and shouldn’t be eating so much? she wondered. The aroma of frying bacon filling the air made her stomach grumble, so she added another egg to her bowl.

  “Besides, if you’d have been here earlier and helped me clean up that room, you would have worked up an appetite too.” She peeled off two more slices of bacon, laid them out on the grill, and then handed what was left of the package over to Cameron. He damn sure didn’t look like any Cameron she’d ever known with those brooding brown eyes and that jet-black hair. His name should have been River or Creed, something totally masculine, certainly not a name like Cameron that could belong to either a man or a woman.

  “I take it from your attitude and the smudge of something gray on your forehead that it did not smell all clean and nice when you arrived.” He grinned.

  He had one of those thousand-watt smiles that reminded her of a used-car salesman. He could probably sell a forty-dollar shot of whiskey to a poor old cowboy who had to count out his last pennies to buy the drink. Eli Smith had fooled her with a smile just like that five years ago, and she had promised herself that she would never be duped again. Her heart had been broken into too many pieces to ever be put back together.

  She wiped the back of her hand across her forehead. “There were dust bunnies as big as baby elephants in there, and a dead mouse under your bed. I should have left your side of the place for you to clean.”

  “But you didn’t because you thought I was a female, and you were trying to start off on the right foot.”

  If his smile got any bigger, she would have to drag out her sunglasses. “I figured if I left your side, then you’d stir up all the dust that I left, and it would float back over to my part of the apartment.”

  “I suppose I owe you a thank-you.” He flipped his bacon over so it would get crisp on both sides.

  “No, you owe me more than that,” she told him, “and I will collect someday.”

  A dozen ways to make him pay came to mind. The first and foremost was to make him drag the mattress off his bed and sleep out in the bar rather than in the apartment with her. That would make him think she was afraid of him and give him power over her. After Eli, there was no way in heaven, hell, or on earth that a man would ever again have that kind of control in her life.

  “Just tell me when, darlin’,” he drawled.

  “I’m not your darling, and never will be. We are partners and roommates, and that’s where it ends.” She shook a fork at him.

  “Yes, ma’am, but I’m wonderin’ how we’re going to manage it when I pick up a bar bunny for the night. Do I hang a towel on the knob or what?” His grin was enough to cause a sworn Sister of Mercy to hyperventilate.

  Her hands began to sweat, and heat crawled up her neck all the way to her cheeks at the vision that popped into her head—he was naked and tangled up in the sheets on his twin bed. She dropped the fork, tried to catch it before it hit his foot but failed.

  “Good thing I didn’t
kick my boots off before we came in here.” He bent over to retrieve the fork, and she got a full view of his butt in tight jeans. She was way too young for menopausal hot flashes, but right then, she sure could have used one of those church fans with Jesus on one side and that psalm about lying down in green pastures on the other.

  When she thought of that, another picture of Cameron wiggled its way into her mind. He was lying beside her on a quilt with pretty green grass all around them. She could hear the quiet sound of a bubbling brook nearby.

  That’s close to sacrilege, a niggling little voice in her head said loudly. She shook the image from her mind and concentrated on finishing her breakfast.

  When everything was done to her satisfaction, she put it all on a platter and set it on the bar. Careful not to brush against Cameron on her way around to the other side, she gave the swinging gate a shove and thought she was doing well until it stuck. She lost momentum and started to fall, then two strong arms caught her and set her upright.

  “Now we’re even,” Cameron said.

  With both hands on the edge of the bar and adrenaline still rushing through her veins, she shot him a look of appreciation. “Thank you, but how come you think we’re even?”

  He shrugged. “You cleaned our apartment. I saved your life.”

  “I almost fell, but I didn’t almost die,” she smarted off.

  “If you’d have hit your head on this hard floor, you might have died,” he answered. “Or worse yet, had brain damage and couldn’t help me run this place. Cleaning the apartment is a small price to pay for your life, darlin’… I mean Miz Jorja.”

  “Just Jorja,” she said through clenched teeth as she kicked the gate open. “Tomorrow, we’ll have to put some WD-40 on that thing.” She continued around the end of the bar and sat down on the barstool in front of her food. “And speaking of tomorrow, I found all kinds of Christmas decorations in the utility room, so I thought we’d make this place look a little more festive.”

  “Mistletoe?” he asked.

  “What about it?” She picked up a piece of bacon with her fingers and bit off the end.

  “Maybe we’ll hang two or three pieces so the poor old cowboys will have an excuse to kiss the pretty ladies.” He went back to the grill and finished making his omelet.

  “Cowboys don’t need excuses for that,” she told him.

  “Some of them might be shy, like me,” he teased.

  She almost choked on a bite of omelet. “Honey, I’ve known you less than an hour, and I already know beyond a shadow of a doubt that there’s not a shy bone in your body.”

  “No endearments, remember?” He shook an egg turner at her. “We are just roommates and business partners.”

  She gave him a curt nod and went back to eating.

  You’d do well to remember that, the voice in her head reminded her.

  * * *

  Cameron had lived alone for the past ten years, and he’d slept in the nude every single night of that time. Even when he was in one of the two relationships he’d had over that decade, he had not worn anything to bed at night. He had a pair of running shorts among his clothing that he could wear, but as he got out of the shower he groaned at the thought of elastic binding his waist. Add that to the idea of decorating the bar with someone as obviously OCD as Jorja was—doilies, for Pete’s sake, and a fancy shower curtain—and he was tempted to make a run for it. If the roads hadn’t been so damn slick and Florida hadn’t been so far away, he might have gotten into his truck and headed back south.

