“Having fun, you two?” she said in greeting. Jeez, she could be talky after some martinis, but what the hell? Destiny had brought the kids here for some reason, and she never stood in the way of cosmic traffic.
They garbled out a couple of uh-huhs.
So fate hadn’t made them cross her path because they were conversationalists. But that was okay, because she was bound and determined to sleep off some of those drinks she and the girls had been throwing down since eleven thirty. As she smiled at the boys, sweetly letting them know their semidiscussion was completed, she sat on her chaise. But just before she leaned back and closed her eyes, she caught a glimpse of a man who’d walked into the pool area.
Or, rather, the hunk of total burning love who’d wandered out from reality and straight into her sights.
Hub-ba. That was her heart talking, and it’d never shouted so loud at her, never forced her to her lose a pulse-beat in a way that made her think she was never going to get her body started up again. But when her heart did get back to business, so did her brain, processing everything about the new arrival.
His hair was the type of blond that reminded her of eternal youth, like in old movies with Brad Pitt, who’d seemed so immortal and shining gold. Even from here, Liz could tell his eyes were blue, too—the shade of runway lights in the dead of night, when she used to drive to McCarran Airport to watch the planes take off to places other people got to go. He wasn’t dressed like anything special, just the white shirt and long shorts of a tourist, but she could only sizzle for what she imagined was under the clothing: broad shoulders, gym-honed arms and chest and abs, an ass that would feel like granite if she gave it a good squeeze . . .
Phew. Funny how, one second, the world had been just a fun little playground for her and her friends, but the next . . .
Burning.
But there was something more about the man that made him extra-interesting. It was like he . . . walked alone? Carried himself apart from everyone else?
Odd, to get that kind of impression about him . . .
Someone cleared his throat. One of the boys? She’d forgotten the two of them were there.
Liz ripped her gaze away from the new arrival, who had been checking her out, too—yowza, what a look—and smiled at the kids. She shouldn’t be acting interested in the man, anyway. Let him come to her if that was in the cards because, not to be vain, that’s what males always did—at least at first. She’d been relying on her looks to attract others her whole life, and so had her mother, so she knew the drill. In fact, they’d banked on those looks since she was a baby chick trying out for commercials and going to ballet, tap, and jazz classes, so why stop now?
It was the after-attraction part that usually gave her problems.
Liz gave the kids in front of her a lazy smile, lying back on her chaise and stretching her arms over her head. Both boys’ eyes nearly popped out of their faces. Poor things.
Well, if they were going to hang around, she could put them to good use getting her one more drinky-winky. “Anyone thirsty?” she asked.
The guys looked at each other. You get her a drink. No, you get her one. She felt like Scarlett O’Hara at a barbecue, just without so much lace and taffeta covering her assets.
A female voice called from across the pool. “Damien?”
The boys snapped to attention.
“Shit,” said one of them under his breath.
They began to walk off, clearly on a short leash.
“Nice meeting you,” the other one said over his shoulder.
Yeah, all they’d done was gape, but when you were a girl who’d made a living strutting your stuff to blitzed tourists in the front rows of a casino’s theater, that was the norm.
Liz only lifted her hand in farewell as the kids walked back to a pair of girls in their early twenties who’d just arrived, unpacking their bags and giving Liz the evil eye.
Sorry, Liz thought. It wasn’t her fault gravity hadn’t hit hard yet, even if she was thirty-three. She’d only retired from show life a year ago because of a knee injury, teaching dance lessons for darling little rug rats at a studio until recently, but a hard body was still on her side.
Speaking of hard . . .
Heart twirling, she chanced another gaze over to where the blond stud had been standing. He was a man, not a boy, an intrigue she wouldn’t mind exploring, just for kicks. He’d be a nice change of pace from the group of gawking tourists she’d met earlier today, even if they had bought her and the girls a slew of martinis.
Just one look and she wanted more. Much more. There was just something about him . . .
