by Avery Flynn
Snips staggered up, holding his junk with both hands. An apricot-sized goose egg deformed his round head.
“You fuckin' cunt.” Spittle sprayed from his angry mouth. Hatred and pain twisted his face. “Forty thousand dollars. I want it all. Tomorrow.”
He limped to the door and out to the Paris Casino's general gambling floor.
Well, she'd taken the bad and made it about twenty times worse. Way to go, Josie. She had less than twenty-four hours to find Cy, or cash out her life savings and find an additional thirty-five thousand dollars. Bile rose in her throat. The tray slid from her clammy grasp.
She could sell her car. Work extra shifts in the poker room and at the diner. Forget about Dry Creek. Maybe she could get a refund.
Her shoulders slumped. Exhaling a deep breath, she headed for the employee locker room. There was no time for feeling sorry for herself. As her dad, a lifelong plumber, said, life doesn't always give you copper pipes, sometimes it just gives you shit.
Swiping the diary from its hiding spot, she gave herself a mental shake then marched out of the poker room.
Sinking down onto a metal folding chair in the employee locker room, she tried to steady her shaking hands enough to unbuckle her shoes. It took three tries, but she finally got them undone and tossed them into her duffel, then wriggled out of her miniscule uniform. So much for the bonfire she'd been planning. Josie sniffled back a tear. She couldn't stop her bottom lip from quivering, but dammit, she would not actually cry. It wouldn't change anything.
Pulling on a pair of dark denim jeans and tugging a soft cotton T-shirt over her head, she contemplated her next task: persuading Clive to give her some more shifts in the poker room. It would take a whole lot of fast talk to get him to agree. Lately, he'd been overwhelmed with requests for overtime from everyone and Josie had three things working against her. She stuffed the diary in her backpack and swung it over one shoulder, grabbed her duffel bag in her other hand and cataloged the negative marks.
One, she'd already quit.
Two, unlike most of the waitresses, her twenties were a fast-fading memory.
And three, she'd just whacked a high roller and kicked him in the nuts.
Desperation tightened around her neck with each step on the short walk from the locker room to Clive's office. She had better odds at the slot machine than she did sweet-talking her boss into giving her more hours. Good luck with that.
He answered her knock before Josie's knuckles even broke contact with the door. A red blotch colored his Adam's apple. Clive only got the hives when he'd been on the business end of a reaming.
“What a way to end your last shift.” He scurried around his desk and flopped into his chair.
“About that—”
He held up his hand. “You already handed in your notice. This was your last day.”
Even though she’d expected it, her stomach sank. “Something came up. I changed my mind, can't you—”
“Jimmy 'Snips' Esposito went to the top. Shit, he dialed the CEO before he even hit the front door. They assured him tonight was your last night.”
“But he grabbed me!”
“He disputes that and no one witnessed the incident.”
“The security cameras—”
“Won't have seen anything. They never see anything when it comes to him.” He shrugged his shoulders. “I'm sorry, Josie, but it is what it is.”
Her body ached, every organ and limb hurt. A bone-deep sense of exhaustion swamped her. She didn't even have the energy to be pissed off. Everything had tumbled down on top of her like a house of cards. Just like L.A. The memory of that betrayal struggled to emerge from a lockbox in the back of her mind but she had enough practice ignoring the pain to force it back. She'd find a way out of this mess. She'd done it before. She'd do it again.
Josie spun on her heel and walked out the door, leaving her tacky-ass uniform in the duffle bag on the floor in front of Clive's desk.
Chapter Two
Twenty minutes later, Josie sank back onto a barstool near the casino's off-track betting room, desperate for a little girl talk with her best friend, Mike, who was tending bar. He’d handed her the usual vodka gimlet and hurried off to tend the customers at the other end of the bar. She twisted away from the raucous trio of blondes at the other end of the room whose last sober moment must have been hours ago—if not days.
Lucky them, everything was perfect in their lives. Damn, she sure sounded like a bitter little muffin with a forty thousand dollar debt tied around her neck. Must be the gimlets. She snorted at her own bad joke.
