Chapter Ten
MY NIPPLES GOT HARD UNDER my dress and a zing of something electric went right down to my the space between my legs. I was too flustered to come up with anything even mildly intelligent in response. “Yes. Busy learning blackjack.”
“Your girlfriend’s a quick study,” said the old man. He motioned the dealer for a hit. When he looked at his card he frowned and then flipped them both over.
I counted them up, letting the girlfriend comment just breeze on by. “Busted,” I said, very sad that he’d lost. I pouted in his honor.
The dealer swooped up his cards and his money.
The old man nodded. “Busted, indeed.” He stood and motioned to his chair while looking at the cowboy. “I’m done. Good luck to you both.”
I spun around, my legs brushing up against the cowboy. I tried to ignore the way that simple touch was making my pulse hammer in my veins. “You’re leaving?”
“Yep. Time to call it a day.”
“Aw, that’s a bummer. But thank you so much for your help.” I hopped off the stool and grabbed him in a hug. He totally reminded me of my grandpa who’d died three years earlier.
He patted my back. “It was my pleasure, Lady Luck. Have a nice evening.” He shook the cowboy’s hand. “Take care of her. She’s got lots of potential.”
“I’ll do what I can,” said the cowboy, nodding once.
I watched my mentor walk away, wondering what he meant by that. It sounded nice. I liked the idea of having a lot of potential. There were people who’d known me for years who’d never say such a thing about me, but they weren’t allowed to ruin my night. Not tonight. I pushed their ghosts out of my head.
The cowboy held the back of the stool I’d been saving for him. “Are you staying?” he asked.
I stood there, my face suddenly flaming red and my body screaming for more of him than just a blackjack partner or victim of my clutziness. What the hell. “Sure. I have to finish this game, right?”
He nodded. “Take this seat.” He motioned at the one with his chips in front of it.
I took it, feeling the sweat break out under my arms when he claimed the seat recently vacated by my busted buddy.
“Do you want to see my cards? Your cards, actually?” I asked. I fingered the chips in front of me for a few seconds and then jerked my hands away, resting them in my lap.
“Hands on the table, please,” said the dealer, frowning at me.
I threw them up to rest on the padded bar in front of the pile of chips, afraid I was about to get arrested for attempted cheating.
The cowboy lifted up first the cards on the left and then the ones on the right. He whistled his appreciation. “Well done, Lady Luck.”
He was close enough that I could smell him. For the first time in all the years I’d known Candice, I fully appreciated her habit of leaning in to inhale people’s scents. I wanted to get his man-scent up into my brain. It was doing something to me that I’d never experienced before.
Pheromones. My eyes widened. I was totally being drugged by this guy’s manliness. How easy can a girl get? Maybe that should have offended my feminist self, but all it did was make me want to bury my nose in his neck. I glanced at him, biting my bottom lip in consideration. Am I tipsy enough to do it? He was leaning over looking at the cards, and it would be so easy.
I bent at the waist just the slightest bit and closed my eyes, inhaling deeply but slowly so he wouldn’t hear it. When I opened my eyes, his face was just a few inches from mine.
“Are you okay?” he asked, humor tipping up the corners of his luscious mouth.
“Uhhh … yeah. Are you okay?” I looked down at his crotch. “Did you take care of yourself in the bathroom okay?” Half a second later I choked on my own tongue. Did I actually just say that?
He chuckled softly. “I got my pants as dry as I could, all considered, if that’s what you mean.”
I nodded, afraid to speak at this point. Who knew what would come flying out of my mouth next. I was dangerous with this many cocktails in me.
The dealer distracted me from my embarrassment, turning over our hands and paying out or taking money. I looked at his cards. He had an ace, a three, and an eight. I counted furiously in my head. Eleven, three, that’s fourteen plus eight that’s … twenty-one? No! Twenty-two! Is it twenty-two? I looked at the cowboy. “What’s that mean?” I asked, pointing to the dealer’s cards.
“He busted. Anyone not over twenty one wins, and you get a little extra for having blackjack.”
I watched as the dealer pushed a pile of chips over in my direction. “Congratulations,” he said. “Must be beginner’s luck.”
My mouth dropped open. “That’s … six hundred dollars,” I whispered. I’d never won any money in my entire life. Every penny in my bank account was hard-earned.
“I hope you’ll stay,” said the cowboy, pulling six chips out from in front of me to put on the table. He put three in front of my spot and three in front of his.
“I don’t have any money,” I said. I’d left all my cash with Candice and it sure wasn’t six hundred bucks.
He looked at the pile in front of me. “Sure looks like you do.”
I smiled, my jaw a little off kilter as it dropped open. If this was his flirting game, I had to give him credit. It was original, even though it did feel a tiny bit like solicitation of prostitution. “That’s your money, not mine.”
He shrugged. “It’s play money. Win or lose, the goal is to have a good time.”
