Blame It on Texas (26 page)

Gazing up, he watched her chase a cashew around her plate with her fork. He liked how she ate. No picking at her food, no putting on airs as a lot of women did. She ate with appreciation.

“Okay, stick a fork in me.” She pushed the plate aside.

“Good. I’ve been eyeing your last shrimp since I finished mine.” He speared the shrimp and popped it in his mouth.

She laughed. “So you approve of my restaurant selection?”

“Oh, hell, yes.” As he drank the last of his beer, he wondered if now was the best time to ask about the recurring nightmares that Ellen had mentioned to him.

Running his nail along the label of his beer, he asked, “Is there anything you remember when you were really young that might help figure out what happened?”

She inhaled. “Ellen told you?”

“She was just trying—”

“I know,” she said. “I like Ellen; she reminds me of Tara.”

“Who’s Tara?” he asked.

“My friend who died in my senior year of high school.”

She picked up a paper napkin and started folding it over and over again—a sure sign she was upset. He wondered if it was the question about her childhood or the memory of her friend that affected her.

Zoe looked up from her napkin. “Was Ellen really stabbed?”

“Yes.” Was this Zoe’s way of telling him she didn’t want to talk about the nightmare? He decided not to push. “It was touch and go for a while, too. She was lucky.”

Zoe frowned. “And I thought I had it bad.”

“You got shot.” He stacked his plate on top of hers.

“Scratched by a bullet,” she said.

“It could have been so much worse.” He’d concluded that the asshole who’d shot at her apartment hadn’t been intending to kill her, but one of those ricocheting bullets could have gone awry. And he wanted to catch this idiot before he tried anything else.

“But it wasn’t,” she said.

He was about to suggest they ask for the check, when she picked up the napkin and started folding it again. “You know they say dreams aren’t accurate.”

So, she was going to tell him. He prepared himself not to like it. “I know. I took some classes in oneirology and read a couple of books on it. But there can be elements of truth there. And in some cases a lot of truth.”

She started rolling the napkin into a long cylinder.
“The child psychologist told me it was just nightmares. That everyone had something they were afraid of. That the dreams were just my imagination pointing out my fears.”

“What are you afraid of?” he asked.

She shrugged. “At first they suggested it was of the dark. But I didn’t agree. I mean, I wasn’t afraid of just the dark. It had to be in a small space.”

“Claustrophobic?” he asked.

“Sort of, but not really. I mean, elevators, crowds, they never bother me, unless it’s dark. It… it has to be a closet.”

“Auchloclaustrophobia,” he said. “It’s a mix of—”

“I know,” she said. She grinned, but it didn’t look genuine. “I can spell it backwards, too. Having a name for my problem made me happy back then.”

He heard so much in her tone—embarrassment, a little vulnerability. He waited to see if she’d continue. When she didn’t, he asked, “Can you tell me about the nightmares?”

“There’s not much to tell. I’m locked in a small closet. I’m there for a long time.” She looked back down at the napkin, but he knew she wasn’t seeing it but images from the dream. “I’m young. Petrified. I wet my pants. I wanted to ask someone to take me to the bathroom, but somehow I knew the person behind that door wasn’t nice. So I curled up in a ball and tried not to cry too loud.”

Tyler’s chest grew heavy at the thought of how scared she must have felt. “How old were you when you started having the dreams?”

She shook her head. “I don’t ever remember not having them.”

“Do you still have them?”

“No.” She said it quickly as if worried he’d judge her.
“Not like nightmares. Sometimes when I first wake up, if it’s dark, I remember it. The feeling of being trapped.” She unrolled the napkin. “When I was younger, I couldn’t open a closet. It just freaked me out. But I got past that.”

The need for revenge clamped down on his chest, and he dropped his hands in his lap so his tightened fists wouldn’t give him away. He told himself she was lucky. He’d just spent the day reading about some kids who weren’t, but he wasn’t sitting across the table from those other kids. This was personal. It was Zoe.

“You don’t remember a face, or you didn’t hear voices?” he asked.

“No. I can’t even remember how I got in the closet, or how I got out.” She paused.

