Game of Hearts (Stacked Deck Book 3)

by Emilia Finn

  “Where are the fucking spark plugs, Lucy?”

  “The sparkawhats? I don’t speak V8, and my Wheels Magazine subscription lapsed.”

  “Get in the fucking car.” He physically moves me. Practically lifts me when a passing car slows, and the guy inside stares a second too long.

  Mac tosses me into my seat, leans over me when he spots the one loose sparkplug, and snatches it with a feral snarl. He turns to me, so close that our noses almost touch. “Nice stunt, Kincaid. But you lose this round.”

  He slams the door, drops the hood until it crashes closed, then he stalks around to the back of my car and growls when he tries to push, but I’ve yet to release the handbrake.

  “My bad!” I holler on a laugh. “Sorry, just lemme…” I slowly, teasingly let the brake lower, because the fact he acknowledges a round means he’s going to play. He doesn’t like it, but he’s already in.

  “Lucy Kincaid! Take it the fuck out of gear!”

  “Oh, sorry.”

  I’ve never in my life tried to sound dumb, but then again, I’ve never dressed up – or, ya know, down – for him either. But here we are, and here I go, rolling toward the otherwise empty garage, after hours, just like I’d planned.

  Mac

  She’s Going to Kill Me

  I push the car as slow as I can, because as soon as we get it into the slip at Ang’s garage, she’s going to get out again. Her legs… her ass… her fucking tits, are somehow more revealing now in that button-up shirt than they were last night on a stripper pole. And why the fuck am I madder about skintight jeans than I was about her dance routine in front of men last night?

  Because when she dances, she’s the real version of her. She’s the happiest version, the most genuine version.

  I push the car across the street, and get a little run up to get it from road to driveway. Across the gravel, I’m going to kill Chuck for looking, and continue pushing when she steers straight for the only open slip, I’m going to kill Chuck for that too. He knew. He fucking knew! And his mother did not slip in the damn shower!

  “Here?” Lucy drops her foot to the brake ten feet too soon, and breaks down in giggles when I slam into the trunk because I’m not paying attention.

  I smash my knee against the back fender, and splat onto the steel frame when my hands slip forward and onto the window.

  “Aw, Mac?” She opens her door and half climbs out. “Sheesh, I’m so sorry. Did you get hurt?”

  “I’m gonna belt you,” I grit through clenched teeth. I stare into smiling, chocolate brown eyes, and glare. “Get in the fucking car, release the brake, take it out of gear, and roll it inside.”

  “Wow.” Dramatically, she rolls her eyes and turns with a flounce. “You’re cranky today, huh? You’re usually a lot more chill.”

  “You’d be cranky if you smashed your cock on the steel frame of a car too,” I grumble.

  Why am I making her take it inside? That’s the question I ask myself. Because she sure as shit does not need a mechanic. She needs to put the fucking spark plug back in, then she needs to go home and put more clothes on.

  So why, Mac? Why are you pushing her car into the slip?

  “Stop there.” I tap the trunk when the car is situated.

  It shudders to a stop, bounces a little on its springy hydraulics, then the door creaks open as she slowly makes her way out.

  “Where’s the spark plug, Lucy?” I move forward, and try my damnedest not to look at her seductive body. I stop close enough that I can differentiate between pomegranate and strawberry, then I hold a hand out. “Give it to me.”

  “Oh, wow. No foreplay? Okay.” She reaches up and begins unbuttoning her shirt. “Maybe we could be a little gentle the first time, but after that—”

  “No! Stop. Fuck.” I grab her hands, still them between us, and throw my face skyward to give myself a minute. “Why are you doing this?” My hands shake, but then again, so do hers. “What’s going on in your head?”

  “Doing what?”

  Her innocent act brings my eyes back down, only to catch her flapping her lashes like she thinks that turns me on. The tragedy is… it kind of does.

  “What am I doing?”

  “What’s with the clothes?” I grit out. “What’s with the shoes?”

  She peeks down between us. “You don’t like my shoes?”

  “I didn’t say I didn’t like them. I asked why. I’ve seen you almost every single day for half of my life, and I can count on one hand the amount of times you’ve worn heels.”

