Her High-Stakes Playboy. Kristin Hardy

I would have been,” Gwen told her, clicking on her e-mail in-box. “These are different circumstances.” She scanned the contents of the messages that popped up in her preview pane. “I just don’t want to blow—” The thought evaporated from her brain as she stared at the words on-screen.

      Joss crowded up behind her. “Did you get something?”

      It took her a couple of tries to speak. “It’s a dealer. He just bought a Ben Franklin, same perf, very good condition. It sounds like one of ours.”

      “Well, call him.”

      “I am.” Gwen scrolled down, searching for the contact signature at the bottom of the e-mail. And then suddenly she was yanking open the desk drawer and pulling out her purse.

      “What? Where is he?”

      “Las Vegas.” The blood roared in Gwen’s ears as she pulled out the matchbook and compared it to the numbers on-screen. “It’s the same area code as where Rennie is.”

      Joss’s gaze took on a particular stillness. “Call it,” she ordered, her voice barely audible.

      Hands shaking, Gwen dialed the number and listened to the tones of a phone ringing hundreds of miles away.

      “Versailles Resort and Casino,” an operator answered crisply.

      Gwen resisted the urge to cross her fingers. It couldn’t just be coincidence the stamp had surfaced there, it couldn’t. “Jerry Messner, please.” She crossed her fingers. All she needed was a chance.

      There was a clicking noise in the background. “How was that spelled, please?”

      Gwen told her.

      The keys clicked some more. “One moment, I’ll connect you.”

      And the line began to ring. Gwen banged down the handset hastily and stared at Joss. “He’s there.”

      3

      LIGHT, COLOR, NOISE. SLOT machines chattered and jingled in the background as Gwen walked through the extravagance that was the Versailles Resort and Casino.

      “You want to tell me what I’m doing here again?” she asked Joss over her cell phone as she walked across the plush carpet patterned with mauve, teal and golden medallions. Ornate marble pillars soared to the ceiling overhead, where enormous crystal chandeliers glittered. Waitresses dressed in low-cut bodices and not much else hustled by carrying drinks trays. The casino had the sense of opulence, a decadent playground for the wealthy, though it was open to all comers.

      Under the luxury, though, was the reality of gambling. The air freshener pumped into the cavernous main room of the casino didn’t quite dispel the lingering staleness of cigarette smoke. The faces of the gamblers held a fixed intensity as they hoped for the big score. Or hoped just to break even. She couldn’t have found anyplace more unlike herself if she’d tried.

      Then again, she couldn’t have looked more unlike herself if she’d tried.

      “You know why you’re there,” Joss said. “You’ve got to find Jerry.”

      A balding man in his thirties glanced up from his computer poker machine as Gwen walked by. “Hey, baby,” he said, toasting her with a plastic glass that held one of the free drinks handed out by casino waitresses. After a lifetime of wanting to be unremarkable, Gwen had gone the other way completely. Exit Gwen and enter Nina, the bombshell.

      “I look like a tart,” she hissed, tugging at her tight, low slung jeans and her scrap of a red top.

      “You don’t look like a tart. You just look like a woman who’s not afraid to flaunt what she’s got.”

      “Yeah, well, the flaunting part’s working.” A bellhop walking by tripped over his own feet and stumbled up with a grin. “Joss, this is not my style. This should be your job.”

      “It had to be you,” Joss told her. “Jerry knows me too well. He’d recognize me in a second.”

      “Like he’s not going to recognize me?”

      “All Jerry’s going to register is blond, tight and built. I doubt he’s going to think much beyond his gonads. Anyway, you were always in the back room. He hardly saw you. And no way would he expect you to look like this. You’re different head to toe.”

      “Tell me about it,” Gwen muttered, resisting the urge to pull up her neckline. “And don’t think I didn’t notice you took my regular clothes out of my suitcase.”

      “I didn’t want you to be tempted to backslide,” Joss said smoothly. “You’ve got to be Nina through and through.”

      Joss had effected quite a transformation, Gwen thought, catching sight of herself in one of the enormous gold-framed mirrors that hung on the wall. Gwen—tidy, understated Gwen—was gone. In her place was Nina, whose Wonderbra-induced cleavage alone was likely to distract Jerry from recognizing the person underneath. How Joss had managed to get her into a good salon without notice, Gwen had no idea, but her brownish hair was a thing of the past. Now it had the same streaky, sun-bleached blond look it had had in Africa, only better. The makeup artist had made her eyes more vivid, her smile more bright, somehow without making her look as if she’d troweled on the makeup. She was undercover and, she had to grudgingly admit, she looked good.

      Just not like herself. Still, the sooner she got the job done, the sooner she could turn back into Gwen. “All right, well, I’m in the casino, so it’s time to get to work,” she said briskly.

      “What’s the plan?”

      “Haven’t a clue. Wander around and get the lay of the land. Watch for our friend. I’ll figure something out and call you tomorrow.”

      “Have fun,” Joss said a little enviously. “Put a five spot on red for me. I’ve always liked red.”

      “Right.”

      Gwen switched off the phone and tucked it into her pocket. She was here. She was incognito. Now she just had to find Jerry, cozy up to him, figure out where the stamps were and spirit them away from him, all without being recognized.

      Piece of cake.

      Gwen drifted steadily through the ranks of slot machines and computer poker games, scanning the players. No Jerry in sight, but then he didn’t strike her as the type for a sucker’s game. He’d want cards, where he could influence the outcome.

      She resisted the urge to yawn. Between the shopping, the styling, the packing and the flight to Vegas, it was nearly eleven—about the time she usually clocked out for the night. Since it was a weeknight, the ranks of the players had thinned out some. Maybe Jerry had gone to bed, too.

      Yeah, right. She snorted at herself as she passed the croupiers at the craps tables. Jerry was more likely to stay up all night, sure in the knowledge he was going to hit it big, throwing away her grandfather’s money all the while.

      As she crossed the broad carpeted avenue that separated the slots floor from the green tables of the real games, the suffocating crowd and noise lessened, replaced by a steadily rising sense of purpose. The people playing at these tables still relied on chance, but they knew their games, and the knowledge gave them a sense of confidence.

      Gwen ambled casually down the aisles between tables, as though she couldn’t quite decide where to stop. No point in telegraphing to everyone that she was on the hunt. A tall, ebony-skinned dealer smiled at her. “Baccarat, lovely lady?”

      Gwen shook her head, a faint flush tinting her cheekbones.

      A burst of giggles rose from the blackjack tables behind her. “Oh, come on, Rennie, you know you’re a winner,” said a woman’s voice.

      Gwen whipped her head around to see two female dealers laughing with the player sitting at their table. A single male player.

      Rennie.

      What