by Avery Flynn
Dangerous Tease
(Laytons Book 3)
By
Avery Flynn
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Copyright © 2012 by Avery Flynn. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary
rights, please contact Avery Flynn at [email protected].
Visit Avery’s website at www.averyflynn.com.
Edited by KC
Formatting by Anessa Books
ISBN: 978-0-9908335-5-0
Manufactured in the United States of America
First Edition: 2012 (Passion Creek)
Revision: May 2015 (Dangerous Tease)
Dedication
Finally, it’s Sam’s turn to find love! I can’t tell you how much I’ve been looking forward to telling his story, but I couldn’t have done it without the help of a ton of people. Not that they weigh a ton - well maybe if they all stood together on a scale while holding bricks, but I’m wondering off the path here.
Anyway... I want to thank all of the people who helped make Passion Creek a reality: the fabulous team at Evernight Publishing, Kim and Kerri, whoever thought to turn coffee beans into liquid gold and everyone—yes, everyone—who read the first two books in the Layton Family series, Temptation Creek and Seduction Creek. Y’all rock. Seriously, if there was an Olympics of awesome, you’d all be there.
XOXO,
Avery
Author Note
Dangerous Tease was first published in 2012 as Passion Creek, but has since been revised.
Chapter One
Jimmy “Snips” Esposito smacked his lips together and sucked air through his teeth, his lewd gaze locked on Josie Winarsky's boobs. Still, she managed to bite back a smartass comment. Barely. The guy was a total slimeball, but not one to be messed with—the idea of tangling with a loan shark with mob ties did not make her feel tingly inside. It made her want to puke.
The first time Snips had made the weasel-like sound while hypnotized by her breasts, they'd been sitting in ninth grade English at North Las Vegas High. Snips was still a perv twenty years later, albeit one with more money, bigger muscles and a longer rap sheet.
Of course, her Paris Casino cocktail waitress uniform gave him plenty of tit to ogle, which usually meant big tips—especially in the high-stakes poker rooms. However, after she clocked out for the last time tonight, she planned on burning the damn thing in the parking lot. No more half-in-the-bag, high-stakes poker players' grubby fingers “accidentally” squeezing her ass. No more running from waitressing gig to waitressing gig and eating cheap noodle dinners to save pennies. No more Las Vegas.
In T-minus forty-eight hours, she would be on the road in her duct-taped Honda Civic. Hell or high water wouldn't stop her from getting to the Rose O'Neill Dry Creek Artist Colony and spending the next six months painting.
Only painting.
She'd let those bastards in L.A. rip her dream out of her paint-caked fingers before, but she was stronger now. More determined. Smarter. She'd be damned if she ever let that happen again. Even Snips' hungry little black eyes couldn't fuck up her night.
“Here's your scotch on the rocks.” She lowered the glass to the poker table, careful not to let the amber liquid slosh over the rim onto the green felt.
Eyes locked on her fluffed-up chest, he didn't acknowledge the drink.
Josie stood at least four inches taller than Snips in bare feet; add in the heels and she towered over the slimy loan shark. From her vantage point, Josie counted the twelve greasy black hairs slicked over his prematurely bald dome. And they say God doesn't have a sense of humor.
“The dealer's about to get started again, but we need to talk later.”
“I've told you a million times, Snips, I'm not interested.”
“When you hear just how much Cyril owes me, you'll change your tune.” Confidence oozed from his blindingly white, toothy grin.
Her baby brother would never borrow money from Snips. “What in the hell are you talking about?”
Snips just smirked. Finally, his eyes met hers. “We'll need to work something out.” His gaze dropped again.
“How much?”
Her baby brother by all of twelve minutes had promised the craps games were in his past. Why in the hell would Cy need money from a shark on the lowest rung of the Callandriello family's crime ladder? Was he gambling again in an effort to cover Mom's out-of-whack medical bills? She didn't have the answers. Instead she had an ominous gurgling in the pit of her stomach and Snips' little snake eyes ogling what he could never touch.
