“We clean up good. We should take a picture.” Coop threw an arm around Darcy’s waist and hustled her over to the showgirl with a red plume shooting out of a gold helmet. Her only job seemed to be posing for pictures with tourists. That, and avoiding the handsy men walking by who seemed to think her barely-covered-anything red and gold sequins were an invitation to touch. Too bad he couldn’t arrest anyone for being a stupid jerkwad.
The idea of a picture with her was just cheesy and stupid enough to be fun. Brad looked down at Trina. She’d done something with her makeup he couldn’t begin to pin down. He just knew her eyes looked bigger, and as green as the lucky shamrocks they sold in the hotel gift shop.
“Are you up for a photo?”
She tossed her hair, in bouncy curls for the night, and beamed up at him. “Don’t you know? I’m always up for anything and everything.”
“Yeah. You are.” So different from the way Dana had considered every invite, running through the list of who might be there and if an event would be of worthwhile business potential. She’d claimed her time was money, and too important to waste. Which had made Brad wonder more than once why spending time with him wasn’t more important than money. “That’s one of the things I like so much about you.” He tucked her against his front. Slung his arms down to hold tight at her waist. Tried not to notice that from that position he could look straight down what she’d informed him was a tightly laced white bustier to where he was quite sure she wasn’t wearing any bra. That effort lasted about four seconds until he said fuck it. He’d look his fill of her creamy breasts every opportunity he got. To ignore their perfection would just be rude. Like staring at your shoes while walking through an art museum.
“Everybody smile,” Coop ordered.
Brad quickly pulled his gaze up to flash his teeth at the camera. And then triple-blinked as about ten flashes went off. Tourists were so excited to take a shot of the Caesars girl that they apparently didn’t care about the four strangers also in the picture. Weird.
“Let’s shoot some craps.” Coop practically bounced right out of his shoes. Then he smoothed his tie, the same color as Darcy’s emerald green slip dress. Three times. And then he smoothed back his hair with both hands. What the hell was with him all of a sudden? He wasn’t acting drunk. More jittery, like he’d had eight cups of coffee.
Brad gave in to temptation and spiked his fingers through Trina’s soft curls. Considered blowing off trying his luck at the tables completely to try his luck with Trina, instead. But he wouldn’t just ditch his cousin and Darcy. Blue balls were no excuse for bailing on a friend. Besides, some things—some women—were worth waiting for. After their kisses on the beach, he knew Trina fit that bill. They’d hang, have some laughs and wait at least half an hour before escaping. So he jerked his thumb at the opposite side of the room.
“I don’t want to lose my entire bankroll in three minutes. No craps for me. I’m more of a blackjack guy. I’m comforted by the pretense that I have some say in how I lose my money.”
Coop snorted. “Pretense is right. You know the house always wins.”
“Sure, eventually. But I’ll drink their free booze and have a good time until that happens.”
“I’ll watch you for a while,” said Trina. “Then I thought I’d just hang out at the penny slots and get more bang for my buck. My strategy is that it’s about how long you play, not how much you win. Plus,” she raised her right arm and struck a body-building pose, “I’ll bulk up my biceps by pulling that handle over and over.”
Dipping his head, Brad kissed the soft, smooth skin of her upper arm. Wondered how long they’d have to stick with Coop and Darcy before sneaking away to kiss more of her. “Remind me not to arm-wrestle you for anything this weekend.”
“Focus, guys. We can all split up later. Let’s just shoot a few rounds of craps first.”
Darcy shook her head. “Craps looks complicated. I’m feeling more like Hold ‘Em. I’ve been playing that since college. How about we all split up, and the first one to win fifty dollars texts us and we take a break to visit that gelato bar we just passed downstairs?”
Coop paled. Seriously, his cousin looked about to toss his cookies. Checked his watch for the third time since getting off the escalator. “No. We don’t split up. Not yet. I, uh, took some lessons from a guy on the force.”
