“You can’t be serious,” Slade huffed, reaching out to steady me as I tottered on what felt like mile-high heels.

“I’m officially twenty-one, Slade. I’m not supposed to be serious.” I fought the urge to fidget under his scrutinizing gaze as I answered him, knowing full well he meant my choice in footwear. Had I thought about how difficult it would be to maneuver through a gravel parking lot in a pair of heels meant for anything but loose rocks, I would have worn boots. But I wasn’t going to admit it. Not even to him. Admittedly, to myself only, wearing heels knowing I had to cross a gravel parking lot made about as much sense as wearing makeup while rounding up cattle in the middle of August.

“That’s not what I meant, Gracen, and you know it,” he grumbled.

I glanced up at him. “You’re in a particularly foul mood tonight. Bad day?” I steered the conversation away from myself as I looked toward the neon lights of Rowdy’s. My stomach fluttered with excitement.

Rowdy’s wasn’t just a bar. It was the bar. Ever since it was built a few years back, I’d been drawn to the planked-board sides with neon lights and its air of secrecy. I’d dreamed of walking through its double swinging doors since the lights turned on and the music could be heard outside the doors when you drove by. The cowboys, oh, the cowboys, who walked into that bar were something to see. It was like my own little personal oasis just waiting for me to be of age.

Not to mention the fact I’d basically struck out everywhere else. Boyfriend wise, that was. Finding the guy who would steal my heart and make me walk with my head in the clouds because my feet couldn’t find the ground wasn’t too much to ask for. Having someone hold me close and dip their head in to kiss my neck as we slow danced wasn’t either. I wanted that so bad; I craved it.

Finding the other half of me had been the biggest challenge of my life to date. I knew I was young, and I had my whole life ahead of me. I’d been told it all before.

And no, I wasn’t shallow or out of touch with reality.

I was lonely.

“You’re not even dressed right to go in there,” Slade said, chuckling when I stumbled again.

“What do you know anyway?” I huffed, swatting him with my beaded clutch.

It only made him laugh a little more.

“I know this is a honkey-tonk,” he answered, pausing long enough to maneuver us around a dip in the sidewalk. “What you’re wearing shouts city-slicker.”

“Because I’m in a dress and heels? FYI, Slade, guys like dresses and heels,” I shot back at him.

What the hell was wrong with him? I knew he liked to give me a hard time, but damn.

“FYI, Gracen, guys don’t care. Especially guys in a bar. What sort of attention are you looking to get walking in there like that?” His chin jerked toward the front entrance.

“You think I dressed like this for attention?” I had to admit that hurt.

“I know you are,” he answered, bringing me to a halt and turning me to face him.

The night air was hot. Even the slight breeze felt warm. The hiss and ping coming from the line of cars in the front row of the parking lot dotted the silence between us. I didn’t want to fight with Slade, but he was making it almost impossible not to. Just because we’d been friends for what seemed like forever didn’t mean he had the right to be a complete bastard to me on my birthday.

“Can we just go inside now?” I asked, hoping he’d stop nagging me for once.

“When are you going to realize this fantasy you have of finding ‘the one’ in a crowd full of people isn’t how it works?” he asked.

“That’s not what tonight is about,” I said, poking him in the chest. “If I would have known you’d throw what I said back in my face, I never would have told you.”

Slade pulled his hat off his head and slapped it against his denim-encased thigh. “But you did tell me. So answer me this… what’s your real agenda tonight? Because I don’t really want to sit back and watch you get groped when I can go home and sleep.”

I hated when he did that. It always made me see him in a different, non-Slade sort of way. Because even though he was my best friend, he was still the most beautiful guy I’d ever seen. I’d never in a million years tell him, though. Just like I’d never tell him he was the one I measured every guy up against. And it wasn’t because I was in love with him. Sure, I loved him. He’d been there for me over the years and vice-versa. We’d been around each other so long we knew what made the other tick. We knew how to get under each other’s skin. We fought. We laughed. We were just us. And the last thing I wanted to do was ruin years of friendship by saying something I couldn’t take back. Something that might make him take a huge step away from me. I needed him too much to lose him.

But there were times when I saw him out of the corner of my eye and it left me breathless. He was everything I was looking for, but couldn’t have because I knew I wasn’t it for him. I was okay with that. I made peace with it years ago after watching the types of girls he went for. I wasn’t anything like the girls he’d dated. In fact, I didn’t measure up to anything he was looking for. Which I supposed was okay, because it made it a whole lot easier to accept.

Even when he didn’t want to, he humored most of my harebrained ideas. Which was why he’d agreed to escort me to Rowdy’s, on a Wednesday night, when he had to be up at four in the morning to start his day.

“If you really didn’t want to come with me, all you had to do was say so.” I crossed my arms, giving him a stern look.

His gaze raked me from the top of my head to my death-trap-encased feet and smirked. “If you think I’d leave you up to your own devices, you’re sadly mistaken.”

“I don’t have any devices. And you’re being a jerk. It’s my birthday, so give me a damn break,” I huffed.

He shoved his hat back on his head with a sigh, turned, and held out his arm. “Shall we?”

The warn chambray button-up shirt he wore was soft against my skin. Inhaling the head-swimming scent of his cologne, I covered my sigh of appreciation by saying, “You clean up pretty good, Slade.”

“Thank you.”

“Would it kill you to pay me a compliment back?” I was totally fishing, but hey, a girl liked to be told she at least looked nice.

He looked me up and down again and said, “Probably.”

I tugged my arm from his. “Just go home. It’s obvious you don’t want to be here.”

He caught my hand in his. “I’m sorry, Gracen. I’m tired. It’s been a long couple of days, and I don’t mean to take it out on you.”

I batted my eyelashes at him, putting our disagreement on hold, and said, “You could make it up to me.”

Slade’s only reply was a sort of humming noise as we approached the entrance of Rowdy’s. My heart did a little summersault as a wave of heat rolled through my body that had nothing to do with the outside temperature.

Finally. I was only steps away from being able to see the inside of the notorious Rowdy’s.

“You can buy me a drink,” I added, letting go of his arm and digging my ID from my purse.

The guy manning the door tipped his hat at Slade without even looking down at the ID I’d shoved in his direction.

Grumbling, I put my ID back in my clutch. I’d had it all planned too. First was walking all sultry like up the sidewalk to the bar. A few catcalls, or maybe a whistle or two, would happen. I’d pull out my ID for the doorman and he’d give me a once-over, look back at my ID, and wish me a happy birthday with a wink.

None of it happened. Not a damn bit of it, blowing my daydream out the water from the very beginning.

And worse?

No live band.

Music pumped through the speakers as a dance instructor called out the next move for the group of line dancers crowding the dance floor.

“Gracen?” Slade bumped his arm into mine to get my attention.

And no wonder he did. I’d stopped right inside the doors, not sure if I wanted to be there anymore.

Slade waited beside me, biting his lip as his eyes searched mine. Stay or go? his eyes asked.

“I need a drink,” I said, forcing myself to move toward the bar.