Deadly Odds (10 page)

“Ha!” Don said.

Ross shot him a look, then came back to Kate. “Yesterday Don and I discussed Dominion’s mini-bac revenue falling short of their average. Interesting that we suddenly have an issue here.”

“Do you think you got hit?”

“That’s what we’d like to find out.”

Kate straightened. Oh, yes. Perfect distraction. Some good solid work to be done. “We need to look at each player’s individual winnings, see if we can narrow it down to one player.”

“Already did that,” Don said. “Biggest scores were between two guys.”

“All right. May I review the video? I need to study it for anything suspicious. Did the dealer see anything?”

“Nothing was reported.”

Don finally moved away from the window and headed for the door. “Kate, come with me. My guys are on video now. I’ll set you up.”

Kate stowed her notebook and glanced at Ross. “Email me the video. I’ve been building a database of suspected cheats and can run the images through it.”

“This could be a fluke, but if it’s not, I want it dealt with. Fast.”

Marcia buzzed him. “Ross, I have your conference call on hold. What do you want to do?”

“I’ll take it.”

“Okay. And, your mom called to remind you about dinner tonight. You have a dinner tonight?”

Ross’s head fell forward and he wrapped his hand around his forehead and squeezed until his knuckles popped.

“I forgot to tell you,” He muttered. “Dammit. Double-booked myself. What an idiot. Sorry, Marcia. Cancel anything you scheduled for me.”

Parents came first. Good for him. He’d told her as much yesterday when he’d lectured her about her brother blowing her off.

His lifestyle, one most would find exciting with all the glitz and glam and high stakes, came at quite a cost if he couldn’t take an hour to share a meal, to connect, with his family. Was it all worth it?

For her? No. Compared to this, that quiet life on a ranch looked like paradise. None of this constant running and stress.

Another reason to avoid personal entanglements with Ross Cooper. His lifestyle didn’t lend itself to serenity. And she needed serenity. Fresh air.

Stillness.

“That’s nice,” she said. “That you didn’t break your dinner with your folks.”

“My parents got me here. They deserve better from me.”

“Ross?” Marcia again. “You ready?”

Kate stood. “Don is waiting. I’ll let you go.”

He nodded. “Check in with me later. Please.”

“Will do.”

She strode to the door, found Don in the hallway rifling through a stack of messages. “Do me a favor, hon,” he said to Marcia. “Call this mope back and tell him I died.”

Marcia laughed.

“You think I’m kidding? I’ve told this guy a hundred times I’m not interested in untested software. Tell him I had a heart attack.” Don grinned. “Then send him to Ross.”

“I heard that,” Ross hollered.

Kate shook her head. “You people are insane.”

She’d certainly never experienced an office environment like this. Palpable stress, but they found humor in odd places. Gallows humor, she supposed.

Fascinating crew. As nutty—as politically incorrect—as they were, simply fascinating. At the FBI, no one dared speak to higher ups the way Marcia did, but the obvious respect, the chemistry of this team and their ability to get things done, triggered a bit of envy.

A longing to fit that Kate had never felt before. Not since her days working the ranch had she’d felt that sense of belonging. She may have had friends at the FBI, but it didn’t compare to this.

She wanted it. To be a part of something.

Don shoved the messages in his pants pocket. “Kate, let’s go bust some balls.”

Chapter Six

By noon, Kate’s eyes nearly bled.

Don had set her up in an empty office at the opposite end of the floor where she’d been staring at video, studying each frame, rewinding, studying again, fast forwarding and rewinding again looking for any tell. Any sleight of hand trick or use of illegal devices—a magician’s holdout or a Kepplinger—used to hide cards on their person and surreptitiously switch them out. If the two targeted players were cheating, she didn’t see it. And that was saying something because Kate could spot a cheat.

Between the rough sleep last night and hours of studying video, her mind and body dragged.

Unfortunately, according to Don, no one knew “shit about these jokers.”

And from what she’d seen on the video, they were simply two men who’d come to gamble and gotten lucky.

Extremely lucky.

She’d learned though that sometimes video didn’t catch it all. As sophisticated as the Fortuna surveillance system was, sometimes a girl needed to get into the middle of the action and hit the casino floor to play a little mini-bac.

Kate poked her finger at the screen. “I’ll get you.”

The half-closed door eased open and Ross stood there, one hand against the door, the other supporting his weight on the doorframe. She felt a little
whump-whump
in her chest.

The man had a way about him. All hot and confident and so very pleasing to the eye.

A word hadn’t been uttered, yet his energy stormed the quiet office, coming off of him like a rogue wave, taking out anything in his path. Whatever he was about to say, his mind had probably already skipped ahead three steps.

He cocked his head. “Who’re you talking to?”

“Myself.”

“Ah.”

No reaction to that. No questioning the crazy consultant. No contemplation. Excellent. “Do you need something?”

“No. Have you eaten? I have twenty minutes. Want to grab a sandwich?”

He wanted to take her to lunch. If twenty minutes could be considered lunch. And was this a pleasure thing?

More than likely, he wanted an update. Of course he did. Only he was too much of a schmoozer to say that.

She smiled at him and his eyebrows hitched up. “What’s the smile about? Is that a yes?”

Kate stood, walked around the desk and leaned on the doorframe across from Ross. The earthy scent of his soap reached her. “Well, sure. But I’m thinking you’d like an update on what I’ve found and you’re using lunch as an excuse.”

Because after all, his boss had installed her here and now it was time for her to pony up some answers. Answers she didn’t have.