“What guy?” Gambling wasn’t exactly something you could do in the middle of the squad room.
The look Coop shot him could’ve pitted a cherry at fifty paces. “Just a guy, okay?” He turned back to Darcy. Grabbed her hand and Trina’s. “Come watch me for five minutes. Blow on my dice for luck. Then you can all go do your own thing.”
Patting him on the shoulder, Darcy said, “Sure. You want to show off your smooth dice moves? I’m all over it.”
“Sorry about this,” Brad muttered in Trina’s ear as they crossed into the mob scene of the gambling floor. “Coop’s not usually this much of a pain in the ass.”
The craps area was the most crowded. Each table had three croupiers and a pit boss. At least ten people crowded around each long oval. They passed a few tables full of players who looked way too serious. People leaned on the padded bumpers as through bracing for a crash. They all wore the same dead, fixed stare directed down at the green felt with the Caesars logo in the center of the table. Another table was all old men, one with a towel slung over his shoulder for God knows what reason.
A croupier with slicked-back hair gestured at them. “I just opened up this table. How about you folks are the first to win at it tonight?”
Coop stepped right up to the rail. Oddly enough, the plumed-up picture girl, two more sexy gladiator-costumed women and a guy in a toga drifted over to watch. As did a couple of waitresses and another pit boss. What the hell was going on? Were they christening this table? Was Coop the one millionth person to roll the bright orange and yellow dice?
A stack of bills got changed for chips. Coop held up the dice in one fist. Laughing, Darcy blew them a kiss. Eyes never leaving hers, he tossed them the length of the table. Everyone started cheering. And then silence fell as a shiny ring plopped inside the white borders of the pass line. Holy shit. This explained Coop’s squirreliness.
He seemed to have gathered his courage, though, because his voice was as sure as a referee announcing a touchdown. “I just rolled the dice on my future. But I don’t need Lady Luck to smile on me. She did that already, the day she rolled the wave that swept you into my arms.”
Oh, that was good stuff. Romantic. Brad wondered how many times Coop had written and rewritten this little speech before practicing it in front of a mirror. It already put his own proposal to Dana to shame. They’d kind of fallen into agreement about marriage one night when she’d complained about visiting him at his house. Dana thought it’d be better if they got married and Brad moved into her snazzy waterfront condo. Looking back, he’d been an idiot to agree to it. Which he’d done just to get her to stop complaining about how there wasn’t any good light in his bathroom mirror, and how all the floors creaked in his hundred-year-old rowhouse. Trying to ward off another fight? Not the strongest foundation for a marriage. Thank God it was all behind him now.
Coop cupped her cheek. “All I need, Darcy, is you. You’re all I want. A life with you. Making a family with you. You’re the sweetest, smartest woman I know. I love the sparkle in your eyes when you talk about the kids you’re helping at school. The evil glint you get right before you tickle me. The way you close your eyes and smile every time you bite into a brownie. I can’t tell you how much it means that you support me being a detective, despite the danger and the crazy hours. I want to spend every day of the rest of my life trying to show you how much I love you.”
Instead of chips, the croupier used his long-handled rake to push the ring over to Coop. “I wanted this ring to be more than bling. This sapphire represents
the ocean that brought us together, and the diamonds on either side are you and me.” Darcy started to reach for it. Coop closed his hand around it and jerked it away with a sly grin. “But to get it, you have to answer one question.”
He dropped to one knee. Tears welled up in both the women. And damned if Brad didn’t feel a clutch at his gut watching the moment his best friend changed the course of his life. “So, Darcy Trent, will you marry me?”
“Detective Hudson, can’t you figure that out without any clues?” Darcy dropped into Coop’s arms, kicking her feet up behind her as he stood and swung her around. Then everything happened at once. All the Caesars employees burst into applause. A champagne cork popped. The four of them shared a round of hugs. The girls shared a round of squeals. Someone pressed champagne into their hands and they all clinked glasses.
