Seven Card Stud (Stacked Deck Book 7)

by Emilia Finn

  “Into a woman?”

  “Yes.” He snags a skipping rope from the ground beside my feet and swings it in place. “He’s gonna help you learn things. He’s gonna help you grow the fuck up. And I’m this fuckin’ close to snapping his neck every time he looks at you.”

  “But you said you like him.” I study Will as he skips. “You said so just a few minutes ago.”

  “Yeah. I do like him. I’d like him more if he cut his dick off and threw it into the ocean for the sharks to eat. That’s when I know I’ll be able to sleep at night. I don’t mind if that boy holds your hand while you walk. But the other stuff…” He shakes his head. “Crosses a line.”

  “How do you know I haven’t already…” I shrug. “You know? I’m eighteen, and every single person my age I know has already had sex. Pretty damn sure I saw you come home with nasty hickeys on your neck when you were younger than I am now.”

  The rope comes to a stop so fast that it whips the gravel and sends snow flicking behind my brother. “Have you, Cameron? Has a man touched you?”

  Jamie’s face flashes through my mind, because Will asked about touching. Not sex.

  “Cameron!?”

  “No, I haven’t had sex. But still. I could have. It’s past time, if you think about average ages and stuff.”

  “It’s never past time. Because I’ll always claim you as my baby.” He begins skipping again. “And how the hell do you remember those marks on my neck, huh? You were eight!”

  “You’re so gross.” I reach up and fix my beanie so it covers my ears.

  Fighters train inside the gym. Men and women spill out of the doors, because there are far too many inside, which is why Will chose tire-flipping over rubbing elbows with wannabes.

  His words.

  “It grossed me out every time you came home after being with a girl.”

  “It did?” His skipping slows, as his eyes, darker under the cloudy sky, study me. “You were never supposed to notice.”

  “Then you were a shitty sleuth,” I laugh. “And I’m not pouting about Jamie. I was never pouting. Only losers pout.”

  “Guess we’ll paint a big ol’ L on your forehead then, loser. Tomorrow, we fight.”

  “I know,” I sigh. “And I’m not babysitting this year.”

  Will’s rope begins moving faster again. “He didn’t need you?”

  I shrug. “He didn’t ask. And since I’ve been busy with other stuff—”

  “Other stuff being Jamie fucking Kincaid?”

  I snort. “Yes. Him. You. That one time I got to dance on stage at the Ellie Solomon Dance Academy.” I still wiggle my toes when I think of it. “I told you I was taking the week to be selfish. To jump in and enjoy myself. Which means I haven’t had a chance to speak to Miles about Lyss. But if he was desperate, he’d ask, right?”

  “Don’t sweat it.” He grunts a white puff of air ahead of him. “If he wanted your help, he’d ask. So are you coming to the tournament?”

  I clasp my hands and twine my fingers together. If I babysat this year, I could have bought me and Will new gloves. “Yeah, I’ll be there. I wanna see what all the fuss is about.”

  “And it has absolutely nothing to do with your fighter in the middleweight division?” He lifts a brow. “Sure is interesting that, this year, you haven’t mentioned once that you’ll be my cheer girl.”

  I snort.

  “The fuck is up with that, huh? Where’s the loyalty?”

  Smiling, I bring a hand up and press it to my heart. I don’t have to speak. I don’t have to explain.

  I’m not sure I could if I tried. And I’m not sure Will would listen anyway.

  “Yeah, yeah,” he grumbles. “Whatever, weirdo.”

  “Hey there.” The cop Jamie introduced me to, Oz, walks across the gravel parking lot in jeans and a blue shirt. He wears a badge on one hip, a gun on the other, and another gun on his thigh that draws my eyes down.

  It’s sad that my natural instinct when seeing a cop is to tense up. To whip my gaze to Will to make sure he’s safe and free.

  It’s equally horrible that Will’s skipping stops. His panting breath is the only movement he makes, though I know he knows where weapons are if he needs them. “Officer,” he grumbles.

  “William Quinn, right?” Oz steps forward with a friendly smile and offers a hand for Will to take. I remain sitting on the tire, and though Oz is speaking to Will, he still shoots a friendly smile my way to let me know I’m not invisible.

