Winning Moves

by Lisa Renee Jones

  Jason easily spotted Hank at a busy table, with a drink in his hand and a sexy red-haired woman twenty years his junior batting her eyes at him. Jason grimaced, and moved in Hank’s direction, cursing that Sean Connery appeal Hank had with women, hoping this wasn’t a sign that he was cheating and this was his mistress.

  He slid into the only seat across the table from Hank and dropped a hundred dollar bill on the table. “Hello, Hank.”

  “Jason, my boy,” he said as the dealer swept away the chips that Hank had just lost.

  “Oh my God,” the woman said, blinking at Jason. “You’re… Oh my God. You’re the judge from that dance show.” The dealer and the three other people at the table immediately looked at Jason.

  Jason grimaced quickly and said, “No. No, but I get that all the time. It’s the name. He’s older and shorter. I swear.” He loved the judges’ table, helping dreams come true and helping new stars develop. He didn’t like being recognized, or becoming the star himself. It just wasn’t him.

  The woman smiled. “Well, you’ll do just fine by me.”

  “Shuffle,” the dealer said, and one of the people at the table got up.

  Hank elbowed the redhead. “That’s my son-in-law,” he explained to her. “Would you mind if he switched places with you?”

  “I’ll share my chair,” she purred.

  “Son-in-law,” Hank repeated. “As in married to my daughter. If he shares a chair with you, I’ll be kicking him in his seat.”

  “Oh.” She pouted and grabbed her chips. “In that case, I’ll leave. All you married guys are no fun.”

  Relief washed over Jason. Hank wasn’t flirting with the woman, that was clear. Jason grabbed his hundred since the dealer had yet to touch it, and moved to the stool next to Hank.

  “Was married to your daughter,” Jason said softly.

  “I’m counting on you to fix that,” Hank told him. “The power of positive thinking. She’s happy when she’s with you. Just stop running off and leaving her behind.”

  “I plan to,” Jason said, feeling the reprimand like a slap in the face and a reminder of the past he had to overcome with Kat.

  The dealer called for bets and slid chips in front of Jason. Hank slid two twenty-five dollar chips to the table.

  “Since when do you gamble?” Jason asked, sliding his own bet forward.

  “Since today,” Hank said, downing his drink and flagging the waitress to say, “Two shots of tequila.”

  No food and alcohol. Not a winning plan, Jason thought, catching the waitress to add, “And something to eat. Pretzels, nuts, whatever you can get me that’s allowed in the gaming area.” He turned back to the table as the dealer looked to Hank to make decisions on his cards. Hank hit sixteen when the dealer had a three. You never hit a sixteen when the dealer had a three, because you knew the dealer’s best hand was thirteen while your chances of going out were high.

  The dealer threw down a face card and Hank now had more than twenty-one. He was busted. He cursed. Jason had a three and a five. He took a hit and was dealt another three. He hit again. The dealer gave him a face card and a solid winning hand of twenty-one. Hank’s screw-up worked out okay for him. The rest of the table—not so much. Everyone else lost their hand. Someone grumbled about bad players and got up. Jason didn’t blame him. He might not make a habit of gambling, but he knew his game when he did and he didn’t play with people who didn’t.

  Jason cocked his head at Hank. “Why are we here, Hank? You know Sheila and Kat are worried sick.”

  The waitress stopped beside them and Hank tossed down a few gambling chips for a tip, then grabbed his shot off the tray, downed it, and gave the waitress the empty glass. “We’re here because I’m trying to make back mine and Sheila’s stock portfolio she has no idea I lost.”

  Jason sat there in stunned silence before emptying his shot glass as well, and giving it to the waitress. He ignored the bowl of nuts and his phone vibrating at his hip. “How much?”

  “Two hundred and fifty thousand,” Hank said, and then to the waitress. “Another round.”

  “Scratch that,” Jason said to the woman. “We’re going to the bar where they have larger glasses.”

  “I’m all for that,” Hank agreed, and shoved his chips toward the dealer. “Cash me out.”

