Wild Nights (Jokers Wild)

by Katherine Garbera

  “It’s not for nothing,” he said. “I wanted to see you again.”

  She tipped her head to the side, studying him. In his tailored suit, he should look out of place in a world populated by casual dressers, but he didn’t. “Why?”

  “So suspicious,” he said, lifting one hand to touch her cheek.

  “If you pull a coin from my ear, I’m not going to be impressed,” she said.

  “I wasn’t planning on doing that,” he said wryly. “That’s not really my style.”

  It was on the tip of her tongue to ask what his style was, but she knew that would be flirting. And she was determined to keep this professional. “Then what are you planning?”

  “To ask about your source for the chest. My assistant wasn’t able to find the item online,” he said.

  She looked up into those bright blue eyes and felt that electric tingle race through her again. She should refuse to tell him. But she hadn’t been able to get him off her mind, and she… Well, she wanted to help him.

  She groaned. “You checked up on my story?”

  He arched one eyebrow at her. “Yes. Does that make me horrible?”

  She shook her head, feeling the weight of her long hair brushing her shoulders. “It doesn’t make you look good. My source is Alastair Mooney. He called me when the chest came into his shop and asked if I was interested.”

  “But you don’t know where it came from?” he asked.

  “Nope. I didn’t ask. But the paperwork should be with it when it arrives.”

  “Fair enough.”

  “Mr. Pine, want to stay for dinner?” Stetson asked when he came back into the room. “It’s taco night, and I already texted Mom to make sure it was okay.”

  “Your mom said yes?” Zelda asked her godson, trying not to glare at him. But she could understand Stetson’s fascination with Nicholas—the illusionist was her godson’s idol. She couldn’t blame the kid for asking.

  “She did,” he said with a grin, revealing his missing two front teeth. “Zee will be there. Maybe you can show me some more tricks. So, will you?”

  Zelda wasn’t sure what Molly was up to but could only guess that her friend was matchmaking.

  “I wouldn’t miss it.”

  …

  Trixie was waiting for him when he entered the large warehouse at Jokers Wild. She had her tablet in one hand and held her finger up to him to indicate she was on a call as he approached her.

  “Text me the address. Mr. Pine is on his way.”

  Leo and Keely were nowhere to be seen, and he’d heard the roar of Dare’s motorcycle as he’d gotten out of his car in the parking garage.

  “Where am I going?’

  “To the police station. They seized a shipping container earlier this afternoon that is full of magic stuff…their words, not mine. But one of the items described could be your Houdini chest. The detective in charge didn’t know enough to verify it positively.”

  Nicholas felt a tingle go down his spine. It made a hell of a lot more sense that someone local stole the chest, so he shouldn’t be that surprised. “Why was the container seized?”

  “He wouldn’t say. But it’s worth a look, don’t you think?” Trixie asked.

  “Yeah, it is,” he said, glancing at his watch. He was supposed to be at Zelda’s in an hour, but there was no way he could make it. He felt a pang as he thought that he was going to have to cancel, but it was probably for the best. For a moment, he wondered if it was Zelda’s shipment that had been seized in Los Angeles. If it was, then he had seriously misjudged her.

  He wasn’t himself at all right now. He should have declined the dinner invite to begin with. She wasn’t his type, and neither was taco night. He wasn’t a domestic kind of guy, and kids weren’t his thing. Some would say he was cynical, but the truth was that, in his experience, everyone lied. And the whole domestic scene was one of the biggest illusions there was. He knew better than to come close to that. His entire upbringing had been an illusion, and he hadn’t forgotten just what it had done to him.

  He liked working on tricks and doing his show—there was an honesty to admitting it was an illusion. But he didn’t ever want to blur the lines between illusion and real life. Saying yes had been an impulse and not one he could easily explain. It wasn’t like he could justify meeting her tonight and call it a hookup, because it had been clear she hadn’t been happy with her friend’s invitation.

  He pulled out his phone, realizing he only had her shop number. He dialed it—at least he could leave a voicemail—but then it clicked, and he heard a pause before she spoke.

  “Touch of Magic.”

  “Zelda,” he said, “it’s Nicholas. I’m afraid I can’t make dinner tonight.”

  There was a long pause.

  “Okay,” she said. “I’ll let Stetson know.”

  “Thank you. I was looking forward to it, but I might have a lead on my chest,” he said.

  “Good. I’ve just had a text from the delivery company that mine will be here in the morning. I was going to tell you at dinner tonight,” she said.

  “If my lead doesn’t pan out, I’ll stop by your place tomorrow,” he said. “I’ve already given Molly’s name to my assistant. All she has to do is tell us when she wants to come to the show, and the tickets will be available.”

  “Thanks. I have her number, so I will give it to Molly,” Zelda said.

  They hung up, and Nicholas shoved his phone into his pocket, heading out of the warehouse to his car. He knew that Trixie would text him the address, and he couldn’t explain what he felt right now. It was a bit of disappointment and a sort of relief, too. Zelda was different—he couldn’t put his finger on how, exactly, and right now he had too much going on in his life to try to figure out the puzzle that she presented.