  “Yes, sir.” Will releases Oz’s hand and fists the handles of his rope. “Is there a problem? We’ve been out here for an hour, and before that, I was inside with Bobby Kincaid. He can vouch.”

  “You’re kinda jumpy, huh?” Oz relaxes back and settles in for a chat. “Nobody rolled the local bottle shop or anything, so I’m not looking to pick anyone up here.”

  “So why are you here?”

  Oz’s brows pull closer as he tilts his head to take in Will’s body language. “In this town, or in this gym parking lot?”

  “The gym. Someone inside cause trouble?”

  “Nope.” Oz rests his hands on his hips – right beside his gun – and almost sends me into a tailspin.

  Get Will. Remove Will from this situation before it escalates.

  “My kid is training inside,” Oz continues. “The heavyweight. You remember me talking about him?”

  “Mmhm. Title-holder from last year.”

  “Title-holder this year too,” Oz shoots back, with pride and a whole bunch of arrogance in his voice. “Betcha.”

  “I’m here to make damn sure he doesn’t get that belt this year, Officer…” Will looks a little closer. “Franks.”

  “Chief.”

  Will’s eyes grow wider. “You’re the chief around here?” He frowns. “I thought—”

  “Well,” the Latino cop with the charismatic smile chuckles. “No. But my boss is my best friend, and fuck him. I like to steal his title to piss him off. You can just call me Oz if you like. So long as you stay law-abiding and all that shit.”

  Will clicks his tongue and restarts his rope. “And all that shit. I was in the middle of something, so…”

  “My wife works here too,” Oz continues. He looks to me. “Lindsi runs the women’s self-defense classes. You should look into those sometime.”

  “Okay.” I bring my pinky finger up and begin nibbling. “I think I met Lindsi once. She has the black hair?”

  “Uh huh. And her cousin works here too.” His eyes go back to Will. “I’m all sorts of tied up in this gym, jefe. I train here, I get my tight Achilles fixed here, I cheer on my son here. I hug my future daughter -in-law like it’s my job.”

  “Your future daughter-in-law being Evie Kincaid, the tournament organizer, right?”

  Oz smiles. “Right.”

  “Awesome. Well, it was fun swinging our dicks around, cabron, but if you’re done, I still have some stuff to do. It’d be cool if you’d…”

  Will’s voice tapers off when a girl around my age walks out of the gym and looks around for a moment. Her brows pull close together. Her eyes search from one end of the lot to the other. Then they stop on us, and her cherry red lips curl up.

  “Deputy?” She steps out into the cold in not much more than a thin sweater and yoga pants that cling to her curvy hips and draw my brother’s eye.

  The wind picks up a little as she walks. It blows her raven hair away from her porcelain face, and allows a pair of bright blue eyes, brighter than anything Will or I have, to stop on me for a moment.

  She smiles, and does the same for Will. Then she stops beside Oz, slides under his protective arm when the wind picks up again and she shivers, then she stands on her toes and presses a kiss to the man’s cheek.

  “Beauty?” Oz holds her close and rubs a heavy hand along her arm in an attempt to keep her warm. “I was just coming in.”

  “Mom asked me to come find you.”

  “Yeah? What’s up?” The way he turns into her, the way
he smiles at her, the way his eyes are for her and only her – and thankfully, not for my brother, who has yet to lift his slack jaw from the cold ground – reminds me of the way Will behaves around me.

  Family.

  Protection.

  Unconditional.

  “Uncle Alex is with Aunt Andi,” the girl continues. “She’s rubbing out the knot in his calf, and he asked for us to find you.”

  “X needs me to hold his hand?” Oz laughs and looks back to us. To Will. “Anyway. Enjoy your workout, Quinn. Don’t do anything illegal.”

  I jump up when Oz and the girl turn to leave, and thrust an arm forward like a baby elephant might toss his newfound trunk around. “Hi!” I aim for the woman. “I’m Cameron Quinn. And you are?”

  “Olivia Conner.”

  “Shit, sorry, Beauty.” Oz smiles for his Beauty, then for me. “Livi, Cameron and William Quinn. Cam, my daughter, Livi.”

  “Your daughter?” It’s comical how high my voice turns when Will literally growls in the back of his throat. “Um, hello, Livi. Conner? So you’re Ben’s sister?”

