Keeping Her Close Read online

  If anyone else spoke to him in that way, shoved a card into his face like she just did, they’d be on their ass before their next synapse fired. Instead, I note his uncertainty. He doesn’t know how to react to this blond spitfire who’s exploded into the penthouse. This place is exclusively for my highest rollers, and she may be a fresh face here, but she’s acting like she belongs and it’s thrown him.

  “It’s real, if that’s what you’re wondering.” Her words are harsh and street-smart, yet coated in a twist of sweet lime and a shot of Southern charm. Her body is a throwback to when women wore their hips with pride and their lips bright red. “Cruzer told me to show this card to the guy at the door. I do know how to play, you know. Don’t judge a book by its cover.” There’s that smile again, and I feel the impact of it in my chest.

  She’s a splash of Mae West’s sex appeal married to Judy Garland’s naïveté, and the combination has my dick the hardest as it’s been in years. Damn thing’s been practically dormant, but now it’s draining all the blood from my brain. Nothing and no one have raised the flag in so long it’s like the return of an old friend. I’m barely able to form a coherent thought with this minx in my line of sight.

  Mel drags a hand down his face, trying to make sense of her. She bats her dark lashes, long and thick, and I get another glimpse of those eyes, like emeralds at dusk. Exotic, that’s the only way to describe them, but that doesn’t do her justice. Almost dismissive, she tips her head, turning away from Mel to examine the room.

  I’m about a rat’s hair away from moving over to her myself, fisting those soft waves and forcing her to her knees. All I can think of is how amazing those red lips are going to look with a mouth full of my cock. Those green eyes looking up, wide and willing. Filling with tears as I cut off her oxygen and I shove every inch of me down her throat.

  Fucking perfect.

  She breaks my trance with a flip of her hair, her cute-as-fuck button nose turning up, taking a dramatic sniff before she says wryly, “Ahh, I love the smell of money getting ready to become mine.”

  “Let’er in, Mel,” I order from the shadowed corner of the room, and her eyes flick my way.

  Mel hears me but doesn’t turn from her, doesn’t even acknowledge that I said a thing. That’s his way, how he maintains his authority, and it’s why I need him. “Buy in is ten grand,” he says, listing the instructions as he would for any other new addition. Seductive and peculiar, she may be, and that might knock him off his stride for a moment, but the professional in him recovers quickly. “Small blind is ten, big blind is twenty. Ten to buy in first round.”

  Her eyes, still aimed my way, betray her. I note the split second of uncertainty. I’m a master at reading tells, and she’s good. But I’m better. The light catches on her throat as she swallows, the sun lowering in the sky outside. It’s an early game, but it will go on for days. They always do. I’ll be up for at least forty-eight hours.

  It’s just a part of this life, the restlessness. And truth is, this life is all I know. Been at it so long my body is used to it, prepared, pacing itself for the long hours ahead. But it’s taking its toll. Others can’t see it, but I can feel it. I’m older than I should be, and that’s why I have to make a change. Next week. Taking my offshore bank account and heading west. Back to where I came from. Back to a life I’ve forgotten, if I ever really knew it in the first place. A life I want more than anything.

  Peace.

  Open spaces.

  Comforts of home. Not that a streetwise fuck like me knows a thing about that, but I’m going to try. I have to. This life, it’s killing me one way or another. Either I die slowly from the endless stress and worry, or one night someone is going to get a burr up their ass and they may kill me quickly. Hazards of the profession. I turn forty next week, and hell if I’m going to spend the next forty wondering if I might not wake up tomorrow just because some fuck lost his stack and his mind.

  “No problem.” She regroups, licking those pouty, seductive lips before eyeing Mel again. “Cruzer said he’ll vouch for me. I’ve got five with me, and the house will spot me another five. Trust me when I say I’ll be walking out of here with a lot more than that. My markers always get repaid, plus some.”

  I’m finding it hard not to grin. She’s bold as fuck, and it’s adorable.

  It’s also making my dick hard as a lead pipe.