  He got into his Corvette and roared out of the parking garage away from the strip, proud that he made it a point never to lie to himself, to project something that was magical on the world. But this time…he wasn’t sure. And he certainly couldn’t question it now. He had a big show to put on—one that would put the Jokers Wild on the map.

  He had friends who were counting on him and a public that expected to be blown away. He couldn’t allow himself to be distracted by a woman. He’d done it once before, and he’d nearly lost everything. He knew that Leo wasn’t going to allow that to happen again. He said the next time that Nicholas fell for a pair of long legs and curvy hips, he was out. Even if she was a sassy redhead who’d made Nicholas feel something other than his usual ennui. That was it, he realized as he slowed down to turn toward the police station.

  He’d become jaded—pushing himself with each new trick, trying to find that little thrill in the bottom of his stomach that used to come so easily. But instead, he was just being drawn closer and closer to the edge, doing tricks that were getting increasingly hard to pull off. But there was no thrill.

  He had started to fear that something had disappeared. Something that he used to call his soul had drifted off with Jade. When their partnership had ended, he’d lost more than an act. But he couldn’t continue to work with someone who had been sneaking around and couldn’t be trusted not to sell out his team.

  Then, watching Dare deal so horribly with the woman who’d burned him coming back into his life had made it painfully obvious to Nicholas that he’d had his trust in women broken. And Zelda wouldn’t be the one to mend that trust; he knew that. He had to just stay focused on what he needed from her. His chest and nothing else.

  Chapter Three

  The dream was always the same. She was on stage, about to get into the water, smiling and waving at the crowd. She wasn’t sure that Zoe, her sister, would be in the trunk at the bottom. Her father smiled, but, underneath the smile, she saw the look in his eyes. She knew better than to disobey him, though she so badly wanted to, and she stood there shivering on the
hot July day.

  She glanced at the water, which had turned into the roiling seas that she’d only seen in movies about boats caught in hurricanes. She shivered again, looking over at her father, hoping he’d give the kill signal that meant the trick wasn’t going to be performed. But instead, he walked toward her and nudged her into the water. Unprepared, she started to panic and then made herself calm down as she’d been taught and turned to face the glass front, waving at the audience before the black curtain came around the tank. Normally there was a glow-in-the-dark pebble at the bottom of the tank so she’d know where to go, but she couldn’t find it. She was running out of air, and the decorative seaweed tangled around her legs as she struggled.

  She jerked upright in bed.

  “Hell’s bells,” she said, fumbling for the light on her nightstand. She was covered in sweat, and her breathing was jagged.

  The water chest.

  She should never have purchased it for the shop. She’d known from the moment she’d seen it that memories of her past weren’t as buried as she’d thought they were. Instead, she got to her feet and walked through her tiny house to the kitchen, pulling a ladder-back chair from the kitchen table and moving it to the high cabinet above her stove. She climbed up, reaching back until her fingers brushed the bottle of tequila at the back, then pulled it forward and almost lost her balance.

  She steadied herself before she climbed down, realizing she was crying. She wanted to say that it was because of the near accident or even the dream, but she knew it was more. She was crying for what she’d lost the day her family had collapsed. The day the illusion had become too real and decades of magic arrogance hadn’t been enough to save them.

  She thought of Zoe, living her quiet life in the Keys, and herself, here in Vegas. A country apart from her twin—the other part of herself…until that night. That trick. That hot July day.

  They had taken Houdini’s famous water escape and made it into their signature act. The act had featured the fictitious Suria Waterstone—actually herself and Zoe. One of them would appear at the beginning of the trick, wrapped in ropes that resembled seaweed, and then she would be lowered into the tank smiling.

  Zoe had been hidden at the bottom of the tank in a secret compartment, and as Zelda dropped lower into the water, Zoe would be making her way up. But one hot July day, tragedy had struck, and Zoe had been trapped in the mechanism that should have freed her. She was left paralyzed. And Zelda, who had skipped rehearsal that day to meet a boy, had never been able to forgive herself. She had always known she was to blame.

  Once they were revealed to be twins, the family’s reputation had suffered. Her father stopped performing, and, two years later, died of an overdose. Their mother had died years earlier from cancer.

  At the time the incident happened, there hadn’t been many people who wouldn’t have recognized her last name—Waterstone. But today, living in Vegas under her grandmother’s maiden name, she was obscure. And she intended to keep it that way.

  Zoe had never forgiven her, and admittedly, Zelda hadn’t been able to forgive herself. She’d kept her relationships light because she hadn’t wanted to risk falling for someone who would eventually find out what she was—weak.

  Zoe hadn’t wanted to do the trick, but Zelda had been afraid of disobeying her father. She’d guilted her sister into performing even though they were both off their game and hadn’t even done a run-through in weeks. Shortcuts had cost them everything.

  She shoved her hand through her hair, then put the tequila bottle heavily on the countertop and went to find a shot glass.

  The doorbell rang, and she glanced at the clock to confirm that it was after midnight. Who would be at her door?