The silence grew loud. “Well.” She sat up straighter as if she was accustomed to putting it out of her mind. “That’s my emotional baggage in a nutshell. What’s yours?”

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

H
IS FIRST INSTINCT
was to change the subject, but he realized how hard it had been for her to confide in him.

He turned the beer bottle in his hands. “You mean, you haven’t figured that out yet?” He smiled to make light of it.

“Yeah, I got the whole ‘convicted of a murder you didn’t commit’ thing going. But I meant childhood baggage?”

He dug deep. “My sisters used to put makeup on me and dress me in their nightgowns. I was supposed to be the princess.”

She grinned. “Seriously?”

“Seriously,” he said.

She giggled. “Well, after talking to your sisters on the phone, it doesn’t surprise me.”

He studied her smile. “I’m sorry about that. I told you they were crazy. But they’re good people.”

“I figured that,” she said. “And honestly, I don’t think their game damaged your masculinity.”

“No, it hasn’t.” Seeing her eyes light up with humor after seeing the other emotions there felt damn good.

“What else? Besides being cajoled into cross-dressing.”

“You need more?” he asked.

“I sense there’s more.” She took a sip of her water.

He tried not to frown, tried not to wonder what character flaw or trait of his helped her reach that conclusion. He started to come up with another story, but the painful truth slipped out. “I guess you could say my dad was a louse, and my mom’s only flaw was she had a weakness for loving louses…”

“Was?” she asked.

“She died about four years ago. I still miss her.”

“I know what you mean. I still miss…” Zoe didn’t finish her sentence, but then she asked, “How bad of a louse was your dad?”

When he didn’t answer, she held up her hand. “Sorry. You don’t have to answer.”

He did if he expected her to answer his questions. And he had a lot of them. “On a scale of one to ten, I’d say he was about a five.”

“Abusive?” Zoe asked, frowning.

“Not to us kids. But to Mom, yes. Mostly when he was drunk—not that it excuses him.”

“Is he still alive?”

“No. He died, liver disease, when I was nine.”

“Sorry,” she said.

“Don’t be.” He brought his beer to his lips even though he knew it was empty. “I’m not.” He set the bottle down. For a second, he worried that he sounded too cold, but he didn’t care. He hadn’t loved his old man, why should he pretend?

She fiddled with her napkin for a second. “Is that why you became a cop?”

“Because my dad died?”

“No, because you grew up wanting to protect someone.”

He considered what she said. “I’ve never looked at it like that, but I guess it could have influenced my decision. Mostly, I fell in love with the reruns of
Starsky & Hutch
when I was twelve. They got to shoot things, drive cars like maniacs, and always got the hot girls.”

She grinned. “I’ll bet they had sisters who dressed them up as little princesses.”

He pointed at her. “Okay, I’m warning you, I haven’t told a soul about that, so if I hear one thing about me having a cross-dressing stage, I’ll know you told.”

She placed her hand over her heart. “It’ll go with me to my grave.”

Mom, of the mom-and-pop-restaurant team, came over. “You enjoy? Yes?”

“It was great, as usual,” Zoe said.

The woman looked from Zoe to Tyler. “I happy you find a good boy to eat with you. Not so lonely now, huh?”

“Uh, yeah.” She shot him a cute embarrassed smile.

The woman dropped a small tray with two fortune cookies and the bill on the table.

Zoe held out the tray with the fortune cookies on them. “You choose.”

“That’s okay,” he said.

“You have to; it has your fortune in it.”

He smiled. “You believe in that?”

“A little bit,” she said.

He grabbed one of the cookies. She waited for him to open it. Indulging her, he ripped opened the paper. “Are you supposed to read it out loud? Or are they like birthday wishes and you don’t tell?”

“You can read it aloud if you wish.”

“Never let the past stop you from making a future.”
He dropped the paper on the table and pretended as if it held no significance to him. “Your turn.”

She opened it, put a piece of the cookie in her mouth, and then read it… silently.

“And?”

She looked down at the slip of paper. “It’s profound.”

“So read it.” He leaned closer.

She focused on the tiny print.
“Be leery of men who cross-dressed in their youth.”

He laughed. “And I thought I could trust you.”

She grinned and stood up. “Ladies’ room.”

