Colorado 03 Lady Luck by Kristen Ashley Page A

didn’t win all the time. It seemed
ridiculous to me and scary because Lady Luck didn’t swing Ronnie a
break very often and I was always waiting for her to pull the rug
out from under him and stop with the balancing act as pertained to
his gambling. Luckily (heartbreaking pun intended), he died before
she could do that.
    “High stakes poker,” I repeated.
    “One hundred K buy in.”
    I blinked. Then I asked hesitantly, “Um… are
you good at poker?”
    “Very.”
    “Really?”
    “Woman, you’re wearin’ over thirty thousand
dollars proves that true.”
    I blinked again. Then I breathed,
“Really?”
    “Yeah.”
    “No, I mean, really, I’m wearing over thirty
thousand dollars?”
    “And the answer is still yeah. Your
engagement ring alone is nearly half that.”
    “ Oh my God,” I whispered, suddenly feeling
my engagement ring burning a circle around my finger. I mean, it
wasn’t like I didn’t know all he gave me was expensive, including
the wad of cash he dropped on the bed to buy my outfits which were
not couture but I didn’t buy them at Target either. I just didn’t
know it was that expensive.
    “What?” he asked when I didn’t move.
    “What?” I asked back.
    “Yeah, Lexie, what?”
    “What as in… what, you give all your women
this kind of bling?”
    This gave new definition to “very” good at
poker.
    “ No. None of my other women signed a
marriage certificate, took my name and gave up their whole life for
me and by the time they earned bling, I’d known ‘em more than a day
and they still hadn’t
done anything that important to me.”
    I stopped breathing and apparently I did
this visibly because I got my second reaction from Ty Walker (if
you didn’t count the lip curve last night). His eyes narrowed.
    “Jesus, woman, you gonna pass out?”
    That’s when my breath came back at the
same time my eyes
narrowed. “Excuse me, Ty, I’ve never worn thirty thousand
dollars.”
    “Yeah you have. Yesterday. But, sayin’ that,
I’m guessin’ at the cost of your shoes.”
    “They were on sale.”
    “Well thank Christ for that.”
    I stared at him. Then I burst out
laughing.
    Ty didn’t find anything funny.
    “Babe, we got a game to get to. I spent a
day makin’ the connections to get a chair. But, the doors close,
the deck’s cut, they don’t let anyone in.”
    My hand went behind me to the table again to
hold myself up when he called me “babe”. Again, I had no idea why,
it was just that it was casual, it was an endearment and for many
men, it was throwaway. They said it to women they didn’t even
know.
    Ty Walker was not that kind of man. He was
not casual. He didn’t do anything throwaway. Every move he made,
every word he said had meaning. I knew this down to my bones.
    “Lexie…” He was now growling.
    “Um… one thing,” I said quietly.
    He sighed audibly.
    I kept going. “ I don’t know how to play poker.”
    “That’s good because women don’t sit this
table.”
    I was back to staring at him. Then I asked,
“So what am I supposed to do?”
    “Get attention.”
    “What?”
    “Poker isn’t all about the cards. Poker’s
mostly about attention. You got a woman whose legs are like yours,
tits are like yours, hair is like yours and ass is like yours, all
she’s gotta do for me is sit there and half the men at the table
won’t be concentrating on their cards. They’ll be thinking about
your legs, tits, hair and ass, how much they want ‘em and just what
they’d do to get ‘em.”
    “I appreciate the compliment, Ty, but I
don’t think I’m all that.”
    “You got a dick?”
    I felt my mouth twitch.
    Then I answered, “No.”
    “Trust me.”
    I really had no choice; it wasn’t my money
anyway so I decided to do that. Trust him.
    But I asked, “So is this always your tactic,
bring in some woman that gets attention?”
    “I’ve never had class with a rack and an ass
like yours so, no. We need the money so tonight I’m tryin’
somethin’