“Oh, I can have a good time in Vegas, trust me. And it doesn’t even take a lot of money either.” The cocktail waitress walked up with a tray and two drinks.
“Where’s your friend?” she asked, looking at the faces around the table.
“He left. But I’ll take his drink,” I said, moving back so she could put them on the table in front of me.
“I’ll take a Bud on your next trip by,” said Mack.
She gave him a sexy smile and cocked her hip out at him. It irritated me more than I wanted to admit. “Coming right up. Can I get you anything else to go with that Bud?”
He looked right at me. “I have everything I need right here, thanks.”
My throat closed up at the innuendo I prayed was coming out of his mouth. But he couldn’t possibly be talking about me. The only thing he knew about me was that I was a klutzy chick who liked to spend his money. Not the best makings of a girlfriend candidate.
I wanted to slap my own face with the direction my mind was going. Girlfriend material? What the hell is wrong with you? You’re in Vegas for chrissake! Get control of yourself. Tonight is not the night for lifeplan action. But a one night stand? Maybe … I sat up straighter and looked at the table, lifting up my card at the corner.
He turned to face the table, but leaned a little closer to me than the stool would normally allow. “You okay?”
I looked at him, surprised to find his face so close again. I wasn’t complaining at all, though. He had a pretty damn fine face, after all. “No, I’m great. Why?”
He smiled a slow, lazy smile that lit me on fire. “You look a little nervous.”
I blew out a huff of air. “It’s because you’re too damn good looking.” The second the words left my mouth I heard them and cringed inwardly. “Did I just say that out loud?”
“I’m not sure. What was it you thought you said?” he asked. He was teasing me. I could hear the smile in his voice, but I couldn’t look at him. Then my humiliation would be complete.
I took a big breath for courage. “I am having a bit of a hard time acting like an intelligent human being with you sitting so close to me.” I was losing my breath, and there was nothing I could do about it short of asking for oxygen or leaving his presence, and I definitely wasn’t ready to do that yet. Talk about potential. This guy had the potential to be my Vegas fling. The wild and crazy sex Candice had talked about on the plane. The forget-Luke-and-move-on man. I looked at him really quick and then faced forward again. Could I have sex with this guy? A total stranger who I know nothing about? Who I’ll never see again? Whose name I don’t even know?
“My name’s Mack, by the way. What’s yours?”
Panic mode, level eight. What is he? A mind reader? Okay, scratch the not-knowing-his-name part. The question is, could I have a one-night stand with a man named Mack who wears a cowboy hat to a casino? He put his forearms on the table as he looked at his cards and waited for my answer. They showed lean muscles under tanned skin and golden highlighted arm hair sprinkling the surface enough to make me wonder what he had going on under his shirt. Yes. I can definitely do this.
I looked at him. He caught my eye and smiled at me, revealing just the slightest dimple in his left cheek … and it was all over for any self control I might have possessed before coming to Vegas. “My name is Andrea, but my friends call me Andie.”
“Andie it is, then.” He draped his arm across the back of my chair, standing so he could get closer to me. “What are you going to do, Andie? Hit or stay?” He wasn’t even looking at the cards. His piercing blue eyes were staring into mine, possibly daring me to take a challenge.
I didn’t even look at my cards. “I could do either one right now and it would make me really happy.” The thrill that ran up my spine was nothing compared to the electricity that jolted my entire body when he leaned towards me and put his face near my ear. His breath tickled my skin as he spoke.
“I meant on the table.”
I smiled, the devil in me taking over. “Wherever, whatever. It’s your call.”
He tipped his head back and laughed, rubbing his hat on his head a few times while he grinned like a madman. “You’re somethin’ else, Andie, you know that?” He took the cocktail from the waitress who’d shown up behind us and handed it to me. I had three drinks now and I planned to drink every one of them. Once he’d gotten his beer and tipped the girl a few dollars, he raised his bottle in my direction.
“Here’s to getting lucky in Vegas.”
I grinned like a crazy fool. “I’ll drink to that.” I clanked my glass against his bottle so hard some of the drink sloshed out. He backed up really quick, pointing a finger at me. “You’re dangerous. If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were trying to get me all wet again.”
I shrugged, sipping my drink as innocently as possible. Then my mouth opened up and more ridiculousness came out. “Turnabout’s fair play.”
He didn’t say anything but he lifted an eyebrow. And I noticed for the next three hands of blackjack, all of which we both won, he got closer and closer to me, until I was turned sideways and one of his thighs was in between mine. If I scooted any closer to the edge of the stool, I’d be humping his leg, but I totally didn’t care. I didn’t even worry about where my friends were or what was taking them so long to find me. I knew Candice would return eventually, even if she had to put Kelly down for the night upstairs first. And I felt more than confident that Mack would take care of me until they came back. If I were being honest, I’d admit that while I waited for my friends’ return, I sent up a few prayers to the goddess of love, begging that Candice not be able to find me for a really long time.