Wild Card. Susan Amarillas

she told him, not willing to give him her personal history, not after Texas. Absently she shuffled the cards, feeling more at home with them in her hands.

      He cocked his head to one side. “I don’t want no trouble. Women and saloons—”

      “There won’t be any trouble. Just more business... which it looks as though you could use.” She lounged back, the chair creaking as she did.

      “I suppose.” He let out a long, slow, thoughtful breath. “I ain’t bankrolling you. You understand that?”

      “I’ll play for myself. Whatever I make I keep. You get the extra business at the bar. Having me here won’t cost you.anything.”

      “When do you want to start?”

      “Tonight.”

      He gave a sharp nod. “Okay.”

      “Okay.” She beamed and shook his paw of a hand. “My name’s Clair.”

      “Bill Mullen.”

      “Nice to meet you, Bill. You are the owner, right?”

      “Yeah.” He stood and started for the bar.

      She picked up the money. “Is there a boardinghouse?”

      “Addie Hocksettler’s. Middle of the street, blue clapboard. Sign’s in front,” he added.

      “By the Lazy Dog, right?”

      He glanced back over his shoulder. “You know Slocum?”

      She frowned. “Who?”

      “Slocum. Beady-eyed little runt. Owns the saloon.”

      “We’ve met.”

      His expression turned dark. “Say ...did he send you here? ’Cause if he did—”

      “No one sends me anywhere.” She cut across his words. “I met a man—I guess it was him—a while ago. We didn’t hit it off.”

      Mullen made a derisive sound in the back of his throat. “Man’s been trying to run me outta here for—” He broke off, as though thinking better of what he was saying. Not that she cared about his troubles—she had more than enough of her own. All she wanted was a place to do her work for a few nights, maybe a week, if business was good. She put her hat on, adjusting the pin in her upswept hair. “I take it you and Slocum aren’t friends.”

      Mullen circled behind the bar. “One of these days I’m gonna...” He looked at her directly, straightening as he did. “You said tonight.”

      “I’ll be here.” She picked up her carpetbag.

      “I’ll tell the boys when they come in,” he called to her as she headed for the door. “And I’ll be wanting to get them eight dollars back.”

      “You’re welcome to try,” she said as she stepped outside, a smile on her lips.

      Thank you, Scarlet Lady.

      By seven she was comfortably seated at the table nearest the window and in plain view through both the window and the propped-open front doors. The place was empty, but it was the first of the month and payday. The cowboys from the local ranches should be coming into town—at least, that’s what Bill had told her when she’d returned from getting settled in her room at the boardinghouse.

      She’d pressed the creases out of her working dress—burgundy satin, black lace trim, cut low enough in front to be, what was the French—oh, yes, risqué. Part of the image, she confirmed, fluffing the lace.

      She wore no jewelry—didn’t have any to wear, having lost it and everything else when she’d fled an angry mob.

      “Get her!”

      “Murderer!”

      Clair blinked hard against the sudden terrifying words and forced herself to focus on the reality of the present She was here, a long way from Texas, a long way from that grim night.

      You can’t change the past.

      That was for sure. Besides, things had taken a turn for the better. Why she hadn’t been in this town but a few hours and already she had a place to work and was up eight dollars.

      Not bad. Not bad at all. Seven of those newly won dollars had gone toward a week’s rent at the boardinghouse, so her bankroll was untouched—an important factor for her these days.

      “Feels like rain.” Bill’s gruff voice broke into her musings. “I’m getting mighty tired of rain. You know, it never rains in California in the summer and there’s places there where it never snows. Ain’t that something?”

      “So I’ve heard.” She glanced up to see him standing at the doorway, peering out at the darkening sky. “I guess this means it’ll be a slow night.”

      Bill only shrugged in answer.

      “Maybe the rain will hold off,” she said hopefully. Rain meant muddy roads, which meant that cowboys couldn’t get to town. All she needed was a couple of good days. She wasn’t asking for much, no milliondollar bets, just enough to get her to the next town and the one after that and the one after that....

      Shaking her head to dispel her dismal thought, she dealt the cards out on the table, her fingers brushing over the gouged surface as she did.

      Bill wandered over, his boots thudding on the floor. “Solitaire?”

      “Keeps my fingers nimble.”

      With a nod, Bill went to light the three kerosene lamps suspended from the ceiling down the center of the room. The metal shades clinked against the glass as he worked.

      Red six on the black seven...

      She glanced hopefully toward the street, scanning the sky beyond. The air felt damp and heavy, quiet, as though in anticipation of something. An involuntary shiver shimmied over her skin and she tensed against the feeling. This was silly. She was being silly. Still, the feeling of eerie foreboding lingered just a minute longer.

      Black eight on the red nine...

      You’re just jumpy, tired. is all.

      Yes, sure, that was all.

      Red queen on the black king...

      As she played the cards, her nerves calmed. Cards and saloons. It seemed as though she’d spent most of her life sitting in a saloon somewhere playing cards and waiting; waiting for that big hand, waiting for enough money to buy her own place, waiting to settle down.

      Settle down, now where had that come from?

      Probably being on the run, that’s where.

      Why was it a person always wanted the one thing they couldn’t have? Sometimes, late at night, she’d lie awake feeling alone, wondering about the future. Times like that she would have liked to have someone to turn to, someone to lean on.

      It’ll take more than luck for that to happen.

      Red two on the black three...

      Yes, she knew about luck and the lack of it. Clair was a realist and she had absolutely no illusions about who she was or what she did for a living. She crossed her legs, and the satin of her dress rustled as she adjusted the skirt under the confines of the table.

      There were those, she knew, who objected to gambling and drinking and other vices mostly. attributed to men. She understood it was easier to blame the temptation—namely her—than the man. But men had been drinking and gambling long before she was born, and they’d probably be doing the same long after she was dead and buried.

      If she’d had more choices maybe she’d have done something else, something more...respectable. But there weren’t a lot of choices for women, not poor women, anyway, and Clair Travers had been born dirt-poor in New Orleans. She’d never known her father, and her mother—a good woman—had taken in laundry to try to make ends meet. Clair had