Chapter 12
“Holden’s not gonna like that,” I hear Maggie say as I reach the front steps of the dance hall. My hand clenches around the key, its teeth digging into my palm.
Holden’s not gonna like what?
A man’s croaky voice follows. “No, I don’t reckon he will. Can you hand me those pliers?”
“These?”
“Yep.”
I pull out my phone to check the time—7:38—then drop my backpack onto the stoop and sit my hungover ass down to wait. Squirrels raise hell in the oaks overhead, their chatter gnawing at my skull.
“You’ll have it fixed by tomorrow, though, right?” Maggie asks. “It gets hot enough to roast a lizard in there with no AC.”
Son of a bitch.
Dancing is the last fucking thing I want to do today, but at least we were going to have air conditioning. Why didn’t this shit get fixed yesterday?
I lie back and drape my forearm over my eyes.
My head’s throbbing from the Mexican martinis Gabi insisted we try last night.
Since when is an entire shaker of booze considered one drink?
Rio Cantina’s “one per customer” rule served more as a dare than a warning, and after finishing our round, we set off down the River Walk in search of another.
Turns out San Antonio is a Mexican martini mecca.
“Oh, you’re here,” Maggie says over the crunch, crunch, fucking crunch of gravel as she nears me.
“Yep.” I lift my head to check my phone. 7:40. “You’re late.”
“Late? I’ve been here for half an hour.”
She hooks a hand on her hip, the other clutching the handle of a small rolling suitcase. I decide not to ask.
Her brows draw together. “You okay? You look worn slap out.”
“Worn slap what? Never mind.” I glance toward the side of the building. “What’s the problem now?”
“Wrong part.”
“Of course.”
“If you want, my family has a barn—”
“A barn? I’ll pass.” I haul myself up and grab my backpack. “Let’s just get this over with.”
“Fine by me,” she says, one blue boot planted on the bottom step while she waits for me to let us in.
My eyes trail up her leg to the raw hem of her denim shorts, a shade darker and a hair shorter than yesterday’s.
Damn. Those should be illegal.
I tear my gaze away and trudge up the stairs to the door. “You comin’?”
“After you, Twinkletoes.”
I scoff under my breath. Christ.
Inside the dance hall, I toss my backpack on the bar as Maggie squats to dig through the contents of her suitcase. Silence stretches like a taut wire, and I can’t help but cut it with my smart mouth. “Taking a trip?”
“Huh?”
“The suitcase.”
She closes the lid, then gets up, a couple of foil-wrapped somethings in her hands. “It’s not a suitcase. It’s a cooler.” She peels back one of the wrappers. “I brought tacos. You hungry?”
The smell of egg smacks me in the face. I cover my mouth, stomach lurching. “You got water, by any chance?”
“Bless his heart, he wants water.”
This time, she bends to get in the cooler, her shorts riding up her thighs.
Fucking hell.
“What the heck did y’all drink last night? Tequila?” She pokes her head around her leg and makes a show of sniffing me. “You smell like tequila.”
“For the love of God, can you please stop saying that word?”
I lift my shirt to my nose. It’s clean, but I do sense the faint tang of margarita rising from my pores.
Maggie straightens, twists the top off a bottle of water, and thrusts it at me. “You really should eat something.”
Absolutely not. I’ll be lucky to keep this water down once we start dancing.
“This is fine.” I take a long pull, then press the bottle to my already damp forehead. Beads of sweat trickle down, stinging my eyes.
What the hell was I thinking last night? Beer wouldn’t have done me dirty like this.
“Did you take any—” Maggie’s question cuts off when the front door opens and slams against the wall.
I grab my head.
“It’s just me,” the repairman says. “You two go on about your business. Pretend I’m not here.”
“How long should we pretend, exactly?”
“Please excuse Holden, Roy,” Maggie says, shooting me a glare. “He’s a little hungover. Can’t handle his tequila.”
Roy’s booming laugh rattles in my ears. “That shit’s the devil if you’re not careful.”
“Thanks for the tip.”
