Chapter Five

Dolly

T he barbecue restaurant Nash chose was a down-home Texas joint, complete with the smell of mesquite smoke and bright neon beer signs flickering on the walls. Rodeo people filled the booths and barstools, laughing loudly over their brisket and ribs, their conversations a low hum of rivalry and camaraderie.

Dolly slid into a booth across from Nash and wasted no time checking the UPRC’s Instagram page. She hadn’t had time to edit the Donnan pictures, but the eight-second ride Nash had today was front and center. Nash’s lean silhouette, swathed in shadows against the blinding midday sun, stood stark and arresting. The image captured him mid-ride, the bull beneath him a blurred fury of muscle and wild energy. He was a portrait of determination amid chaos. It was a good start.

“Got quite the eye, don’t you?” Nash’s voice cut through Dolly’s concentration as she reviewed the reaction to her latest post.

“Comes with the territory,” she murmured, her thumb hovering over the screen, tracking the influx of heart reactions and comments.

“That’s some fancy editing. Makes me look almost competent.”

“You did all right today. Blevins jumped the gun.”

“Smoke and mirrors. And smoke doesn’t last long. Let’s hope your smoke holds out until we find something solid on Blevins.” Nash reached for a bottle of barbecue sauce, turning it over in his hands. The label was faded, the edges peeling.

“Has the news trickled down to the other riders yet?” Dolly asked.

“Yeah, from what I hear Blevins fired four other bull riders.”

“At least you weren’t the only one,” Dolly said, scrolling through her phone. “I’ve been looking at some strategies to engage fans and increase your visibility. We could create a series of videos featuring you and Donnan. You know, show off the softer side of a tough cowboy.”

Nash scoffed, shaking hot sauce on the basket of fried pickles that the waitress had placed on the table. “And how’s that going to help me become popular?”

“Fans want to feel like they know you. Your failures and successes become personal to them. Trust me, it’ll help people connect with you more,” Dolly insisted. “We could even host a live Q&A session with UPRC fans. Answer their questions, and then give them a glimpse into your life. I’ve got a detailed social media plan all worked out for you.”

They ordered the special and it came out fast. Dolly snapped a picture of the generous spread before them: fall-off-the-bone ribs, tender brisket, and all the fixings, including coleslaw, baked beans, and corn bread.

“Really?” Nash asked as he caught her taking the photo, a teasing smile playing on his lips. “You’re one of those people who has to document every meal?”

“Hey, it’s for work.”

“I guess I can let it slide this time.”

Their knees brushed against the table. Their eyes met and her mouth went dry.

“You look pretty tonight,” he said after several charged seconds.

“Thanks.” Dolly was trying to remember how to breathe steadily.

Nash toyed with the saltshaker, while the conversations of the rodeo folks continued around them. Dolly was usually much better at making small talk, but sitting so close to Nash was short-circuiting her brain. “So tell me about yourself.” That was lame, but at least it was something to break the tension.

“Not much to tell. I grew up in Georgia. I did some rodeo during college. Obviously, I didn’t continue. How about you? Were you a high school cheerleader?”

Dolly nodded. “And junior high, and college and then I went pro.”

“Why did you stop?”

“It wasn’t my choice. I got too old.” Dolly pushed aside those feelings. She stuffed a big piece of corn bread in her mouth to compensate.

“That sucks. I was forced out of my job too.”

That was news. She quickly chewed and swallowed, washing it down with a gulp of sweet tea. “What happened?”

Nash shook his head. “A long story and I don’t want to get into it now.”

She could understand keeping secrets, so she let it pass. “Were your parents disappointed when you left? My father couldn’t care less, but my mother acted like someone died. Mom was a pageant queen, and she had wanted all her daughters to follow in her footsteps.” Dolly fiddled with the frayed edge of the red-and-white checkered tablecloth. “Loretta gave it a go, but lost interest right away. She wanted to be an artist. Reba balked from the get-go. She’d have rather been in the barn than in a makeup chair. I did all right, but I never won a title. LeAnn gave her that, but then turned in her tiara for cowboy boots.”

“Was she disappointed?”

“LeAnn? No, I think she was relieved to have the pressure off her. I know I was when I aged out of the pageantry scene. My mother, though? She was devastated.”

“She must have been happy when the NFL picked you up.”

Dolly hid a wince. “Thrilled. She taped every game I was in. If you’re ever interested in being bored witless, let me know and I’ll see if I can pry them out of her grip. What about your parents?” she asked, nudging again.

