by Lying Eyes
“If there’s anything you need, anything at all, you’ll find me?” She all but purred the words trying to hide the twisted way her lips curved into a well understood smile.
“Count on it.” He held his hand out for Audra and helped her from her chair. They left with the happy hostess at their side. She never once made eye contact or even acknowledged the young woman he escorted. Finally, when they were ready to exit the building, Max turned to Audra and quickly introduced her.
After brief introductions, he added a little jab. “Yes, you might want to find her one of those business cards, too. She was the chip leader yesterday at the Main Event and she’s not too far from the lead today. It’s worth your while to pay attention to this one.” He winked at Audra and webbed his fingers through hers.
The thirty-something year old woman’s jaw dropped. It seemed likely she replayed the last ten or fifteen minutes and quickly remembered she practically sneered at the woman Max brought there for dinner. Good. Max hated the false pretenses found in the casino world and on occasion, he found the charades they all played quite comical. The inner circles were appealing when it suited him but right then—it didn’t. Special treatment or unnecessary favors were unwanted. He only had eyes for Audra and since he quickly made up his mind to keep her close while he was in Las Vegas, he didn’t care who knew it.
Stepping out into the desert heat, Max took the lead and slowly moved them through a still crowd looking up at the overpowering display of lights. He wrapped his arm comfortably around her shoulder and it was the first time he’d touched her that she hadn’t flinched with the closer contact. Something he noticed before he released a sigh of contentment, maybe even relief.
Audra stared at the dancing images. The musical beats filled the streets.
“I take it you don’t like casino hosts?” She teased him openly about his obvious and rude behavior.
“Are you kidding? I love them—most of them anyway.”
“They’ve always been great to me.”
“Most of them men, I imagine.” He grinned. He continued to stare up as the images scattered across the illuminated sky.
“Yes, but a few females have contacted me too, and they’re just as generous with comps as the men I see.”
“See?” He knew his question gave everything away. He didn’t care and he went for more insight. “How often do you see your hosts?”
“You know,” she popped a mint in her mouth and offered him one too. “When I need a comp or something, I see someone for freebies.” She turned her back to him but he saw the wide smile she unsuccessfully attempted to conceal.
He lightly touched her arm and turned her back around to face him. “What’s so funny?”
“You are—and you’re really cute when you act this way.”
“I plead the fifth.” He winked. “And that’s as much as you get.” Cute? He wanted her to think of him as sexy and manly, but cute? So what, he’d take it for now.
“I’m not seeing any of my hosts for the record—or anyone else.” She added the last part as an act of good faith.
“Good,” he replied, “but I didn’t pry.” He didn’t leave anything to chance either. He wanted her to know he was interested. “I’m glad I don’t have to worry about the annoyance of competition.”
“I never said you didn’t have competition,” she teased.
He kissed her then, on impulse. Just a brush of lips but a public peck all the same. “Audra, believe me when I tell you this,” he teased, “I don’t have competition, because you already want me and understand, I’m a confident man. I know what I see. I see a woman who can’t wait to get me in her bed. You can try to deny it, go ahead. It won’t change things. Thoughts of me completely fill your devious little head.” He pointed to her temple.
Audra’s mouth dropped. “You’re worse than I thought. More arrogant than I ever imagined.”
“I’m sure that’s true.” He still held her close before he finished with a whisper, “The problem is, you view me as the enemy and until you get past that, you can’t tie me up and make passionate love to me all night long.” He released her then. “And darlin’, it’s a shame you can’t forget about the tournament for a few hours, because I can do things to you that you’ll never experience on a casino floor.”
Her eyes bugged and he pressed his finger to her lips with a smile. “Shh…don’t say a word. I know I’m right.”
“And just what if you’re—”
“Wrong?” A groan hung in his throat, maybe a growl. “Sweetheart, it would truly be a first.”
* * * *
Rather than get all hot and bothered, she seemed to make light of the provocative word disruption on the way back to The Rio. After numerous sexual insinuations, he would’ve preferred to find her smokin’ hot and ready for him, but he understood. It might take her another night or two to accept the fact that she was already on a freeway headed straight for his bed.
He hesitated outside of her suite once they returned. He didn’t want to say goodnight but he realized she still wasn’t so sure about him. She didn’t trust him and maybe she never would. He wasn’t asking her to love, honor and stay—not yet anyway.
“So are you going to invite me in?” He leaned his arm up against the door and kissed her lightly on the lips. “I’ll behave.”
“I bet.”
“Wanna?”
“No, I don’t. It’s one I can’t win.” She stepped inside and closed the door. Her voice changed when she quietly said the words and behind them, if he searched hard enough, a truer meaning lingered.
* * * *
Audra didn’t make a habit out of sleeping with strangers. While she liked to think she was all grown up and more than enough woman to handle him, something significant held her back. Max the poker player versus Max the sexy man twisted her nerves into spasms. She didn’t want to dwell on it but it seemed hard to think about anything else. The man slept only inches away from her and they were, in a sense, sharing the same roof.