Josie wobbled on her four-inch Lucite heels, but forced her voice to strengthen. “I asked how much?”
“Don't worry about it.” He winked at her. “I'm sure we can work something out.”
She swallowed her disgust. Pointing out the obvious—that Snips wasn't touching, ever—wouldn't help her brother. But she hadn't survived ten years of being a Vegas cocktail waitress by letting creepy little fucks walk all over her.
Leveling an icy glare at Snips, she put on her best bitch-please face, ready to blast him a new one. But Saul Rosenberg shuffled over, lost in a suit jacket that must have fit him in his prime, but now it swam on the man's seventy-year-old frame. Josie ate her words, not wanting to upset her favorite septuagenarian.
Once, after a big tip night, she'd teasingly offered to buy him a new sports coat. His gaze softened and he'd declined, saying his wife had bought it for him on their fortieth anniversary and since Marlene couldn't be here with him, he'd keep the jacket. Josie hadn't been able to stop herself from sighing and giving his frail shoulders a squeeze.
“Josephine, dear.” Saul stopped by her elbow, holding a small square package that looked like it had been wrapped by a drunken elephant. “I need a word.”
Snips shot her a hard look before turning away.
Josie scanned the room, worried her boss, Clive, would spot her being less than diligent about filling the players' drink orders, but the only person watching her was a long and lean drink of water who, unlike Saul, wasn't a regular at the Paris Casino's high-roller tables. Her gaze locked with his tawny, hazel eyes and her breath caught.
Something woke up within her, setting her pulse racing. The stranger's reddish-brown hair reminded her of her favorite burnt sienna crayon from childhood and her imagination went wild, wondering how this man in his crisp shirt and pressed jeans got the two-inch scar that wriggled across his cheekbone. His fingers wrapped around the old fashioned glass. Josie had no idea how his drink stayed so cold because she was burning up just looking at him.
His aesthetic was all alpha man—broad shoulders, muscular arms and lean, strong fingers. Her gaze traveled back up to his face and her skin sizzled as his hazel eyes stayed focused on her. He didn't smile and, judging by the tense line of his jaw, rarely did. Too bad; if his smile matched the rest of him, it would be a sight to behold. She wished he'd stand up so she could see if his ass was as squeeze-worthy as her mind painted.
On canvas, he would fill the space, muscles coiled, battle-ready. A painting of him bloomed in her mind: a Spartan warrior, fierce and deadly, gearing up for war. A shiver started at the base of her spine and ended when her shoulders twitched, jiggling her barely contained boobs.
She never slept with her customers, too many were regulars and she didn't believe in making relationship ties. But this guy wasn't a regular and for him, she might just break her own golden rule. After all, it was her last night on the job. She stepped in his direction.
&
nbsp; “Josephine, did you hear what I said?”
Her cheeks flushed and she turned. “I'm sorry, Mr. Rosenberg. It's my last night and I'm a little out of sorts.”
“Understandable.” He patted her hand with his own liver-spotted one. “I got you a gift.”
“Oh, you shouldn't—”
“Shhh, playing poker and discussing art are my only loves now that Marlene has passed on. I couldn't let you go without thanking you for listening to me prattle on about both.”
Those stories had always circled back around to his beloved Marlene. The widower had spun tales of everyday romance, like bringing home flowers on Thursdays, and continuing to do so out of habit even after his wife died. It was the stuff of books and movies, not real life—at least not as she knew it. Between two waitressing jobs and spending every nonworking waking moment with a paintbrush in her hand, a relationship was so far on the back burner, it wasn't even in the kitchen.
He held out the package. “Go on, unwrap it.”
Josie bit the inside of her cheek and tore the thin wrapping paper to reveal a small book. The musty scent of old paper and worn leather wafted up. She slid her thumb across the battered corner of the crackled cover.