Nash took a big draw from his beer. “My father is a con artist, always looking for the next big score. I haven’t heard from him in years.”

Dolly winced. “Sorry to bring it up.”

Nash shrugged. “It is what it is. My mother was the same until she found religion. Now she’s just the opposite—a devout woman who tries to save everyone’s soul, including mine. She’s a stickler for rules now. To her, everything is black and white, no room for gray areas.”

“Sounds familiar,” Dolly said.

“Who me?”

“Yeah you. You never go over the speed limit. You go out of your way to make sure your equipment is regulation.”

“That’s called following the rules. The rules are there for a reason.”

Dolly shook her head. “No one cares if you bend them a little.”

“I care,” he said forcefully.

“I can see where you get your strong sense of duty from.”

“More like my strong sense of guilt,” he muttered under his breath.

“Is that why you went into the…” she looked around and lowered her voice to a whisper “…the bureau?”

“Let’s just say it made me value the importance of abiding by the rules, and being honest whenever I can,” he said, his tone tinged with bitterness.

She lowered her voice to a near whisper. “Being undercover must be hard for you then. It’s a kind of lying, isn’t it?”

He looked up at her sharply, as if he was surprised that she came up with that. “Yeah, exactly. I know it’s a necessary part of the job, but it makes me feel like my dad.”

“Well, you’re doing this for good. I bet he did it for the money.”

“Some of the time. Most of the time, though, he did it because he could.” Nash shook his head in disgust. “I can’t tolerate anyone who lies. Myself included.”

His words sent a shiver down Dolly’s spine. All the more reason to keep him at arm’s length.

She looked up to find Nash studying her, his dark eyes filled with curiosity.

“So you used to be a professional cheerleader,” he said, as if trying to picture her in that role. “What was that like?”

Dolly felt a twinge of fear, wondering if he would somehow connect the dots to her past as an escort. She had been very careful to separate herself from Leisure Industries. There wasn’t a digital trace to prove that she had ever been connected with the escort service. And yet, she knew she needed to grab his attention so he wouldn’t probe any deeper. “You won’t believe the crazy stunts we used to pull. It was like being in a reality show, but with more glitter.”

Nash leaned in, intrigued. “Go on.”

Dolly didn’t like the shift back to her past, but she was glad to keep him talking. “All right, so picture this—it’s Monday Night Football, and we’re in the middle of this intense routine. We’re doing these precision kicks, right? And just as I go for a high kick, I accidentally kick off my own shoe, and it goes soaring into the stands, hitting a hotdog vendor right in the ketchup bottle.”

A wide grin spread across Nash’s face. Dolly faltered. He was really good-looking when he did that. She wished she could get him to lighten up like that more often. When he smiled, it really did transform him into someone more approachable. She cleared her throat. “I had to finish the routine with one shoe on. My teammates called me Cinderella from then on.”

“Did you ever find your prince?”

“Sadly no.” She smiled as another memory came to her. Dolly was caught between mortification and hilarity.

“What’s that look for?”

“I haven’t thought about this one in a long time. I must have tamped it down in my memory. We had this grand plan for a surprise entrance during a championship game. I was supposed to descend from the rafters on a harness, landing gracefully on the field. Well, let’s just say gravity had other plans. The harness got stuck, and I ended up swinging back and forth like a human pendulum. It was like a cheerleader version of Tarzan gone wrong. Our sound guy was quick on his feet. He queued up, “Yakety Sax”—you know the theme song from the old Benny Hill show? The crowd went wild.”

“Were you scared?” he said.

She paused. He was supposed to have laughed—everyone else did when she told that story. Instead, he looked concerned. “Petrified,” she said after a beat. But then because looking into his eyes was too intense, she concentrated on her food. “They eventually got me down and I cheered the rest of the game. We won. Thirty-three to twenty-five.”

“That was very brave.”

“Nah,” she said, trying not to feel his words in her heart. “Brave is getting back on an enraged bull after not being on one in several years.”

“Bet you looked better doing your thing than I did,” he said.

“That’s why they paid me the big bucks.”

As the conversation lulled, Dolly tried not to stare at him like a lovesick buckle bunny. There was just something about him that did it for her. He looked rugged and handsome with his strong jawline and dark hair. Dolly’s gaze lingered on the way Nash filled out a T-shirt. Why did he have to be so damned good-looking? What would it be like to kiss him?