He watched her walk away, then he noticed her fortune beside the half-eaten cookie. He reached for it.

Love is always a risk. But it’s a risk worth taking.

Thirty minutes later, Zoe followed Tyler into his apartment. It wasn’t your typical bachelor’s apartment. There weren’t take-out boxes, beer bottles, dirty socks, or magazines with half-naked women on the covers tossed around the room. There was a basket of folded clothes on the tan sofa, two pairs of shoes beside a leather recliner, and a stack of books on the coffee table: two old classics, a couple of biographies, and a copy of
Twilight
.

A smile curved her lips. She looked up at him. “Edward or Jacob fan?”

“Definitely Jacob. I’m rather upset with the outcome.” He studied her, and when the pause grew a tad longer, he added, “Come on, I know you want to give me hell for reading it. Point out that it was due to my cross-dressing stage.”

She laughed. “No, all I will say is that you have eclectic reading tastes.”

“I could say the same of you.” He pinched his brow at her. “Seriously, romance novels?”

“What do you think
Twilight
is?” She cut him an accusing look. “So you snooped around in my apartment?” She headed over to the TV stand where he had several framed photos.

“No more than you’re doing to mine right now,” he said.

She looked back at him. “Fair enough.” She moved her gaze around. “The apartment’s nice.”

“It is,” he said.

“A lot nicer than the apartment at the office. Why are you moving there?”

“The commute to work.” He chuckled. “Seriously, Dallas and Nikki wanted to move out, and I spend so much time at the office I thought it would just be easier.”

She refocused on the photos. “The crazy family?”

“That’s them.” He moved in beside her, his shoulder brushed against hers, and warm tingles shot down her arm from the quick touch. “That’s Sam, my twin. The one standing next to her is Lola, my oldest sister. The ones you spoke with.”

As he was listing off names of his other siblings and cousins, she saw the scratches on his knuckles and remembered meeting him in the clown costume with his hand bloody. Funny how she’d forgotten about that.

“And that’s Anna, Sam’s daughter.” He picked up the picture, and Zoe sensed Anna was special to him.

She looked up at Tyler. “She looks like you.”

“What’s worse, she acts like me. Already has her nose buried in books.”

“That’s not a bad thing.” Zoe met his gaze, remembering having her nose in books at the same age. “As long as she’s not into cross-dressing, she’s probably okay.”

His grin came with sex appeal.

“So what is it you need to grab from here?” She remembered how good it had felt when he’d pulled her into his arms and she’d cried on his shoulder.

“Some kitchen supplies and clothes,” he answered.

Her gaze shifted to the spot on his shoulder where she’d rested her head. She hadn’t been held like that in… in a long time. Not that it had been sexual; it had been much more alluring than just that. It had been tender, caring.

And ultimately, that made it far more seductive than the kiss had been. Ever since then she’d been debating if saying yes to two weeks of wonderful pleasure, of bliss, was really such a bad deal.

And it didn’t have anything to do with the fortune cookie, either. If she did take Tyler’s offer, she’d have to accept it was not about finding happily ever after, it was about finding happy for two weeks.

“I’ll do most of the moving later,” he continued. “I have a lease on the place for another three months, so I don’t have to hurry.”

Her gaze went back to the photos of Tyler’s family. She saw an older photo to the side that must have been of his mother. And Zoe ached a bit for the younger Tyler whose childhood must have been so chaotic. She couldn’t help but wonder how much of that chaos was the reason he now avoided long-term relationships. And how much was about the mysterious Lisa.

Zoe’s gaze went back to the large sofa and the books.
It was the perfect place to curl up and read. The perfect place to do a lot of things. Did Tyler bring a lot of women here to entertain?

Did he make love to them on the sofa? Or did he take them to…

“Hey, come into my bedroom. I have more books in there you might want to borrow.”

He started moving.

She didn’t.

Her feet felt as though they were sunk into concrete slabs on the wood floor. Not because she didn’t want to go with him—she did want to go with him, right?

He got to the door and looked at her. A frown passed his lips. “I’m not trying anything here. You know that?”

Well, that was a disappointment. “Yeah,” she said. Mentally, she pulled her feet out of the cement and followed him into the bedroom.