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And why the hell was she surprised?

  “Betty?”

  She turned around without another word and headed toward the bar, not really caring when one of Jason’s buddies called her a cold stuck up bitch. Hell, that was tame compared to some of the things she’d been called in the past.

  But when one of them said—loudly enough for old man Davies, sitting at the bar to hear, “more like a slut. I hear she’ll screw anything with a dick.”

  She winced.

  The fourth guy, someone she’d never met before, laughed. “She won’t do it for free. Her kind never does. But if you offer her enough cash, I bet you could bend her over a table out back. Hell, I might just do that. Get a taste of some premium pussy before I head back home to the wife.”

  There was a time when Betty Jo Barker would have dealt with an asshole like that. She would have marched her butt back over to the table and shredded him in one sentence.

  But the old Betty Jo Barker was gone—replaced with a pathetic version who really didn’t give a shit. Except that maybe she did.

  And maybe it was the hidden truths that made it hard to hear—hard to take.

  Old man Davies, a retired history teacher who spent more time at the bar than at home since his wife passed over a year ago, turned around and glared at the men. He huffed and shook his head.

  But it was the other man who had slid onto a stool near the slot machine at the opposite end of the bar who caught her attention.

  Beau. Simon.

  Just fucking great.

  His eyes, so blue she could make them out from where she stood, flickered over her briefly, before settling on Jason and his buddies. He studied them for a few moments and Betty took the opportunity to get back behind the bar.

  Her calf muscle twitched and she grimaced, kicking it out as she grabbed the rag and threaded it through her fingers.

  “Mr. Davies, can I get you another draft?” she asked politely.

  He turned to her and shook his head. “No. I don’t suppose I should.”

  His watery grey eyes softened as he studied her. “No woman deserves that kind of verbal abuse.”

  Unnerved, she cleared her throat.

  “Why do you care?” she asked without thinking. God, she’d been an absolute nightmare in school. Always late to class and when she did show up, she usually caused problems. Mr. Davies had flunked her ass out of American History…twice.

  Betty Jo had always had a problem with authority figures. It used to drive her father crazy and these days, it was one of the things he liked to throw in her face. That is, when he remembered which triplet she was.

  Mr. Davies pushed his empty mug back, his bony fingers riding the round edge once, then twice, before muttering softly.

  “Someone has to, Betty Jo.”

  For whatever reason, his words brought tears to her eyes and Betty scrubbed the bar with her rag, as Mr. Davies slid from his stool and ambled toward the exit. But not before admonishing Jason and his buddies over their severe lack of respect for women, and telling Jason he just might have to have a chat with Jason’s mother.

  Jason looked more than a little embarrassed, apologizing, while the others tolerated Davies’ words and chortled like animals when he left.

  Betty, very aware of Beau’s eyes on her, grabbed the tip Davies left and had just pocketed it when Duke strode behind the bar, coming in from the office out back. He came to a stop and nudged her.

  “That Beau Simon?”

  She didn’t follow his eyes but nodded, “yep.”

  Duke’s eyes widened, his long, sweeping mustache quivering. “Son-of-a-bitch. I heard he was still in town. He been served yet?”

  “I was just about to head over.”

  “No worries. I’ll get him.”

  Duke sidled past her and Betty exhaled. Thank God. The last thing she wanted to do was dance around with Beau.

  What the heck was he still doing here anyway? He couldn’t still want to discuss whatever the hell it was he wanted to discuss with her…could he?

  Betty disappeared into the kitchen, deciding that now was a great time to re-stock the lime and lemon bowls. The bar would be fine with Duke there and she didn’t want to face Beau right now.

  He’d heard the comments. She’d seen it on his face.

  Most days she let them slide off her back, like water drops across a slick window. But not today.

  Today they hurt.

  Today she wished like hell she still drank.

  “Betty can you come out here?” Duke poked his head into the kitchen and she paused, knife in hand, lime about to be dissected.

  “Can I finish this up first?”