“See?” Brad grinned at his cousin. “I told you this was a great night. One we’d be talking about for years.”
“And that was before I raised the ante with a proposal. Think what a letdown it’ll be when all of us just go out for pizza back in Baltimore.”
“I’m looking forward to lots of those boring, sucky nights with you guys,” Darcy teased.
“I’m proud of you, Coop. Lucky bastard. You sure picked a winner.” Brad turned to Darcy, and gave her a gentler version of the bear hug he’d given Coop. “I’d say welcome to the family, but you’ve been a part of ours for months already.”
“And you’ve all made me feel so included. Oh my gosh, we’re going to have a family.” With the speed of a supersonic pendulum, Darcy’s focus shifted right back to her new fiancé. “We have to have a boy who looks like you, honey, to torment the next generation of women.”
“They need a couple of minutes to wallow in happiness,” Trina murmured. “Plus, picking baby names for their firstborn isn’t my idea of a hot night on the famous Boardwalk.” She grabbed his hand and tugged him away from the table. They left the craps section, crossing to the opposite side of the casino floor.
Brad paused in front of a bank of glowing slot machines. “Thunder of Zeus. Amazon Temple. Jewel of the Dragon. Which one do you want to sink your pennies into?”
“Mmm, none of them right now. I think Coop and Darcy are overloaded with all the good fortune in the whole room.”
Yep. For once, tonight the house wasn’t the big winner. “Want to get out of here for a little bit? Get some fresh air? It’s safe to say they won’t notice if we leave.”
Trina hooted in laughter. “They wouldn’t notice if Caesars emptied their entire vault right at Darcy’s feet.” As they walked through the blackjack tables toward the exit, she demanded, “Teach me something.”
“Never hit on seventeen.”
She hip-checked him. “I’m serious. You’re a trained detective, and I’m training to become a detective. This is the perfect place to observe people. Help me boost my observational skills.”
Could be fun. Obi-Wan always seemed to get a kick out of mentoring an apprentice. And Trina had a point about this being a people cesspool. Brad could drop a few observational truths her way. “Hookers always carry their phone in their right hand.”
A nod, like she was absorbing the info. Then she torqued her head up at him. “Why?”
How the hell should he know? It cracked him up the way her mind burrowed into shadowy corners other people ignored. “Good question. Next time I walk past one in Holding, I’ll be sure to ask.”
“Okay, then, how can I spot a hooker without a phone?”
Instinct. Experience. But he knew neither of those answers would satisfy her. “See that super tall, busty blonde with the short, bald guy? The way he’s hanging onto her like a trophy? Not talking to her, just hanging on to her and talking to his friends? That’s not a relationship. That’s a business transaction.” Brad did not want to spend the rest of the night talking about hookers. Or crime. Pushing through the doors onto the Boardwalk, he said, “Here ends the lesson.”
They got in a Rolling Chair, Brad ducking beneath the bright blue awning to sit on the matching, side-by-side cushion. It was a tight fit. Gave him the excuse to put his arm around Trina’s shoulders and pull her close. He’d have done even more if the guy pushing the chair from behind wasn’t mere inches away. But just holding her felt great. Brad breathed deep the salt-tinged air. Tried to think about the woman practically in his lap, instead of circling back to what had just gone down inside.
“I feel lazy,” Trina announced.
Brad laughed. She always said the first damn thing that tripped off her tongue. “It’s supposed to be romantic. Would you feel lazy if this was a horse-drawn carriage ride through Central Park?”
“Good point.” Squirming even closer, she draped a leg across his. A leg that was bare from toe all the way up to the hem of her short black ruffled skirt. It made him wish he could rip off his pants to feel her skin against his. She rested her head on his chest and relaxed.
