Hold 'Em: Vegas Top Guns, Book 3 (4 page)

Leah scooped up the loose ends and set about redoing the ponytail.

“No, wait,” Mike began.

She stopped mid-motion, hands at the back of her head, breasts high. “What?”

The words were on his tongue, but he didn’t have the right to say them. It wasn’t his place.

Colleagues. Ex-lovers. That was all.

“Never mind. Forget it.”

She dropped her hands, wearing a look of exasperation. “Tell me.”

A subtle frisson made his hands flex. He was beginning to adore that tone of voice. “I was going to ask that you leave your hair down,” he said evenly.

Something dark and curious swept across her expression. He was not so hopeful as to think she understood what he wanted from her. Not yet. She hadn’t given his cuff a second look, which made him think the subtleties of his particular bent were beyond her experience.

But she seemed game enough to flex her muscles—if only as a woman in the position to tease.

“Well, then,” she said, one finger twirling a loose end. “Ask it.”

Maybe she thought he wouldn’t. Maybe she assumed he’d make it into a joke. Yet for Mike there was nothing simpler than answering a woman when she asked what he wanted.

There wasn’t much space between their bodies, for the sake of staying clear of other guests. He chose to shrink that distance even farther. But not too much. From morning to night, Leah Girardi probably had guys on her like bugs on flypaper. He was in no mood to be just any guy.

He
was
in the mood to catch a hint of her scent and the subtle touch of her body heat. He’d grab a little sample before he locked it down again.

“Leah,” he said, gaze trained on her mouth. Looking her in the eye would be too challenging, which he didn’t want at all. “Will you leave your hair down?” He paused for a heartbeat. “Please?”

Her lower lip had strayed from its partner, parting. Dark brows quirked a fraction. She smelled of something floral mixed with a faint trace of gasoline and leather. Heat from her body pulsed along the bare skin of his forearms, even warming his T-shirt.

She dropped her hand. “Whatever,” she said, but Mike caught the swallow that constricted her throat. “You have very good manners, Michael.”

With a nod and a slight shimmy, she angled away from him and toward the main lobby. Dark hair trailed behind her, the ends of which brushed where the lace edge of her camisole touched naked skin. He could only stand there, body frozen, heart hammering, as he tried to find his composure.

She’d called him Michael. And she’d done as he asked.

The two intimacies together were enough to shift the ground beneath his feet.

“You coming?” she called from across the faux-marble monstrosity.

After sweeping a hand over his mouth, Mike stifled his grin and joined her. She wasn’t anything to him yet. Not more than a bundle of memories from six years ago, layered with the complexities of finding himself her colleague. But his body was clear for take-off. He was already beginning to wonder what Leah would be like as his mistress, where being granted any request from such a woman was a treasured gift.

The flashing thrill of their bike ride was long gone. He sank into an easy calm that belied his keyed-up body. This was either going to happen or it wouldn’t. The decision wasn’t his to make. She would grant permission if the time came. Mike followed her through to the casino, mentally releasing himself into her care.

“Pick your poison.” Leah opened her arms to the casino floor. Hundreds of people shared space with gaming tables and a circus worth of noise and lights. The buzz and clink and ring of the slot machines filled every silent hollow. “Anything you want.”

Mike ignored the invitation. That’s not how he wanted to play. “I suppose it depends on how much we have to lose.”

Laughing, Leah shook her head. “Not much then.”

“More trouble in paradise, Miss Flying Ace?”

“We live for the speed, not the pay.” She swiped a tendril of hair off her cheek. “I’ve been going out with Jon too much. Need to remember that not everyone has a limitless store of cash.”

Her casual mention of another man cooled the hard-and-fast run of his libido. “Jon?”

“Jon Carlisle, call sign Tin Tin. He’s freaking
loaded
.” A sneaky grin shaped her lips. “You’ll meet him Tuesday.”

Mike humored her with a nod. The exchange reminded him just how much history he was coming into by joining the Aggressors. By military standards, these pilots enjoyed long, long assignments to the same unit. That meant stronger than usual bonds between the pilots, and even more difficulty when forming romantic attachments within a squad.

“Poker, then,” she said. “Might as well start with poker.”

That found his humor again. “Are you serious? You have just about the world’s worst poker face.”

“I’m not talking about me. You have unreadable down to a science. Let’s go make money.”

After a quick stop at an ATM, they exchanged cash for Caesar’s chips and found a table of Texas Hold ’Em. Mike took a seat, with Leah scooched in beside him.

Unreadable, eh? He wouldn’t have called himself that, not in a million years. But then, he’d been carrying around “Strap Happy” for three years now, always with a straight face—or better yet, with a knowing smile. The world wasn’t exactly on board with what he enjoyed in his off hours. Much easier to keep it cool and let folks assume they knew what aroused a guy like him.

“You’re not going to be much help if you’re sitting beside me,” he said.

“You think I’ll peek and give something away?”

“If you peek, you
will
give something away.”

“Fine. I’ll sit here and send you good-luck vibes.”

Mike anted up, smothering a snicker. “You do that, Princess.”

Two cards were dealt to each of the six players by a fifty-something Hispanic man with a thick mustache. Briefly Mike wondered how many people the dealer had seen come and go. Even in one night he must face-off against hundreds of gamblers intent on a big payout. Some people might’ve been intimidated by those sorts of odds, but not Mike. He’d made his living battling much tougher challenges for much higher stakes.

“The big blind is ten dollars,” the dealer announced. “To you, sir.”

Mike acknowledged his responsibility with a mere flick of his eyes. Poker was a way of life where he’d been stationed outside of Kabul—where waiting was a helluva lot worse than any sortie. Waiting for orders. Waiting for news. Even right then, that moment, he was waiting for his stay at Nellis to truly begin. Might as well kill time the old-fashioned way.

