Cruising the Strip

Games of chance, games of passion, games of love—roll the dice for a week in Las Vegas with games mistresses Radclyffe and Karin Kallmaker. Whether a public table or a back room invitational, the players want to score and everybody can’t wait to go all in.

A pit boss who thinks she’s seen it all thinks again. A shy novelist considers research in a hospitality suite. The fountains of Las Vegas inspire more than one couple to try something new. Double or nothing? Inside bet? How about a little insurance when the dealer has the upper hand?

Choose your game, ante up and enjoy the floor show. All bets are off when these two writers deal the cards, and every hand is a winner.

In Deep Waters 2:
Cruising the Strip

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In Deep Waters 2:
Cruising the Strip

© 2008 By Radclyffe and Karin Kallmaker. All Rights Reserved.

ISBN 13: 978-1-60282-469-0

This Electronic Book is published by

Bold Strokes Books, Inc.

P.O. Box 249

Valley Falls, New York 12185

First Edition: May 2008

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission.

Credits

Editor: Cindy Cresap

Production Design: J.B. Greystone

Frontispiece: Barb Kiwak (www.kiwak.com)

Cover Graphic: Sheri ([email protected])

To Lee

All the Stories

Humbly dedicated to Radclyffe and Linda Hill for figuring out a way for me to have so much fun.

Was it good for you?

Thank you to my partner and children for their support and tolerance, and to friends and readers everywhere for encouragement and inspiration.

Romances
Innocent Hearts
Promising Hearts
Love’s Melody Lost
Love’s Tender Warriors
Tomorrow’s Promise
Love’s Masquerade
shadowland
Passion’s Bright Fury
Fated Love
Turn Back Time
When Dreams Tremble
The Lonely Hearts Club
Night Call
Secrets in the Stone
Desire by Starlight

Erotica
Erotic Interludes: Change of Pace
(A Short Story Collection)

Radical Encounters
(A Erotic Short Story Collection)

Stacia Seaman and Radclyffe, eds.
Erotic Interludes 2:
Stolen Moments
Erotic Interludes 3:
Lessons in Love
Erotic Interludes 4:
Extreme Passions
Erotic Interludes 5:
Road Games
Romantic Interludes 1:
Discovery
Romantic Interludes 2:
Secrets

The Provincetown Tales
Safe Harbor
Beyond the Breakwater
Distant Shores, Silent Thunder
Storms of Change
Winds of Fortune
Returning Tides

Honor Series
Above All, Honor
Honor Bound
Love & Honor
Honor Guards
Honor Reclaimed
Honor Under Siege
Word of Honor

Justice Series
A Matter of Trust (prequel)
Shield of Justice
In Pursuit of Justice
Justice in the Shadows
Justice Served
Justice For All

First Responders Novels
Trauma Alert

Writing as L.L. Raand

Midnight Hunters
The Midnight Hunt

Romance:

Above Temptation
Stepping Stone
Warming Trend
The Kiss that Counted
Night Vision / The Dawning
Christabel
Finders Keepers
Just Like That
Sugar
One Degree of Separation
Maybe Next Time
Substitute for Love
Frosting on the Cake
Unforgettable
Watermark
Making Up for Lost Time
Embrace in Motion
Wild Things
Painted Moon
Car Pool
Paperback Romance
Touchwood
In Every Port

Erotica:

In Deep Waters: Cruising the Seas
18th & Castro
All the Wrong Places
Tall in the Saddle: New Exploits of Western Lesbians
Stake through the Heart: New Exploits of Twilight Lesbians
Bell, Book and Dyke: New Exploits of Magical Lesbians
Once Upon a Dyke: New Exploits of Fairy Tale Lesbians

By the time I finished my first cruise with Karin Kallmaker, I was ready to book a return trip. Everything about
In Deep Waters 1: Cruising the Seas
(Bella Books, 2007) from the first page to the last, was fun, creatively challenging, and satisfying. What more could an author want? Well, I wanted to do it all again—and luckily, so did Karin (which is a very good thing, because we’d already promised our respective publishers one volume each before we’d even set sail the first time). I think we both worried a little bit more on the maiden voyage because what if we didn’t get along? What if we couldn’t concur on a story order? What if, gasp, we couldn’t agree as to who was on top (or not)? As it turned out, we had no trouble either time negotiating a more than satisfying arrangement regarding scenes, accoutrements, and accessories (and who got to play with what when). Vegas is one of my favorite cities and thanks to Karin, it is now one of my favorite literary haunts.

Many thanks to Cindy Cresap for forging a whole from twenty four selections by two authors with different voices, different rhythms, and different styles. An anthology with multiple authors is far easier to edit because the individual selections are not as intimately related as they were designed to be in this collection. Thank you, Cindy, for making this such a rewarding literary threesome.

Barb Kiwak and Sheri deserve kudos for the outstanding artwork, frontispiece and cover, respectively.

And lastly and most especially, to the readers, thanks for joining us in Vegas, and no matter what your pleasure, I hope you have as much enjoyment in the reading as we did in the writing.

— Radclyffe, January 2008

If you really enjoy something, I recommend doing it at least twice, especially if it involves partnering up with someone whose love of the results matches your own.

Working with Radclyffe is like finding the perfect partner for tennis—one challenging enough to get you out of your own zone, leading to the mutual goal of a fantastic volley based on complementary strengths. For this anthology, she lobbed balls over the net and waited patiently to see if I could return service. When I did, ooo, baby, did we have fun!

Having collaborated before on
In Deep Waters 1
, we spent less time making sure we were in sync and more time just plain playing. I hope readers are as amused and excited as I am by the results. Any resemblance of our characters to persons living are purely coincidental. Let’s just say that I suspected Radclyffe of having a twisted and inspired sense of humor, and I wasn’t wrong.

Speaking of characters, several of mine from previous works make an appearance in this volume. With a librarian’s convention in town, “Twenty-One” of course makes Marian and Liddy from
One Degree of Separation
a natural choice. Brandy and Tess of “Lucky 7” first appeared in
All the Wrong Places.
“Lucky 7” continues the storyline from “Cruising Solo” in the first In Deep Waters. Author Carolyn and her agent Alison, from
Paperback Romance
, are attending the romance writer’s convention, reaping the rewards of fifteen years’ pride in “Payout.”

Though I want to say that such stories, and the few other affectionate jokes in this volume, are all for the readers, honesty demands that I admit that I love revisiting my old friends. I truly hope that readers enjoy the results as much as I do.

Gambling is often compared to the risks of love and relationships. I’m not sure why, since inherently gambling means someone loses and someone wins, and the odds are always lopsided. So while we play with the metaphor, it is flawed. In practice, writing with Radclyffe about gambling, love, and sex defies the metaphor completely, because everyone comes out a winner.

— Karin, January 2008

The instant I stepped inside the Palace Casino, I saw her holding court with a hundred avid readers right in the middle of the grand lobby. Heads were going to roll in publicity as soon as I got to a phone. I only agreed to attend this conference because the VP of Marketing assured me, on his life—and more importantly, his annual bonus—I wouldn’t have to breathe the same air as her. And here we were arriving at exactly the same time. Wonderful bit of planning.

“Welcome to the Palace, Ms. Wainwright,” a handsome young man looking somewhat ridiculous in his red uniform with gold tasseled epaulets and shiny buttons announced as I quickly composed my face into what I knew was a cover-shot worthy smile. “Let me assist you to reception. The bellman will take your luggage directly to your suite.”