28. Sienna #2
I set my glass down and tried very hard not to pout, because I was sitting at a family poker table, but the whole room had turned against my very reasonable belief that cards should have emotional wellbeing. “I think you’re all being unfair. Cards are supposed to be fun.”
“Cards are supposed to take money from people who think they are having fun,” Jamison said.
I narrowed my eyes. “That is bleak.”
The betting reached me, and because I had a queen and there was another queen on the table, I reached for a neat little stack of chips.
Jamison’s hand closed around my wrist before I could push them forward.
The touch was light.
It still stopped me completely.
His thumb rested over the inside of my wrist, right where my pulse had betrayed me far too often already that day. I looked at his hand around mine and forgot the chips entirely.
“How much were you about to bet?” he asked.
“All of these.”
“That is an overbet.”
I bit the inside of my cheek.
Jamison ignored everyone and guided my hand back, removing most of the chips from my fingers with controlled patience. He left only a small bet and nudged it forward.
“I have restraint.”
His gaze dropped to my mouth.
My face warmed instantly.
“Questionable,” he said.
The hand continued. I lost because another card came, and apparently my queen situation had been less powerful than I had believed. Julian won with something called a straight, which I thought was an uninspired name for five cards that did not even match.
“I don’t understand why his line beats my queens,” I said.
“Because the rules say so,” Adrian replied.
“The rules lack romance.”
“Cards lack romance,” Jamison said.
I looked at him. “Then why do they have kings and queens?”
His lips twitched.
A tiny victory.
The next hand came, and I tried very hard to be serious. I looked at my cards without smiling. I breathed evenly. I did not whisper encouragement to the three of diamonds, even though it appeared neglected beside an ace.
Jamison watched every second of my attempt.
“What do you have?” he asked quietly.
“I can’t tell you.”
“You’re about to marry into a bloodline that controls Harlan nightlife. I am not having my wife sit in one of my rooms thinking twos need charity.”
My heart stumbled.
My wife.
He said it as if it had already happened.
“I could learn from this chair,” I said, though my voice lacked conviction.
“You could. You won’t.”
“Why?”
“Because from that chair, you’ll keep hiding your cards from me and making decisions based on whether the queen looks lonely.” His eyes darkened, and he held out one hand. “Lap, Sienna.”
“I need another drink.” Adrian muttered.
Julian kicked him under the table.
I stood because my body had apparently chosen treason over dignity.
Jamison pushed back enough to give me space, then guided me down onto his thigh with a hand at my waist and another at my elbow. He handled me carefully, in that unsettling way he had begun doing since the waterfall.
I settled sideways on his lap, my dress smoothing over his thigh, my shoulder near his chest.
His arm came around me.
Possessive enough that my breath caught, but loose enough that I knew I could move.
He angled the cigar away from me and tapped ash neatly into the tray. The smoke drifted to his right, toward the open window, never into my face.
“Comfortable?” he murmured.
I nodded, unable to look at anyone.
“Use words.”
“Yes.”
“Good girl.
My cheeks heated again.
Jamison picked up my cards from the table and placed them into my hands, then covered my fingers with his, adjusting their angle.
“Never hold them that high,” he said against my ear.
His mouth was too close.
Far too close.
Every word brushed warm over my skin, and when I turned my cheek instinctively toward him, his lips grazed just below my ear. It could have been an accident. But, Jamison did very few things by accident.
My fingers tightened around the cards.
He smiled against my hair.
“Focus.”
“I am focusing.”
“No, you’re thinking about my mouth.”
The cards nearly slipped from my hand.
“Jamison.”
“You are very easy to read in my lap.”
I closed my eyes for one second.
Julian dealt the flop with the brittle composure of a man determined to pretend his sister was not sitting on a Crow’s lap while learning poker.
The cards landed.
Ace of spades, two of hearts, nine of clubs.
“Oh,” I said softly.
Jamison’s hand tightened at my waist. “Why did you make that sound?”
“The two came back.” I grinned. It must like me.
“It did not come back. It is a different two.”
“They’re related.”
His mouth brushed my temple. A kiss, barely there, hidden by the angle of his face and the curtain of my hair, but I felt it everywhere.
“You are going to be a disaster in my casinos,” he murmured.
“I can stay near you.”
“That is the first correct strategy you’ve named.”
My stomach fluttered.
He tapped the cards with one finger. “Tell me what you have.”
I tilted them toward him. “A nine and a four.”
“Pair of nines with the table.”
“That’s good.”
“It is something.”
I smiled despite myself. “Should I bet?”
“Look at the table first.”
I looked.
Everyone looked back.
“That did not help,” I whispered.