  A total newbie, strolling in, asking the house to spot her five grand? If I didn’t know better, I’d think she’s walking in here with a kick hidden up her sleeve. Or a set of iron balls that don’t suit the rest of what I see.

  Although that thought just makes my mind wander to what’s under those painted-on jeans. Her pressed white oxford pulls tight over tits that any man would topple kingdoms to have in his mouth. On top of that, she’s wearing a pair of red, patent leather pumps and a plaid schoolgirl tie.

  I don’t know what her game is, but I’ll play. Fuck, will I play.

  Play her all fucking night.

  Kick. That’s what she is, my own personal Kick.

  Melvin bobs an incredulous brow at her before throwing me a side-eye. I lower my chin, the movement so small no one else would notice. After ten years together, we barely need to speak to know what the other is thinking.

  “Name?” Mel pulls a palm-sized black leather notebook and pen from the inside pocket of his black suit coat. He dabs the ballpoint to his tongue, showing his age, then holds it to the paper, waiting for her reply.

  I realize I’m holding my breath, waiting for her lips to move. Who the hell is she?

  I need to know where she came from and, most importantly, how I’m going to get her into my bed and under me for the rest of my damn life.

  She twists her body to and fro and purses her lips, stifling a chuckle before answering, “I’m Ellen Olenska.”

  I clear my throat, choking back another laugh. This girl is fearless, dropping a fake name when she should be on the back foot. I know the origin of her Ellen Olenska, but Mel doesn’t catch her play, even when she offers a hand for him to kiss and adds a mocking curtsy.

  The alter ego is obscure enough to pass, and I let it go because it only serves to heighten my fascination with this brazen creature.

  Mel considers her for a second, and something deep inside me stirs to life. Some dark beast I’d either forgotten or didn’t know existed. I don’t like Melvin even looking at her. Before I know it, I’ve taken a step forward, ready to get between them, but then he finally speaks.

  “Ten minutes, then you’re on table two. You want a drink, the bar’s over there.” Mel stuffs the little black book into its home again before continuing in a gruff burst. “You need to piss or shit, you wait until you’re out or all the players break.”

  “If I need to whaaaa?” She places three fingers over her lips, shrugging her shoulders to her ears.

  Mel rolls his eyes, then turns his body to the side, allowing her full entry, and shuts the door behind her glorious ass. “Get your chips from Walrus. Over there.” He twitches his head, then turns away just enough to let her know she’s dismissed.

  The only gloomy corner of the penthouse is the one where Walrus sits, blocking out the remnants of light breaking through the two-story windows behind him. Cigar smoke drifts in a haze around him like a Lewis Carroll dream. He dwarfs the enormous desk that is his home when we run games here, making it look like dollhouse furniture.

  Still, she’s not intimidated, sashaying over without another word.

  Walrus’ eyes flick up. His acute sense of his surroundings notifies him she’s afoot, and he watches from behind his thick glasses as she heads his way, the cigar drooping between his surprised lips. He darts a look my way, and I hold up my hand, splaying five fingers wide, and he nods in understanding.

  Mel eyes me then shifts his gaze to her working the room, and he chokes back a grunt, which is as close to laughter as he gets. I lick my lips and adjust my stance. My fucking cock is as full and thick as if I were ready to pus
h inside her right now, and it’s uncomfortable as hell being all bound up inside my boxers and suit pants.

  The tension that’s thundering in my groin spreads upward, clutching in my gut before settling thick in my chest. Something inside me twitches. Something I haven’t felt for so long it’s barely recognizable.

  It’s my fucking heart. It’s pounding.

  How fucking old is she anyway? Eighteen? Jesus, she could even be sixteen for all I know. We don’t fucking check ID in here. But fuck, she’s young. Too young for an old fuck like me. But my dick seems to disagree, because he sure feels twelve right about now.

  “Thank you.” She chirps, laying on her sweetness as thick as syrup, while Walrus counts out her ten grand in chips. Then she raises an eyebrow as he hands them over. “Walrus, huh?”