He’d gone to the bar by the hot tub, taking a seat, his back to her. Hmm. Had she only been imagining the way his gaze had lingered on her when he’d first entered? Why hadn’t he sidled on over here like any other red-blooded males would’ve done by now, even if it was just to sit by the pool a few feet away to ogle her breasts?
That heart of hers—the one that’d been so giddy a few seconds ago—thudded, slowing down.
Was he . . . not so much into women? Or just not so much into her? Or maybe . . .
Liz smiled. If he was playing it cool, she could play it right back. And if he was meant to be more than a guy who’d wandered into the pool area, life would find a way to get him over here.
Liz gave him a few minutes. Then a few more, the top-forty music playing away, along with the laughter of her girls in the pool. With her eyes closed, she could even hear the chatter of Damien and his friend as their girls nattered at them about how they weren’t about to take off their tops and thanks very much for making them come to a place where they felt pressured to do it. Ew.
Peeking open one eye, Liz checked to see if the man was still at the bar, if he had turned around in his chair to face her yet. Boobs were boobs, and they were here for him to see. Come on already.
But he was having a drink, laughing with the bartender.
Something primitive in Liz blazed up. Maybe it was because the last blond she’d been with had turned his back on her, too. Jameson Hughes, business tycoon and, at first, a man who’d made her pulse go pitty-pat until she’d discovered he was as cold as they came. The night she’d had with him in Reno, he’d kissed her off with twenty thousand dollars and had barely woken up from his stupor in the morning, muttering at her to get the hell out. Bruised, and also knowing that he was angry because he couldn’t get a stiffie, she hadn’t argued, just scooped up that gift and walked out the door with as much pride as she could muster, knowing that he clearly wasn’t meant to be, anyway.
And that the money would at least make a tiny dent in the mountain of debt left from her mom’s sickness.
The fact that he’d given her money didn’t bother her—she was used to men giving her gifts. That happened when you were a showgirl, or even an ex- one. There was a glamour attached to the position, and even though Jameson’s gift had been a big one to her, she knew that, to him, it’d been small potatoes. And he hadn’t treated her like a prostitute or anything—the choice had been all hers to go home with him, thinking that this could be the start to a bright future . . . and it wasn’t the first time, either.
Stupid her. God, when she’d met this guy, she’d looked into his eyes and thought, Could he be the one, even if he’s had a tad too much to drink? Is this for real?
All she’d ever wanted was real because everything in her life had been staged—her failed career as a child performer, her suspicion that she hadn’t been so much a daughter to her mom as much as a meal ticket. She’d asked herself the “real” question so many times with so many men that she was starting to doubt that anything would ever go beyond the fake.
Was she so interested in this blond because she’d been let down by Jameson, who’d given her a whirlwind romance after they’d met at a casino bar and made her sweet promises about bringing her back to his rented town house instead of having her return to the friend she’d been visiting in Reno?
I don’t want t
o let you go, he’d said. Just stay with me, Liz, and I’ll give you the world. . . .
Yeah, last time she’d ever put her fate into the hands of a playboy. What she needed was hunk plus burning plus love over there at the pool bar, a regular guy who wouldn’t treat her like a toy unless she gave him permission to. Flirting with him had to equal a way to get her out of this postdumped funk.
But he was taking much too long to get with the program.
Oh, well, sometimes destiny needed a kick in the butt to get going.
Sitting up on the chaise, she tied her bikini top on since bar etiquette demanded it—and she knew that rule well because of earlier, when the tourists had bought her and the girls martinis. Thank heaven they’d sprung for the tab, too, because she was going to save as much of the twenty thousand from Jameson as she could. Part of the reason she’d been up in Reno was to learn the ropes of a new restaurant another ex-showgirl friend owned; it was a dream to have her own place someday, but it’d take more than twenty thousand to do it because of all the savings Liz had used for her mom’s medical expenses, a major debt she’d been struggling to get out of the past few years, even after Mom had died from her cancer. After this one teeny vacation, she wouldn’t be spending another dime.