The first crisp, ice-cold vodka with a hint of lime in the had gone down way too easy. Josie really didn't care as she accepted the second that Mike slid her way. She'd already left Cy four voicemails. Her texts had gone unanswered. No one in the family had heard from him in a week. Not since Cy had e-mailed that he'd hooked up with a construction crew for a two-week job in Reno. Her twin vibe would be going mad if something had happened to him, like it had when he was shot in Iraq. She'd known hours before the call came. But this time, baby bro just didn't want to talk.
“Hell, if I owed pond scum forty thousand, I'd probably be ignoring my phone too,” she mumbled into her drink.
Still, a nugget of worry sat like a brick in her stomach. Why would Cy need to borrow money, let alone that much?
Stymied in her search for the answers, she took refuge in another gulp of vodka. After everything that had happened in the past few hours, some adult beverages and a bitch session with Mike were in order. Hashing it out with her best friend always seemed to set things clear in her head.
She'd accomplished step one, having a pair of vodka gimlets. Step two had been a bust because of the bachelorette party. The small casino bar was normally deserted at this time since most games had finished hours ago, but tonight Mike had slid the second gimlet her way then gone back to making a trio of pink martinis. He set the drinks on the bar in front of the flirty blondes and made his way toward Josie on the opposite end.
“Sorry, doll, you know what bachelorette parties are like—high maintenance but with an equally big tip. All I have to do is pour the drinks and bat my eyelashes.”
“Don't you feel the least bit guilty?”
He shrugged. “For what?”
“Flirting with horny drunk girls when you're gay?”
Mike arched a perfectly shaped eyebrow and blew her a kiss with lips that had never touched female flesh, except to kiss his mother on the cheek at Thanksgiving. “Honey, when I flirt, it is a form of high art. They could care less who I go home with.”
Judging by the lust reflected in the bride-to-be's glassy eyes, she just might.
“Oh, Mikey, I need some help.” The woman tilted her head and pouted.
“Well, I do believe I have just what you need.” He winked at Josie then sauntered down to the other end of the bar to earn an extra zero on his tip.
Eh, who could blame him? It wasn't as if Josie didn't do the same thing with the poker players. Scratch that. She used to do the same thing. Now she was an underemployed waitress with only one job, a perv loan shark circling her for forty K and a brother in the wind.
Josie twirled the skinny brown straw in her second gimlet and the ice cubes clinked against the glass. She planned on savoring this one, as it would likely be her last frivolous purchase for the foreseeable future. Tomorrow, she'd track down Cy, pick up as many extra shifts at the diner as she could and put a listing for her car on Craigslist. After that…well…she didn't have the energy to think about it but that's what family did, they saved each other when the situation called for it. She'd find a way.
The stool next to her slid back.
Except for her, Mike and the bachelorette party, the entire bar held nothing but empty chairs. Yet someone had to pick the barstool right next to her? She really was not in the mood to deal with a chatty tourist right now.
Determined to wallow alone in her own misery for at least one more gimlet, she
kept her head down and her body turned slightly away.
Then, out of the corner of her eye, she watched Mr. Tall Drink of Water from the poker room sit down.
Her heart started doing jumping jacks and, all of a sudden, hanging out alone feeling sorry for herself lost much of its appeal. Josie's pulse jackhammered in her throat and she squirmed on her barstool. Keeping her face angled down, she used her peripheral vision to scope him out. Tall. Strong without being a musclebound goon. Light reddish-brown hair worn long enough to show the beginnings of a slight wave. He smiled her way and her cheeks blazed at being caught.
“You okay after what happened?”
His voice slid across her skin like warm, poisonous honey, dangerous but oh so sweet.
And, poof, gone was her vodka-induced acceptance of her current no-win situation. Anxiety and anger one-two punched her in the solar plexus as hard as she'd whacked Snips with the serving tray.
“Perfectly fine. Getting felt up by the gamblers is just one of the many perks of being a drink bunny.”
