Page 33 of The Undercover Cowboy

That was some bit of relief.

“And he’s a good kisser.”

Dolly could have lived without that little bit of information. “Yeah, I saw.”

Loretta didn’t even look up from her painting. “But I’ll keep my eyes open. I don’t want to be fooled again.”

Dolly felt like a jerk. “I’m sorry. I don’t think he’s trying to deceive you. I just don’t know him.”

“And I’m not the best judge of character,” Loretta said, giving her an annoyed look over her shoulder.

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t have to. My track record speaks for itself.”

Damn her sister’s exes. Dolly hoped karma would bite them both on the ass for hurting Loretta. “Those guys were assholes. They were just good at hiding it. That’s on them. Not on you.”

“Maybe Taylor is an asshole who is good at hiding it too.”

“And maybe he’s not,” Dolly said softly, squeezing Loretta’s shoulder in sympathy.

Loretta took in a shaky breath. “I hope not. I really like him.”

Dolly didn’t feel any better when she left her sister, so she made it a point to promo her stall on all the social media feeds.“Hashtag brilliant artist” and “must buy.” She didn’t know if it would drive sales, but it couldn’t hurt.

Her next stop was the will-call booth. She was about to turn her phone back on, but she saw Nash coming up from the parking lot.

“I need the VIP pass for Nash Weaver,” she said to the person manning the booth.

“Sorry, Dolly. He’s been removed from the VIP list.”

“By who?” Dolly frowned.

“Mr. Blevins called in a bunch of people. He said they would try and sneak in the rodeo via the VIP system, so he put a stop to it.”

Of course, by that time Nash was in earshot. “No problem.” He got into the ticket line instead.

“Wait,” Dolly said. “I can fix this. There’s been a mistake. Nash Weaver is one of my models.”

The will-call operator frowned at his list. “I don’t want to get into trouble.”

Dolly fumbled with her phone. She turned it on. She would text Blevins or Shelby and make this go away. But even before her phone came back on line, Nash reached the beginning of the ticket line.

“One please,” Nash said.

“I’ve got this,” Dolly said, wanting to shake her phone, as if that would make it go faster.

“Thanks,” Nash said, taking his ticket from the other worker. He walked through the gate and into the rodeo.

Exasperated, Dolly hurried over to him. “I’m so sorry about that. Blevins has never done that before.”

Nash shrugged. “Doesn’t matter.”

“I could have gotten you in.”

“I’ll expense the cost of the ticket back to Shelby, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“It’s not the money. It’s the principle of the thing. He shouldn’t be sticking his nose into my business.”

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