Skintight (4 page)

J
AX FELT GREAT
.
His plan was proceeding according to schedule, the prospect of sack time with a Las Vegas showgirl was a promising glimmer on his horizon and he was up forty-eight grand from his original stake when he'd sat down to play a little poker at the five-thousand-dollar-limit table three hours ago.

Life was good.

He studied his fellow players. The woman to his right had a good, stoic poker face. So did the Asian man sitting in the small blind position. The guy next to him had been an All-Star pick for three years running, but while he might knock 'em dead on the baseball diamonds, he had two definite tells. His left eye narrowed slightly when he was bluffing, and he compulsively fanned open and snapped shut his cards when he had a good hand.

A good portion of the stack of chips sitting in front of Jax were courtesy of Mr. All-Star.

The cocktail waitress offered him a drink and he refused it with a smile. Catching a flash of red hair across the casino, he straightened from his slouch and craned to see over the crowd before he caught himself and relaxed his forearms, draping himself over the table once again.

It wasn't Treena. The woman whose hair he'd seen across the room didn't share the same pale flame shade of hers. Its deeper color had merely caught his eye for a minute and he decided that it was natural for Treena to be in the back of his mind. She was, after all, the object standing squarely between him and his goal.

The fact that his heart had begun to beat a stronger, more rapid rhythm merely meant he was a red-blooded guy. It would be a hell of a lot more unnatural if the thought of a sexy showgirl
didn't
rev his engine a little. He didn't mind admitting that he was looking forward to taking her to bed. But he also knew he wouldn't let pleasure get in the way of the program.

Realizing his concentration was broken, he cashed in his chips for the day, bought himself a club soda and took it over to watch the action at a nearby Gai Pow poker table. There was a decorative post not far away and he leaned his shoulders against it while he watched the action going on at the table.

“Where's my baseball?”

Shit.
Jax dropped the foot he'd propped against the post and straightened with a lazy show of indifference. But if there was anyone who could bust his mellow mood, it was Sergei Kirov.

“I haven't got it yet,” he said evenly, looking at the Russian. “I told you it would take a while.”

“Tick tock,” Kirov said. “Clock is counting down.”

The two beefy men flanking him laughed as if he'd just uttered something witty, but Jax merely looked at him and thought,
You fucking freak.

Sergei's appearance wasn't as startling in Las Vegas as it had been on the rest of tour. Black
pompadours and sneering mouths were a dime a dozen in a city where one was just as likely to find an Elvis impersonator officiating at a wedding as a regular minister. The same look in Europe, however, had made the millionaire Russian stand out like a hooker at a Baptist wedding.

With anyone else, Jax might have written the affectation off as a ploy to psych out his fellow players. But Kirov was dead serious about paying homage to the late, great King of Rock and Roll. He had a passion for all things American from Elvis Presley to baseball. He also had the money to indulge in his obsessions. Jax looked at the tangle of gold chains that glinted in the V where Kirov's jumpsuit was unzipped nearly to his navel and shook his head.

“I want that ball,” the Russian said.

“And you'll get it. But as I explained before, my dad's estate turned out to be more complicated than I anticipated.” He didn't mention that the baseball hadn't actually been left to him. And he sure as hell wasn't about to bring up Treena's name. Rumor had it Kirov's money had its origins in the Russian mafia, and as much as Jax figured the showgirl for a scheming gold digger, he had no intention of seeing her injured—which was a distinct possibility if Sergei ever learned it was she who stood between him and the baseball. “I'll have it for you by the end of the tournament, just as we agreed.”

“See you do,” Kirov ordered. When he snapped his fingers his companions wheeled around and marched off on either side of him, looking like two black crows flanking a Russian Elvis wannabe in a glittering white jumpsuit.

Jax blew out his breath and sagged back against the
post. He'd behaved like a rank amateur when he'd allowed Kirov to maneuver him into losing the baseball.