“Sounds like a shitty job.”
She snorted and picked up her glass, its condensation cooling her palm. Sure, it was a craptastic job, but the tips were huge and she needed to make bank fast.
“Was a shitty job. And since jobs are just so plentiful around here, I won't have any problem finding another,” Josie said, sarcasm thick in her tone. She gulped back a swallow, the clear liquid burning down her throat. As drawn to this stranger as she was, another in a short string of one-night stands wasn't a good idea tonight. Her emotions lay too close to the surface, bubbling and threatening to overflow.
“Good for you for quitting.”
“Oh, I didn't quit. They fired me.”
“Fired you?” His voice dropped an octave, becoming deadly serious.
“Correction. They declined to accept my change of heart about my resignation. Tonight was supposed to be my last night, but then my world went to hell and I realized I had to keep my two awful waitressing jobs, beg for overtime and give up my dream, all to fix Cy's mess. Brothers, they really can make your life hell sometimes.” Josie sucked in a shaky breath, realizing too late she was about two seconds from crying in front of a total stranger about the shit pit her life had become.
Forget talking to Mike later, she needed to beat feet before she turned into a blubbering mess in public. She hopped off the stool, swiped her backpack off the floor and tried her best to level her voice. “Look, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have dumped all over you, it's just been…well, you know what it's been.”
Trying to salvage her shredded pride, Josie took two steps toward the door before a hand on her shoulder stopped her. His heat seeped into her, sparking a trail of fire from his thumb on her shoulder blade to the juncture of her thighs. Josie turned and faced him.
“I'm Sam Layton. Why don't you let me buy you a drink?”
Mesmerized by the golden hazel of his heavily hooded eyes, she could only nod her assent. Dangerous territory ahead, her sense of self-preservation counseled, but she ignored the warning.
Sam couldn't let her walk out now even if Rebecca's Bounty had been laid out in his hotel room. The draw was immediate and undeniable, but that didn't mean it was logical or close to typical behavior for him.
His type ran quiet; academic women with hair pulled tight and shirts buttoned to the throat. Women whose most passionate outbursts came during faculty meetings at Cather College about publishing requirements for tenure. Neither he nor his dates stuck out in the crowd like this platinum Amazon.
The mixed scent of amber and orange wafted around her, teasing his senses. Without thinking about why, he scooted his barstool closer to hers when she sat back down.
“Josie Winarsky.” Her gray eyes stared into him. His face must have reflected his inner confusion because her Ferrari-red lips curled into a smile. “My name, it's Josie.”
“Like the song?”
She shook her head, sending the fat curls that fell to her chin waving. “Oh, I hate that song.”
“Too late now, it's stuck in my head. Josie's on a vacation far away…” Who was this person singing in a bar? Even his own mother wouldn't recognize him.
Not that he didn't want to flirt, because Josie was gorgeous. She must’ve been almost six feet tall with legs that went on and on like an epic poem. She'd changed out of her cocktail outfit, but he couldn't stop picturing the intricate, tattooed curving vines and flowers that twisted into the shape of an infinity sign spanning from one bare shoulder to the next. He'd been so busy watching those vines while he played poker, he'd folded on a royal flush. Only a moron did that, which, apparently, included him tonight.
The plain white T-shirt she wore now covered that tattoo, along with almost all of a tiny pink princess slaying a kelly-green dragon on her right biceps. Only the dragon's curled tail extended below her sleeve.
“What'll you have?” The bartender in a tight black shirt winked at Josie.
“Another gimlet, thanks, Mike.”
“You got it, kitten. How 'bout you?”
“Scotch, neat.”
Mike wandered off to make their drinks, leaving Josie and Sam in the middle of an awkward silence. His shirt collar felt tight. He undid the top button. After all, he was in Vegas—he might as well live a little.
“What do you do, Sam?”
“I'm a history professor.”
“Oh, I love American history. I just read the most fascinating book about Cleveland's assassination.”
He'd yet to get to that new release, which was sitting on a stack of books on his nightstand. “Really?”