He lifted the corner of his cards, catching sight of an ace of clubs and a five of diamonds. Betting continued as the dealer turned the three flop cards face down, and then again as he revealed the turn—a queen of spades. Mike had already sorted out his competition from his marks. His only real opponent was a short balding man with a bright red birthmark across his scalp.

Leah, however, was proving quite a distraction. She ordered Mike a beer and herself a Dr. Pepper, then proceeded to pick at his bottle’s label. He was able to relegate her to background motion—barely—until she touched his silver cuff.

His whole body tensed. She obviously didn’t get it, but the cuff was a silent proclamation of Mike’s preferences. He was a sub. Plain and simple. Giving his sexual power to a woman was his biggest turn-on, and seeing Leah touch it, her expression somewhat curious, laid a foggy blanket over his ability to think.

“It’s pretty,” she said quietly.

Mike cleared his throat. “You’re not helping my odds here.”

“Not my money to lose.”

“How generous of you.”

“Who gave it to you?”

With a hand to his temple, he tried to reclaim his strategy for the next round of betting. Leah’s knee brushed his thigh, blowing that aim all to hell.

“Call.” Mike wasn’t exactly sure if that was wise. Nothing about the evening reeked of wisdom. But she was touching his cuff again. The fit of his jeans became considerably less comfortable.

“Who, Michael?”

“You assume someone gave it to me,” he said roughly.

She shrugged. “Of course I do. It’s too nice. So…?”

“A friend.” That was as far as he would go with thoughts of Georgia. One day he might reveal more to the right woman, but for now those four months as her lover were his alone.

“And the final card.” The dealer flipped up an ace.

If one more ace waited in the flop, Mike had a chance. He couldn’t begin to calculate the odds because Leah had thrown him off his game. So he called, then matched when the bald man upped his bet.

The dealer nodded. “Reveal your cards, gentlemen.”

The bald man had managed a respectable hand—two pair with queens high. Mike turned over his ace and five, hoping for the best. Not for the first time that evening, he gave himself over to the whim of fate. He couldn’t have survived the last few years without that simple act of faith.

The dealer revealed the flop cards. A third ace gave Mike three of a kind.

Leah squealed. Nah, that wasn’t right. She wooted like a drunk hippie girl at a Dave Matthews concert. Then she hugged him round the neck, planting a swift kiss to his temple.

Mike sat there, dazed, extremely turned on and happy to let lady luck take the night.

Chapter Five

Leah loved winning. She loved it best when she rocked it out herself, but standing at Mike’s side when he took the hand was almost as good. Messing with his head while he tried to keep his mind on the game didn’t hurt.

She only meant it as a tease—a little taste of what he couldn’t have anymore. That was all. So she kept touching him.

Mostly she trailed her fingers through the slightly too-long hair across the back of his neck. To get that shaggy, he must have taken a nice chunk of leave before showing up at Nellis. She liked the novelty.

What she
really
liked was how he shuddered when she scraped her nails over his skin.

He obviously tried to power through it, winning two more hands and losing one to the older dude across the table. The muscle at the back of his jaw ticked in response.

She was so freaking cruel. To both of them really since nothing could come of it.

The moment in the lobby had meant…something. Mike had steadily watched her mouth as he asked Leah to leave her hair down. He’d been so polite, despite the way his voice hit a rumbling pitch that had made its way down her torso. Lower. Between her legs.

Plenty of guys hit on her. A lot of them had even been fellow squadron members. One of the reasons she was so close with Ryan and Jon was their ability to ignore that she was a chick.

Technically, Mike hadn’t even hit on her. He’d asked for such a simple thing. Yet no man had ever been so respectful. Or intense.

The bracelet hadn’t helped, either. Well, calling it a bracelet was entirely too feminine. The dully polished silver had barely registered to Leah until his strange reaction, as if she’d poked at a tender spot.

It had been six years. By no means did she think that Mike had spent them locked alone in his bedroom—though that image had its own naughty appeal. After all, she certainly hadn’t been alone.

Neither had someone given her a silver cuff that she still wore.

Hot possessiveness slunk through her muscles and made her eyes narrow.

As if moved by their own power, Leah’s fingers walked down his arm. The thick muscles and tendons rippled under her touch. She traced the edge of the silver cuff. It was a strange. Snug as hell. She could barely wiggle the tip of her index finger between his hair-dusted skin and the metal warmed by his body.

He slanted her a look from those sharp blue eyes. A hint of a grin pushed laugh lines across the top of his cheek. “You’re like a dog with a bone, aren’t you?”

She shrugged. “Curiosity is one of my biggest failings.”

“I don’t know.” His long fingers stacked and restacked chips into tidy piles. “There’s something to be said for exploring boundaries.”

“I guess that’s why we’re fighter pilots, right?” She made herself pull back.

When he chuckled, his thigh bounced against her knee. He shook his head. Streaky gold-brown hair dipped across his temple. “That wasn’t the type of boundaries I meant.”

“Right,” she said. “Because you’re so edgy, aren’t you?”

He stretched until his mouth brushed the curve of her ear. That her hair was down made the move more intimate, creating a screen from the world. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

“You are
all
talk, Michael Templeton. Remember, I know that for a fact.”

His eyes shifted to a deeper blue. Less neon, more devious. “Facts change. After all, Pluto’s not a planet anymore.”

She laughed, a little relieved that the tension had somewhere to escape. Her nipples had been drawing too hard for comfort. Mike was a buddy now. He’d have to be since they were going to work together.

Wouldn’t that just bite her in the ass, if teasing him ended up teasing her. She’d been told all her life that pushing as hard as she did would come back to smack her someday. But there was something different about Mike now. Something she couldn’t name. She wanted to take him apart to figure him out.