  “Prom.”

  I blink. Swallow. Blink again. “What?”

  “Prom,” she repeats. “I wore heels to prom.”

  “Yes…” I think of the dress she wore – white, but edging toward silver. It had sleeves right down to her wrists, and a neckline that sat beneath her chin. Complete coverage, as per her daddy’s request, and still… “Yes, I remember.”

  “You didn’t ask me to prom.”

  “No. I did not.”

  She swings away, snatching her hands from mine and makes her way across the garage. “You’re a prick for that too, just so you know. I waited for you to ask, but you didn’t. You refused.”

  “Prom meant limos. It meant pretty flowers and fancy suits. It meant a whole lot of things, none of which I had mon–”

  “Money.” She rolls her eyes and stops in front of a calendar that’s going to get me in trouble. I never put it there, but guilt by association and all that. “Yeah, I get it,” she drawls. “Money. It’s always about money.”

  “Has to be.” Ignoring her mood, I climb into the front seat of her car and jam the passenger seat back to search for the second spark plug. “When you’ve got none, everything suddenly costs a lot. I couldn’t afford you. So I didn’t ask you.”

  “Instead, my own brother asked me.”

  “Yup, and you got the limo.” I twist and lean toward the floor of the car. “Limo. Flowers. Dancing. And no one got handsy with you. Pretty decent situation, as far as I was concerned.”

  “Nobody else asked me.” I watch through the windshield as she turns and studies her nails. “Not one single person in our school asked me.” She lifts that hand, presents a thumb and finger so they rest only a half an inch apart. “Made me feel this small.”

  “No one asked you because everyone knew I’d beat them to hell and back if they tried.” I meet her eyes. “Bad heart or not, I wasn’t tolerating that nonsense.”

  Her brows pull close. “You warned other boys away?”

  It seems so obvious to me. So fucking duh. And yet, she almost looks confused.

  “Yeah. Just because I couldn’t afford you doesn’t mean I was gonna let some other dude raid their piggy bank. So Jamie asked you, and Bry went with some other chick from your grade. That was two Kincaids in the room, watching over you while you wore a skintight dress and didn’t dance with handsy pricks.”

  Her eyes change. From confusion, to a slight tinge of embarrassment, only to settle on bone-deep, manic rage. “I hate your guts, Mac Blair. You ruined my prom because you were hogging a toy you never intended to play with. You wouldn’t have me, but no one else could either?”

  “I can’t find it in my replacement heart to feel sorry for my actions.”

  Grunting with frustration, I lean so far into the passenger side that I’m almost upside down, and blood rushes to my head. I peek under the seat, curl my lip back when I find half a cheeseburger – but it looks exactly the way it looks in the drive-thru.

  “Where’s the fuckin’ spark plug, Lucy?” I push up to sit, and whip back when I find her at the passenger window with clenched teeth. “Fuck!”

  “The spark plug is gone. Get over it. And you’re a controlling asshole. A girl only goes to prom once, Macallistar! And you ruined mine because you’re an ass.”

  “I did the best I could.” I push away from her, climb out my side of the car, and rest an elbow on the roof while I study her. With the car in the way, hiding her cleavage a
nd the inch of bare skin on her belly, the blood remains in my head and not my cock. “I don’t share.”

  “But you also won’t be with me?”

  “Nope, sorry.” I slam the door and cross the garage to study the wall of supplies: spare headlight globes, belts, fuses, tire caps, nuts and bolts, and at the end, spark plugs.

  I pick the kind I need, match it to the one I slipped into my pocket back on the road, then I toss the little cardboard box as I cross back to the car.

  “I can’t have you.” I pass closer to her than I intend. I swear I mean to keep my distance, but she smells of strawberries, and she’s wearing heels, just for me. “I won’t. I refuse. But I sure as shit ain’t gonna let someone else have you either.”

  “So I’m to spend the rest of my life alone?” She storms to my place at the front of the car. Her breasts bounce as she moves – not that I was looking or anything – then they bounce again when she slams her hands to her trim dancer’s hips. “Really, Mac? You’re so concerned about the toy you want, that you have no care for my happiness? Are you fucking serious right now?”

