Lucky Charm (24 page)

It had been a long time since she’d cried that hard. The last time… Just the thought nearly brought on the waterworks again. Enough of that. There had been something cathartic about it, though.

The image of Matthew’s rugged face, his bright green eyes, tried to find purchase but she wasn’t ready – yet – to think about Matthew. Not yet. A part of her wondered where he was, where he’d gone last night and if he was safe but she didn’t dare think too hard about it. Still, she wondered. And worried.

The fear of last night was still with her. What had those men wanted? Or the men the night before? All they’d done was walk toward her. They hadn’t said or done anything and yet they’d been more than intimidating. She couldn’t imagine why anyone would think she was a threat. There was the odd tension in the Marathon offices, the strange discrepancies and the sense of being watched but it had eased in Birmingham by the time she’d been done. Whatever it was they were concerned about – and it probably had to do with Matthew’s appearance there – it seemed to have passed by the end of the week.

What was going on?

She felt as if she were surrounded by murky shadows, with no way to see where the danger lay. It was unsettling.

Here in the hotel, in the brightness of day and with people all around her, though, she felt reasonably safe. She needed to unwind, especially after the events of the previous night. A swim would loosen her up and relax her. She could lie in the warm air and let the sunshine soothe her. No sunlight on her pale skin, though, thanks. First because she burned very easily and second because a friend was going through her third surgery for skin cancer. That was convincing enough for Ariel.

She ordered room service, ate desultorily and finally pushed it away. Her appetite simply wasn’t there.

Changing into her bathing suit, she headed for the pool. Maybe that would help her work some of her funk off.

It was one of those rooftop affairs, far above some of the noises of the street. She could hear a distant honking and the wail of sirens. A few people were up at this hour but only a few. She found a lounge chair that had a good sized umbrella stretched over it to shield her too-fair skin from the sun. Dropping her towel and room key there, she looked at the pool. It looked cool and inviting.

She smoothed waterproof suntan lotion on every part of her she could reach except her back. For a half a second she considered asking someone to put some on for her but then remembered what had happened the last time she’d let a stranger to touch her body. It had been so long. Her heart wrenched as a shaft of desire shot through her with surprising strength. Matthew, with his mix of gentleness and fierce passion.

Put it aside, put it away
, she thought.

It was a lovely morning, with the sun shining brightly, the sky brilliantly blue and nearly cloudless. She couldn’t have asked for more beautiful weather, even if it was surprising to her northern soul to find it this warm and humid at this hour of the morning but that was New Orleans.

Feeling the tension drop away, she smiled as she walked to the side of the pool and launched into a good, clean, shallow dive. The water felt wonderful, refreshingly cool after the heat. She came up for air, then dove, turned and braced her feet against the wall before pushing off with strong strokes. She swam as far down to the end of the pool as she could reach without coming up to breathe.

It was invigorating, bracing and exactly what she needed – the simple pleasure of letting her muscles work. From her old days in high school and college, she called up the memory of synchronized swimming exercises. Floating on her back, she arched, stroking to turn a backwards circle in the water. She took a breath and then dove deep, working her stiff back, arms and shoulders. It wasn’t a big pool but it sufficed. She loved every minute of it, glorying in the feel of cool water and hot sun.

It had been a lucky guess. Somehow Matt had guessed she was an early riser as she had been the morning they’d made love. She’d been up before most people on a weekend morning. He liked that about her, that she didn’t waste the day sleeping.

Matt had watched from the crack in the utility closet door as she’d come out in a swimsuit. A one-piece, which was a little disappointing. The color, a deep pink, brought out the roses in her cheeks and lips, made her ivory skin and ebony hair seem to glow.

From that, though, it was a pretty good guess where she was going.

She did have a beautiful body. He recalled it vividly. The suit clung to every curve as she turned to make sure the door had closed completely behind her. It was clearly a habit for her to check those things. Not many people did. So, she was careful about security. He’d noticed that in Birmingham, the way she had kept her head up alertly, well accustomed to traveling alone in strange cities.

When she turned he had a great view of her body in profile, the snug bathing suit showing the fullness of her breasts, her slim, taut belly and the firm muscles in her legs. There was no doubt she kept that body toned, trim but not muscular, just defined. Gorgeous. His body reacted predictably, his jeans becoming tight. The memory of her hips rising up to take him in didn’t help.

Using the stairs, he followed, arriving in the pool area only moments after she did. He found a place where he could watch unobserved from behind a screen of decorative bushes in planters on a little raised area at the edge of the pool apron.

There was a little shack in the corner, probably a bar for later in the day. A small table with an umbrella shaded him from the merciless pounding of the rays of the sun. It was hot, humid and sticky. He longed for the dry, blast furnace heat of Phoenix, not this thick miasma that was so much more fluid than air, dense and hard to breathe.

He watched Ariel apply suntan lotion, gliding it over those lovely legs and her sleekly muscled arms. Her pale skin gleamed. Tilting her head back, she spread the lotion over the smooth white column of her throat and across the rounded tops of her breasts. He thought of helping her with that, of what it would feel like to feel his hands slip slickly over her skin. Her fingers slid beneath the top of the bathing suit. He could feel himself twitching as he imagined doing the same. It wasn’t his fingers twitching, either.
Down boy
, he told himself but his body wasn’t listening much. The jeans he’d put on this morning were suddenly far too tight. Again.

