Million Dollar Cowboy (Cupid, Texas #5)(117)

"What's this sweetheart legend I've been hearing about?" His voice was low, sexy, and cozy as a fleece blanket in front of a roaring fire on a cold winter evening. There was a lazy lilt. As if he'd spent time in the Deep South where words were stretched out slow and sultry.

But there was something steely as well. It was in the way his tongue hit the back of his teeth hard on the "t" sounds. Determined. Stubborn. A quality and tone that said when this man set his mind to a goal, come hell or high water, he would never, ever give up.

Paige shivered. Just a little. Barely.

But he noticed. His eyes darkened and narrowed, taking leisurely measure of her.

"Huh?" she said because she was so distracted by his potent sexuality she couldn't remember what he'd asked her.

"The wishing well, the old tree with lovers' names carved in it, the statue of a hugging couple in the park. What's that all about?"

"Uh," she said. "Rebekka Nash and Jon Grant, childhood sweethearts from Missouri. They separated by the Civil War. She was a Southern Belle and he turned Yankee solider. But they never stopped loving each other. Fifteen years later they met accidentally on the banks of the Brazos River at twilight, and they were reunited."

"Hence the name of the town?"

"Indeed."

"Ah." He laughed. A beautiful sound that sent her heart thumping. "There's nothing like a good romantic legend. Bet it stirs tourism."

"You got it."

His eyes drilled into hers. As if she meant something.

And then he left without another word. Opened the door. Walked out. Disappeared into the crowd. Gone forever?

Goodbye.

Good riddance.

Oh no, don't go.

Emma popped back into the lobby. Paige shifted her gaze from the door, where the cowboy and his world-class butt had just vanished, back to her employer. Emma wore a green-and-red elf costume that complimented her auburn curls and pixie smile. She was playing the role of Jovie that Zoey Deschanel embodied in the movie.

"How do I look?" Emma asked, patting her stocking cap and setting the big jingle bell on the end of the hat jangling.

"Like the star you are," Paige assured her. "You'll look all of eighteen in that outfit. You'll be the talk of the town."

Emma blushed, her gorgeous blue eyes glowing with delight, slow grin lighting up her face. "You made my day. I've been worrying I'm too old to play Jovie."

"No way. You're perfect." Paige returned the smile, felt cheery warmth settle in her stomach and heat her from the inside out. She loved making people happy.

It was her greatest strength, and according to her mother, her biggest flaw.

"You gotta be a little selfish sometimes," said her mother often-this from the woman who'd taken a powder on motherhood when Paige was ten and her brother, Parker, four. "Remember what they tell you on airplanes. Put your oxygen mask on first."



       
         
       
        

But if putting other peoples' needs before her own was Paige's worst sin, she would take it with her head held high. Because, c'mon, what was a little hypoxia if she could make the world a better place?