He couldn’t speak.
‘Winning or losing?’ She waved at his chips.
‘Cashing out,’ he managed, and got up with his racks.
He felt her follow him as he strode to the pay window – would they jump him in the parking lot or follow him home? He hadn’t won enough to be offered an escort; maybe he’d ask for one anyway.
She watched him stuff the roll of money into his jeans and smiled. ‘Just like old times.’
‘What do you want, Ness?’
She hesitated, and Tom saw doubt in her eyes.
‘Buy me a drink?’
He almost didn’t; he almost walked away. He’d think later that he should have.
But he didn’t.
He bought her a whiskey straight and got a Coke for himself. If he was going to get into it tonight, he’d need every one of his reflexes at his immediate disposal.
They were halfway through their drinks before she spoke. ‘How are you?’
He laughed with real amusement – had a hard time stopping – and finally answered, ‘Fine, thanks – ever since you tried to kill me.’
‘I didn’t—’
‘Know,’ he finished for her sarcastically. ‘For a smart woman, Ness, you’re just a ball of ignorance.’
She looked down the bar, away from him, and Tom thought that if she was pretending to cry, he’d slap her hard and enjoy doing it.
She wasn’t pretending to cry: when she looked back at him, she was cool and calm. ‘Everybody’s running for cover. Stanley’s talking. Your security guard in Texas is talking. The operation’s falling apart.’
‘Good. Where does that leave you?’
‘Nowhere.’ She sipped her drink. ‘That’s the thing about being a small fish in a big pool. It’s easy to disappear.’ Then she lifted her chin at him defiantly. ‘Unless you tell the Feds about me.’ Her words were a statement but her eyes were a question mark.
‘Not yet.’
‘You won’t.’ She smiled. ‘If you want to stay out of jail.’
He hated her smug look. He wanted to watch it change as he told her he knew about her and Stanley, but he stopped himself. Never show your hand. Even after winning.
She put a hand on his forearm, running her thumb sensuously across the dark hairs. Despite it all – despite the betrayals and the sex games and the cursed ticket to DC – Tom felt the pull of her.
She smiled sexily up at him. ‘You want to take me home, Tom?’
‘No, thanks.’
He winced as she dragged her nails lightly across his groin. ‘Yeah, you do.’
He caught her hand in his and moved it away from him.
‘How’s Richard?’
She faltered. Frowned. Hurt creased her brow, and then anger.
He turned and walked away from her.
Her voice rose behind him: ‘I faked all my orgasms! Every last one of them!’
Men at the bar stared at them in surprise and amusement but Tom didn’t turn round.
‘Me too,’ he threw over his shoulder, and left.
He stopped on the way home and bought a bunch of flowers and a bottle of Jack Daniel’s. One in case Lucia came back, the other in case she didn’t.
46
HE LET HIMSELF into the apartment and found Lucia on the couch. He pressed the door closed with his back and leaned against it. ‘Hi,’ he said.
‘Hi.’
She’d lost weight again, and her eyes were huge in her face now. Huge and somehow sad.
Tom was tongue-tied and stupid in the face of her sudden presence.
She nodded at the flowers. ‘Are those for me?’
‘Yes.’ But he didn’t move.
‘How did you know I was coming?’
‘I didn’t. I just kept buying them. And hoping.’ It was true, even if it did make him sound like some jerk in a romantic movie. Last week’s flowers were still in the vase in the window, drooping in green water.
He registered that she still hadn’t smiled at him. Surely she should have smiled at him by now. Tom put the Jack Daniel’s down on the bureau next to the horses and stepped forward with the flowers. ‘How are you?’
‘Okay.’
She didn’t reach for the flowers, so he laid them on the table beside her. He felt a seed of unease deep in his belly, and ran his hand up the back of his neck before he could stop himself.
‘I got my job back,’ he said, feeling like a kid presenting his mother with a lumpy piece of C-grade woodwork.
She nodded, then said, ‘I’m not staying.’
‘What?’
‘I’m not staying in LA. I’m going back to Savannah.’