“It's Dry Creek, Nebraska. That's where you're going, yes?”
“Right. They've got a great artist colony. I'm going to spend six months painting.”
“I thought so. Turn to the first page.”
She eased open the cover, afraid the obviously old book would tear. Diary of Rebecca Morrell, Dry Creek Nebraska, 1865. Josie traced her fingers across the bold but faded script.
“I won it a few years ago in a poker match. The young man said it had been in his family for generations. It seems young Rebecca was crossing the country on the Oregon Trail with her dowry to meet her fiancé out West. She made it as far as Nebraska when she discovered he'd died. Heartbroken, she stayed in Dry Creek, where she eventually married a rancher.”
“How sad.” Like a real sap, her heart winced at the tale.
“Yes, but according to the young man and what's in here…” He tapped the diary with one arthritic finger. “She buried her dowry outside of Dry Creek. Many have looked for Rebecca's Bounty, as they call it, but none have found it.”
“I'm not surprised.”
“But they didn't have the map. You do.”
Her breath hitched. A real treasure meant money, maybe enough to pay off her mother's medical bills, Snips and a longer stay in Dry Creek. “Map?”
“Oh yes, I took the diary to be appraised and the examiner found the map secreted in a false flap on the back cover. It took me a while to realize it's a map. I thought it was just some lovely drawings—Rebecca, it seems, was an artist herself—but then one day it hit me. She'd drawn a treasure map hidden inside her landscape drawings. Quite a clever girl, that Rebecca. My Marlene would have liked her.”
“Mr. Rosenberg, this gift is truly lovely, thank you, but it must be valuable. I can't accept this.” She held out the book, but he waved off her offer.
“It is worth money but I'm too old to go on any more adventures; however, you're certainly not. Take it with you to Dry Creek. Who knows, maybe you'll be the one to find Rebecca's Bounty. If nothing else, think of it as the diary of a fellow artist and a reminder of an old man who enjoyed your company.”
She swallowed the sentiment blocking her throat. “Thank you.”
After a quick hug, he shuffled back to his poker table and she hid the diary in a safe spot behind the bar.
Mr. Tall Drink of Water sat a few chairs away from Saul, deep in conversation with the man on his left. The other guy looked a few years younger, relaxed and mellow, unlike the man who put an extra bit of sway in her hips as she strutted toward the players. He had an air of alertness about him and an intensity that couldn't be missed. Still, the resemblance between the two men—from their broad shoulders to their matching hazel eyes—left little doubt they were related. Both were handsome, but there was something about the older one that sent a tingle sprinting across her exposed skin as surely as if he'd touched her. She couldn't wait to get close enough for better inspection.
“Hey ya,” a burly player called out from Saul’s table. “Bring me a Jack and Coke.”
Yanked back into reality, Josie made a beeline toward the bar and away from the six-feet-plus of yumminess getting ready for another round of Texas Hold 'Em.
Hours later, her size-ten feet aching, she leaned against the bar and counted down the minutes of her final shift in the world's most uncomfortable shoes. She'd probably get cancer from the hazardous toxins released if she burned them with her uniform. Maybe she'd just run them over a couple thousand times with her battered Honda instead. Of course, with her luck, the Lucite heels would puncture the worn tread on the tires.
The itch of a thousand ants marching up her arms tipped her off that she hadn't gone unnoticed in the empty bar corner farthest from the poker tables. Only one person gave her the heebie-jeebies quite like this. She turned. Bingo.
Snips stood just shy of her personal bubble.
“Okay, how much does Cy owe?”
“Forty K.”
Her blood pressure exploded. “Why in the hell would he need forty thousand dollars?” Please God, don't say he's found a craps game that would take him.
Snips shrugged. “Don't know. Don't care. I just want my money, but your brother dropped off the radar. That does not inspire my confidence. If he doesn't show up soon, I'm going to have to track him down as a message to the rest of my clients.” It went without saying that Snips' threats involved baseball bats and brass knuckles. “So where is he?”