  “And me,” Jason said, pushing his forward, but he suddenly realized the waitress was still standing there.

  She thrust her empty tray at him with a pen and a napkin on top. “Can I have your autograph?”

  “Why does everyone think you are that guy on that show?” Hank asked in an impressively convincing voice. “You’re not near as good-looking even if you think you are.” He eyed the waitress. “You want my autograph, too? I’ll sign Sean Connery if you want. You can tell them all I have a lot more hair than you thought I did.”

  The girl was young, not more than twenty-one, and she blushed, her cheeks flushing a bright red. “I’m so sorry. I really thought you were him. You just look so much like him and I heard he was in Vegas for a show.”

  Her embarrassment sent a rush of guilt through Jason. His fame was a blessing, even if it didn’t feel like it at times. He knew that. It let him do things for his family. It would let him help Kat’s. He just couldn’t get used to living under a microscope. He enjoyed creating stars, not being one himself.

  Jason grabbed the he napkin and signed it, then snatched the hundred dollar chip the dealer had given him to cash out and tossed it on her tray. “Please make sure anyone you told I was here believes you were mistaken. At least, until I’m not here anymore.”

  “It is you,” she whispered. “It is.”

  “Yes. It is.”

  She smiled brightly. “My lips are sealed. You are not you. Thank you so much.” She rushed away.

  Jason and Hank quickly headed for a dimly lit bar area with leather armchairs and round glowing blue tables. Hank flagged a waitress and ordered drinks while Jason quickly typed a message to Kat. Bad phone reception in casino. No other woman. No one sick or dying. Try to sleep. I know you won’t but try.

  She immediately replied, What is going on?

  At least he knew she got the message. He typed, I’ll explain later, and then knew Kat wouldn’t take that answer, and quickly added, retirement jitters, now go to bed. Trust me, Kat. Everything is going to be fine.

  “Must be hell to be famous,” Hank said. “I mean, it has to be tough to have all them girls pawing all over you, and movie stars hanging on your arms.”

  Jason tensed, more than a little surprised by the accusation in Hank’s words when he’d sensed nothing of this before now. They did say that alcohol made people say what was on their minds, and there was no missing the undertone. Nor did Jason doubt the fragility of it coming from a protective father with too much tequila and a really bad day under his belt.

  Jason returned his phone to his belt without answering Kat’s next message and focused on her father, looking Hank straight in the eye. “The life I want is with Kat.”

  “Now that you got the starlets out of your system?”

  “Kat and I were split up,” he said. “I tried to move on. It didn’t work.”

  “It took you too long to figure that out.”

  That wasn’t true, but that was a conversation for Jason and Kat. “Things between Kat and I have always been complicated.”

  “Then it won’t work out now any more than in the past. You should walk away before you tear her apart right when I’m about to destroy her mother.”

  Destroy? Whoa. That was a strong word and Jason was officially concerned that there was more going on here than he’d first imagined. Jason leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “Talk to me, Hank. What happened? What the hell is going on?”

  A muscle in Hank’s jaw clenched. “You hear about the Smith-Wright investment company?”

  “Yeah,” Jason said, seeing where this was headed. “It’s been all over the news. All of the key executives were arrested for fra
ud.”

  “That’s the one,” he said. “They had our retirement portfolio for ten years, though Sheila never knew. I take care of our finances and I always have. Those guys gave me reports, showed I’d doubled our money and kept me investing. According to them I’d turned two hundred thousand dollars into five hundred thousand dollars over that decade. Sheila and I were set for retirement.” He scrubbed his hand over his lightly stubbled jaw and when the waitress appeared by his side he paid her and downed his shot before handing Jason his.

  “Don’t make me drink alone, son,” Hank said when Jason went to set the glass on the table. “Not tonight.”

  Jason didn’t enjoy being drunk or out of control, not even a little bit. And even if he did, like it or not, he was famous, and he had to guard his public behavior. He also needed Hank to keep talking.

  Jason braced himself for the bite of the liquor and poured the shot into his mouth. “That’s it for me until I eat,” he announced when the burn let him speak again. “I’m done.”

