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Chapter 17
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LOVE IN TEXAS Chapter 17.1
She smiled, and it spoke of sadness and perhaps empathy. She placed a hand on his arm. “You really have been stung by the media, haven’t you?” She gave his arm a warm squeeze. “The tape is just for me, to use as a backup for my notes and my memory. If it makes you uncomfortable, Iwon’t use it.” She picked up the recorder and made as if to put it away.Nick stopped her. “No, go ahead. Just do this the way you usually do.”She gave a small bark of laughter. “It was too late for that several days ago. However, we’ll start with basics. I’m going to ask you all sorts of things that might not end up in the book. But they’re things I need to know to get a better picture of who you are, where you were in your life on 9/11, how that affected you and brought you to where you are today. I have your vitals, date of birth, immediate family members, your education. I’d like to start with you telling me why you wanted to become a fireman, and whenand where you first knew that was what you wanted.
LOVE IN TEXAS Chapter 17.2
She narrowed hers. “I asked first.”He shook his head. “Mostly I don’t get it.”“Well, that’s all right. You’re not who they’re aiming for, anyway.”He gave her a half smile. “The rap music industry isn’t aiming for an audience of old has-beens?”Shannon tilted her head and studied him. “That’s not really how you see yourself, is it?”“Is that an interview question?”She groaned and barely stopped herself from stomping her foot. “There you go again, answering a question with a question.”“You answer a question with a complaint.” She laughed at him, and he made a face at her. “Carlucci, how’s it going?”Shannon nearly swallowed her tongue when she recognized the man who came and sat sideways, facing them, on the next bench down.“Pretty good. How about yourself?” Nick shook the man’s hand.“No complaints. I’m being nosy. Maybe it’s the newspaperman in me, but I believe I know your friend. It’s Malloy, isn’t it? Shannon Malloy?”Now she really was speechless. She had met Wade Harrison o
LOVE IN TEXAS Chapter 18
“You don’t have to stay, if you’d rather not,” Shannon said, her nerves twisting into tight knots.Nick tore his attention from the television and looked at her. “You want me to go?”The Tribute Tigers had won their homecoming game, and after joining the throng for an ice-cream cone at the Dairy Queen, Nick had walked her back to her room. He’d turned on the television and stared at it withoutsaying a word. That was ten minutes ago. He was brooding. She recognized it easily, as her father used to act the same way when something heavy had weighed on his mind. The trick was getting him to unload, or share the burden.“No, I don’t want you to go,” she told Nick. “Do you want to talk about it?”He stared at her, then looked back at the television. “I don’t know whatyou’re talking about.”Shannon felt a hot stinging behind her eyes. Her vision blurred. She whirled away from him and closed herself in the bathroom until she could beat back the threatening tears. He had just shut her out co
LOVE IN TEXAS Chapter 18.1
“Wade gave me a heads-up, so I lay low while they were here.”“How do you lay low in a town this size? What did you do, stay home?”He gave a wry laugh. “The first time, it was summer, so, yeah, I kept pretty close to home. But for the monument and the wedding, I had to be at school every day. We were shorthanded, and I had to spend some time at the elementary school, where Dixie’s boys go, so don’t think I wasn’t worried. But I kept out of everyone’s way. Drove instead of walked. If I had to walk, I stuck to back alleys.”Shannon shook her head. “All that trouble, and now here you are, a few weeks later.”“Huh. It’s one thing for the town to learn who I am. Most of them won’t care. But with that other group, the media and whatnot, I would have been plastered all over the place again. Just like last time.”“Just what did happen with the media? Oh—no. Don’t answer that.That’s an interview question. We’ll get to it tomorrow. Except you’ve got an appointment tomorrow.”He looked away an
LOVE IN TEXAS Chapter 18.2
For once, Shannon was at a loss for words. She didn’t know what to say to help him. He was obviously speaking from experience; platitudes would be worse than useless, they would be condescending. “I’m sorry,” she said quietly.He whirled on her. “What for?” The words shot out as if fired from a gun.“I’m sorry that someone made you think you had to live up to all that. I can see some of the problems it can cause.”“When you try to tell them you’re nobody’s hero, just an ordinary man, they argue with you, or think you’re being humble or something, or they get hurt or mad because they need a hero, and they expect you to be it.”Shannon ached for the anguish he tried to disguise with anger. “Come here.”He narrowed his eyes. “Why?”“Because I like sitting next to you.”He dropped his head and heaved a sigh. “I’m being an ass, right?”“No.” She scooted back on the bed until she sat against the headboard.Then she patted the space beside her. “That’s a pretty heavy load for anyone to carry
LOVE IN TEXAS Chapter 19
The nursing-home inspection was not the ordeal Nick had feared. The inspection team consisted of Lon, a couple of town council members and a representative from the state’s fire safety board. And Nick, for whatever that was worth. The owner of the facility was there, as well, and the twostaff members designated as fire-safety staffers.Then, of course, there was the local media. The safety of the nursing- home residents warranted one reporter/photographer from the Tribute Banner—and Shannon. She came sidling up to Nick where he stood at the back of the group while the owner gave his spiel about how much he appreciated the city working to make the patients and building safe.As if she thought Nick didn’t realize she had entered the building and was standing beside him—not know? How could he not know when she walked into a room? He could be dead and he would know. Shannon nudged his arm with her shoulder.“What are you doing here?” he asked, keeping his voice low. “I’m thinking of an e
LOVE IN TEXAS Chapter 19.1
“What are we celebrating?” “Your successful outing.”The kid behind the cash register, Bucky Jones, who’d graduated from Tribute High last year, nearly swallowed his tongue. “G-g-g-olly, Mr.Nick.”“She didn’t mean that the way you think,” Nick said darkly. “Shannon, tell Bucky you didn’t mean that the way he thinks.”“What? Oh.” Shannon laughed. “No. Sorry. It wasn’t that kind of outing.”If Nick hadn’t had to spend the afternoon overseeing the decorating at the high-school gym, Shannon could have finished interviewing him. Butsince their time was short, she decided to put it off until after the dance that night and let him eat his pizza in peace. They had only one small incident during their lunch.That came when Nick, rather offhandedly, Shannon thought, casually mentioned that he’d been wrong about the jeans for the dance. He’d been told in no uncertain terms that this was a dress-up affair. The Homecoming Queen candidates would be in formal gowns; the rest of the females attendi
LOVE IN TEXAS Chapter 19.2
“You were wrong,” Shannon told her quietly.Shannon was still smiling over Deedra’s stunned silence followed by another endless stream of questions and demands about Nick, about her, about Nick and her, when the man in question knocked on her door.“Oh, my,” she said when she got a good look at him. The man cleaned up real nice, as her dad would have said. His dark gray suit accented the width of his shoulders, the length of his legs. The crisp white shirtcontrasted beautifully with his dark olive complexion, and the tie added the perfect touch of panache. “You look fabulous.”Nick goggled. “You took the words right out of my mouth.” Except, he thought, fabulous was way too poor a word for the vision of her. Her dress was plain, unadorned, unruffled black, long sleeved, high necked, ending just above her beautiful knees, and hugged every curve of her shapely body. Black three-inch heels made her legs look a mile and a half long.He knew he was staring, he just couldn’t seem to help h
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