Chapter 1
Alison James slid the card she'd been dealt in front of her and waited for the dealer to finish the round. The casino had an energized vibe, the cool oxygenated air helping to keep everyone alert and eager to spend more money. Gamblers dotted the green felt tables. The pro's studied their hands with blank faces. The tourists, with their free drinks in front of them, showed more emotion. Alison could tell at a glance which ones had been dealt good hands and which had busted.
Alison let the steady clanging of the slots and the din of voices fade into the background as she kept one eye on the cards and the other on the crowd. The place wasn't filled to capacity, which suited Alison just fine. She preferred to come when it was only moderately crowded. Less people to keep track of that way. Less faces in the crowd to scrutinize. Less chance of one of them spotting her before she spotted them.
Shifting in her chair, she shot a sideways glance at the stranger beside her. He looked maybe sixty and almost as wide as he was tall. Didn’t matter what he looked like, really, just that he was there. Having other people at the blackjack table made counting the cards easier, especially tonight.
Tonight, she needed all the distraction she could get while she calculated her odds.
She’d chosen the Lucky Ace because she’d expected it to be sedate, safe, secure. The new owners had proclaimed a war on crime in the place, which usually equated to less crowds and more opportunities to win. Not tonight, however.
Tonight the place was crawling with extra security. That made her nervous and when Alison was nervous she tended to get chatty with math jokes.
“What do you call a number that can’t keep still?”
The man looked at her out of the corner of his eye, gave a half shrug and focused back on his cards.
Disappointed her fellow gambler didn’t seem interested in her punch line, Alison went to give him her signature hair over the shoulder flip, but encountered only air. Well, damn. She'd forgotten that she'd taken to wearing her new longer hairstyle of auburn curls in a ponytail. That would still take some getting used to.
Then again, considering everything in her life was different now, it all still took some getting used to. Determined to keep her fellow player distracted and not allow him to get too suspicious about her, or too curious about her recent winning streak, Alison laid the punch line on him anyway. “A roamin’ numeral.”
He gave her a flat look and she snorted, raising a brow at him. “Get it? A Roman numeral.”
The jokes were her quirk, the one she just couldn’t seem to leave behind. A piece of her past that she could safely allow out in the open since most people didn’t get her mathlete-type humor anyway.
“Hit me,” Mr. Hefty said, inching away from her slightly.
She gave him a side glance and crossed her legs in the opposite direction.
Gutsy move, ordering up another card. She quickly tallied the numbers in her head. The guy had sixteen showing. Based on the cards in her hand, his chances of going over twenty-one with the next draw were eighty-four-point-five to one. Alison glanced up at the dealer, a friend of hers named Faye, and winked.
Faye maintained her usual cool demeanor and slid another card from the deck, positioning it in front of Mr. Hefty before flipping it over.
Ha! Jack of Diamonds. Busted.
“Shit.” The guy pushed his sizable bulk away from the table, grabbed the chips in front of him and took off, mumbling under his breath about bad jokes and bad luck.
“Guess he didn’t appreciate my humor.” Alison watched the guy walk away then ordered up one last card from Faye, smiling as her friend turned it over to reveal an Ace of Clubs to go with her two Kings.
Blackjack. Just like I’d planned.
Faye grinned and shook her head, her long chestnut brown hair gleaming beneath the recessed lighting. She passed Alison a stack of chips to add to her already overflowing winnings for the night. “Guess not.”
Two beefy security guards passed behind Alison, and she quickly glanced at them while stacking her chips. “Something going on?”
“Don’t know.” Faye straightened then stretched her lower back, the arch of her spine highlighting her generous curves and drawing the attention of several appreciative male patrons at the adjacent tables. “I heard the new owner and her boyfriend are in tonight to check up on things. Maybe that’s got something to do with it.” With only Alison at the table now, Faye relaxed her professional persona a bit and rested one hand on her hip while leaning the other on the table’s edge. “Too bad, if you ask me. All this extra muscle, means they pulled Rockford McHottie off the floor. And I’m missing my nightly eye candy something fierce.”
Alison raised a brow at the way her friend’s Latino accent rolled the R in Rockford, making it sound risqué. Good old, Faye. Always up for a party or a hot man. “Rockford McHottie, huh? Is that his official title?”
“To me it is.” Faye futzed with the front of her uniform a bit before leaning over and lowering her voice. A collective hush fell over the male players nearby as the low-cut white shirt beneath Faye’s standard, casino-issue vest showed a provocative glimpse of flesh. Faye seemed completely oblivious, but Alison knew better. She used her looks the same way Alison used her brains—to survive and thrive. “Everyone else calls him Owen Rockford, the head of casino security. Have you seen him?”
“No.” Alison rearranged the stacks of plastic colored chips in front of her for the umpteenth time and frowned. She had better things to pay attention to in here, like someone recognizing her from her past. “Why would I care anyway?”
“Because he’s gorgeous.”