She put on her wedge sandals, resisting the urge to take a picture of the man for her many Facebook friends, and instead moved right to the bar.
God, was it possible that she could smell the soap on the hunk’s skin from two seats down? The shivers all over her arms made her think that kind of chemical magic was possible.
The bartender recognized her, and he smiled. “Martini straight-up with gin, vermouth, and two olives.”
Liz smiled back and perched on the chair. Was Manly Man looking?
Nope, dammit. Maybe he wasn’t that into girls. Just her luck.
But the longer she subtly checked him out from beneath her lashes, the more her blood high-kicked its way through her.
Liz had never been shy, so why did the cat have her tongue now?
When he picked up a cigarette lighter from the bar where he’d set it next to his drink—a Manhattan?—she recognized the image on the casing: black Cleopatra hair, kitten-with-a-whip pose.
“Bettie Page,” she said, seeing her opening with him. Thank you, destiny.
The man gave the lighter a good look, then nodded. “So it is.”
“I had a friend who was into her, for pure kitsch value, of course.” A costume designer from the years she’d worked on Blaze! at the Oceana, a dead hotel-casino on the Strip that’d closed down six months ago, after she’d retired.
“This belonged to a friend,” said the man. “He gave it to me before he left on a long trip.”
Forthcoming. She liked that in a man.
She extended her hand. “I’m Liz.”
He gave her a look that she couldn’t comprehend for a moment—something between ice and fire, disinterest and . . . more? But before she could decide, it went back to neutral.
“Ben.” He shook her hand.
Her skin came alive, a burst of whirring sparks spinning through her fingertips and up her arm, popping in her chest and spangling lower until her belly fizzed.
Hub-ba-ba-ba.
He disengaged, going back to his lighter, fiddling with it. She didn’t see any cigarettes nearby.
“You need a smoke?” she asked.
“I’m not in the habit.”
“Good.” So she was anti. Sue her. “I mean, I don’t have any cigarettes to give you.”
“Then why’d you ask?”
Wow, he was to the point, but he’d said it with a slight grin. As she sat there deciding what that meant, she slid down in her chair ever so slightly. She shouldn’t like him—he was reminding her too much of Jameson, especially in the blond department—but chemistry didn’t lie.
“I’m only being polite,” she said with her own smile as the bartender brought her martini.
The man drained his cocktail, and Liz nodded to the bartender, ordering another for him.
When he glanced at her, she shrugged. “It’s on me.”
For some reason, his mouth went tight, but then the bartender brought his next cocktail, and Mystery Man raised the glass.
“To Bettie Page,” he said.
She met his glass with hers, and they both drank. She watched him the whole time, his mannerisms feeling so familiar and not-so-familiar.
When she finished sipping and laughed a little, he loosened up.
“What?” he asked.
“Nothing really.” She peered at him, her heartbeat racing again at the blue of his eyes. “It’s just that you remind me of someone. . . .”
This time when his smile disappeared, Liz knew there had to be a good reason.
3
Had Liz Palazzo caught on to him?
Ben had never been in a situation where he needed to be anyone but himself, and he wasn’t sure he was pulling off this Joe-Blow-on-vacation imitation right now. Was she an avid tabloid reader and she knew who he was? Or worse, was he somehow reminding her of Jameson? He and his brother weren’t dead ringers for each other, but was Ben more like him than he’d thought?
Either way, Liz Palazzo had a way of looking into Ben that made him shift in his seat. He itched to get back to his comfort zone, start up the old flirting machine, slipping his Rolex onto her wrist and whispering sweet nothings into her ear to distract her from everything else. Shiny things—and sinful ones—had always distracted him.
But she’d come over here because she’d been attracted to Joe Blow, not because he was buying a saloon full of people drinks or giving away expensive watches to one-night stands. For once, that felt kind of good, even if he was obviously just a poolside flirtation.