“Think whatever you want. Maybe I’m just a guy looking for food and the company of a beautiful woman.”

Oh, the charm. “Whoa fella, no need to tax yourself.”

Ross laughed. “Kate, I’m hardly taxing myself. Now, if you weren’t working for me, then you’d be in trouble. Wicked good trouble if I had my way.”

The blood rush to her cheeks should have set her face ablaze. Kate Daniels, homebody, lover of stillness, had no business challenging a player like Ross Cooper. When it came to the art of flirting, he’d win. Every time.

Ross leaned in. Not too close, but enough that his presence, that sexual energy that oozed off of him drew her an inch closer.

The man was a master.

“I don’t need an update” he said. “But we’ll use it as an excuse if you want a reason to go to lunch with me. In case you were in the next state and didn’t hear him, Don came to my office half an hour ago screaming about his hack saw.”

“Hack saw?”

“So he could take someone’s hand off.”

Oh.
Wow. She’d completely missed that show. She
had
taken a bathroom break. “I see.”

“In Don speak, that means he’s no further along than we were this morning and it’s aggravating him.”

From what she’d seen on the surveillance video, that wasn’t surprising. “The photos of the players from last night didn’t match anything in my database,” she said. “My boss is looking into it from his end. I also called a friend from the Bureau. They don’t have anything on them either.”

“So these guys just got unusually lucky on the same night.”

“Maybe.”

“You believe that?”

Kate rolled her bottom lip out, thought about it a second. “I’m not ruling it out, but I’m not done yet. Before you came in here, I decided a trip to mini-bac might be in order. I’ll spend the afternoon at the tables. Maybe one of them will come back.”

“We’ll have surveillance watch for them. If they come back, you can hop over to whatever table they’re at.”

“Exactly. Ross, if there’s a cheat in your casino, I’ll find him.”

* * *

At 10:00 P.M. Ross walked through the front door of his condo, tossed his keys in the tray by the door and flipped on the hall light.

Silence.

He tilted his head back, stared at the ceiling, resisted moving.

For once.

On the drive home his brain, normally sharp and snapping, ready for the next task, had simply quit. Short-circuited to the point where he couldn’t even decide whether he should go to bed or check his emails.

He stood for a moment, settling his mind. Taking in the quiet. The last few years, silence had grown to be his enemy. During silence he thought too much and obsessed over things he had no business obsessing over. Things like his professional life hijacking his existence.

No wife. No kids. Barely a few friends. Real friends who stood up when everyone else sat down.

What was up with the pity party?

He had a life most young executives would kill for. Who wouldn’t want his life? The action, the fun, the high stakes.

The rush.

Kate
.

That’s who.

From the second she’d walked into his office, his normally chaotic life had gone into overload. She disrupted his routine, his order. Even if it was insanity, it was his insanity. And she’d messed with it.

All because he had a thing for the hot consultant.

A thing.

Way more than that. Every thought suddenly revolved around her. The way her hair fell over her shoulders, that soft wave at the ends curling just below her collarbone. And how she wore minimal makeup and was still astonishingly beautiful. And the way she made him work for every inch she gave him. Most women easily fell for his act, the flirting, the innuendos, the game. Kate? She rolled her eyes. Before today he’d never thought that would ever amuse him.

“She’s…different,” he muttered.

Different and working at Fortuna. Not even out of the gate yet and already this thing had problems.

More problems, he didn’t need. What a pissy mood he was in. Fatigue. That’s all this was. After two nights of sleeping in his office a night in his own bed might lift him from this irritating funk.

For no apparent reason, he walked to the kitchen, opened the fridge. Having just come from dinner with the ’rents this side trip to the kitchen seemed a waste of time.

And the only things in his fridge were a couple of beers, butter and five water bottles. He’d given up keeping food here. All it did was create more work when he threw it all out.

Hell, he’d spent a friggin’ fortune on a condo in the most sought-after high rise in Vegas and the place had it all. A view, valets, a concierge to handle groceries and dry cleaning, anything he wanted, he snapped his fingers and it appeared. The building name alone drove the price up a hundred grand. And for what? To never be here?

“Some life, man.”

His phone, of course, rang. If that phone went more than three minutes without bleeping at him, he assumed the battery had died.

Some life.

Liz Baker’s face lit up the screen. Liz Baker. Their history assured him that with a little effort he might find a place to land for the night. A warm, highly active place that would occupy his mind, keep him from thinking these stupid-ass boo-hoo thoughts.

But he wasn’t about to do that. They’d dated a short time and somewhere in those three weeks, his let’s-keep-it-casual messages failed to reach their destination. Her response? She showed up at the casino with another guy. One she’d announced she was dumping Ross for. When her back-asswards attempt to make him jealous resulted in him wishing her luck, she’d panicked. She’d called him five times since, each time trying to lure him back with one outrageous suggestion after another on sexual positions they could try. As if that would be all it took.

Remorse—or was it guilt?—dropped on him. He’d inadvertently misled her into thinking the relationship would include wedding vows. For the life of him he didn’t know how that had happened. And now, hooking up tonight, letting her think they had a shot at a future, that wouldn’t make him an asshole, it’d make him ten kinds of asshole.

He swiped the ignore button sending the call into the folder with the other seven missed calls from the last hour. All he’d needed was an hour of peace. An hour to clear his head. And none of those calls had been urgent. Urgent calls at this hour only came from certain people. None of whom had called.

He set the phone in the charger on the counter. He’d hit the shower, wash off the grime of the day and the piss-poor mood, collapse in bed and hopefully dream of a green-eyed, redhead.