  “We call him Sasquatch.” She releases my hand and folds back into her daddy’s arms. “If you wanna be cool around here, you have to think up a name that’ll annoy Ben, then you commit, and you ride it until the day you die.”

  She looks to Will. To me. To Will. And swallows. “Um. Most of us have stuck with Sasquatch, but Yeti is available. Dragon. Dipshit. All possible names that no one except Ben will get mad at you for. Uh…”

  When Will does nothing but stare, she extends a hand.

  Someone growls in the back of their throat, but this time, it’s not Will.

  “I’m Livi,” she smiles a smile even I crush on a little bit.

  Will fists the rope in his left hand, and when he can’t possibly be more of a weirdo, wipes his palm on his pants before taking hers. “Will. You’re the cop’s daughter?”

  Her eyes sparkle with fun. “In all the ways that matter. I’ve seen you around.”

  “You have?”

  “Mm.” She releases his hand and smiles. “You’re fighting in my brother’s division this weekend. I’m legally, ethically, morally, and sister-code obligated to hate your guts. And if I happen across a Molotov cocktail at any point this week, I’m instructed to push it into your…” She makes an upward motion with her hands. “Sphincter.”

  I burst out in a loud, cackling laugh. “Sodomy.” Then I smack my brother’s chest and repeat, “Sodomy! We were just talking about that.”

  Oz’s face turns red with rage. His hands grow tighter around his girl. “Yeah, we aren’t discussing that in front of Liv. See you, Quinns.”

  He turns away, and though Liv follows, she still manages to look over her shoulder and smile. “Nice to meet you both.”

  “You too.” I give an overly-friendly wave. “It was lovely to meet you, Livi.”

  “See you around, Olivia.” Will watches her every step. And not just the watching kind of watch. But the take a massive bite out of her ass kind of watch. The kind where a man might respect a woman in the streets, but when sheets are involved, he’s gonna disrespect the hell out of her.

  The moment they step inside the gym, I spin and smack Will. “Dude!”

  “Ow!” He grabs his arm where I hit. “What did I do?”

  “Well, you’re squaring up to the cops, first of all. And now you’re looking at the cop’s daughter the way ‘a man looks at a woman’.” I use his words from only ten minutes ago, and smack him again when his eyes remain on the empty doorway. “William! A cop’s daughter. That cop’s daughter. Are you insane?”

  “I didn’t do anything.” Scowling, he fixes his rope and moves me away so I don’t get whipped. “She’s pretty.”

  “She is off-limits. That’s not me being a jerk the way you are about me and boys. That’s me saying for as long as you wanna live a normal life, you can’t be looking at her.”

  “Did you see her hips?”

  I throw my hands up and flop down onto the tire where I began. “Yes, I saw her hips.”

  “And her ass.”

  “Saw that too,” I groan.

  “And her smile, Cam.” The rope moves fast, slap, slap, slap, against the ground, but his eyes come to me. “Her fuckin’ smile, Bubbles. Holy hell, Kincaid might be onto something.”

  “Don’t even think about it.” I roll my eyes to the sky and shake my head. “You can pick just about any other chick here, but if Ben Conner sees you looking, you’re dead meat. If Oz Franks sees you looking, you’re arrested. And I don’t even know what would happen if Evie saw. But I bet she’s protective of her boyfriend’s sister.”

  “She’s so fuckin’ pretty,” he murmurs. “I saw her last year too.”

  “She was pretty then, too.”

  “Yes, she was,” he whispers. “She was beautiful. I think she likes to do yoga.”

  “No shit, you don’t think?”

  I’ve never in my life told Will who he can and can’t date. It tends to be the type of situation where I close my eyes and pretend it’s not happening. But this girl. This girl.

  “Will, you need to lock it up. You can’t look at a cop’s daughter.”

  “Looking ain’t illegal, Bubbles.”

  “Will!” I thrust up from the tire and step into his way so the rope whips me and comes to a stop. It stings, especially with the cold air racing around us, but I step into his space anyway. “No. I’m vetoing her.”

  “You can’t veto her! I didn’t ask your permission.”