Her stomach clenched. Something was off. Way off. After Mom got really sick, Cy had cleaned up his act and joined the military. He’d left the Corps a few months ago, but was being all mysterious about how he was supporting himself. Warning sirens blared in her head.
“I haven't heard from him in a few days. I don't know where he is.”
“Well, I hope you have an extra forty thousand stuffed between those big tits of yours.” He raised up on his toes and leered at her.
“I bet you do.” She crossed her arms to block his view.
He guffawed, an ugly, mean sound. “You'd better find my money or your brother. I'd hate to have to go introduce myself to your parents. Haven't seen your mom since high school. She still in the wheelchair? I really should stop by and see how her kidney dialysis is going.”
Panic buzzed inside Josie's head like a kamikaze bee on a suicide mission. Her mom would give her last penny to help Cy. Shit, she'd already done it about a million times, that was why Josie had come home from L.A. Well, one of the reasons. But Mom couldn't afford to do it now, not with a foot-high stack of medical bills and a mile-wide stubborn streak pushing her to refuse any financial help from Josie.
No, she'd have to take care of this before her parents even heard about it.
“Look, I don't have it all, but I'll get it. I just need some time. Come by the diner during the lunch shift tomorrow and I'll give you five grand.” Just saying the words was like watching her dreams curl up and die.
Snips' eyes lit up, no doubt at the prospect of getting his grubby hands on her hard-earned cash.
That money was her entire life savings after she'd paid for her stay at the Rose O'Neill Dry Creek Artist Colony, but if Cy was desperate enough to borrow money from Snips, he really needed it. The fact that he'd dropped out of sight meant something had gone very wrong and he was in real trouble. Damn, why hadn't she followed up on his last cryptic text? He'd promised to never leave her to clean up his messes again—unless something awful had happened.
“I need it all.” Snips snuck across the invisible line separating her space from his. “Of course, you're such a hot piece of ass that I could be persuaded to give you a few extra weeks, if you asked in the right way.”
The ants double-timed across her skin and she took an involuntary half-step back. “Come on, we've known each other since
middle school. I've told you a million times, no way, no how.”
Anger flashed in his beady eyes. “Yeah and in all that time, Miss Tight Ass, you've never given me a second glance or the respect I deserve. I was never good enough for you. But guess who needs me now?” He raised himself on his tiptoes and jutted his face into hers. “Who's hot shit now, bitch?”
His hand shot out so fast it must have broken some kind of land-speed record and clamped onto her left breast.
Shock stopped the moment in time. Her brain emptied until it was a vast white space with only one thought: What. The. Fuck?
He kneaded her tit like a baker with a loaf of unformed dough.
Rage and disgust rattled and climbed up to her throat, her cheeks flamed. She gritted her teeth and shoved his hand away, her knee slamming into his steroid-shrunken balls. He bent over with an oomph! She grabbed the metal serving tray in both hands and swung it with everything her five-foot-eleven-inch body could give. The tray made a heavy boing sound on the side of his head.
He went down. Hard.
Lungs heaving, she tried to bring her breathing and heart rate back to normal while her brother's loan shark—the man who held Cy's kneecaps in his hands—wriggled on the ground in agony.
The other poker players, waitresses and even the new bartender let out a collective gasp. Pandemonium broke out as the crowd converged around them. Mr. Tall Drink of Water hung back, but he tipped an invisible hat at her. Shouted questions bounced off the walls.
“What the hell happened, Josie?” Her boss, Clive, picked that moment to appear.
“He grabbed my boob.”
“Aw, hell.” He swiped his fingers through his hair and aged about ten years in a breath. Snips dropped a ton of cash at the casino on a regular basis. “Go change and then let's talk in my office.”
Clive went to work dispersing the gawkers.
Fuckity fuck fuck. And this was why Cy rolled his eyes at her whenever she called him out about his temper.