  “It’s gone now,” Hank said, and he wasn’t talking about the tequila. “All of the money is gone. Every dime Sheila and I had saved. Every dime Kat insisted we take when I didn’t want to take it. I figured I was just investing it for her. I’d give it back with a little extra in return.”

  “And you thought coming here was the way to get the money back?” Jason asked, trying to ignore the angry churn of his stomach and hating the slight buzz in his head.

  “Why the hell not?” Hank demanded defensively. “I see people get lucky all the time, living on the edge and doing things wrong. I’ve spent a lifetime doing everything right, planning and preparing, and where did that get me? Sheila wants to travel. She’s waited that lifetime with me, and worked her backside off to see the world. Now I have to tell her she waited with the wrong man. I destroyed her dream.”

  Jason and Kat had spent years apart, chasing opportunities he’d naively called dreams that were supposed to make them happy. For him that idea had been a big failure. “You two have something special, Hank. Whatever goes right or wrong, you have each other, and that’s what matters.”

  “I know that,” he said. “I do. But Sheila has always dreamed and I swore I’d make those dreams come true.”

  “You still can,” Jason said. “I’ll give you the money you lost including the return you were promised.”

  Hank stared at him blankly, as if he didn’t compute what he’d said. “You’re telling me that you’d give me five hundred thousand dollars,” he snapped his fingers, “just like that.”

  “Without a second of hesitation.”

  Hank blinked at him and then scrubbed his jaw. “Holy hell.” He mumbled something to himself and then refocused on Jason. “I’m not taking your money, son, but the fact that you just offered it to me tells me that you love my daughter even more than I thought you did. You do what you have to do to make her see that. You win her back.”

  “I’m going to give it a try,” Jason assured him. “Look, Hank, you and Sheila have always been family to me. Besides, the studio pays me an insane amount of money for sitting at the judging table. Millions of dollars which I invest and turn into more. I won’t miss this money, but you will. You and Sheila go live your dreams together, the way Kat and I should have lived ours.”

  “If you were me, would you take the money?”

  No, Jason thought. He’d have too much pride. “This will be our secret with no strings attached. If Kat kicks me to the curb, it changes nothing. This is my gift to you.”

  “I’m not taking your money, Jason.”

  There was such absoluteness to the tone that Jason knew he had to change strategies. “How much do you have left in your retirement fund?”

  “Ten thousand.”

  Of the five hundred thousand he’d thought he had. Jason knew that had to sting. “You say you want to gamble tonight? To throw caution to the wind?”

  “That was the idea.”

  “Then bet with me. Give me the ten thousand dollars to play, because let’s be honest here, you don’t know what you are doing at those tables. If I can turn that money into a hundred thousand, then you let me take it to my investment guy to work some magic. Your money turned into more money. No borrowing and no gift. No need to be prideful. You can forget any of this ever happened and book your first trip to wherever you want to go.”

  “How are you going to turn ten thousand into a hundred thousand?”

  “I’m really good at craps,” Jason said, pushing to his feet. “Which I’m going to play at the high stakes tables. You have to bet big to win big.”

  Hank stood up, his eyes clouded over, his pupils dilated. “And if you lose?”

  Jason patted his back. “We’ll be needing a lot more tequila.”

  The waitress approached but Jason waved her away before Hank saw her. The last thing Jason needed right now was more of a buzz going on in his own head.

  They left the lounge area with Jason fully intending to get Hank to take his money one way or another. Jason was taking care of Kat’s parents. The craps tables were confusing to newbies, and though Jason really was good at the game, Hank would never know if Jason won or lost. Not if he tipped the right people enough money, which he intended to do. He had this under control despite the tequila. Everything was going to be fine. And Jason believed that right up until the moment he and Hank walked around a corner and straight into the path of two men in suits. Hank and the two men stopped dead in their tracks.

  Hank—calm, collected, normally reserved Hank—was apparently hanging by a thread that snapped. “These two buzzards work at Smith-Wright,” Hank growled and shoved one of them.

