But Colt came forward and pressed a kiss to her temple, and looked down at Allan. There was a possessive look on his face as he casually laid a hand on the small of her exposed back.
Allan looked at Colt, then back to Beth Ann. Shock and hurt flickered across his face. “I don’t understand.”
“Well,” Beth Ann said, wishing this wasn’t so tense and uncomfortable. “I’m seeing someone.”
“Me,” Colt said flatly.
“But…what about me?” Allan tugged the pink cape off, let it fall to his lap.
“Guess you’ll have to find someone else to sleep with. Sounds like you’re good at doing that,” Colt said, the words tense. His hand tightened against the small of her back, as if he wanted to pull her away from Allan.
Beth Ann flushed. Ouch. Allan’s face grew flushed with anger under his tan. He stood. “You’re sleeping with this man, Beth Ann?”
Lord, her cheeks were going to catch fire if they got any redder. “I don’t see what business it is of yours if I am or not.”
“It’s my business because I care about you. I don’t want to see you with someone that’s not…that’s not…” He paused, as if almost afraid to spit out the words. “You deserve better,” he finally bit out.
“Like you?” she said in a hard, bitter laugh. “Twenty dollars for the cut, Allan. You can see yourself out the door.”
He grabbed a twenty from his pocket and held it out to her. When she reached for it, he pulled it back, infuriating her. “So this is the man you ‘trust’? The one you feel that you can trust more than me?” He gave a hard laugh. “You’re kidding, right?”
She held her hand out for the money. “Just stop it, Allan.”
“Yeah, well, you’ll come to your senses soon enough, Beth Ann. Because we both know you deserve so much better than him. And when you do, I’ll be waiting.”
She snatched the twenty from him. “Don’t hold your breath.”
He gave Colt a hateful glare and shoved out of the room, casting her one last wounded look. Beth Ann didn’t follow. She didn’t want to follow. That was what Allan wanted.
He paused in the doorway of the shop and turned to look back at her. “Your father wanted me to tell you that the Halloween committee meeting is tonight. He needs you to be there.”
He slammed the door.
“Fuck!” Beth Ann said, clenching her hands into fists.
Colt looked at her in surprise.
“Sorry,” she said, and then bit her fist in frustration. “That man makes me so mad that I want to spit nails.”
“Do I need to scare him off?” The look in Colt’s eyes was deadly serious.
She shook her head. She could only imagine what Colt would do, and Allan would call the cops in a heartbeat. “He just needs to get it in his head once and for all that I’m not with him.”
Colt pulled her close, his hand sliding against her back. He pressed a light kiss to her mouth. “Maybe we should be more public with our relationship.”
“Sex in the football bleachers?” she asked wryly. “We could ask Allan to hold the condoms and he still wouldn’t grasp that I don’t want to be with him.”
He chuckled, brushed a hand down her back. “Nothing quite so public as that, I don’t think. We could start with your committee tonight.”
She groaned, leaning against him as if the thought sapped her will to live. “I don’t want to go. Don’t make me go.”
“I won’t make you go,” he said, his hands cupping her ass through her skirts.
Beth Ann sighed. “And if I don’t go, my father will thunder in like a hurricane and want to know why I’m sabotaging his campaign for reelection by being so publicly unhelpful when he needs me now more than ever.” She rolled her eyes. “He trots out those excuses every other year around this time.” Her arms wrapped around his neck and she lifted her face for another kiss. “I have to go to this stupid meeting.”
“I’ll go with you. If that dickhead is going to be there, I’m not leaving your side.”
A warm, fuzzy feeling crept down her belly. So protective of her. She loved that. But he had to know what he was getting into. “I’m warning you. It’ll be boring.”
“I’ll think of new ways to make love to you. I’ll make a list. They’ll think I’m taking notes.”
She laughed and her hand slid to the front of his pants. “Well, I wasn’t entirely against the sex on the bleachers idea. I’ve never made love in public.”
“I’ll put that as number one on the list,” Colt drawled, smiling down at her. “Though it’s probably not as scandalous if everyone thinks we’re in a relationship.”
She kissed him again, her heart fluttering. He’d said relationship twice now. Is that where they were going with this? They hadn’t put a name on what they had yet. And she was afraid to ask, for fear she might ruin it.
After all, Allan had showed that she wasn’t good with relationships. But she trusted Colt, and he knew how important that trust was to her. So maybe she could hope, just a little.
The committee meeting was every bit as boring as she’d thought it would be. She’d been assigned the costume bash in the town square, and it was her task to set guidelines for costumes, contests, awards, and sponsors. Easy enough—why did they have to have four more committee meetings before Halloween to determine things? She complained as much to Colt on the way home, who agreed.
He’d been a perfect gentleman that night, she’d decided. He’d sat at the back of the room, just enough of a reminder for Allan to be quiet about his proclamations of love. Others had seen her enter with Colt, and the looks they’d given her were disapproving to downright confused. Wasn’t she supposed to be with Allan? They had to be thinking it.
She’d take their confusion. Eventually people would get the picture, and if she had to trot Colt out everywhere she went, she would.
The meeting went on for three hours, killing any hopes she’d had of going out with Colt after the meeting had ended.
His expression when they met afterward was grim. “They don’t like me with you.”
“That’s crazy.”
He shook his head. “It’s not crazy. You saw the way they were all looking at me. Like I’d come between the two of you.” His jaw was clenched with fury. “So we either f**k in secret like we have something to hide, or when we’re together, people act like I’m the bad guy.”