She paced the floor and took a deep, but shattered breath. It hitched in her chest just like it did when she heard him threaten to teach her things she would never learn on the casino floor. He didn’t say ‘teach,’ she reminded herself, his word of choice was ‘do,’ and that too only dampened her with wet anticipation. Trouble with Max and men like Max was that they expected something in return when they made a play for Audra.
It was because of the world she lived in that most men mistakenly believed she had it going on behind closed doors. Hers had never so much as revolved like a merry-go-round packed with lovers. In fact, it never rotated at all.
Squatting down next to her stuffed suitcase, she tugged out her less-than-sexy pajamas. Her mind immediately went right back to Max.
Men like Max didn’t settle for women like Audra. Oh sure, she understood what they saw when she took the time to peer in the mirror but her beauty could only take her so far. Besides, a man didn’t fuck a woman’s face, well not in the literal sense anyway—she stopped tugging items from her luggage—or did he? She would think about that another time. Right now, she had bigger oceans to cross. Max was going to make his move and when he did, she wasn’t going to know what to do. She had all the utensils, she reminded herself again, but she just didn’t know how to use them to stir up a man’s meal, one that would keep him coming back for more.
She stepped into the bottom half of her plaid pajamas when the light knock on her door came. She lightly kicked up her heels and did a silent dance before she casually opened the door. “I’m glad you knocked because I meant to thank you. I can’t believe I forgot it. I should be embarrassed…”
His eyes fell immediately to her chest. “Have sweet fucking mercy.” He didn’t offer to take his gaze elsewhere.
If her nipples were hard before he made the growl of true carnal hunger only a man ready to fire understands, they all but pressed into tight little gems with his uninhibited endorsement. Yeah, approval from him tempted most wo
men, even her.
Before she opened the door, she forgot the obvious show of cleavage and the gentle contour of her breasts. Given the snug camisole, she could see where he might think pajamas looked sexy. He left little to chance the minute his expression changed from mischievous to ravenous. She crossed one arm over her chest and reached for the door. “I um…I uh…don’t have an excuse for my um…”
“There’s none needed. The explanation was in your kiss earlier today. It’s all the encouragement I needed to knock again.”
“You must’ve misread something because I’m not sure how you could’ve assumed anything at all from just one—”
He wasted little time leading her right through a refresher course and his mouth nipped at hers with a smooth reminder. The kiss lingered and his hands headed for her southernmost region—yep, backside. His palm stroked against her hip before he moved both hands to gently squeeze her only tighter against his lower body.
It didn’t take long for the kiss to turn sexy hot and that’s when a low moan stopped them both.
* * * *
Her eyes were wild. A brown blaze of something close in resemblance to fury washed over them when he released her. He didn’t offer a hint of an apology, like she might have wanted. “I’m not sorry. You felt—amazing.” His hands somehow ended up at her waist again. It took an act of God for him to remove them altogether and he only released her after he decided she might just smack the shit out of him.
Her entire face flashed an unexplainable warning but he saw something else there too—fear. Only then did he realize he overlooked something fairly important.
“Audra, have I scared you in any way?” he asked.
“That’s the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard.” She backed away though and he watched her take those three steps to do it.
“I have.” He studied her closer now. “Haven’t I?”
“No,” she replied quickly and turned away with the fib still on her lips.
It didn’t matter what she said, he saw the truth anyway.
In the last two years, he’d asked questions about her, a lot of them. He tried to find out anything he could about her from those who played on the circuit. No one anywhere could ever connect her to a man, no one. He couldn’t find a one night stand, a boyfriend in the closet, not one solitary man appeared from behind a curtain. Nothing. The reason? There wasn’t one to find.
“Hell’s fury.” He heard his voice but he couldn’t believe he’d verbally cursed his sudden thought. If anything, he should’ve cheered.
“I need to get to bed.” Maybe she didn’t want him to tell her of his suspicions. Maybe she really needed some shut-eye. “I think you should go.” She made the request flatly.
He stepped away then. He wanted to read her like an open smut book even though he didn’t think he’d find too much eroticism in her past, but she must’ve known what he was thinking. The quick blushing of cheeks proved two things—he was right and she was embarrassed. Now where did that leave him?
Stupid. Flat stupid.
“Seriously, I think it’s time to go,” she whispered.
Vulnerable and innocent; a man like him should be damned for wanting to rob her of one while making her feel the deeper threat of the other but he was going to do it if she gave him half a chance. He couldn’t help himself.
It only took him a Las Vegas minute to figure out what to do next, even his cock settled down to a manageable size. “Tell you what, I’m a great story teller. Let me…,” he moved to the bed and provided a quick turn down service, “tell you one or two of them and then I’ll tuck you in and say goodnight. You can later tell your grandkids that the great Max Reynolds, poker legend and winner of the 2007 World Series of Poker competition, tucked you in the night before he took your chip stack. Then, you can watch in complete—and alarming I might add—dismay as you witness the twinkle in their eyes. The recognition in their little voices,” he muttered.
He watched her entertain the idea because her brow arched and then relaxed. She seemed to like the fact she was off the hook all the more. She quickly crawled up the bed and slid under the covers before giggling out a response. “Dismay, huh?”