  “Looks like it.” I slide the first spark plug into place. Then the second, newer one. “But don’t sweat it. I only mean that you can’t be with someone else while I’m here. While I’m living and able to see. But death will come for me before you’re old and saggy, you won’t have long to wait.”

  “Mac!” She shoves me. She shoves so hard that the second plug pings out of place, and I stumble back a handful of steps. “You are not dying! You will not be gone while I’m still young enough to move on. You’re a whiny little bitch. Fuck!”

  “And you didn’t reply to my text this morning. Why do you dance for men? Why do you dance for money when we both know you have piles of it?”

  “Probably because I’m horny,” she tosses callously. “You and I, we dance together, we train, but you won’t touch. You get me all wound up, but don’t finish it out. So I go to the club where men, I assure you,” she hisses, “know how to get the job done.”

  My heart stops. My tightening throat threatens to choke me. “You’re lying.”

  “Maybe I am. Maybe I’m not. But unless you’re my man, you’re not entitled to answers.”

  “You don’t sleep with them!” I grab her arm, shake her hard enough that her teeth rattle. “You do not let them touch you.”

  “This one guy,” she purrs. She lowers her voice and fucking purrs. “He’s not a lot older than us, and he’s pretty sexy. I have no clue where he gets his money, but he always wears nice suits and tosses the big bills when I dance.”

  She purses her lips, juts her proud chin forward, and stares right into my fucking soul. “I would never do it with an old person. Money doesn’t mean anything to me, unlike some other materialistic jerks I know, so there’s nothing someone could pay me to help me forget my self-respect. But a good-looking guy, our age, successful, wealthy…” She tilts her head to the side. “He has big hands, good manners, and doesn’t let me walk away without knowing I’m desired.”

  “Dancing is one thing,” I growl so close to her face, I feel her breath on my chin. “Dancing is allowed, because it’s art, it’s expression, and it makes you happy. But if someone touches your body, I will kill him.” I run faces through my mind, faces of men our age who have money. Then I think of Checkmate, and the resources I have there. “I will end his fucking life, and then I’ll have you on lockdown so tight that you won’t even be able to touch yourself.”

  “I’m so skilled at that already,” she spits out. “Touching myself, that is.” Her eyes flicker to my lips. To my tongue that darts out to wet them. “I’m a full-grown woman, and you still won’t say yes. Which means I touch myself. I think of you, and I fuck myself.”

  “Lucy!” I release her and back away so fast that I slam against the office wall. “Why are you saying these things? Touching yourself?” My cock grows. Throbs. Stretches against my zipper. “Why?”

  “Because I get offers of sexual satisfaction often. Almost daily, really. But the one man I want says no. So I touch myself.” She lifts a hand. Presses two fingers together, almost like a gun. “These have seen more action than I have.”

  “Stop.”

  “Have you ever slid your fingers inside a vagina before?” She taunts me. She hurts me, blow by blow. “I have. It’s kinda ridged, hot, and when you’ve been particularly kind or funny that day, extra wet. Lord, your humor turns me on.” She moves forward with slow, deliberate steps. “Those days when you’re extra: extra funny, extra charming, just extra… I’m extra wet.” She licks her lips. “Extra tight. Those are the days I use toys, because hell knows, I want to know what the real thing feels like.”

  “You need to stop.” I grab her arms, hold her a full two feet away. From this distance, she might be able to kick me in the nuts, but she won’t be able to touch them with her hands. “Are you off your fuckin’ meds or something? What’s gotten into you?”

  “What? Does my newly acquired ability to use my words offend you?” She lifts a sharp brow. “You admitted you wanted me too. Last night,” she presses. “You admitted it. Before that, I was terrified that I was all alone in this. But I’m not, am I?” She slithers out of my hold, slips forward, slides into my guard so her chest presses against mine. “Before, I thought it was just me. All alone, unlovable and stupid. But it’s not true.”

