Chapter 19 – Paloma
Dallas Golden had been one of my closest confidants growing up.
Even though it might have been silly, I'd nursed a secret, invisible crush on him for years, despite never having met him in person. And most of the time, I wondered if he was even real.
It wasn’t until eight years later, just six months ago, after my bandmates and I wrapped up our European tour in Croatia, that I unexpectedly found myself in a bar, face-to-face with a former Marine who was just passing through the country.
His shaggy blonde hair made him look exactly how I’d always imagined Dallas did and I threw caution to the wind, living out my wildest dreams in his arms.
I went home with the marine for a fun night and asked him if I could call him by the name Dallas in bed. He didn’t give a shit about what I called him as long as he took control, so I let him.
He fucked me so hard I saw stars and then deposited me back at the hotel where I was staying.
Coming down from the high of role playing what it'd be like to be with my long-lost pen pal shattered me into pieces. It wasn’t nearly as satisfying as I’d expected and cracked open a wound that had just scabbed over.
I finally decided that it was time to write another letter to Dallas. A final one that would let him know I was saying goodbye to the idea of us being friends as adults and ever meeting. Goodbye to the man that I’d loved.
But before doing that, I’d searched his name online, the first time I’d allowed myself to do that in twelve years, and found exactly zero photos confirming his existence save an article written about the app that he’d sold to become rich at just twenty years old.
The guy had stated he was a protégé, making history, and damn good at everything he did, yet other than that small, hardly interesting article, there was no trace of him online. His digital footprint was non-existent, and I started questioning once again whether he was even real.
The whole situation was bizarre. He was either as incredibly mysterious as I’d made him out to be in my head or he was a master at avoiding the social media craze that permeated our generation.
Either way, I was half impressed, half annoyed.
Which is why I’d gotten rip roaring drunk by the firepit my bandmates built and penned an angry email where I told him to F-off.
But the guy who is standing in front of me now, in the middle of Rex’s Rodeo House Bar, a classic in our small town, claiming to be Dallas Golden, my Dallas, is nothing like what I’d imagined in even my wildest fantasies.
Because this guy is even better.
Dallas’ hair is buzzcut-short, but I can tell it’s a deep brown, certainly not the bleach blonde that I’d always imagined.
His muscles stretch the black T-shirt he’s wearing tightly across his chest, and he’s so tall I feel a kink forming in my neck from tilting my head upward.
His arms are covered in tattoos, and though his eyes softened when he first saw me, there’s a darkness lurking behind them that tells of the pain he’s seen.
His lips are full, teeth straight, and despite his strikingly attractive face—almost too attractive for a man who’s fought in wars and surely witnessed tragedy—there’s no denying he’s a Marine.
His stance radiates a clear warning: he’s not a man to mess with, and his expression is completely unreadable.
He stands out because he’s nothing like the other men in the bar tonight. Nothing like the men in Texas.
And I love that.
My mind races, struggling to make sense of the words I’m hearing.
How can this man—the same one that I’d been trapped in an elevator with earlier today, the one whose meaty cock I’d grabbed on accident while talking about my pen pal—also be my Dallas?
How did I not realize this earlier today?
Did he tell me his name when we were trapped together and I’d missed it? Too self-absorbed in my own problems as I read another misguided article written about me.
Why is he here tonight?
Why is he in Lonestar Junction?
Has he really moved here like he'd said in the elevator?
Did he come looking for me because of the last letter that I sent?
I feel my cheeks flush as Dallas' strong gaze remains trained on my every movement. I hope he doesn’t notice, but with the way he’s staring at me so intently, it feels like nothing can escape his controlled perception.
I can’t remember everything that I’d written in the last, drunken letter I’d mailed him over six months ago.
I’d been full of alcohol, self-loathing, introspection, and high on the excitement of my last concert of our European tour, but somehow, clearly, it must have made its way to him because I can’t reconcile any other reason for him to be in Lonestar Junction right now.
“What… what are you doing here?”
He’d never mentioned having any ties to the tiny town I grew up in or plans to visit. I tried to remember his explanation for moving here from the elevator conversation.
‘Looking for peace, quiet and a change of pace.’
“I think I'm missing something...” Wylie states as he points the top of his bottle between Dallas and me, eyes shifting back and forth.
“It’s a long story...” I respond while Dallas remains noticeably silent, his eyes never leaving mine. “We met in a broken elevator earlier today."
Partially true. Though now I wasn't sure if it counted as a first-time meeting since at the time I hadn’t known it was him I was trapped with.
"You met how?" Stevie blurts out from beside me, her brow arches in a way that screams suspicion. She shoots Dallas a look so accusatory, it seems like she might know even more than I do about what’s going on.
Wylie shakes his head before pointing at Dallas again, “We’ll let you two catch up, but Dallas, you may have saved my life once before, but if you do something to Dove, I'll take yours. She’s our town’s royalty.”
The corner of Dallas’ lip ticks upwards as he holds in a smile but nods in acknowledgement while Stevie drags Wylie away from us.
Clay, Nash, and Savannah disappear into the crowd and finally, we’re alone.
The bar is still loud, my siblings somewhere lost in the crowd waiting for me to return to catch up yet all I want to do is be alone with Dallas, asking him all of the questions I’ve kept wrapped into my heart for so long starting with, Hey, where the hell have you been and how could you leave me hanging like that?
“Can we go outside and... talk?” I ask, unsure of how to address the towering man in front of me with eyes piercing through the depths of my soul, fleshing out all of my insecurities, and calling me for deeper connection in a way that I’ve only ever felt with him before.
He feels both familiar and yet like a complete stranger.
After our time together in the elevator, I'd felt a connection to him in our shared survival, but he’d disappeared while I was speaking with chief Hollister.
Now I was wondering if it’d been because he’d felt familiar. Like coming home. Home to myself.
I needed to understand why he'd hid his identity from me and what the hell he was doing here in my small town…
He nods and lets me lead the way out of the bar into the dark night.