“Sure. I’m assuming you’re still here to win so I can only imagine the disappointment you’re going to feel when you do, in fact, lose.” His forefinger brushed over the tip of her nose and he kissed her cheek as he settled in beside her. “Since you did agree to have dinner with me, I’ll try to go easy if I’m the one forced to put your cute little ass out on the front steps.”
“Empty threats.” She tugged the sheet and comforter closer and tucked both across her breasts and under her arms.
He heard a grunt and recognized it well. If he didn’t—her eyes glued on his own told him he was definitely the guilty party.
“Okay.” He avoided another snappy exchange and started into his tall tales. “Once upon a time, there were two men. Actually three…”
“Is this a sex story?”
“No. Be quiet and listen.” He started again. “Two men ready to risk it all met a man by the name of Benny Binion—”
“Is this the story of the first World Series of Poker?”
“Yes,” he sighed. “Please try to pay attention. Remember, you love my stories.” The way she’d responded to his original poker tales when they first met in Tunica only drove him to tell her more of them now.
“I’ve heard it before.”
“Then you can hear my version and tell me which one you like better. The first one you heard or—”
“Or you can tell me a spicy bedtime story.” She grinned up at him with an inviting proposal, only he was smart enough to know she’d never let him take it that far.
Licked lips were unavoidable all the same. Sweet heaven, she teased him and the thoughts she provoked were done with pure malice. He was certain of it because the woman didn’t have a clue what he held in store for her. Not one solitary notion. And he was going to call her bluff just to prove it. No, he was fooling himself. He raised the stakes because he damn well wanted to know if she’d resist him, if it was even remotely possible once he pinned her under his body.
He moved his fingers to the base of her neck and lightly strummed them across her silky skin. Before he allowed either of them to get too carried away, he had a cupped grip around the side of her neck. A gentle motion nearly emulated a real slow screw. He squeezed and released. Stroked up then forward and back, the whole time his palm inspired a new form of seduction and what he’d give to just to sit there all night repeating the process over and over again. His eyes drifted, moved, searched—burned.
She caught his wrist after the impact of what he planned to do must’ve hit home. “About the stories?”
“There for a minute, I thought you were ready to write your own.” His lips slanted then and he didn’t wait. He kissed her tenderly at first but the way the woman responded, he didn’t play nice for long. She refused to let him. The kiss safely underway with true purpose, he moved his mouth from hers and kissed his way to the maddening fragrance right below her ear. He nibbled her earlobe before adding true commitment to the cause.
“Once I make love to you, you’ll never want for anything more.” His breathless promise left her body limp in his arms.
What a mistake. If he’d just kissed her and been easy to please, then he wouldn’t have to worry about an empty bed and blue balls. Someone should’ve warned him ahead of time. Virgins were easily scared off by experienced men with big dicks, large egos, and even bigger mouths. And then there was the pathetic choice of wording. Today’s woman wanted to be slowly screwed or fucked or something, anything but ‘made love’ to by a man with too many years and women under his belt.
She pushed on his belly and quickly began with her reasons why a little lovin’ and hanky-panky was pretty much out of the question. She did it with a firm, telling stare and tight upper lip. He had reason to believe she really wanted storytelling in lieu of becoming the heroine in a love
story he wanted to live out. As soon as he realized what she was already thinking, he all but ran for cover too.
* * * *
“I can’t do this.” She sat up. “I think you should go.”
“Okay.” He patted her head. She didn’t know why, but she really loved his attentive little caresses.
“I guess you think I’m a common tease.” She swallowed. “If it helps any, I think you’re probably right.” The slick heat gathering in between her legs confirmed she played around just long enough to be discounted as a woman who wanted it both ways.
“It doesn’t matter what I think. It matters what you want and I know you want me, you’re just trying to fight it. It’s fairly natural but I’m hard to resist once the right woman breathes in my ear, so consider yourself forewarned.”
“Hmmm…” She narrowed her eyes. “You’re not pissed?”
“Well, actually, I tell a mean story and I’m kind of disappointed you didn’t want to hear it but no, I’m not going to hold it against you, at least not tonight.”
“Still want to tell it?”
“Still want to listen?” His brow rose slightly.
“Is this a softer side of Max Reynolds sitting beside me or am I being played by the biggest player of all?”
“Maybe both. Satisfied?”
“Hardly.” The tone was carried across with far too much sex appeal, never mind the underlying significance found there too. Her hungry tongue encased her entire mouth with one quick swipe counterclockwise; purposefully slow.
“Damn it!” He moved to the edge of the bed and struggled to keep his hands placed in between his knees. He seemingly studied the somewhat peculiar pattern of the carpeting. He took a deep breath and then released it.
He leaned back on one arm. “Audra, I’m going to be blunt here because I think it’s important. I don’t want to play games with you but if we’re going to, then we both need to understand the rules and stick by them.”
He cleared his throat before he continued. “The day you sat down at my table, I pegged you for a tease and I’m beginning to believe I had it right the first time.”