  He hands them over with his standard growl, “Ku ku ka choo. Good luck to you.”

  Walrus’s signature bastardization of the Beatles lyric has become his tag line. But, I have to agree, if he used the “Goo Goo Joob” they actually wrote, it wouldn’t have the same effect.

  A groan catches in my throat as I watch her take her chip tray from him in her left hand then hold it up like of the tray of a 1950’s cigarette girl, before blowing a kiss at Walrus with her free hand. Then she spins on her sexy as hell tiptoes back toward the table.

  We’re running three tables of ten tonight, which is our usual. Mostly regulars, a few vetted newcomers, but she takes the fucking cake. There is a low hum in the room as the players settle in at their seats. They range in age as much as they do in their styles of dress. There are guys in douchebag hoodies and sunglasses, others in three-piece handmade suits and fedoras.

  But her.

  Holy mother of pearl.

  She’s like nothing I’ve ever seen. And from the looks on the faces of some of the other players, players they aren’t sure what to make of her either.

  I meet a look from Walrus as he pinches his cigar back into place between his beefy lips.

  He and I have been at this game over twenty years now. Started out down in the alleys behind the wig and liquor stores on Gratiot Avenue. Got our asses handed to us more than once too, trying to carve out our niche in this dirty, cutthroat business.

  Hell, I’d trust him with my fucking life. But right now, for the first time ever, I want to choke that fat son of a bitch until lack of oxygen makes him forget all about that air kiss she just tossed his way. Because that shit is about to be mine.

  It’s all fucking mine.

  C H A P T E R T W O

  Holli

  Get your head out of your ass, girl.

  If he would stop looking at me, I might be able to pull this out of the bag. Wrong fricking night to have the cards fall against me. Wrong night for a run of bad luck.

  Wrong night for me to suddenly find my inner Cinderella all twinkle-toed and distracted about a guy.

  It doesn’t help that these three douchebags at the table are marking me and playing every move to push me out. They think I don’t know, but under my dimples and pouts, I’m no babe in these woods. I see their play.

  “Hey, short stack.” The one with the squint addresses me with the condescending nickname. “You ready to take your ball and go home?”

  The dealer waits on my next move, along with the rest of the table, and the slightest of tremors shake my pinky finger. I can’t think. But it’s not the cards.

  No.

  It’s him. I felt it from the moment I walked in that door. This soft tugging in my belly toward the shadowed corner where he stands in his stupid, perfectly fitted black suit and orange tie. Staring at me with eyes that remind me of caramel drizzle on dark chocolate ice cream. God, I’m hungry.

  Who the hell has the balls to wear an orange tie? And then look hot as fuck in it?

  It’s as though there is an invisible string he’s got wrapped around his fingers and he’s dragging me, slowly but surely, toward those ice-cream-sundae eyes. And, for God’s sake, the slight cleft in that chin. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen that on a man before, not even sure I would like it on anyone else, but this guy? Jesus, it fits him as well as that dang orange tie.

  I look around the table, feigning an aura of indifference. Six of us are left.

  The game started off pretty well. I was up a grand after an hour, ready to clean out some wallets. Then we all took a table break, and things changed. I came back, and three guys started pushing me every hand, doing everything they could to shove me out. I’m good at my game, but when a three-way alliance starts hammering, even the best players with the best cards are going down.

  Now they all have six or seven fat stacks sitting in front of them, and I’m down to half of one. About five hundred dollars of the ten grand I started with.

  Fuck.

  Not. Good.

  “Top of the food chain ain’t for everyone, bubblegum.” Douche number two sticks his eyes to mine, biting back a smile that’s threatening his chapped lips. He’s wearing a purple polo shirt with a dumb-ass flipped-up collar, and he needs to tone down the fucking Drakkar Noir because my eyes are burning.

  But I won’t be drawn into his shit. Instead, I return his vitriol with my sweetest Charleston charm. “You know, it sure is lookin’ like you’re right, hon.” I feign embarrassment and look down at the table. Flip up the corners of my two cards and fight the urge to shift in my chair. My jeans are tight as hell as the seam running down my lady parts is starting to chafe.

