Against The Odds (Anna Dawson #1) (23 page)

“I’m not surprised all of those guys in Pittsburgh were home. Those bigwigs aren’t going to do their own dirty work,” I said. Although, I could kind of see Ralph Stankowski taking the responsibility on himself. He seemed like a “out of the way, I’ll do it myself” kind of guy.

But not a murderer kind of guy, if I had to guess.

“But that’s the fun of the revenge motive,” Frank said. “Doing it yourself. Seeing the one who caused you pain getting his.”

I waved that away. “So how are all the hit men in the world making livings? Some of those have to be revenge crimes.”

“We’re not thinking these jobs were professionally done,” Jack said and Frank nodded his agreement. “With the possible exception of Danny.”

“Right. But even that isn’t consistent with the other two shootings. That was close range, back of the head, assassination-style.”

“Exactly,” Jack said. “Gus and Ben were not shot by a professional.”

“How can you be so sure?” I asked.

“Because they’d be dead.”

J
ack crawled into my bed at six a.m. “Should you be in here?” I asked, though I was happy to curl my body around his big, warm, male one.
 

He’d decided to stay at the house over night. I don’t know if it was to make me feel better, or for his sense of duty, but I was glad to have him in the house. I’d offered to share my bed, he opted for the couch.

“The patrol car’s outside,” he said as he started divesting me of my sleepwear. “I’m officially off duty until—well, until we’re finished.”

I chuckled. “I love the way you keep hours.”
 

“Me too.”

“And I’m more attractive to you than a bourbon? For the few minutes you’re off duty?” I asked, hoping he heard the tease in my voice. No way was I going to get on his case about his drinking when I knew I had a visit with Vince ahead of me today.
 

“This time,” he said, and rolled me over.

“W
hat’s on your schedule today?” he asked later as he dressed.
 

I didn’t think there’d ever come a day when I’d tire of looking at a naked Jack Schiller. I might get sick of that damned raised brow, but not the whole, gloriously naked package.

I pointed to the envelope with the twenty thousand dollars in it that sat on my bedside table. “I need to take care of that today.”

He slipped his pants on. “Good.”

“And whenever Gus is ready to be discharged I’ll take the boys to get him.”

“No.”

“No?”

“The boys aren’t going anywhere. I’ll get Gus and bring him here.”

“That might freak him out, not to have us there. Just a cop coming to get him, not even taking him home.”

He sighed, scrubbed his face with his hands. “Okay. Call me when you know what time that is. I’ll meet you, and only you, at the hospital and escort you both back here. How’s that?”

“He’s going to want to stop at his apartment and gather up some clothes.”

“Can’t he wear something of Ben’s? Or we’ll just pick him up some sweats or something.”

“Oh, Jack,” I said like I was talking to a three year old. “You haven’t really met Gus, have you?”

He sighed again, started buttoning his shirt. “I didn’t know you’d be such a package deal.”

“Yes you did,” I said. The man was a detective for Pete’s sake. “Besides,” I added, slipping from the sheets, kneeling on the bed and pulling him toward me by his belt loop. “I’m worth it.”

He raised a brow at me as he came even closer, but his actions said he agreed.

“W
hat am I supposed to do with this?” Vince asked, tossing the envelope of money into my lap.

“Put it toward my tab,” I said, but it sounded more like a question, because of course, Vince was calling the shots.

“I thought your tab was going to be paid with other arrangements.” Not even a hint of question on his end.

“That was before I had this money.”

“What if I’ve been making plans based on our previous agreement? It’s not really fair to change your payment plan now.”

Payment plan. Like he held my mortgage or something.

Vince had probably started shifting funds around—sending Paulie to collect from some poor souls—so that he had a huge chunk to plunk down on the game JoJo would be working.
 

The long shot underdog that
had
to have an upset.

The extra pressure at the thought of Vince putting so much money on one game made my stomach churn.

“I’m sorry if that’s the case,” I said. I took it from my lap and pushed the envelope toward him across the little wrought-iron table at the gelato stand in the Bellagio.

He ignored it. “There’s not a hundred k in there. I’d say twenty.”

