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and buttoned his
trousers, then reached out and caressed Charli’s cheek. “You are an
amazing woman.”
    “I’m a terrible person,” she moaned, burying
her face in her hands.
    “Should we dress her?” one of the men
asked.
    “No, let me.” Her mystery lover moved behind
Charli where she hunched over, wallowing in her horror at having
succumbed yet again to the excitement and lust of multiple
strangers making love to her. The man’s hands moved swiftly and
surely, lacing the strings of her corset, pushing her breasts up
and out. When he’d finished, he brushed her hair to the side and
planted a kiss on her shoulder. “One minute to spare.”
    “Please leave,” she whispered.
    “Have we displeased you?”
    “Far from it. You all were incredible.” She
sighed but kept her face buried. “I’m the one who failed.”
    “Not in our minds.” He tugged her off the
boxes and into his arms. “You could never disappoint.”
    “Maybe not you.”
    “Do you have another lover?”
    She laughed, the sound closer to a sob. “Not
anymore.” She tossed her hair and pushed against his chest.
“Go.”
    “As you wish.” He nodded to the other three
men, who rounded the column of chip boxes and exited the storeroom,
shutting the door. O.S. faced Charli, lifting her hand to his lips.
“Until next time.”
    “No.” Charli touched the gorgeous cowboy’s
arm. “I can’t see you again. Any of you.”
    “Are you certain?” O.S. cupped her chin,
staring down into her eyes.
    “I can’t.”
    “Ah, there is someone else.”
    She shook her head, her chest squeezing so
tight she could barely breathe. “Not after I confess my sins. You
being the biggest sin of all.”
    A grin spread across his face. “I’m a sin?
I’ll take that as a compliment.” He kissed her again. “I promise
that you will figure this all out and that I will see you again. We
were meant to be together.”
    Before Charli could protest further, her
mystery cowboy walked out of the storeroom, the music swelled and
quelled as the door opened and closed.
    For several long moments, Charli stood with
a hand pressed to her breaking heart. The tryst in the storeroom
with the dark strangers had been incredibly erotic, a total
mind-blowing sexual encounter. Charli had been powerless to
resist.
    Which told her what she should have known
from the beginning—she wasn’t a one-man-woman. She craved
excitement in her sex-life. If the past fifteen minutes was
anything to go by, she’d never be true to one without thinking of
what the experience was like with four.
    Knowing what she had to do, Charli adjusted
her skirt, checked her corset to make sure everything was where it
should be and sufficiently covered. Then she trudged out of the
storeroom into the saloon, ready to find Connor and set the record
straight, no matter what it cost.
    As she emerged into the ear-numbing din of
loud music and cowboys hooting and hollering, her boss caught her
arm and swung her toward the bar. “Oh, good, there you are. Time
for the show.”
    Charli planted her heels. “I can’t.”
    “What do you mean you can’t? You have to.
The men are expecting it, and you’re our only singer.”
    “I need to find Connor.”
    “It can wait until after the show.”
    “No, it can’t.” Though Charli tried to
argue, Audrey was already two steps ahead, dragging her behind.
    Someone jammed a microphone into Charli's
hands and the band struck up the lead-in music. Jackson Gray Wolf
grabbed her around the middle and lifted her up onto the bar where
Lacey, Kendall, Bella and Libby waited, dressed like Charli in
their matching red corsets and black ruffled skirts. With the
weight of her transgressions on her shoulders, Charli choked on the
first words of the song. Heart pounding, her gaze panned the crowd,
searching for Connor’s open, honest face, half-afraid she’d find
it…even more fearful she wouldn’t.
    Lacey danced over to where Charli leaned
against a support column.