In fact he hadn't made so many dumb moves since he was a kid trying to be the athlete his father wanted. He shouldn't have even told Sergei about his dad's baseball in the first place. Never volunteering the details of his personal life was a code he lived by on the circuit, or had been until the night in Geneva when Kirov's eternal bragging had rubbed him the wrong way one time too many.

His response to it, however, had been all out of proportion. Yes, he had received bad news about his father, but it wasn't as if he and the old man had ever been close. Big Jim hadn't been around much when Jax's mother was still alive, and after her death Jax had futilely tried to please him. Life had been tough enough for a brainy kid who'd skipped three grades and didn't know how to interact with his older peers. He'd hoped that at least his dad would be as proud of him as his mother had always been. Instead, Big Jim had wanted him to be one of the “regular” kids.

It just hadn't been in the cards, Jax reflected bitterly. They'd fought over everything. It was no surprise he had jumped at a full scholarship to the school of engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology when he was fourteen, and not merely because MIT was his university of choice. The bigger incentive had been the fact that it was about as far away within the continental United States as he could get from Big Jim.

It had been a good move for him, too. He'd been suffocating in Las Vegas, trying to fulfill his father's expectations. In Cambridge he'd discovered that it didn't
matter if he sucked at organized sports. The other students appreciated his mathematical mind. And once away from his father's badgering he'd lost his perpetual clumsiness and gained more physical grace over the course of his three-year accelerated program than he could ever have imagined. After that, he'd avoided as much as possible going back to the environment that had made him feel like such a loser.

Of course he'd still been an adolescent in an adult world. When classes were over, it hadn't mattered if he'd dazzled his fellow students with his brilliance. They'd gone off to grab a beer; he'd headed back to the dorm to play video games. Yet their appreciation of his mind—not to mention that of the think tank that had snapped him up after graduation—had made him feel like a winner most of the time.

That was more than he'd ever been able to say of his dad. Which only made that night in Geneva that much harder to accept.

Jax shook his head. Thinking about it was a huge waste of time and energy. Yet, even as he stared blankly into the middle distance, he couldn't get the night that had set him on his current path out of his mind.

 

H
IS FATHER WAS DEAD
. Jax shook his head to clear it, then read the letter from the attorney again, certain he must have misunderstood. Yet, not only did it state that his old man was gone, it explained that he'd passed away almost four months earlier. No one had been able to locate Jax right away to notify him—and for that he had no one to blame but himself, since he hadn't bothered to keep Big Jim and the Bimbo Bride informed of his whereabouts.

He set the letter carefully on the hotel desk then crossed the room to the courtesy bar. Digging out two mini bottles, he poured their contents into a glass. Not bothering to dilute it, he knocked back the drink, then poured another double and carried it over to the window. Sipping this one, he stared out the window at the Alps. The view that had knocked his socks off yesterday barely registered now.

He caught himself rubbing his chest, feeling as if he had a huge gaping hole where his heart should be.

Considering his estrangement from his father, the depth of his grief didn't seem logical and it sure as hell wasn't probable. His entire adult life had been built around logic and probabilities, so he was at a dead loss to understand the way he felt now. But the hole spread and the gnawing grief dug deeper until he experienced an inexplicable urge to howl.

Swearing, he grabbed his key card and headed down to the hotel bar in search of distraction.

Twenty minutes later Sergei Kirov walked into the lounge. Ordinarily, Jax went out of his way to avoid the Russian, but he was on his fourth drink, no one else spoke English and he was desperate to avoid the emotions that had his stomach in a knot. He greeted the other man like a long lost friend.

Kirov swerved from the counter where he'd been heading and came over to the table. “Hello, Jax. It is unusual to see you in bar.”

“Yeah, well, I got tired of my own company.” He studied the other man, taking in his black denim suit with its white topstitching and the boldly striped black and white T-shirt beneath. “Lemme guess. The King's Jailhouse Rock period?”

“Very good.” Sergei beamed his approval of Jax's keen eye. “Not everyone picks that up. You like?”