“Not sure how long I’ll be, but I’ll try to keep it down,” he says as his work boots plod across the floor like hooves.
“That’s okay, Roy,” Maggie calls after him, gaze fixed on me. “We’ll be outside today. I know someone who could use the fresh air.”
“Outside where, Magnolia? The parking lot that’s paved in loose rocks?”
Her jaw clenches, a muscle jumping in her cheek. “No, not the parking lot, you dumbass.”
A flicker of shock crosses her face, like it’s not a word she’d normally use.
She recovers quickly. “There’s a trail out back that leads to the creek. The previous owner kept an RV with a concrete slab for a patio. The RV is long gone, but I bet the slab’s still there.”
“You want to hike through the woods in search of a slab?”
“To dance on?” she says, but it comes out like a question. Like she’s talking to a dumbass—which, fair. She plants a hand on her hip. “Can you just not today?”
A loud metallic clang reverberates from the maintenance closet, and we both flinch.
I grab my backpack off the bar. “After you.”
This isn’t so bad, I tell myself as I follow Maggie to her “dancing” slab. The oaks are thick, and the breeze makes it almost pleasant. Even the squirrels are tolerable. A stream gurgles somewhere ahead, luring me like a desert oasis.
“We there yet?” I ask for the third time in as many minutes.
She glares at me over her shoulder, clearly in no mood for my jokes, as she wrestles her suitcase-cooler across the uneven terrain.
I jog up beside her. “Here. Give it to me.”
She fires back with a sharp “No,” followed by a heated, “Dad-gummit!” when the wheel snags on a vine.
“Maggie, come on. Would you please just let me have it?”
“I’m fine.” She charges ahead, dragging the cooler now that the wheel is locked up. “Wouldn’t want you to overexert yourself.”
“Perish the thought.”
I slip my hands in my pockets and saunter after her, inhaling the clean, smog-free air. Not that I’d admit it, but I think she might’ve been right about this—until we break into a clearing, and I see her big white concrete slab baking in the hot Texas sun.
This is worse than bad.
Breeze or no breeze, it’s brutal, and by the time we get to it, I’m sweating out tequila like it’s on tap. Cue the buzzard circling above, probably waiting me out.
I drop my backpack and swipe my forehead with my sleeve. “Nothing like the great outdoors. Am I right?”
“Better than the alternative.”
“You think so?”
She ignores me, crouching to dig through her cooler while I yank my now-damp T-shirt over my head.
“How far’s the creek?”
“Not far,” she says without looking up. “Why?”
“I’d like to cool off, if you don’t mind.”
“Cool off? You haven’t done anything.”
She stands, water bottle dangling from her fingers, eyes doubling in size like I just went full Monty on her.
Fucking great. Of all things, this offends her?
“What?” I say. “It’s skin. Just give me a minute, will you? I’m trying not to die out here.”
Her wide eyes narrow to slits, and a sound (hell, was that a growl?) rumbles from her throat. I find myself inching back before I even realize it.
“I will not give you a minute,” she grits out.
“I’ve already given you plenty of minutes—my minutes—which you spent on the phone with your girlfriend.
And now you have the audacity to show up hungover?
And not just a little hungover, a lot hungover.
” She opens her water and hurls the cap at my feet.
“Pardon-me-while-I-strip-naked-and-take-a-dip hungover.”
“I’m hardly naked.”
“I got up at the crack of dawn to pack that cooler, and then, because I’m considerate—or maybe just stupid—drove forty minutes out of my way for Lucy’s famous chorizo and egg breakfast tacos. Because you can’t come to the Hill Country and not at least try one.”
“I didn’t mean—”
“But do I even get a thank you? No! I get attitude for being late, which I wasn’t.” She reaches behind her for the cooler handle, then stands tall, shoulders squared. “I’m exhausted, Holden. You’re exhausting.”
“Look, Magnolia, it’s been a rough couple of days, and I know that’s no excuse, but last night… Shit. I’m not a tequila drinker, obviously. If I’d just stuck with beer.”
“Seriously?”
