Chapter 2
Chapter Two
Tonight is my first night on the Blue Casino floor working at one of the blackjack tables. So far, I haven’t botched my addition skills, and my riffle shuffle rocks.
The customer in front of me swigs his diluted complimentary drink. He’s in a red floral Hawaiian shirt that stretches over a massive beer belly. I’m ignoring the coarse black hair poking through the gaps between his buttons, so I won’t be forced to gouge my eyes out later.
He picks up all but one chip—my tip, bless him—and walks away. As he leaves, Gen signals to me from her elevated perch in the Blue Casino open lounge.
I’m not supposed to chat with anyone but my customers.
I glance at the pit boss. He’s handing out complimentary drink tokens and what appears to be a coupon for a free night’s stay to a woman with a blond bob haircut and a designer bag.
The pyramid of chips in front of her is worth about twenty grand, and while my pit boss distracts her with a room comp, a new dealer replaces the old.
Pit bosses switch dealers when a customer gets too lucky. I have no idea why, but somehow that can break a winning streak.
Sneaky casino bastards.
The pit boss is busy orchestrating the woman’s downfall, and I have no customers for the moment. I wave Gen over.
Gen’s job is more social and fluid. As long as she slings drinks, she can talk to anyone, though she does have to be careful about approaching tables outside of her section, even if it’s just to gossip with a friend.
Higher-stakes gaming goes to the veteran waitresses who’ve been around five years or more, and those bitches are territorial as hell.
And catty. As far as I can tell, they’ve hazed Gen for no other reason than that she’s young and beautiful.
Gen skips the three steps down from the lounge and crosses the wide lane separating us. Her nearly black hair, hazel eyes, and pale skin are a striking combination. With my strawberry-blond mop, we’re like a giant checkerboard walking down the street.
But right now, every guy in the vicinity is staring at Gen.
Poor girl. The universe put a reserved female in the body of a knockout.
Her pretty oval face and slender five-foot-ten figure in the skimpy cocktail uniform make her the focus of attention, and she hates it. Even now, she’s avoiding eye contact and speed-walking to my table.
We’ll have to work on that. Guys tend to think you’re not interested if you don’t look at them.
She plops her round serving tray on the armrest of my blackjack table, eyes flittering to the side as if she’s nervous.
The casino floor is obnoxiously loud, with whistles chiming and bells blaring. I’ve gotten used to elevating my voice just enough to hold a conversation without announcing myself to the room. “What’s up?”
“Don’t look now,” she says through stiff lips, “but the bartender at the East Bar invited us to drinks with him and his friends tonight.”
I stretch my neck like a flamingo and search him out.
“I said, don’t look!”
“Why not?”
“Because he might think I like him.”
“Do you?” I glance at the guy again and waggle my brows. Medium brown hair, a dimple that flashes whenever he smiles at his female customers—I couldn’t have picked a better prospect. “He’s cute.”
She fumbles with her cash caddy. “I don’t know Mason that well, but he seems nice.” Her mouth twists and then softens. “It’d be good to make new friends.”
I nod soberly. “I support this endeavor.”
Project Gen Hookup moving ahead of schedule!
A few hours later, Gen and I pass through the sliding doors of the casino next to Blue, and the air conditioning suctions me inside, my ears popping from the pressure.
“Wow,” Gen says, eyeing a nearby cocktail waitress. “It’s a good thing you had a contact at Blue and not here, or my ass cheeks would be on full display beneath Cherokee nylons.”
“You’re welcome,” I say. She’s been bitching all week about her uniform.
We walk to the center of the casino and Gen points out Bartender Mason in the lounge. He’s swapped the white and black casino uniform for a pair of jeans and a dark button-down.
Mason’s broad shoulders fill out the shirt to hot-guy perfection, and I nudge Gen in the ribs, signaling my approval.
She glares at me. If we weren’t close to her new friend, she’d tell me I’m behaving like a dork. Which is why I do it now, when I can get away with it.
Mason stands, a wide smile spreading across his face as he glances at me then takes a leisurely look at Gen in her short denim skirt, T-shirt, and sandals.
Neither of us anticipated going out after work when we dressed this morning, so we’re both on the casual side.
A couple of guys sit at Mason’s table, along with a girl.
“This is Adam and his girlfriend Breanna—” Mason gestures to a dark-haired pretty boy with pressed dress sleeves evenly rolled to his elbows.
Breanna smiles while Adam does a not-so-sly perusal of our bodies, his gaze lingering on my chest. I’d like to say it’s because I have a large rack, but really, it’s because I displayed my boobs nicely.