She was giving him a sultry look, the tips of her mouth lifted in a pink smile that was slightly and, yes, even adorably tipsy.
“Yup,” she said lazily. “You’re familiar, all right.”
Every nerve cell was alive, zinging with awareness, with a lust that nearly took his common sense over. Beautiful woman, interested woman, his kind of woman. Up close her eyes were even more vivid than in the phone picture, neon violet promises.
He gripped the Bettie Page lighter Cash Campbell had given him. It’d been as much of a sure conversation-starter as he’d been hoping. “How could you have seen me before when you just met me?”
“Oh, it’s not necessarily you I’ve seen.” She leaned on the bar with both arms, flashing the tops of those perfectly round breasts that’d fit right into his palms like they were made to be there.
Damn, he really wanted to strip off that bikini top. But this wasn’t the moment to be lusting when maybe she was about to tell him he resembled Jameson. Was his cover already blown?
She gave him another smoking hot look, stroking her finger over the stem of her martini glass. His very own misbehaving stem pulsed, and he looked away from her and at his drink.
Focus. This is how Jameson got into trouble with her, too.
Her voice was as smooth as the lapping pool water in the background. “You on vacation?” she asked.
“I am. You?”
“You could call it that.”
“Sounds like you have a story behind this trip.”
There it was—a smile from her, a getting-to-know-you-over-drinks step in the right direction. One of Bennett’s—and obviously Ben’s—specialties.
“We all have our stories,” she said with a careless shrug. “Mine just happens to include a man who didn’t quite work out for me. And that’s why I must drown my sorrows today.”
Was she referring to Jameson?
Besides being a little buzzed, she was being flip about her story. Surprisingly, there was even a sadness there, too. But how could she have given a crap about Jameson if she’d stolen from him?
At least she was talkative, but then again, most people he met at bars were like that. Booze, the social lubricant of choice for lonely people . . . or maybe just people w
ho went to places like this to not be lonely.
Ben glanced at her again as she sipped her cocktail, one pinkie up. When she placed the glass back on the bar, she sighed, resting her head in her hand while she gave him another considering glance from beneath her lashes. Damn, they were long. They looked natural, too.
“And what’s your story?” she asked.
Relieved that she’d dropped the whole you-remind-me-of-so-and-so thing, he pocketed the lighter. “No story. As I said, I’m here for a few days of relaxation.”
“On your own?”
Forward, wasn’t she? He liked it, but he tamped that down, too. He was also beginning to suspect she’d never seen him in the tabloids. Was this working?
“Yes, I’m all on my own.” He smiled back at her. “Where’s that man you’re running from? Is he somewhere around?”
“Heavens, no. I wouldn’t say I’m running from him, either. He flicked me out of his condo like I was an insect. A perfect storybook fantasy ending to our time together.” She stretched out her body as she leaned on the bar, emphasizing those breasts, the luscious curve of her back. “Anyway, it’s my friend Anita’s birthday, so we decided to live it up here for a few days. It’s a treat for us locals to come to the Strip like this.”
They were swerving off topic, so he tried to get them back on it. Maybe after she downed that martini, he’d buy her another so she would give him even more of her story. “This definitely isn’t the kind of place the ninety-nine percent can come all the time.”
“Well, luckily, I’ve been making a lot of friends who like to buy girls drinks, and I have a few connections in town.” She nodded toward his Manhattan. “Consider yourself special, though. Right now, the tab’s on the man who left me high and dry.”
Jackpot. “What do you mean?”
She wound her bobbed hair around a finger, her gaze easing into his, pinning him, making his heart throb painfully, right along with other spots that couldn’t control themselves.
No wonder Jameson had brought her home.
“What I mean,” she said with that sad inflection again, “is that some people can only express affection with money. This man I’m talking about? He was one of them. We weren’t together long at all, but before we parted ways, he gave me a gift.” She shook her head and laughed. “God, I’m talking way too much. Martinis, you know?”
Down and Dirty Page 3