The air between them felt charged, electric, but it was the underlying current of unease that Dolly noticed more than anything. He hated liars. Finding out she had been an escort would be a total deal-breaker, and potentially a heartbreaker, for her. She needed to keep this professional. Dolly focused on the clink of silverware and the murmur of voices at nearby tables, trying to ignore the growing tension.

“Did you hear about those Mexican fighting bulls they’re bringing in for the next rodeo in Laredo?” a man at a neighboring table said.

“Sure did,” another replied. “They say those bulls are meaner than a rattlesnake with a toothache. Can’t wait to see how the riders handle ’em. This is the first time the UPRC has brought them in.”

Dolly’s eyes widened as she leaned in toward Nash, her voice barely above a whisper. “Do you think that’s a clue?”

“At this point, I think anything could be a clue,” he drawled.

“So are we going to investigate?”

“We?”

“Have camera will travel.” She waggled her phone at him.

“I suppose it’s as good of a cover as any. Can Reba get us close to the new bulls?”

“Sure. She’s probably going to be doing drug testing on them. You’re not thinking of trying to ride one of them, are you?”

“Why wouldn’t I?” Nash replied, his eyebrow cocked defiantly.

“Because those bulls are crazy mean,” Dolly said.

Nash’s expression hardened, his jaw clenched. “Don’t you think I can handle it?”

Well, to be honest…no. But she wasn’t sure how to say that.

“You’d have a hard time getting access to them since you won’t be on the roster,” she said, hedging her answer.

“But if I can ride one for a reel of yours that could get some buzz .” He flashed finger quotes at her.

Oh for Pete’s sake, he sounded just like her sister LeAnn. Were all bull riders this crazy? “You just stayed on for eight seconds today for the first time in forever. Build on that.”

“I plan on it.”

They glared at each other over the table.

“I just don’t want to see you get hurt,” she said.

“I’m not going to get hurt,” Nash snapped, his eyes narrowing. “Besides, it’ll make a good TikTok, right?”

“Fine. Do whatever you want.” Stubborn ass. It would serve him right if he got kicked in the head or something.

Nash’s expression softened for a moment, but he quickly masked it with a curt nod. “Anyway, there might be something to investigate with these new bulls coming in. If that’s the case, the closer I am to them, the better.”

“Blevins has to be behind it. He’s all about any press is good press. And these Mexican bulls are killers. Having them at the rodeo is going to bring up a lot of bad memories of last season when we lost Ronnie.” Dolly still missed the sweet cowboy who would have been one of the sport’s greatest riders had he lived after being thrown from an enraged steroid-injected bull.

“Looks like I’ve got two new situations to investigate. Let’s hope that between the petting zoo and the fighting bulls, there’s a connection…and something illegal I can pin on Blevins.”

Before Dolly could respond, she caught sight of a familiar figure approaching their table. It was Mick Mickelson, a former cowboy whose career had ended after he took a bad fall from a bull. He had made it his life’s mission to cause trouble for the UPRC, and her in particular, ever since. Was it too much to hope for that he’d get sidetracked by a beer or get hit in the head by a chair? She glanced over at the empty chair next to her, half considering it.

Mick sneered as he stood over them, arms crossed. “Look who we have here,” he drawled, his gaze locked on Dolly. “The rodeo’s very own spin doctor. I suppose you’ve got an answer for everything that’s been going on?”

“What’s been going on, Mick?” Nash asked, tensing. He met Mick’s hostile gaze head-on.

“Plenty,” Mick shot back, baring his teeth. “Like how this rodeo’s going to hell, and you two ain’t doing nothing but making it worse. You with your shitty riding and her spray-painting glitter all over the horseshit show that counts as entertainment these days.”

“Last I checked, you’re not part of the UPRC anymore or welcome at any of the events,” Dolly retorted, her patience wearing thin. She empathized that Mick’s life wasn’t going the way he had pictured it when he was a hotshot bull rider. But as he had also broken her baby sister LeAnn’s heart, her empathy only went so far. “And while I realize that you need to feel relevant, stop trying to cause trouble for the rodeo or I’ll put a restraining order on you so fast your head will spin.”

“A restraining order is just a piece of paper,” Mick said with an evil little smile she wanted to slap right off him.

“All right, that’s enough,” Nash growled, pushing back from the table and rising to his feet. His tall frame towered over Mick, but the former cowboy didn’t flinch. They faced each other, locked in a tense standoff. “You want to leave right now before I break your other leg.”

“I’d like to see you try.”

Dolly saw several camera phones come out. Some of them were from Mick’s friends who wouldn’t know their way around social media with a flashlight and a map.