  Before Jason could even react, the cameras began to flash and people gathered around them. Trouble was here and it wasn’t going to go away without dragging him and Hank into a whole lot of that spotlight Jason didn’t enjoy. And he knew the press. They’d investigate Hank, and they’d figure out the connection. He and Kat were about to be outed as exes and if he didn’t calm Hank down, that might be the best of the worst to come.

  * * *

  AN HOUR AFTER Jason’s last text, Kat snuggled into the oversized blue chair in her parents’ living room, with her mother resting on the matching couch, and flipped on the ten o’clock news.

  “I wish they’d call,” her mother murmured, clearly not watching the television. She leaned up on her elbow. “What if it’s not retirement jitters? What if Hank is having a full-fledged midlife crisis and we’re not as happy as I thought we were?”

  “Stop doing this to yourself, Mom. I read you Jason’s text. If there was something to worry about, he would have told me.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Yes, I’m sure.”

  “What if Hank hadn’t told Jason everything yet? And my God, what did he tell him?”

  “Mom,” Kat said softly, understanding how she must feel. How Kat herself would feel if this were Jason acting strangely. “Jason is with him. Dad knows he will tell me what is going on. If he didn’t want you to know do you think he would have been that quick to invite Jason to join him?”

  “…Jason Alright from Stepping Up…”

  Kat’s attention whipped to the television and her mother sat up and increased the volume.

  “…was involved in a disturbance at the Blue Moon Casino…”

  Kat and her mother were both standing now, both dialing their phones, trying to reach Jason and Hank.

  “…a section of the casino was shut down but has now reopened. No more details are available.”

  “No answer,” Kat said.

  Sheila shook her head. “Let’s get over there. I’ll call the hotel while you drive.”

  “And the police station,” Kat said grimly. “And let’s hope they aren’t there.”

  10

  JASON AND HER father weren’t answering their phones, but they weren’t in jail, per her mother’s call to the police station. That was the one good thing Kat had to cling to as she an
d her mother rushed to the front desk of the Blue Moon Casino.

  “I need to locate Jason Alright,” Kat said to the tall, thin twenty-something male attendant behind the counter.

  “Jason Alright?” the man asked, looking down on her from beneath his dark rimmed glasses.

  Her brows dipped. “I know you know who I’m talking about.”

  “No, ma’am,” he said primly. “I’m afraid I do not.”

  “Listen up,” her mother said, letting the tough E.R. nurse who took charge in the center of disaster shine through for the first time tonight. “You can’t tell me you don’t know the judge from Stepping Up when he was the center of attention right here in this hotel only a short while ago. Jason is her husband. Find him, find someone who knows how to find him or just plain go get him yourself.”

  The man stared at her for several terse seconds and then eyed Kat, inspecting her T-shirt and messy hair with a bit of disdain. Thank goodness her leggings were hidden below the counter. His lips tightened. “I’ll return momentarily.” He turned away and left them to wait.

  Kat glanced around the crowded lobby, and it was clear that her mother’s loudly spoken words had garnered unwanted attention as pointing and whispering had begun. Kat cringed as numerous cell phone pictures were taken. She was officially outed as Jason’s wife, and she wasn’t even his wife anymore. Nevertheless, they had a history, and the connection between them was bound to come out. She’d simply hoped to get a little farther into the show than the first week of rehearsals.

  “Mom,” Kat said. “Jason and I—”

  “Love each other,” she finished. “So don’t let him go. This time is it, Kat. I feel it in my gut. He’s going all the way or he’s going away and it has to be that way. You both have to get on with life, one way or the other.”

  Kat sucked in a breath at the blunt reality etched so precisely into those words. Deep down Kat knew that if Jason exited her life again, he was gone for good, but hearing it from her mother was a blow. Her stomach knotted because history said he would leave again, and while part of her said this time together was something, they needed to be able to move on. Another part of her though could still feel his touch and smell him on her skin, could still hear his deep voice, see his smile, and that part of her hoped for a future with Jason.