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rowdy song and couples once again took their places on the dance floor. The female lead singer started belting out the Martina McBride song For the Girls in honor of Ladies Night when Scarlet walked up, bold and brass, and held out a hand to him. Her heavily-lashed eyes glittered a challenge he couldn’t resist. 
    Lord, she was pretty.
    His belly clenched in reaction and he went hard enough to pound stone. The woman made him ache. Hell and damnation!
    Yeah, he should haul ass outta here right now but no, he stood, grabbed her hand and led her to the dance floor.
    Nope, he’d didn’t have a lick of sense.
     
     

Chapter Two
     
    She didn’t have a lick of sense. She saw his face go hard as he took her hand and led her to the dance floor. When he drew her close, she briefly closed her eyes wondering why she was so drawn to him.
    Other men had seemed sexy to her. Lord knows, Cole had been but he’d never stirred her to such primitive longings. Heck, she didn’t really even know this guy. It was insane.
    Nash spun her across the packed dance floor with quiet purpose and she felt a bubble of laughter ring up through her throat. Dancing with this man was like riding the rollercoaster at the fair. He had some moves and it made her wonder about other moves he might have. Bedroom moves.
    How long had it been anyway? Oh yeah, she knew the answer to that one. She hadn’t had sex since right before she learned the man she’d thought she loved had been caught with his jeans around his ankles and his male parts buried deep inside another woman. Renewed anger bloomed inside her.
    Her friends were right and so was Mom. It was time to start living again but she didn’t like the idea of breaking her hard and fast rule about one night stands.
    “Hey. Where’d you go?” Nash whispered in her ear as the song came to an end. “One minute you were laughing and the next, you go all quiet. You feeling okay?”
    “Yeah. I’m just thinking too hard.”
    “That can be dangerous. You’re supposed to kick up the heels of those pretty red boots and have some fun.” He flashed a lopsided, very seductive grin. “Anyone ever told you you’re a hell of a dancer?”
    “I do a lot of things pretty well.” Scarlet wanted to bite her tongue. Where had that comment come from?
    He laughed low and sexy. “Yeah, I’ll just bet you do, darlin’.”
    The band started up a slow, hold-me-close waltz and Nash pulled her in, when there was a slight clamor from the stage. “Whoa there, folks. Sorry for the interruption,” one of the band members said into the microphone. “Looks like we’ve got us a big announcement coming up. Hold on for just a minute and we’ll let y’all get back to your dancin’.”
    Everyone paused, most smiling, and a low murmur broke through the crowd as a tall, lean, very familiar man walked up to the microphone and took it in one hand. She went cold to her bones and a chill of alarm ripped through her.
    “Cole.” Scarlet whispered the name and it seemed the world dissolved into shadows, leaving her in the middle of a black void, alone. She felt Nash’s arm tighten around her waist and she leaned into that sturdy weight as if it were the only thing holding her upright. A feeling of dread settled low in her belly. Her heart pounded like a jackhammer.
    “Most of ya’ll know me.”
    Several hoots rose up from the crowd. Cole’s buddies, she figured. Even rats had friends.
    “Anyway, I…um…I’ve got something to say.” Handsome, blonde Cole Thomas, her one-time fiancé, held his hand out toward the side of the stage. “Hey Tiff, come on up here, honey.”
    Stunned, Scarlet watched the red haired woman who figured prominently in most of her nightmares walk up, smiling, onto the stage and to Scarlet’s amazement, Cole went down on one knee.
    “Hell,” she whispered. Nash’s hold on her grew tighter and she vaguely felt someone take her hand. Lyssa squeezed it tight. Patti-Pie stood next to Lyssa, scowling