Standing, she walked to the edge of the pool. She glowed in the sunlight, her skin so white it almost hurt the eye and then set herself to launch into a nice clean dive. Cutting into the water with a little splash, she swam with strong strokes under the surface to the far side.

She swam like a fish, that is, mostly underwater, amazingly lithe and graceful. He watched her turn lazy circles in the water. The hard way. Backwards. Arching her back, her arms stroking as her head and shoulders disappeared beneath the water, breasts pointing toward the sky, then her trim waist and shapely legs followed. It was amazing and oddly erotic to watch. She played in the water like an otter.

When she grew tired of it she dove deep, drove herself with hard kicks up the side of the pool, planted her hands on the side and popped out of the water to sit neatly on the side. It was a nifty little piece of gymnastics. Her skin glistened as the water sheeted off of her. He tried not to think of what it would be like to taste her skin when it was wet or think of having her at home in his own pool. Or having her at all. This was maddening. His groin thickened and tightened. She was driving him crazy. What was it about her that did that?

She didn’t want him.

No, that wasn’t true. Her eyes had brightened when she’d seen him in Birmingham and again here, last night, there was pleasure as she responded to him. He knew that. He remembered the sound she made in her throat when he kissed her, that longing. The feel of her lips and the way they parted beneath his. Yes, she wanted him, at least as much as he wanted her and it terrified her. There was no doubt in his mind that at the first sight of him, she would run. The fear was too strong. He couldn’t think of a single way he could get close to her that she wouldn’t avoid right now.

Violence had frightened her but not as much as her emotions did. The emotions he roused in her. Somehow, that heartened him. She did care. There was a chance, if he could find a way to break past the fear.

As long as she was in danger, though, he intended to stay close. The stooges were still around and for some reason they were targeting her as much as him. He hadn’t forgotten his main objective – he could never forget Bill – but he wouldn’t leave her unprotected, either. Marathon waited for him.

Once she was safely in her hotel room for the night, he could move on them. He wouldn’t get much sleep but he was used to that.

Back in her room and freshly showered, Ariel found she still wasn’t hungry and the thought of sitting around the hotel room didn’t appeal to her. She wanted to get out. However, those men from last night might still be out there. Walking to the window, she looked out at the bright lights of the casino across the street. Lots of people wandered around and the casino would have their own security. It was only a short distance away across a busy plaza. Whoever those men were, she didn’t think they’d try anything with so many people around. She’d never gambled. It would be fun to try, she thought, as she finished drying her hair.

Buttoning up the front of her sundress, she stuck her room key, driver’s license and some money in her pocket and went to have some fun. That was what she had come here for, after all.

She was cautious as she crossed the street, staying alert, looking for those three men. It wasn’t large muscular men her eyes were drawn to, though. A bright flash of blond hair, a tall, rangy frame. Green eyes. There was no sign of him that she could see and she tried not to acknowledge the disappointment she wouldn’t admit to herself she felt.

The air was stiflingly warm as she walked across to the casino. A blast of lights, noise and cold air hit her as soon as she pulled the door open. Lights of every color and type assaulted her eyes while bells, whistles, shouts and laughter did the same for her ears. It was overwhelming, certainly amazing and definitely astonishing.

A wide central aisle split the center of the massive room, before it forked around each side of the card tables. On each side of the aisle were banks and banks of slot machines. A mind-boggling variety of machines. All kinds, numbers and amounts. It took a minute before she figured out how much you had to put in each machine and then she wandered around to see which ones could be played for the least amount of money. She found some machines you could play for only a nickel and stared at them in bewilderment.

An old woman wearing a brilliantly colored muumuu in violent shades of violet that nearly matched her silvery-violet hair looked up and laughed at the expression on her face. The machine she played erupted into bells and whistles but she only glanced at it.

“First time, sweetie?” she said, “Come on and have a seat. I’ll explain it to you. It only looks complicated, they really do make it easy.”

She patted the chair next to her.

What the heck
, Ariel thought and sat down. She listened intently as the old woman explained how to play the thing. It turned out it wasn’t as complicated as it looked.

The first few times she hit the button nothing happened and then she hit it again. The machine went crazy, dials spinning, bells ringing and whistles shrilling. For a moment she simply stared at it and then started laughing with delight. She’d won. Then she looked at the amount and started giggling. All that over a few dollars. What did it do if you hit the jackpot, she wondered?

She didn’t hit one but someone nearby did, if only a small one. It was very funny. Lights were flashing as dials spun and bells rang.

After a while, she switched to another machine, the people around her happily and patiently explaining how it worked. For a little while she played, winning some, mostly losing, chatting idly with the people around her. She discovered that all the drinks were free, which astounded her until she realized players had no reason to get up from the machine, except to eat or go to the bathroom. If she’d been a drinker, it also opened up the possibility she’d gamble unwisely once alcohol lowered her inhibitions. The casino would claim it was simple hospitality.

Someone sat down next to her, put a few quarters in the machine and pushed the button.

“So, pretty lady,” he said, “What’s your name?”

Ariel glanced at the man from the corner of her eye. She’d gotten enough of a look at him to make her heart sink. Medium height, thin, silk shirt over too-tight slacks, with a gold chain around his neck. Attractive enough if you liked the lounge lizard lothario type. This she did not want. All she wanted was to have a little fun and be allowed to play in peace.