“Very cool.”

“Thank you. Thanyouveramuch. I am best Elvis.”

According to Sergei he was the best at everything. Jax bit back a smart-ass put-down, reminding himself that, in the scheme of things, the Russian was a minor irritation. “Whatever. So what have you been up to today?”

Kirov gave his order to the waitress who appeared then turned his attention back to Jax. “I finally—how do you say?—score the baseball card to complete my 1927 World Series collection.”

Jax's heart lurched at hearing the pennant championship that had haunted his childhood mentioned, but he regarded the man across the table without expression. “I didn't know you were a collector.”

“I have the best collection of all. Nobody has better. I own the official program of Worlds Championship series, the bat Herb Pennock used to win the fourth and final game, the New York Yankees team picture and every Pirates baseball card. I had every Yankee baseball card, too, except one. Today I buy rare Earle Combs card to complete my set.” He smiled smugly. “Is most important collection in the world.”

Jax had managed to shrug off Kirov's constant boasting in the past; he'd shrugged it off two minutes ago. He was no longer in the mood. Raising his drink, he looked at Sergei over its rim. “I own the first home run ball of the series.” He took a sip.

Sergei stared at him. “Babe Ruth's ball? The one in third game that brought in three runs?”

“Yep. Signed by the entire Murderers' Row.”

“I will buy from you.” Kirov slapped both hands down on the tabletop. “Name your price. Sergei will pay.”

“Oh, it's not for sale.” In a far off corner of his mind he knew he was taking just a little too much pleasure in saying no. But it had been a crappy afternoon, so he'd grab his jollies where he could. “It has great sentimental value, don'tcha know. My grandfather caught that ball and when he died it passed to my father. Now the fucker belongs to me.” Fresh pain stabbed deep and he killed off his bourbon.

To his surprise Sergei let it go and signaled the waitress. They had a couple more drinks. When the Russian suggested a friendly game of straight draw poker, Jax dragged his wandering attention back to the other man, grateful for a focal point that wasn't Big Jim's death. His inner professional whispered the number one cardinal sin of poker in his ear: never play when you're too preoccupied to give the game your complete attention. Hell, he never played cards with his competitors during off-hours, period. He flashed Sergei a big loose smile. “Sounds like a plan.”

Five minutes later they were up in his room, clearing the small table by the window of everything except a deck of cards and the money from their wallets. Kirov carried significantly more cash than he and Jax crossed to the room safe, staggering once before he caught himself. When he turned back with the difference from his stash clutched in his hand, Sergei was standing at the desk, reading the letter from Big Jim's lawyer.

Rage rose in a bitter tide up his throat. “Put that down.”

The Russian did so, carefully, then turned to him. “I am sorry for your loss.”

He shrugged. “We weren't that close.” He indicated the table. “Let's play.”

He lost consistently. He had no business playing at all and looking down at his fifth hand, he had just enough functioning brain cells left to realize it was time to fold and call it a night.

Kirov, who had been talking nonstop, studied him across the table. “Is funny thing about fathers and sons,” he said.

A red mist fogged his already cloudy mind. “I don't want to talk about my old man.”

“Mine was old-time Communist. I didn't like him worth a damn but I wanted his approval anyway. How many cards you want?”

He studied his hand. He had to draw to an inside straight and that was never the most promising odds.

“Did you—how you say—chase your father's approval, too?”

“Seek. Seek my father's approval. And what's it to you? Are you gonna talk all night or play cards?” he demanded. Extracting the card that didn't fit his straight, he skimmed it across the table. “I'll take one.”

He actually drew the card he needed to fill out his belly-buster straight draw. After Sergei dealt himself two cards, Jax tossed three one hundred dollar bills into the pot.

Sergei saw his bet and raised it seven thousand.

He counted his remaining cash. He didn't have enough and knew he ought to toss in his hand.

“Sergei is best poker player,” the Russian crowed. “You may as well save your money and skip Las Vegas. I am going to win.”