The mix on the Boardwalk was totally different at night. No more kids. The gaggles of teenagers were older. There were still obvious, wide-eyed tourists in striped tees with sweaters draped over their shoulders against the ocean breeze, women clutching huge purses. Older, seedier souvenir shops gave way to over-the-top theme restaurants with neon waves on the roof and twenty-foot-tall fake palm trees. Every block they rolled brought a different, glitzy casino. And then the pattern reversed as they neared the end of the Boardwalk.
Trina drew a slow pattern on his thigh. “How do you feel about Coop proposing?”
“Darcy’s great. They’re great together. I’m thrilled for them.”
“No, I mean, how do you feel about him doing it tonight?”
This felt less like small talk and more like a therapy session. Brad stilled her wandering hand. “Why?”
“He hijacked your non-honeymoon. You don’t so much seem to be wallowing in misery. Instead, it looks to me as if you’re trying everything to distract yourself from it. And in waltzed Coop, spiking your brain right back into wedding stuff.”
Trina didn’t need any help with being observant. She’d read him with the ease of a comic book. “Yeah.”
“Does it bother you?”
“Yeah. I mean, not really.” He rubbed his cheek against the top of her head. “I get why Coop did it tonight. He took advantage of the opportunity to do something different. Memorable. I’d be a real jackass if I let that bother me.”
“But...”
“Now I’m thinking about it. How he knocked it out of the park with that proposal. I didn’t put a quarter of his thought or effort into the one I did last year.”
“What else?”
Without even looking him in the eye, Trina could tell there was more. The woman had good instincts. It’d be fun to watch her grill a suspect. Eventually. After many, many more months of training and supervision. “How you can tell that Coop and Darcy are going to last just by looking at the two of them. And how my engagement failed. I’m not used to failing. It feels shitty.”
“So at this point, the failing feels worse to you than the actual loss of Dana.”
“Yes, Doctor Trimble,” he said sarcastically, “that is what’s kicking me in the nuts.”
“I try things and fail at them all the time. It’s called living with no regrets.”
“Uh, no. I regret failing. Big time.”
She twisted around to look up at him. “But at least if you try, you’ve got a chance at succeeding. Failure isn’t guaranteed. If you don’t even try at all, you’ve already failed.”
It was total pop psychology. But Coop had told him to talk to someone about this whole mess. Trina was the easiest person to talk to he’d ever run across. And he planned to kibosh this pseudo-therapy session the minute they got off the Rolling Chair. He could be real with her for another half block. “So I’m a winner just for t
rying.” It came out gruff, mocking. Because if he believed it, he was off the hook. No more beating himself up. It couldn’t be that easy.
She smiled at him with all the pride of a teacher bestowing a gold star. “Yes.”
Still too easy. But tempting to believe. Trina sure skipped through life as happy as could be. It worked for her. So why not give this new approach to his engagement fuck-up a try? “And if I learn from my failure, it’ll keep me from screwing up as bad when I try again—so I actually come out ahead?”
“Now you get it. That’s how I look at life. Why don’t you chew on that for a little while? See if you enjoy the flavor of it?”
They hopped out and started walking inland hand-in-hand, just a block from where the land curved at a ninety-degree angle. Past a barbershop that was not only open, but full of customers an hour before midnight on a Saturday night. Past rows of gray condos with shingled roofs and brown-railinged balconies all with drying beach towels flapping.
While they walked, Brad thought about Trina’s viewpoint. The freedom in not beating himself up anymore. Because Coop hadn’t revealed any great truths last night that hadn’t already occurred to Brad. Yeah, Dana ditched him. Long before she actually called off their engagement. But he let her. He didn’t fight for her. Probably for the best, seeing as how he didn’t miss her.
He’d never again stay with a woman who checked out of his life, of their life together. What he needed was a woman who didn’t want a separate life. At least not completely separate. Brad wanted to dive in with both hands and get messy. Get soaked with all the bits and pieces of her life, and vice versa. He wanted someone who’d put, not him first—’cause that would make him a self-centered dick—but them first. Damned if he wasn’t curious if Trina could be that woman.
Love on the Boardwalk Page 9