“Stand down, Nash. This is a setup.”

“What?” he said, jerking his attention to her.

“Mick’s trying to start something and get it on video so he can build up a following or go viral. He’s looking for eight seconds of fame again. And he’s not going to get it here.”

Nash didn’t like it, but he deliberately sat back down again.

“Coward,” Mick spat.

Nash’s jaw clenched and he glared at him but did nothing else.

That was enough of that. Dolly raised her own phone and pressed record. “Hi y’all,” she said in a bright, happy voice. “I’m here at the Pig and Puddin’ Palace in Killeen with up-and-coming bull rider Nash Weaver.” She stood up and panned the camera over him. “Nash’s mouth is full of delicious barbecue so he can’t talk right now.” Deliberately, she kept the camera off Mick and turned her back on him. “And look who else I see? It’s Sammy Volero.” She walked to one of Mick’s cronies, who dropped his phone on the table when she centered him in her shot. “Sammy, I hear there are some Mexican fighting bulls coming into the lineup for next week’s rodeo in Laredo. What do you think of that?”

As Sammy preened and stuttered, Dolly saw Mick seething behind her. After she moved on to his other friends, who were more than willing to talk on her live feed, he stormed away. Too bad. She had hoped to goad him into doing something stupid on camera.

When she finished up the post, she came back to the table. The live post had gotten some hearts and thumbs-up. Maybe she needed to do more lives before and after the rodeos. They seemed to be popular.

“Were you always so good at putting a spin on things?” Nash asked, scowling at her for some reason.

“It’s a skill that’s gotten me out of tight situations,” she said.

“In my experience, people who bend the truth tend to bend the rules too.”

Dolly gave a half-shrug. “Rules are made to be broken, don’t you think?”

Nash winced. “No.”

“Right.” Dolly shook her head and whispered again, “Once a Fed always a Fed.” Then a little louder she said, “I play by the rules when others play by them. But if you want a fair fight, sometimes you have to get down to their level.”

Rolling his eyes, Nash got up and threw some cash on the table, more than enough to cover their meal. “Give me a call when Reba can get us in to see those bulls and you can do a photo shoot or something.” Without another word, he stormed out of the restaurant.

As she watched him go, her emotions swirled with a mixture of worry and frustration. Dolly wished they could have a conversation that ended more pleasantly. Had he been mad that she hadn’t let him duke it out with Mick? Or was he just done with the whole social media thing? Either way, she would have liked to have finished their meal with a shared peach pie or something. Maybe walk hand in hand into the sunset? A good-night peck on the cheek?

Well, to hell with him. She’d order dessert without him. While she waited for it to come out—with a scoop of ice cream—and while the thoughts of Mexican fighting bulls were still fresh in her mind, Dolly called LeAnn.

“Hey, what’s up?” LeAnn said.

“I just overheard some rodeo hands talking about a shipment of Mexican fighting bulls coming in. I thought you should know since you’re riding this season.”

“Really?” LeAnn’s enthusiasm didn’t waver. If anything, it seemed to grow. “That’s amazing. I’ve always wanted to try my hand at riding those beasts.”

Dolly clenched her jaw, irritated by her sister’s reckless attitude. “Those bulls are killers. This isn’t something to celebrate.”

“This is what bull riding is all about—facing danger head-on and coming out stronger for it.”

“Right, because getting gored by a bull is really going to make you stronger,” Dolly muttered under her breath, but she knew there was no use arguing with LeAnn when her adrenaline was up. “Just…be careful, all right?”

“Where’s the fun in that?” LeAnn replied cheerily before hanging up.

Dolly sighed, slipping her phone back into her pocket. As she turned to leave the barbecue restaurant, she spotted another of her sisters, Loretta, sitting at a nearby table with Taylor. They were laughing together over plates piled high with brisket and coleslaw, seemingly oblivious to the world around them.

For a moment, Dolly felt a pang of longing. She wished she could have someone like that in her life. There just didn’t seem to be anyone who fit into her world. Her thoughts flickered to Nash again. Anyone who was interested in her, anyway.

Still, she was glad for Loretta. Her sister had been through hell and back after discovering her rock star husband’s infidelity and then after the divorce, falling for an art professor who turned out to be married with kids. If anyone deserved a fresh start, it was Loretta.

Dolly watched them for a moment longer, taking in the easy smiles and the warmth of their connection. Then she squared her shoulders, reminding herself that she had bigger fish to fry—like figuring out Jackson Blevins’s true intentions and keeping her sisters safe from the fallout.