The Cop and the Chorus Girl by Nancy Martin

dinner sent up and—no, of course there’s nobody here with me. Why would you think that?”
    Torrano shouted some more.
    â€œNo,” Dixie said. “I’m quite alone at the moment, Joey. Now, you go to sleep and think about whether you want to sign a contract to support the show, okay? Yes, good night. Good night, Joey!”
    She tossed the receiver to Flynn and whooped. “Wonderful! He’s suspicious already!”
    â€œSuspicious about what?”
    â€œYou!” Dixie exuberantly splashed water into the air. “He had one of his spies in the hotel tonight. The guy must have spotted you and reported to Joey.” Delighted, she crowed, “They think I’ve got a man up here!”
    â€œYou do,” Flynn observed.

Five
    â€œW ell, we’ll let Joey get his trousers in a twist and see what happens.” Dixie settled back into the bubbles, pleased with the way her plan was going.
    Flynn looked less than pleased. “You’re playing a dangerous game, Miss Davis.”
    â€œI don’t play games.”
    â€œI think,” he argued very carefully, “you play games all the time.”
    â€œI do not!”
    â€œFirst the Texas Tornado act, and—”
    â€œThat may be an act,” Dixie quickly conceded, “but it gets things accomplished.”
    â€œIsn’t that a game?”
    â€œIt’s business.”
    â€œShow business.” Flynn nodded. “You manipulate people—first to entertain, then to make them give what you want.”
    â€œAre we talking about Joey now?” Dixie demanded. “Don’t feel sorry for him. Joey got what he wanted out of our relationship, if that’s what you mean.”
    â€œBut you never slept with him.”
    â€œThat’s not what he wanted!” Dixie sat up defensively. “Oh, he thought I was sexy and all, but he wanted me so I’d make him look good!”
    â€œIt’s pretty tough to make a lifetime criminal look good,” Flynn snapped. “But you managed to do it.”
    â€œOnly for the benefit of the newspapers,” Dixie replied. She lifted her toes out of the bathwater to check her pedicure. “Anyway, Joey’s not so bad.”
    â€œYou don’t think so?” Flynn’s dark eyes were suddenly hard, and he seemed unaware of her dripping leg as she extended it in a leisurely stretch above the fragrant bubbles.
    Dixie slipped her leg out of sight again. “He’s given a lot of money to the show.”
    â€œIs money the way you measure goodness in people?”
    â€œOf course not!”
    â€œYou seem to be protecting him.”
    â€œMaybe I am in a way. I just think—well, you have to know my friends, the ones who work with me at the theater. They’re—they all have different stories—different reasons why the show is so important. I want to keep it going a little longer. I owe them that much.”
    â€œYou owe them? Why?”
    Dixie decided not to answer that one directly. “Look, I admit I’m not exactly what I seem—”
    â€œYou’re not the Texas Tornado?”
    â€œYes, in a way. I mean, it’s who I am—where I come from.”
    â€œBut I notice you drop the drawl and the lingo when we’re alone.”
    Suddenly she didn’t like the laughter in his gaze. “Of course I play it up a little! Why, my mama and Granny Butterfield think they’ve died and gone to hog heaven—me on the legitimate Broadway stage and all—but I—oh, hell, my real name isn’t even Dixie!”
    â€œIt isn’t?”
    â€œDaddy called me Dixie from the time I was knee-high to a longhorn steer, but my given name is...”
    He noticed her reluctance at once. “Your given name is?”
    She sighed. “Diana. Boring, huh?”
    He sat forward on the velvet chair. “Not boring. Nice.”
    Suddenly Dixie felt awkward. She wasn’t used to men