  Duke glanced back and into the bar and she heard him yell at his wife, Jackie. “I’ll be right back. Don’t pester the boy. Give him some room.”

  Great. Guess Mr. Blond Ambition was still out there.

  Duke grabbed the lemons she’d cut up and shuffled his feet.

  “What?” she asked roughly, not liking where she thought this might go.

  “Beau says he’s here to talk to you.”

  “Did he.” It was a statement, not a question.

  “Yep. How well do you know him?”

  Betty glanced up sharply.

  “Whoa! I’m not asking if you…if you and him…Ah, hell.” Duke’s face went beet red and if Betty wasn’t so pissed off and tired, she might have found the situation funny.

  “I’m just asking a question…do you know him or not?”

  That pain in her head began to radiate again and Betty wiped the back of her hand across her forehead, swearing when a drop of lime juice fell into her eye. Was Duke really going there with her?

  “What do you want, Duke?” she asked tiredly.

  “I’m just thinking that if Beau Simon agreed to participate in our celebrity ball tournament, well, that could be a big help to the bottom line for Hunter Adams.”

  “Hunter Adams?” she said dully, hating that he’d pulled out the big guns. Hating that there was still a place inside her that cared about something or someone other than herself.

  Which was kind of ironic, but she wasn’t going to dwell on it too much.

  “The four year old whose bone marrow transplant we’re helping to fund.”

  She thought of the flyers posted around town and felt something inside her crack. The knot at the back of her throat loosened and she was afraid she’d start to bawl like a baby. Since when had Betty become such an emotional sap?

  “You alright?” Duke asked gruffly.

  “Yeah. It’s the lime juice.”

  It was bullshit and he knew it.

  She squeezed her eyes shut and wiped them once again with the back of her hand. Hunter Adams had big brown eyes and a cherub face that would melt an iceberg. He was the only reason she’d agreed to appear in the tournament. Duke still would have hired her to work at The Grill. He wasn’t stupid.

  But, contrary to what most folks thought, she hated eyes on her. Hated the focus. The attention.

  She hated the way most men looked at her, with predatory eyes.

  It was going to be hard for her. This tournament.

  “Will you ask him? Work your charm?” Duke enquired gently.

  Betty’s eyes flew open and she tossed the knife onto the wooden cutting block. Turning to the sink she began to wash them under a cold stream of water. “I’m not sleeping with Beau Simon.”

  “I…I never said anything….shit, Betty, I would never…” Duke took a step back, his red face mortified.

  “Just saying,” she answered, as she moved past him and headed out into the bar.

  Betty Jo Barker hated Beau Simon.

  She hated his good looks. The spoon that he’d been born with. She hated the fact that he could do no wrong. That Marianne Phibbs would spend over one hundred dollars on a dress because she thought Beau Simon would like it.

  Most of all she hated the way he made her feel. The conflicting emotions. The hurt. The anger. And she couldn’t lie. The des
ire.

  There were some things she couldn’t forget and some things she shouldn’t remember.

  Beau thought he knew her—just like everyone else in town—but they didn’t know shit. No one knew the real Betty Jo and she was fine with that. She wasn’t about feelings or letting people in. She wasn’t about sharing. That kind of stuff would bite you in the ass.

  But that didn’t mean she didn’t have a heart. It was there…buried somewhere beneath all the scars.

  It was there.

  She thought of the little boy—of the big eyes in the photos she’d seen posted around town—and something inside her twisted. And though she was probably going to regret it, she knew that Beau Simon would make a difference. His name alone would sell a shitload of tickets.

  This was for the kid. She could do this.

  Betty glanced over to the end of the bar where Beau sat chatting with Duke’s wife and Miss Goody-Two-Shoes herself, Deidre Hollings. Deidre glanced up and saw Betty. Blonde Goody-Two-Shoes, had her tits practically in Beau’s face, and smiled at Betty as she bent even lower to whisper something in Beau’s ear.

  Something sparked inside Betty. Something fierce, and hot, and kind of exciting.