  Because her shoes give her an extra couple inches in height, she’s able to slide her hand along my jaw, pinch my chin between her thumb and finger, and draw my eyes down. “You’re right here with me, and frankly?” She flattens her lips. “I’m fed up with being unwanted. I’m fed up with waiting. I’m done with pretending everything is okay. Because it’s not okay, Mac. It’s absolutely not okay, and I’ve seen this show before. The childhood friends, the stubbornness and inability to just use some effing words. I refuse to do that, so now when you say no, it’ll be because you don’t want me, and not a miscommunication or some misplaced bullshit about chivalry.”

  “Chivalry? I don’t say no because I’m trying to be a gentleman,” I growl. “I say no because you deserve better.”

  “Tomato, tomahto. And now you know my thoughts, so when you say no, you’re actively and purposely hurting me. You say you’re my best friend, that you love me, that you care about my happiness. It’s time for you to step up to the big leagues. If you love me, then you won’t hurt me.”

  “Saying yes is hurting you! Saying yes is a short-term win, but long term…” I shake my head. “I know better.”

  “You know nothing! You’re so blinded by your bitterness that you throw away a good thing.”

  “I have no good things,” I snap. “That’s the fucking point. I have no good things, and if by some miracle I get a taste, the universe will smite me the fuck down. You wanna risk being close enough to get jacked up by lightning? Are you willing to risk that kind of bad luck?”

  “I’ve been beside you this whole time!” She releases my chin, but I swear, it’s almost a jab to the jaw, rather than a liberation. “I’ve been here, with you, beside you, in every fucking storm since we met. But you don’t see me. You refuse to see me. You were better last year,” her shouts turn to a whimper, “you were better, happier, freer.”

  “Because I had the tournament. It was my time to win, and I figured the universe was giving that to me, right? So maybe it was my time.” I swallow. Stare into eyes that might be crying a little. For every tear that fights to fall, every tear that she pulls back in, another layer is stripped away from my heart. “I had a good thing, but then the universe reminded me that I’m not allowed. I lost to Iowa, I was put back in my place, and it was fucking brutal. So if you think for a single second that I’m gonna say yes to you and tempt the universe to take you away again, then you’re wrong. You’re so fucking wrong, Lucy. You’re delusional if you think you get to step in front of me.”

  “It was a fight.” Her lips shake, and her eyes flicker between mine. “It was just a fight. L
ike, shit, who cares? We lose in sparring all the time. There will always be a loser, and that night last year, that was your turn to lose. Who gives a shit? More than two hundred people walked away without the win, without the belt, without the money. You were one of them. Who cares?”

  “I fucking care! But you wouldn’t know what that’s like, because you have your belt and all that cash in the bank. Come back to me when you lose, let me know how that feels.”

  “You are so small-minded,” she says quietly. No longer the seductress, she drops all of the fakeness, and bares herself to me the way she has every day for as long as I remember. “So fucking small-minded. The world does not revolve around you, Mac. It doesn’t revolve around your heart, and it doesn’t revolve around Stacked Deck. So maybe you lost a fight, but ya know what? There are seven-point-something billion people on this planet that have absolutely no fucks to give about that. It wasn’t even a speck on their radars, but in your world, it’s an eclipse. You can’t move past these petty things, and because of that, you hurt me.”

  She grabs my hand, stronger than she appears, and places it on her heart. “You hurt me, time after time, and for what? Your pride about a stupid competition? You hold beef against a fighter that probably hasn’t thought about you one single time in ten months. He has a daughter to take care of, a life to live, a job to work, and in his spare time, he trains. Your drama is not important enough for him to worry himself over. But to you, this made-up beef and the loss that you obsess over, it’s powerful enough for you to hurt yourself, and by extension, me.”

  She pushes away. Shakes her head in disgust. “Call me when you’re fifty and single, and you realize how you screwed up the one thing the universe did give you.” She backs up to her car, drops the hood. “You focus on what you don’t have, you focus on what the universe won’t let you have, but maybe it took all those things away, all of those distractions, so you could focus on what you did have.” She makes her way to her door, swings it open, and slides in. “And yet, you don’t see me.”