  But that would mean admitting that Jorja had gotten under his skin, and he’d already let a couple of lovely ladies do that job in the past. Now his policy was to love them for a night or a weekend at the most and leave them with a smile on their face and some happy memories. No more commitments for him. He had been burned badly the last time around, and now he steered clear of the fire.

  When he left the bathroom and padded barefoot across the cold wooden floor, he noticed that she was already in bed and facing the wall. Her red hair was splayed out on the pillow. Thick red lashes that he had seen earlier proved that her flame-colored hair didn’t come from a bottle. Like stars in the sky, freckles were scattered across her nose, reminding him of what his grandmother had told him about the freckles on his sister’s face.

  “That’s where the angels kissed her before she was born,” Nana said.

  Evidently, the angels didn’t think a tough old cowboy who’d grow up to be a bartender needed any kisses. He stared his fill of Jorja and then crawled into his own bed. He’d driven long, long hours that day, and it was almost two o’clock in the morning, but tired as he was, he couldn’t fall right asleep. He laced his fingers behind his head and stared at the dark ceiling for a long time before his eyes finally got heavy enough, and he drifted off. When he awoke, the clock on her chest of drawers across the room clicked over nine thirty, but the window above his bed was foggy gray. For a few seconds, he was disoriented and unsure where he was. Had he spent the night in some woman’s house?

  Then everything came back to him in a flash. He cut his eyes across the room. Janie’s bed was made and the red and green pillows—no, that wasn’t right—it was Jorja, not Janie. Jorja Jenks, hence the JJ that he’d thought would be a guy. He heard a noise, and then cussing loud enough to blister the paint right off the walls filtered across the room. The door to the utility room opened and Jorja dragged out a box with a picture of a Christmas tree on the front of it. His eyes left the box and focused on the fuzzy black spider crawling toward her arm. He started to yell, but words wouldn’t come out of his mouth. The critter hopped from the box to her arm, and she simply slapped it away.

  Cameron could tolerate snakes, wild bulls, mice, rats, and even redheaded women, but spiders gave him hives. When the black, furry thing flew through the air and landed on his leg, he came up out of the bed with a yelp and began dancing around the room.

  “Good God! What’s the matter with you?” Jorja stomped the spider, gasped, and spun around.

  He felt a cold breeze on his naked body and scrambled for his sleeping shorts that were lying on the floor. “Sorry about that. I must’ve kicked these off in the night,” he muttered as he pulled them on.

  “Rule number one,” she said. “You have to wear clothes to bed.”

  “You can turn around now,” he said.

  “Are you sure?” she asked.

  “Do I have to wear a shirt too?” He glanced at the black spider she had smashed and shivered.

  “That would be nice.” Her face was still scarlet when she turned around. “So, you’re afraid of spiders? Anything else going to make you do your rain dance?”

  “Nothing like a spider touching me.” He jerked a shirt down over his head. “Where did that sorry little bastard come from? What are you scared of?”

  “Probably out of the storeroom where the Christmas tree was put after last holiday season. There’s probably another one hiding up under your sheets, and to answer your question, I’m afraid of commitment,” she answered.

  “Too bad I can’t wipe away a dead commitment to repay you.” His eyes shifted over toward his unmade bed. He wouldn’t be able to crawl between the sheets until he was sure all spiders were gone. The only good spider, in his estimation, was a dead one, and there was no wrong way to kill one of the evil varmints.

  “If you could do that,” Jorja told him, “I’d rent you out and we’d make a million bucks within a year. Are you ready to get busy with our decorating?”

  “Coffee first,” he muttered. “Maybe I’ll help with decorations after that. Are you obsessed with Christmas or something?”

  “What makes you think that?” She slid the box forward a few more feet with her foot.

  “Red and green pillows, Christmas shower curtain, and now decorating a honky tonk? You think the people who come in here will give a damn if there’s a
Christmas tree in the corner or lights all around the bar?” He covered another yawn with the back of his hand.

  “I’m not obsessed with the holiday, but I do love the spirit of Christmas.” She sat down on the edge of her bed and wiped sweat from her brow with her shirtsleeve. “I enjoy decorating, and it’s the smart business thing to do. Folks will come in here tonight and see everything all festive, and they’ll be more apt to buy their neighbor a drink or a beer. Trust me, we’ll have more business when folks are in a giving mood.”

  “Bull crap,” he muttered. “But if you want to go to all the trouble, I ain’t got anything else planned for today, so let’s get to it. I’ll bet we don’t have half a dozen folks tonight anyway.”

  “Why?” she asked.

  “It’s Monday, and the weather is horrible. Look out the window.” He pointed.

  “That’s all the more reason for them to be here,” she told him. “The guys will be tired of their wives nagging them to fix this or that, and the women will be tired of their husbands sitting around in their recliners watching television. The parking lot will be full. What do you want to bet?”

  “Whoever loses has to take down all this crap after New Year’s without gripin’ or beggin’ for help from the other one,” he said.

  She stood up, crossed the room, and stuck out her hand. “It’s a deal.”

  He wasn’t prepared for the jolt of heat that rushed through his body at her touch. He’d kept her from falling the evening before, and their bodies had brushed against each other several times during the cooking process. He hadn’t felt chemistry then, so why now?

  Another spider reappeared right at his toes, and he took a couple of steps back. His knees buckled when they hit the edge of the bed and he fell backward, and then bounced back up so fast that it made him dizzy. How many of the damned things could infest one box of Christmas decorations?

  Jorja stomped the spider and then calmly pulled a tissue from the box on her chest of drawers. She cleaned up the dark spot from the floor and said, “There now. That mean old spider is gone. I’ll meet you in the bar, and you can bring that box out to me. I’ll start getting the lights out of one of the lighter boxes.” Her face was still scarlet red when she closed the door behind her.