She narrowed her eyes. “Why? Do you think drink fairies with big tits only read the tabloids and TMZ?”
“That's not what I meant.” His cheeks flamed. This was why he never flirted. Foot in mouth seemed to be his specialty outside of the lecture hall.
“Uh-huh.” She took her gimlet from Mike, the ice cubes clinking as she sipped. A red copy of her lips stayed on the glass when she put it down. “So are you at UNLV?”
“No, Cather College.”
“Where's that?”
“Dry Creek, Nebraska.”
Her face darkened and her spine stiffened.
What the hell had he done now?
Desperate not to sink into silence again, he grasped for a conversation topic. The black ink script on the inside of her left wrist caught his eye. “What does it say?”
Her brows squeezed together in a question before she smiled softly and held out her wrist to him.
Sam brushed his thumb across the blue veins visible under her porcelain skin. Electricity jolted against his fingertips, tingling its way up his arm. His lungs tightened and his cock stirred. From his position, the words were upside down. Without letting go of Josie's wrist, he stepped down from his stool and turned so that they faced the same direction, with her directly behind him.
They were so close, her breasts rubbed against his back. “Sam…”
The single syllable brushed against the back of his neck and his body reacted as if she'd caressed his dick instead of only speaking his name. He wouldn't, couldn't, let go of her until he read the tattoo. He had to know what it said.
Adventure is worthwhile in itself.
“Amelia Earhart.” He lifted her wrist to his mouth, kissing the words as her pulse jumped under his lips. Surrounded by her amber scent, touching her soft skin, tasting her warmth on his lips, the out-of-character action seemed perfectly logical.
Josie slid her arm from his grasp and he reluctantly returned to his stool. But she didn't leave or scoot farther away.
“How did you know?” Her long fingers stroked across her wrist.
“My dissertation was about Earhart's impact on Midwestern women's perspectives of early twentieth century feminism.”
She arched her brow. “An unusual topic for a dude.”
“You haven't met my family. If you aren't comfortable with strong women, you won't last long.” He fell deeper int
o her orbit at the sound of her alto laugh. “How about you, what's your story?”
“I'm a waitress, remember?”
“Bullshit. That's a job, it's not who you are. Come on, if you can't spill your secrets to a total and complete stranger whom you'll never see again, whom can you tell?”
A lightness loosened her tense shoulders. She leaned in closer. “Sort of an I'll tell you mine, if you tell me yours, eh?”
Blood rushed in Sam's ears before heading south. “Exactly.”
She laughed and began telling him about growing up in Vegas with her mom, dad and brother. As she talked, she played with the simple gold chain around her neck that dipped down into her creamy cleavage. The sight of her fingers tangling in the delicate necklace entranced him, taunted him with visions of her touching him. He had no clue how long he sat in a desire-induced daze before she caught him.
“Sam, did you hear a word I just said?” She laughed, a low, throaty sound that ratcheted up the lust fogging his brain.
He had no idea where she was in her story when he'd stopped listening. “You caught me.”
“And I was just telling you the story about how a nude modeling gig during art school turned into a crazy all-night orgy.” Her teasing tone gave away the statement as a whopper.
“I'm really sorry to have missed that. Can you tell it again?”
She tossed back her head and laughed, sending her platinum curls bouncing.
For the next few hours they talked about their families, debated American political history, discussed her painting and laughed at the escalating—and doomed—flirtation between Mike and the trio of bachelorettes. Somehow their barstools moved closer and closer until their legs touched from ankles to hips. While his higher mental functions were focused on talking, the rest of him reveled in the softness of her skin, the way she chewed on the short straw from her gimlet and the top curve of her breasts peeking out from her V-neck T-shirt.
She wet her lips with a swipe of her pink tongue and his cock almost broke through his zipper. Her fingers brushed against his biceps and he had to force himself not to toss her over his shoulder and race up to his room. Wondering if that soft spot where her hip dipped in to meet her waist tasted as sweet as her wrist was about to drive him crazy.