  She squared her shoulders, tossed her hair, and walked toward them as if she was working a catwalk in Paris, a sexy smile on her face.

  Miss Goody-Two-Shoes was about to get run over.

  Chapter Eight

  BEAU TOOK A sip from his beer and glanced up as Betty came swooping back into the bar from the kitchen.

  She had him. Just like that.

  His focus.

  Hell, she had every cell in his body standing at attention. He figured it was a perfectly respectable reaction to a beautiful woman so he wasn’t gonna over analyze it.

  Duke’s wife, Jackie, kept up with her enthusiastic endorsement of his last movie, her friends Sylvia and Deidre holding onto their autographed napkins as if they were buried treasure. The assholes sitting several feet away from him took their eyes from where Beau sat long enough to rest them on Betty.

  The bastard who’d insulted her, grinned, wiped foam from his mouth, and shouted for another jug.

  Betty didn’t bother to look at him as she answered. “Get it yourself dickhead.”

  She strode toward Beau, those long, bare, tanned legs looking like every man’s dream in black come-fuck-me heels. Her hair was loose, falling around bare shoulders in silky waves. And though she wore barely any makeup, her natural beauty shone through in a way that even the dim lighting in The Grill couldn’t hide.

  “You’re still here,” she said rudely as she stopped just on the other side of the bar. A soft, summery scent wafted in his nostrils and as she leaned her hip against the bar, he took a closer look.

  The delicate skin beneath her eyes was bruised, as if she’d had no sleep—which, considering the scene he’d witnessed the night before, was understandable. There was something almost fragile in her gaze as she stared at him, hands twirling a straw between her fingers.

  “Oh my God, Betty,” Duke’s wife exclaimed while her friends gasped. “That is not how we talk to customers. This is Beau Simon!”

  “Yep, he’s Beau Fucking Simon, alright.” Betty said with a flip of that damn hair as her eyes landed on Beau. “I also know that just like every other man on the planet, he pees standing up—“ she paused and smiled wickedly at him—“you do, don’t you? Pee standing up? Or maybe you sit like a girl.”

  Betty made a point of studying him closely, her bottom lip held between even, white teeth. “Yeah.” She nodded. “I think you probably sit like a girl and read People magazine, counting all the pictures and articles related to any one of the Simons. I bet you even take phone calls in the bathroom.”

  “Really, is that what you think?” He tried not to smile, but couldn’t quite help it.

  “I do,” she said, that wicked gleam still in her eyes. “I think you like to look at pictures of yourself and I think…”

  “Don’t stop now.”

  Betty paused, then leaned close to whisper. She was flirting and he had no clue why, but Beau wasn’t going to stop it. “You don’t want to know what I’m thinking right now.”

  Beau took another swig of beer, liking the way her eyes rested on him and no one else. And this coming from a guy who, though used to people staring at him, didn’t particularly enjoy it much.

  “Betty Jo Barker,” the woman beside Jackie Everets said. “You’re going to hell. Anyone who talks smack about Beau Simon is…Going. To. Hell.”

  The woman pressed in closer to Beau, her chest thrown out as if she was hanging the girls out to dry. They were impressive girls. Nicely rounded, a tad more than a handful. Heck, if this was a different time and place, he might even make a play to have those girls in his hands for a few hours.

  As it was, he was more interested in watching Betty interact with these people who lived in her hometown. The hometown she claimed to hate.

  “Do you want to know a secret, Deirdre?” Betty asked, her voice coated in enough sugar to make a sane person gag.

  Deirdre lifted her chin, her eyes narrowed in dislike. It was obvious she didn’t care much for Betty Jo, but then, Betty Jo didn’t make it easy for anyone to like her.

  “If going to hell meant that I wouldn’t spend eternity running into stuck up bitches with asses wound so tight they could pop the top off this here beer bottle, I’d be cool with that.”

  Jackie glared at Betty, before turning to Beau with an embarrassed smile. “I’m so sorry, Mr. Simon. Betty Jo is just…”

  He nodded. “I’m well acquainted with the Betty Jo factor.” He smiled and watched her blush. “And call me Beau. Please.”