  I got nothing.

  And if I’m reading these three right, the cards are with them. As well as each other.

  I’m fucked.

  And I can’t shake the suspicion that I wouldn’t be losing quite so badly if not for the man in the corner, the one who’s got my princess panties soaked and my nipples hard as pebbles. He hasn’t said a word to me directly, but he doesn’t have to. I know who he is.

  I’ve never met him before tonight. Nobody I ever met at the house games and bar-run poker rooms had ever actually talked to him. Not until I met Cruzer through my stupid roommate, Angela. But everyone in Detroit with any time in this game knows of Lincoln Kirk.

  His status as the top dog in high-stakes private poker rooms borders on legendary. When my roommate’s boyfriend, or whatever he is, Cruzer, said he’d vetted me for this game, I was over the damn moon. I knew it was my chance, probably the only one I’d ever get. But now I’m simultaneously humiliated and as aroused as I’ve been in a very, very long time.

  I was a little surprised Cruzer had an in with this level of game, if I’m being honest. I mean, he runs his own deal, mostly numbers on big fights and sports, but I guess he’s better connected than I thought. Because here I am, getting my ass handed to me, courtesy of that little white business card I waved around at the door.

  “I’m all in.” The few lonely chips I have left clatter together as I shove them across the royal-blue felt, then watch as the emotionless dealer flicks my final card in front of me.

  On the outside, I’m hoping my expression hasn’t changed, because my heart is currently doing things that have me honestly quite concerned. But the truth is, I’m not sure if it’s because I’m bluffing my ass off or because Lincoln Kirk is not even trying to hide the fact that he’s been staring at me and nothing else for the last hour.

  Add to that, what if my bluff doesn’t work?

  I owe the house five grand. The money I brought here was a chunk of what I’ve got stashed away to pay for my master’s program at Southern Utah University. But I promised myself and my mother that I wouldn’t touch that money, for love or hate. I’ve spent three years getting my undergrad, paying for everything with my backroom poker winnings, going to classes year-round. But I’ve been accepted into the Forensics program there, and I’ve promised myself my hustling days are over once I arrive.

  So, the five grand I brought with me tonight?

  That’s my broken promise to my mom.

  I took it out of my school fund, and I needed another five to
pay the tuition bill that’s due next week. Either that or it’s bye-bye masters for another year. Or forever. Who knows.

  Now I owe the house another five. I’m going headlong in the wrong direction.

  Not to mention, I won’t make it another year. I can’t. This life is killing me. Just because you are good at a thing doesn’t mean it’s good for you. I want to cash out, follow my passion. The best Forensic program in the country is at Southern Utah, and I intend to get there.

  Wide-open spaces.

  Fresh air.

  Not something I know anything about, but I want to.

  My dreams are filled with images of slow drivers winding their way down a single main street. I dream of diners where the waitress with the drawn-on eyebrows and the scent that’s taken right from the Avon catalog knows your order before you sit down. Where other people walking down the street ask about your uncle Fred’s bursitis.

  And every time I dream this dream about my magical new life, there’s a man there too. His face is never clear, but he’s always there. Standing behind me, a quiet strength about him, but I know who he is.

  In the dream, he’s a husband.

  My husband.

  I didn’t ever think I’d want one of those, but apparently, my dreams have other ideas.

  Some of those dreams, this poker game was going to make a reality. But now it looks like it’s going to laugh in my face and screw me six ways from Sunday, because the next five minutes turn in all the worst possible ways for my position. I’m fucked. Even my annoying eternal optimism throws in the towel.

  I take a deep breath as I push my cards into the middle of the table and feel the tension break as “The Three Douches” collectively congratulate each other with sniffs and bobbing eyebrows. It’s almost surreal that the other two tables should still be going strong, oblivious to the black hole into which I’m being sucked.

  “Sorry, bubblegum.” Douche number three reaches over to tousle my hair, and I jerk my head sideways. When his move is thwarted, he turns instead to high-five his buddies.