His lips grazed my ear again when he spoke. “Do not look at their faces as a group. One at a time. Start with Adrian.”
I tried.
Adrian gave me a wide, charming smile.
“He looks innocent.”
“He looks guilty of being Adrian. Ignore the mouth. Look at his hand.”
Adrian’s fingers were near his chips, tapping once against the edge of a stack.
“He’s tapping.”
“He has nothing or wants you to think he has nothing. He performs too much when weak.”
“Can he hear you?”
“Yes.”
Adrian stopped tapping.
“Now he’s irritated. Good.” Jamison smiled.
I bit back a laugh.
“Julian,” he said.
I looked at my brother. Julian sat perfectly still, eyes calm, cards low. Too still now that I knew to look for it.
“He has something?”
“Likely.”
Julian’s mouth tightened.
A thrill went through me. “I saw it.”
“You did.”
His hand slid slightly lower at my waist, fingers resting just under the edge of my dress where fabric met bare thigh. Enough to make my breath stutter and my thoughts scatter.
He felt that too.
“Focus,” he murmured again, kissing my temple more openly this time.
I turned my cheek into him without meaning to.
His mouth lingered.
The room all blurred at the edges. I could feel his chest behind me every time he breathed. His thumb moved in a slow line.
“Baby,” he said, voice rougher now. “Cards.”
I blinked down at them. “Right.”
I placed a careful bet. Jamison did not stop me. That felt more thrilling than the chips deserved.
“Good,” he said.
I tried not to react.
Failed, obviously.
The hand continued. Julian raised. Adrian folded with exaggerated sorrow. Henri glanced once at Sabine, who gave the tiniest shake of her head, and he folded immediately.
The turn card was another nine.
My body went tense with excitement before I could stop it.
Jamison’s arm locked around me. “No.”
“What?”
“You lit up again.”
“I have three nines.”
“And now Julian knows you have at least one.”
Julian leaned back, smiling faintly. “I did suspect.”
I frowned at him. “You’re meant to be supportive.”
Jamison’s mouth brushed my ear. “Raise.”
I looked at him. “But you said Julian knows.”
“And Julian believes your excitement makes you reckless. Use that.”
I looked back at my brother. Julian’s expression was calm, but now I saw the way his left thumb brushed the side of his glass. He disliked something.
Maybe the bet.
I raised.
Julian watched the chips, then called.
The river came.
A king.
A lovely card. Proud. Handsome. Alone.
Poor queenless king.
Jamison’s fingers moved at my thigh. “Do not pity him.”
“I said nothing.”
“You sighed.”
“He looks so misplaced.”
“Bet.”
I bet.
Julian folded after a long moment.
I stared.
“I won?”
Jamison gathered the chips toward me. “Yes.”
“With the nines?”
“With the nines.”
I smiled so hard my cheeks hurt. I turned before thinking and kissed Jamison’s cheek.
The room went silent.
I froze. Jamison did too. My lips had touched the edge of his jaw, because he had turned slightly at the last second. I pulled back slowly.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
His eyes locked on mine.
“No apologizing.”
“But I—”
“No.” His hand slid from my waist to my back, holding me there. “If you kiss me because you’re happy, do not apologize for it.”
My heart gave one hard, foolish beat. Father cleared his throat into his fist, trying for the room to get order back. While my mother opened her fan aggressively.
Jamison bent and kissed my temple. Slowly, and in front of all of them. Before he turned his attention back to the cards.
“Again,” he said.
So we played again.
I forgot the rules twice more. Once because I confused a straight and a flush again, and once because I thought two pairs should become a “double marriage,” which Jamison refused to accept as legitimate terminology no matter how many times I explained its elegance.
I also tried to rescue a two.
He stopped me.
“You cannot keep funding weak cards out of compassion,” he said.
“Everyone deserves a chance.”
“No.”
“You’re mean.”
His mouth touched the side of my hair. “Only to bad hands.”
I laughed before I could stop myself, and his arm tightened as if the sound pleased him more than the pot he had just won from my father with a king-high bluff.
He taught me how to fold without looking sad. How to hide excitement in my shoulders and breathe through a good card instead of greeting it with my whole face.
Every lesson came close to my ear with his hand steady on me.
When I leaned too far forward, his palm spread beneath the edge of my dress, holding my thigh lightly as he drew me back. I forgot to keep my cards angled, he covered my hand and turned them down.
I won a small hand, he kissed my temple again and murmured, “Good girl,” so quietly that my entire body went warm and useless.
“You’re doing that on purpose,” I whispered.
“What?”
“Distracting me.”
His lips brushed my ear. “Yes.”
“That seems unfair during a lesson.”
“A Crow table is never fair.”
“I thought you wanted me to learn.”
“I do.”