  Jackie nodded before turning to Betty. “I’m sure Duke needs you in the kitchen or, I don’t know…maybe serving customers? You’re not here to look pretty and cause trouble.”

  “You sure about that?” Betty said sarcastically.

  Betty licked her lips and leaned on the bar, the deep V of her halter-top leaving not a lot covered up. Her butt stuck out at an angle that had him thinking things he probably shouldn’t be thinking and for some reason, her blatant display of sexuality bugged him.

  “Actually, Jackie, Beau and I were just leaving.”

  Beau arched an eyebrow.

  “Really.”

  She nodded, tossed her rag onto the countertop and reached under the bar to grab her purse.

  “Yes, really.”

  She ducked underneath the end—giving him another very nice view of her ass—and looked at him expectantly.

  “Are you coming?”

  Beau finished his beer, tossed a five-dollar bill on the counter and nodded to the ladies. “It was nice talking. Glad End Zone, worked for you.”

  “Are you making another one?” Deirdre asked, her boobs still way too close for comfort.

  He thought of his current project and the direction he wanted to go and shrugged. “Only time will tell Ladies.”

  With another smile he was out the door, following Betty’s steps until she stopped in the middle of the parking lot. He thought he heard her mutter something like, ‘what the hell am I doing,’ before she whirled around to face him.

  For a few seconds, they stared at each other, the air crackling between them, heavy with a whole bunch of stuff he wasn’t interested in. Stuff he knew he couldn’t act on. Hell, it wouldn’t be professional and since they didn’t like each other all that much…what was the point?

  She bit her bottom lip, tucked some hair behind her ear and he glimpsed the soft skin beneath her lobe. For a moment he was hit with an unbelievable wave of lust as his mind went to a place it shouldn’t go.

  An image of his mouth nibbling along her neck. Her body bowed to his, breasts crushed to his chest, hips beneath him. Her lips open and wet. Vulnerable. Passionate.

  Those noises she made. Animalistic. Frenzied.

  Painful.

  Jesus. Beau gave himself a mental shake and shoved his hands in
to the front pockets of his jeans. He needed to stay focused.

  “Betty, I—“

  “Beau…”

  They both started at the same time and Beau shrugged. “Ladies first.”

  “Some would say I’m no lady.”

  Good. He liked sarcastic Betty a hell of a lot better than the one he remembered from that night. Or the one he glimpsed the evening before. When had he ever met a more complicated, mysterious and fucked up woman?

  “They’re probably right.”

  “Yeah,” she answered, gazing just over his shoulder. “Look,” her eyes returned to his, the blue depths direct. “I need to ask you a favor.”

  “A favor?” He took a step closer, and then another, as she continued to watch him warily. “And here I thought you wanted me away from those women so you could have me for yourself.”

  “I’d rather suck face with that asshole in the bar,” she retorted.

  “Darlin’, he wanted to shove a lot more than his tongue into you.”

  “Don’t they all.”

  Beau regretted his words the moment they left his mouth. Damn, but this woman pushed all of the wrong buttons. Something in her tone told him he’d crossed the line. And it was that something that made him step back.

  “Look, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to insinuate—“

  “Yeah,” she said softly. “You did.”

  She was right. And he felt like an ass.

  “Can we just start over?” he asked carefully. “What’s the favor?” He was blowing it. This was his chance to nail Betty down for his project and he was blowing it. What the hell was it about this woman that drove all sane thought from his head?

  Betty’s chin was up and she glanced away from him. Her jaw was set tight, her foot tapping the pavement impatiently.

  “What are you doing next weekend?” Her eyes were now on the ground and he could tell that she was nervous.

  “You asking me out, Barker?”

  “What?” Her head shot up. “No.” She heaved a sigh and her breasts strained against the revealing halter. He couldn’t help it. His eyes strayed until she crossed her arms over her chest and cleared her throat. “You done looking?”

  “I guess,” he said slowly, liking the way her cheeks flushed.