In her experience, gorgeous men got you nowhere but trouble. More guards followed the same path as the first two and a fresh sprout of unease blossomed in Alison’s gut. “Considering all these goons running around, maybe they should’ve kept their head security honcho on the floor.”
“I know, right?” Faye gave a small shrug. “Even if there was a problem, though, it’s not like they’d tell me anyway. I’m just a dealer. Small potatoes in the bigger scheme of things. But you can bet if it were up to me, I’d make sure Owen was down here every night. Preferably with stubble and a G-string. Nothing else.”
“Nice.” Alison chuckled. “How would that help with safety? Where would he put his gun?”
“I know exactly where he could store his weapon, Chica.” Faye gave her a saucy wink. “And safety isn’t exactly my top priority when there’s hot guys around, as you well know.”
One of the pit managers passed by their table and gave Faye a disparaging once over before moving on. Faye straightened immediately and adjusted her uniform back into pristine condition before taking her appointed spot again. “Would you like another round, ma’am?”
“What I’d like is to know what the hell has things so tense in here.”
“Like I said, I’m not sure. But you’re right. Things do seem more high-strung than usual.” Faye’s dark gaze darted around the room before returning to Alison’s. “There’s been a normal drop in business, what with losing all the low-life drug dealers and loan sharks from the premises, but I’ve never seen quite such high security here on such a slow night. Are you sure you don’t want to play one more round? You’re on a winning streak, Chica.”
“No, thanks.” Alison stood and took her chips in hand. Her success was exactly the problem. If she got caught counting cards, it would bring unwanted attention. Unwanted attention might mean an end to her privacy, and privacy was her top priority right now. Privacy kept her alive.
“See you later.” She waved to her friend and headed for the bathroom. She didn't really need to use it, but the bathrooms had no cameras and it was part of her overly-cautious plan to reduce the chance of being tracked on surveillance. It was probably over-kill, but one could never be too sure. So, she usually spent twenty minutes in the bathroom, or headed to the eating areas or any other area that didn't have cameras. Sometimes she did both to make it even more confusing for anyone to track her. Then she cashed out.
Forty minutes later, she approached the cashier kiosk in the middle of the large room. The Lucky Ace had been recently renovated, following the new owners taking over. You could still smell a faint hint of fresh paint and drywall in the air. Plus, they’d brightened the interior by adding more lighting and removing some of the old school furnishings, replacing them with comfortable, modern, more contemporary styling. The place still retained its Old Vegas feel, it was now just less mob hangout and more vintage hipster refuge.
As she waited in line to cash in her chips, Alison eyed the exits and counted the guards in place. At least twenty that she could spot, and those were only the uniformed guys. Her count didn’t include plain clothes officers and undercover private security. She rolled her tense neck and shuffled her feet in place. There had to be some reason for all the extra muscle. She believed Faye honestly didn’t know, but not having all the answers didn’t sit well with her analytical brain. She wanted to know all the angles, solve all the equations, in order to stay safe, to stay one step ahead, to stay breathing.
Yet another guard sidled past her and bumped her arm. A shiver of fear passed through her at the contact. What if they’re really here for me? Have they finally found me? A quick run of the logistics in her head helped ease her anxiety. No. If she’d been discovered, they’d call in professional reinforcements—hired thugs, trained assassins.
“How may I help you?” the cashier said, her voice even and cheerful.
Trembling slightly, Alison stepped forward and passed two stacks of hundred dollar chips through the window. “I’d like to cash these in, please?”
“Certainly, ma’am. I’ll need to see some ID or your player’s club card.”
Familiar stress constricted her chest as Alison forced herself to breath and smile while pulling out her wallet and extracting her Nevada driver’s license.
“Perfect, Ms. Smyth. One moment while I process your transaction.”
She’d been through this hundreds of times—thousands, more accurately—in the past few years, but each time someone asked to see her ID it still rankled. She kept a myriad of fake licenses and passports in the small bag near her hip for just such occasions, but still. Each time she flashed one she risked discovery of her real identity.
The day that happened, she’d have to flee again.
A small commotion started near the Lucky Ace’s front entrance as a broke slot player tried to hightail it out of the casino with someone else’s winnings and Alison’s pulse skyrocketed. She glanced back at the cashier, who still typed something into a computer near the back wall. What’s taking so long? Maybe I should just leave without the money. Do I have enough in savings to…
“Here we are, Ms. Smyth.” The cashier passed back Alison’s ID. “Do you have a preference in denominations?”
“Hundreds are fine.”
“Very good.” The woman proceeded to count out two thousand dollars in cash. “Anything else I can do for you this evening?”
“No, thanks.” Alison tucked her money and ID back in her bag then turned to leave, only to be halted by the cashier’s voice.
“Thank you for playing at the Lucky Ace Casino, ma’am. Good luck!”
As she hustled toward the side exit of the casino, desperate for fresh air and freedom, Alison knew she needed all the luck she could get right about now.
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