God, she missed this. Dietrich’s was responsible for some of her best memories, ever, and not only for what happened on the dance floor. Someone their senior year became convinced that the legend about passing under the train trestle in a boat and glimpsing your true love was real, and the entire class spent every Saturday night trying to prove it, one way or the other. She never did spot the face of her true love, but she supposed that was because Nat was always in the rowboat with her.
Mona nudged January’s elbow at the rather ambitious opening fiddle strains of a stripped-down “Cotton Eye Joe,” a favorite group dance of the kid-set because it was the only time their Bible-hugging parents allowed them to say bullshit. Scream it, really.
“I’m good,” said January. “You go.”
Mona shot to her feet and linked shoulders with those already in formation.
As if Mona needed her permission. Her mother had been especially clingy since they bonded over styling MooDonna’s tuft of white hair that afternoon. The cow snorted, the women giggled, and all three of them considered a rather brazen coat of quick-dry Making Whoopee purple on her hooves until Willie broke up the girl party. January smiled at the recent memory.
“If I didn’t know better, I’d say you’re enjoying your time in Close Call.” Nat said from a spot near the tree trunk.
Stumbling dance lines and howls of laughter provided the perfect cover for her newfound contentment.
Nat took Mona’s place. He folded his long cowboy legs on the bench in front of them like a giraffe styled in a starched button-down shirt and Wranglers. His cologne didn’t hit her like the others that had wafted her direction that night—peppery, in-your-face excuses for masculinity. Nat wore his scent to perfection. Aged leather. Woodsy, like the balsam fir in a Christmas candle. Virile without trying.
“Forget the steps?” He motioned his longneck Shiner bottle toward the dancers.
“I needed time to pop my shoulder back into alignment. Bud might have mistaken my arm for a tire pump.”
Nat tossed his head back, his laughter throaty and warm. “Old Man Goff never dances. He’s a little out of practice since his wife died.”
“He’s sweet.”
“He’s not the only one.” Nat pulled a swig of his beer and took his time swallowing. “I’ve seen you out there, dancing with old toughies and widowed women who never get asked and red-haired twelve-year-olds with freckles and bad teeth.”
“That kid’s going to be a looker. Give him a handful of years.”
The band eased from the rollicking folk tune to a slow number.
A guy sporting a Texas-flag snap-button shirt and reptile boots approached. Apart from his questionable fashion sense, he was a dead ringer for Superman—the recent Hollywood version she’d caught on a flight from Sydney to London a few years back. He had spun every other eligible female on Dietrich’s dance floor like a pennant caught in a hurricane.
“Would you like to dance?” he said.
Beside her, Nat straightened. May have even stopped breathing.
January grabbed Nat’s hand. “I’m sorry,” she told Superman. “He asked first.”
She tugged Nat toward the dance floor, a little like a giraffe hesitant to enter a limbo contest. But they fell into an easy rhythm, a forgotten alliance, a soft place. His body picked up the beat and telegraphed it to hers through their joined hands, the slight pressure of his touch at the curve of her spine, his close proximity.
“What was that?”
January shrugged.
“That was Eric Pickford.”
“Should that name mean something?”
“Cousin to our beloved banker, Austin, and sole heir to the Dyed And Gone to Heaven chain of hair salons?”
“The one that used to be the gas station on Main, with the wigs on the pumps?”
“And the one in Hickory that used to be a funeral home. It’s a three-county empire.”
“Nathaniel James Meier, you sat there and watched me turn down a shot at marrying into a pedigree. Shame on you.”
His chuckle resonated between them. A warm buzz danced along the nerves in her neck and arms, sans alcohol. She had forgotten the single most pleasurable part of being around Nat—making him laugh. At first, a challenge. Then, as he opened up and let her in, a salve when her parents’ marriage festered, when her father left, when her mother struggled with two mouths to feed. Leaving had been the only relief January could think to give her.
“Seems everyone wants to dance with the world traveler,” said Nat.