I lift my head to Maggie’s death glare and, God help me, have to stifle a smile. She’s fucking cute when she’s mad, but now’s probably not the time to tell her.
“That’s what you have to say for yourself?” Her nostrils flare like she’s about to breathe fire. “‘If I’d just stuck with beer?’”
“No, that’s not…” I exhale. “Why are you getting so upset? I just wanted to dip my sweaty fucking T-shirt in the water and put it back on.”
“To cool off.”
“Yes,” I say. “To cool off.”
She strides toward me, tightening her grip on the bottle. “Then please, allow me.” Her arm goes up, and I watch—with ire? Or is it awe?—as her hand tips forward, and ice-cold water rains down over my head. “No need to thank me for that either.”
I mentally count to ten. Whether to keep from snapping at her or kissing her, it’s hard to tell.
“Point made,” I say, pushing the wet hair back from my face.
She drops the empty bottle, and it bounces off the toe of her boot. An eternal minute passes while she stares at the ground, probably deciding my fate, before jutting her chin toward the trail. “I’m just going to go.”
“Magnolia, wait.” My phone vibrates in my pocket. I dig it out and glance at the screen.
“My name is Maggie,” she says, her voice scarily quiet as she brushes past me.
“It’s Artie. Can you just—please—give me a minute? One minute.”
She stops. “You have thirty seconds.”
“Hey, Artie,” I say, putting him on speaker. “What’s up?”
“Where are you guys?”
“We found a spot outside.” I fight an eye roll. “There’s a breeze near the creek.”
“Okay, well, I won’t keep you. Just wanted to let you know I spoke to Barrett.”
Maggie looks back at me, her grip loosening on the cooler handle.
“And? What’s the verdict?”
“He’ll be here Friday.”
“Friday? We don’t start filming until next week.” I rub my aching head. “When Friday?”
“Afternoon? Early evening? And before you start, no, I don’t know why, and no, I didn’t ask. We’ll block a scene, or hell, order pizza and sing ‘Kumbaya.’”
“Yeah, okay.”
“Let Maggie know?”
I meet her gaze. “Yep.”
A door slams, followed by Roy the Repairman’s gravelly voice.
“I gotta go,” Artie says. “Give me a shout when you finish up.”
“Will do.” I slip the phone back in my pocket, my eyes still locked on Maggie’s.
“So,” she says, crossing her arms, “he is coming.”
The wind picks up, lifting wisps of blonde hair off her neck.
“You should be there.” I pull my T-shirt back on. “Whether or not we keep doing this. I know how important it is to you.”
“No,” she says. “Not if I bail on you.”
I chance a smile. “Can I convince you not to bail on me?”
“Don’t you want me to?” Her shoulders sag. She looks defeated, and I fucking hate it.
That’s called guilt, you asshole.
I swallow hard. “I guess I’m not very pleasant when I’m…under the weather.”
She arches a brow.
“Fine. Hungover.” I drag my fingers through my wet hair. “Look, Magnolia—shit, Maggie—I promise. It won’t happen again.”
“What about respect, Holden? I can’t teach you anything if you don’t respect me.”
“I do, I swear.”
My phone starts buzzing again. Dammit.
“And that needs to go off,” she says as I reach for it.
I drop my hand. “I can’t, Maggie. It’s complicated, but I can’t turn it off.”
“It’s a distraction.”
“I know.” The vibration thrums against my leg. “I’ll try to make it less of one. Somehow.”
She frowns, unconvinced.
“It’s not what you think.”
“Like I said yesterday, it’s none of my business. Just save it for breaks, okay?”
“And you’ll stay?”
“I’ll stay.” She grabs her cooler and starts dragging it back to the slab. “But from now on, our relationship is strictly teacher-student. Nothing more. We only talk about dancing. No banter. No chitchat. Are we clear?”
She can’t be serious.
“Aye aye, captain.”
Her head whips around, blue eyes dark as thunderclouds.
I lift my hands in surrender. Oh, yeah. She’s serious.
She points past me. “Creek’s that way.” The buzzard soars above us, following the line of Maggie’s finger before dropping out of sight. “Be back in ten.”