“And that’s Jaeger.”
Jaeger? Like Mick Jagger, except with a long a? That name sounds familiar, but I don’t recognize the guy.
Jaeger is a head taller than Adam, wearing a casual T-shirt and worn blue jeans, and his arms are as long as a basketball player’s. His light brown hair is cut close to his head, and though there’s something familiar about his face, I can’t place him.
He’s cute, though, with a strong jaw line and symmetrical features that are too classically handsome to lump him in with the meatheads; his brows don’t protrude enough. He’s more genetically big than steroid-inflated.
Jaeger gives Gen a cursory glance, then looks at me. His gaze falters and holds a second too long. He half nods in acknowledgement, and returns his attention to his friends.
He hesitated when he looked at me. A sign I’m right about us knowing each other? I can’t ask him about it, though, because Adam is talking to him now.
I study Jaeger some more and my gaze catches on full lips, trailing down to a very broad chest, muscled shoulders and arms, and—large hands. The guy has strong, well-formed hands.
A shiver racks my body. I have a weakness for men’s hands… and I’ve veered off course. I’m checking out men for Gen, not me. But the only thing I’d complain about on Eric’s body are his long, thin hands. The rest of the package is so good, however, that I happily overlook it.
This is beyond annoying. I swear I know this guy. Did we go to high school together?
I wonder if Gen has noticed Jaeger. If Mason doesn’t work out, Jaeger should be put at the top of Gen’s list of prospects.
“—we worked at Heavenly together,” Mason says, and I tune back in to the conversation. He’s just told Gen how he knows these guys.
I take a seat beside Adam and Jaeger, leaving Gen the chair between Jaeger and Mason.
We order drinks, and I turn and listen in as Adam continues what must have been the conversation Gen and I interrupted when we arrived.
“I don’t know what he was thinking.” Adam shakes his head in disbelief. “Why would he cheat with prostitutes? Groupies, maybe—but prostitutes? Germs, man. Disease.” He mocks a shiver. “Just not right, even for a celebrity.”
Gen and I are entertainment news junkies. I run through my mental Rolodex to ascertain which trashy celeb Adam’s referring to. The pop star? Or the athlete whose prior reputation was as a virgin former choirboy?
It’s a tough call.
I lean closer to catch the details, right as Jaeger eases back in his chair, his shoulder inches away.
His body heat crosses the short distance between us, and a pleasant whiff of shaving cream fills my senses, making my heart beat faster.
He runs his knuckles down firm thighs, and a ripple of attraction shoots through my belly.
What the hell? I sit up, eyes trained on Adam. I haven’t noticed another guy since before Eric and I got together, and here I am, checking out one of Gen’s prospects, like he’s for me.
My gaze darts to Jaeger’s face and I wonder again how I know him. The more I look, the more familiar he appears.
Jaeger nods as if he’s listening to Adam, but he doesn’t contribute to the conversation. As though he knows Adam will continue talking without input from the others.
Adam’s overly chatty. That’s annoying. It’s a good thing Mason introduced the girl beside Adam as his girlfriend, because I already struck the guy from Gen’s list.
Mason pushes a spear of olives from one side of his martini glass to the other. “Why bother getting married? He should have stayed single.” He lifts the glass and takes a swallow.
Gotta be the athlete. The pop star isn’t married. “You’re talking about that basketball player, right?” I say.
Mason nods.
“He’s a bastard.”
A low rumble escapes from Jaeger. I glance up and catch a faint smile on his mouth.
The conversation slowly turns to skiing and snowboarding, and Jaeger’s shoulder dips closer to me.
“How have you been, Cali?” His deep voice turns my spine limp and spongy. I could melt from the sound of it and happily live as a sticky puddle on the lounge floor.
We do know each other. “I’m sorry—you’re familiar, but I can’t remember how.”
He leans forward, elbows on his knees, head angled toward me without directly looking. “Tyler.”
Tyler’s my older brother.
It all makes sense now.
Images cross my mind of a tall, slender guy with blond, shaggy hair who used to hang out with Tyler during my freshman year in high school.
My gaze rakes Jaeger’s hard, well-defined, and heavily muscled body.
Is it possible for a guy to add sixty pounds of muscle and a couple extra inches of height between the ages of eighteen and—?
I mentally calculate. He’s gotta be my brother’s age, about twenty-three—no, Tyler skipped a grade—Jaeger must be twenty-four.