  “I’ve never interfered before, Will. Not once.” I look into his eyes, and hate the way my heart slams inside my chest. “But I’m saying no this time.”

  “Bubbles…”

  “It’s too dangerous. So you’re gonna have to put your blinders on when she’s around. Find a different chick who does yoga. I bet there are loads of them.”

  “You’re jumping to conclusions,” he reasons. “I literally said she’s pretty. That’s it.”

  “I’m jumping to solutions because you and I can’t afford conclusions. Not to this episode. Not the conclusion that is inevitable if you start looking at a cop’s effing daughter.”

  “Cam.” Jamie’s voice at the gym door brings me swinging around so fast that the tips of my toes touch the ground.

  From anger at Will’s wandering eye, to a smile so large it hurts my face, I forget about my brother and his crush in an instant, and instead run across the gravel to my very own slice of hypocrisy.

  Will wanted to veto Jamie. Maybe Jamie isn’t a cop’s son, but he’s rich, he’s recognizable, and he has a whole bunch of cops in and out of his family’s gym on a daily basis.

  Will wanted to veto, and I wouldn’t let him.

  Now, I run straight toward Jamie, I smile when he smiles, and wrap my arms around his torso when we slam together. His body is hot, sweating from working out, and his heart races just as fast as mine. The scent of his sweat mingled with aftershave fills my lungs and intoxicates me.

  Just a hug. That’s all this is. And yet it feels like something so much more.

  “I missed you all day.” Jamie folds me into his embrace and presses his lips to my hair. “I could see you sometimes, but I couldn’t get to you.”

  “You were sparring all day long.”

  He chuckles, low and deep under his breath. “I sucked at it. Because you’d walk through the room, and my attention was somewhere other than on the fists coming for my face.”

  “Did you get hurt?” I pull back, and look up in search of damage. I bring a hand up, and lay the pads of my fingertips onto the bruising that shadows his jaw. “Someone got you here.”

  “Bry got me, because he’s a prick. But I have a surprise for you.”

  “You do?” My grin creeps up.

  I usually hate surprises. And a year ago, if Jamie Kincaid said that, I’d assume it came with strings attached. That was the life I led. The expectations I held for the general male population. But I guess I’
ve changed. I’ve come to trust – not all men, not all people in general. But Jamie Kincaid… yeah. He worked his way under my skin exactly how he warned me he would.

  “What’s the surprise?” I ask.

  Instead of answering me, he looks over my shoulder to Will. “Can I have her for a few hours?”

  “Fuck no!”

  “Will!” I turn and laugh. “Yes.” Then I turn back to Jamie. “Yes, because I’m eighteen, and Will can’t boss me around.”

  “Sure do like bossing me around, though, dontcha, Bubbles?” Will’s rope stops, but his breath comes out in white-fogged panting. “Veto this, veto that, but oh look, you’re gonna kiss the pretty boy.”

  “He thinks I’m pretty?” Jamie’s voice takes on a distinct aww tone that makes me giggle. “I mean, you ain’t ugly,” he looks Will up and down. “You have her eyes, her chin, her bad attitude. So if I was swinging your way, it wouldn’t be a hard transition.” He clears his throat. “Figuratively.”

  “You’re disgusting,” I snicker. “And what’s my surprise?”

  “Will?” Jamie’s eyes are all for my brother. “Couple of hours. I’ll return her good as new.”

  “Where are you going?”

  Jamie shakes his head. “It’s not about where I’m going, but where you’re going.”

  Will frowns. “Me?”

  “Yeah. My family is hosting a dinner at the estate tonight. Not everyone is invited,” he scoffs, “fuck that noise. All the wannabes would jizz if they got an invite.”

  “But we’re invited?”

  Jamie grins. “I got you a seat at my table. But I asked my mom if Cam and I could be excused.” Finally, he looks to me. “Can I take you out to dinner?”

  “Oh!” I spin and plead with Will. “To dinner! A date.”

  “A date?” Will growls. “You’re kidding me, right?”

  But then the universe smiles down on us – or smites, I suppose, depending on perspective – because Olivia steps out of the gym with her beautiful smile. “See ya, Jamie.”

  “Liv.” Jamie hugs me, but he smiles for the girl my brother can’t stop staring at. “It’s cold out. You should have a coat on.”