Free Texas Outlaws: Billy by Kimberly Raye Page B

nodded and Susan glanced at her watch.
    “And cupcakes, too.” Sabrina held up a bakery box, courtesy of Sarah and their newly formed alliance. “Chocolate and red velvet.”
    Another excited murmur floated through the crowd, this one even bigger than the first.
    Maybe the baker did know her stuff.
    “Yum,” Susan murmured. “Can I have one of those?”
    Sabrina nodded and handed over a Chocolate Ecstasy.
    “I’ll leave you to it then,” the woman said around a mouthful. “I’ve got charades starting in the east wing in a few minutes.”
    Sabrina eyed the roomful of women quickly closing in on her. “Any men in the east wing?” She gave Susan a hopeful glance, but the woman had already started for the door.
    “Only the Morgan sisters,” Red chimed in as she came up to the card table where Sabrina had set up her display of goodies. “They’re not actually men, but they tell everybody that they’re bisexual.”
    “They only do that because they think it makes them more interesting to the opposite sex,” Dolores chimed in, wedging in next to Red. “I’ll take a red velvet. And a shirt and a mug.” She pointed to the stand-up display depicting the shadow of a cowboy, hat tipped low, and the caption Looking for a real man? “And I’d like to fill out one of them profiles, too.”
    “Sure thing.” Sabrina handed over the items, along with a clipboard with a questionnaire. While she’d promised Livi to turn down any more female profiles, she didn’t have the heart to turn away Dolores. Or the dozen or so other women who crowded around her. Not when they looked so eager. And lonely.
    Still, her real objective was to find some eligible widowers for Melba and Sarah Jean.
    That, and she was doing anything and everything to keep her mind off the coming evening and the fact that she’d agreed to meet Billy at the motel at ten for night one of their agreement.
    Her nipples tightened at the notion and excitement zipped up her spine. Too much excitement, considering she’d already slept with him.
    But that was the point entirely.
    She was going back for seconds when she never allowed herself a second rendezvous. There were no seconds when it came to her weakness. Yes, she indulged because she couldn’t help the attraction, but she didn’t give it a chance to morph into more.
    There were no follow-up dates. No phone calls or text messages or contact of any kind. She kept it simple and brief and safe.
    Until Billy.
    He’d thrown a wrench into her entire system, not that she was going to let him throw her off track entirely. It was just a matter of keeping her perspective and remembering that this was a mutually beneficial arrangement.
    That meant no primping for tonight or worrying over what she was going to wear or if he was going to be on time.
    She’d done all three for all of a half hour after she’d parted ways with Livi. Her partner had gone back to her room to work, while Sabrina had spent thirty minutes feeling like a virgin before her first real date. She’d finished up at the fairgrounds an hour ago with a whopping thirty cowboys to add to their database. While she still needed to scan in the profiles and send them to Kat for entry, she knew that would only take a half hour at the most.
    And so she’d come here, desperate to do anything and everything to keep her mind off the coming evening and off Billy and her crazy reaction to him, and do something productive.
    Yeah, right, a voice whispered as she accepted profile after profile. All the right age range, but the wrong sex.
    “Is this an all-female home?” she asked after adding another profile to her growing stack. “No offense, but I was sort of hoping to find a few senior men.”
    “Aren’t we all, sugar,” said the short, round eighty-something with tight silver curls and thick glasses who reached for a mug. “Aren’t we all.”
    * * *
    S HE FINALLY FOUND a man.
    Sabrina gave herself a mental high five as she rounded the corner with