  She knew some people thought bad news came at night, but every bit of bad news she’d ever received had come straight up in the middle of the day.

  She flipped on the porch light and then glanced through the peephole. Nicholas.

  He wore another tightly fitted shirt and skintight jeans. Of course he did. She put her forehead on the doorjamb and just stood there.

  Not tonight. Not when her defenses were down and she needed to forget her past sins.

  “I saw your light on,” he said. “If you don’t want any company, I’ll leave.”

  She opened the door but moved to stand in the opening, trying to convince herself that she wasn’t going to invite him in.

  “What are you doing here? I mean, I’m trying to give you the benefit of the doubt, but this is kind of stalker behavior.”

  He held his hands up at his shoulders, and she noticed the ring he wore on his middle finger and the tattoo on the inside of his wrist that was an old magic family sigil. Something only those in the inner circle would know. She had one as well, but she’d covered it up with a black rose.

  “I stopped by to drop off an apology gift to Stetson,” Nicholas said. “I remember what it was like to be young and expecting an adult to do something. I’m sorry that I had to disappoint him tonight.”

  Of course he had. Nicholas was that kind of man. She wanted to believe he was all illusion, smoke, and mirrors, but from the beginning, she’d seen something more in those bright blue eyes of his.

  She’d always believed in the inherent goodness of people, and Nicholas Pine was a good guy. He had been brought into her life for a reason. “That’s really sweet. He was cool about it, but Molly was annoyed.”

  “I have no doubt she was,” he said. “It was unavoidable.”

  His lead on the chest. His priority was his show and she knew what that was like from personal experience. She’d have to try to protect Stetson from a grand illusionist like Nicholas. He could mesmerize with his charm but when the chips were down, his show was always going to come first.

  “So, are you going to invite me in?” he asked.

  Was she?

  The vestiges of guilt and sadness she’d woken up with had disappeared when she saw him on her doorstep, and she wasn’t one to look a gift horse in the mouth. She knew that sleep would elude her for the rest of the night, and even though he was a magician, she couldn’t help liking him.

  “Okay, but no judging.”

  He arched one eyebrow at her in a questioning way. “Why would I judge you?”

  “I couldn’t sleep, so I was in the process of making myself a good old-fashioned home remedy.”

  “I think that’s a great idea,” he said. “Trixie, my show manager, has been teaching me some meditation to help me rest.”

  “I’m more old-school,” she said, stepping back to let him enter her house. He walked inside, glancing at the dark hallway and the light that spilled from her kitchen.

  “How?”

  “Tequila.”

  “I like it,” he said. “This way?”

  She nodded, closing the door and leaning back against it, watching Nicholas Pine, illusionist, turn into her kitchen. She believed in karma and had seen it at work in her life more than once. Like when she’d met Molly—a found sister to replace the one she’d lost. And when she’d started selling her antiques online but then had heard about an opportunity to turn her business into something bigger. But Nicholas… She couldn’t figure out if he was her chance at redemption or just another form of torture.

  …

  Nicholas stood in Zelda’s kitchen, wondering what the hell he was doing. He’d come out here not because of the kid… Well, maybe a little bit, because Stetson reminded him of himself in some ways. But also for her. Her house felt homey, comfortable—the kind of place he imagined normal families lived.

  He’d grown up in a brick and stone 12 bedroom mansion with a kitchen that had been meant for a large staff of workers, and he and his grandfather had always eaten in the master suite to be near his grandmother. He’d grown up believing that his parents had died when he was a baby. His grandparents had raised him in their big mansion,
treating him like he was a special gift in their lives. It had only been after they’d died that he’d realized everything he’d known had been an illusion. He’d been an adopted baby they’d used to replace the son they’d lost as an adult.

  He shook those thoughts off. He rarely allowed himself to indulge in remembering the past.

  There was something sunny about the room, much like the woman who owned it. She followed him into the kitchen, her bare feet making a soft rubbing sound against the tile floor. He waited for her, looking around and realizing he was as out of place here as he was in her life. He wanted to tell her he’d come for the chest, but he knew that was a lie.

  While he always acknowledged that everyone lied to a certain extent—even himself—he tried to avoid it. There was no use buying his own illusions. That had led him down the path to mistakes like Jade. Mistakes he wasn’t planning to repeat.

  He wanted to blame his anxiousness on the fact that he’d lost his talisman. That water chest was more to him than just a collectible. It had been something he and his grandfather had purchased and then taken the time to restore. The chest had been in rough shape when they’d found it, and because his grandfather had been in his eighties, it had taken a long time to bring the chest back to its former beauty. The two of them had worked on it, taking breaks to visit with his grandmother, who’d always been bedridden, and in those long conversations, the seeds of the man he was today had been born.

  In more ways than one, he thought ruefully.

  His belief that life was an illusion had been planted in his seemingly idyllic childhood. He saw the chair over by the stove—used, he assumed, to reach the top cabinet—and then the tequila bottle on the countertop. There was more to this shop girl than he had imagined. He had been busy filtering through his spectrum, trying to figure out if she’d been complicit in the theft of his water chest, never once seeing that she had her own demons.