Chapter Six
Chet
“I scanned it.”
I sigh and glance out the window beside us. “Nash Remington,” I explain before Grady guffaws loud enough to get the attention of our nearest neighbors.
He shakes his head, all playful and boyish again. “No way that’s his real name.”
“Obviously not,” I dish, leaning a little closer as if spilling some highly guarded trade secret. When honestly? I just like being close to Grady. Sue me. “Carl Covington is his real name.”
“Oh wow.” Grady chuckles. “I can see why he changed it.”
“Anyway, he’s the star of our hit show, Smoking Guns.”
“I’ve heard of that,” he muses. “It’s on that one channel ... the one with that talking horse show.”
I chuckle. “Saddle Soap,” I fill in the blanks for him. “That was our first hit. You ever watched it?”
“I mean, I see clips when they pop up on my social media feed,” he hems, as if looking at pictures of an ugly baby he doesn’t want to flat-out call ugly. “They seem ... funny.”
“Yeah, that show’s not my cuppa either, but we’re all very proud of Smoking Guns, and Nash is quite popular with a particular target audience.”
“Lemme guess,” Grady offers with the eye of a practiced media fiend. “Bored housewives with lots of free time and a cowboy fetish?”
I brighten. “Something like that,” I confess. “Anyway, we’ve had three seasons to build a following, and while we’re steady on that front, new viewers just aren’t coming in, and the Campfire Channel hasn’t exactly been forthcoming about renewing us for Season four, so...”
Grady nods. “Press tour time, right?”
“You’re in the wrong business,” I schmooze him, wishing his soft brown eyes weren’t so dreamy and his matching curls weren’t just begging my fingers to tousle them as we spooned after, well ... you know. “You should come work for us in Hollywood.”
He winks. “You mean ... Burbank?”
I snort again, struggling to remember the last time I’ve laughed so much in the span of, what? Five minutes? “Guilty as charged.” I sigh. “So you can see how, uh ... precarious my situation is at the moment, right, Grady?”
He nods in that gentle, understanding way of his. “And so, this Grand Opening in Pistol Creek is supposed to ... what now?”
“He grew up here.”
“Who?”
“Nash, Grady,” I tease. “Please do try and keep up.”
He rolls his eyes. “I am keeping up,” he huffs playfully. “And ain’t no way no damn Carl Covington grew the fuck up in this here Pistol Creek. I would have remembered that durn fool name. Trust me on that one.”
I squirm uncomfortably. “Okay, so, he didn’t exactly grow up here, but his cousin twice removed, Carla Covington, went to Pistol Creek High for a few semesters.”
Grady guffaws, swirling a straw through his milky iced coffee before sucking half of it down in one hearty swallow.
I watch his Adam’s apple bounce, wondering if he’s a spitter or a swallower, before catching myself.
“Wow, why don’t we offer him the key to the damn city while we’re at it, Chet?
Hell, he practically founded this town!”
“Yeah, yeah, I get it, but honestly? Nash is surprisingly charming in person, and women go ga-ga in his presence, so...”
Grady nods at me, our eyes meeting almost intimately above the small table for two. “Just women?” he murmurs, soft and low, like maybe he’s afraid of what others might think.
I pounce at the slightest hint of innuendo. “Oh, he has his male followers, for sure.”
“I meant...” Grady pauses, as if to signify this is a big moment happening right here. “Are you a fan, Chet?”
I roll my eyes, even though the way he says my name lets me know I haven’t been as slick about my sexuality as I like to think I am when meeting strangers.
Especially straight southern gents with smooth as molasses drawls and saccharine little dimples in their ruddy cheeks. “I’m paid to be a fan, Grady.”
He nods, jaw tensing quietly as he glances out the window next to our cozy and getting cozier by the minute little booth. “And if you weren’t?” His eyes turn back to me, pinning me with an almost soul-sucking clarity as he all but demands an answer this time. “Would you still be a fan?”
I grin and realize there’s an opportunity here. And for once? I’m not the one making the first move. “Of Nash?” I tease, my tone just shy of a purr—but not quite a growl, either—as I watch Grady shift uncomfortably with the reply. “Or ... cowboys in general?”
“Yeah,” Grady grunts almost eagerly. “That second one.”
I pin him with my eyes, the gesture unmistakable and the pause just long enough to give him the answer (I hope) he’s looking for. “I suppose it depends on the cowboy, Grady.”