“My debt is for thirty. This is a start.”

“The choice was thirty and a…physical penalty. Or one hundred.”

“I know, Vince,” I said, disgusted with myself at the pleading in my voice. “But this is what I have. I can’t leave Ben right now to fix a game.”
 

My level of desperation was so high I actually uttered the words that I never had before…fix a game.

“You’re not going to do Ben any good sitting in a hospital,” Vince said pointedly.

“So, those are my choices?”

He shrugged, took a bite of his ice. “Those were your choices yesterday. You were thanking me then.”

“That was before Ben was shot at,” I said. Vince didn’t seem surprised.

“Yeah, I heard. That’s too bad,” he said. I didn’t ask how he’d heard so soon. I didn’t really want to know how far-reaching Vince’s network was. “But the offer stands. And it’s a damn generous one at that, Anna.”

“I know,” I said quietly, trying to desperately think of a way out.

“I want an answer now, and I’m holding you to that. I don’t want you taking a few days and trying to play that twenty k into a hundred.”

He’d just read my mind. “Why not? You’d get your money.”

He took another bite of his ice, wiped his mouth with a napkin. “Yes. But I could make a killing with this game.”

My mind whirled, but I came up with nothing that would pay back Vince, keep me in town for the duration, and keep me out of the hospital. Even if I could bear the shame—and I wasn’t sure I could—of asking Ben or Lorelei for it, and the slush fund was healthy, it probably wasn’t a hundred thousand healthy after the Lexus and the twenty thousand that now sat staring at me.

“This is business, Anna,” he said.

I nodded. “I know, Vince.” I sighed, cornered. “I’ll have the game to you in a couple of days,” I said and started to leave, taking the envelope from the table. It would have to be my seed money to make JoJo’s plans grow.

“Tomorrow. By five,” he said, and I knew better than to argue.
 

“Tomorrow,” I agreed.

“And the game is played by Sunday.”

“By Sunday,” I said, wondering how the hell I was going to leave the boys in the next few days to take care of this.

And what Jack would say about me suddenly going out of town?

Chapter Nineteen

“S
o, Jack, how is it that you ended up in Las Vegas?” Ben asked that night as we sat around the dining room table playing cards. Jimmy and I’d suggested poker—for cash of course—but Lorelei had insisted on gin rummy so that she could play too.

She’d lived with me for years and yet she still didn’t know if a straight or flush was the higher hand.

“How do you know I’m not from Vegas originally?” Jack asked Ben as he discarded a three of clubs.

“Nobody’s from Vegas originally,” Jimmy said. I looked around the table. It was true of all of us. But gambling—and dancing in Lor’s case—had brought all of us here. I didn’t see police work as something that would necessarily drive someone to Vegas.

Of course, there’d be no shortage of cases.

“I’ve been on the force here for just about a year. I was in the Portland area for fifteen years. But I was raised in the Bay area.”

Huh. So he had stuck to the truth in his cover in Pittsburgh. Except for his name.

He leaned over to me, touching my shoulder with his. “Always stick as close to the truth as possible,” he whispered. “That way you have less rope to tangle in.”

“I’ll remember that, Danny Lowenstein,” I said. He chuckled, and leant into me, bumping shoulders. I held my hand of cards closer to my chest like he was going to sneak a peek, which only made him chuckle louder.

Ben and Saul looked at us and gave each other knowing smiles which made me blush. As much as I can blush at a card table.

“Were you on the police force in Portland, too?” Ben asked, studying his cards.
 

“Yes, sir. First vice then homicide.”

At the mention of vice, Jimmy gave me an amused look. “Bet you dealt with a lot of degenerate gamblers in vice,” Jimmy said. I scowled back at him.

“Not as many as I’ve dealt with here,” Jack answered.
 

“Here, Vegas? Or here, at this table?” Ben said earning laughter from everyone. Except Jimmy and I.

“Both,” Jack answered to more laughter.

“Gus, how are you feeling? Can I get you anything?” I asked.

Gus had come home with Jack and me unwillingly at first, but more easily once we’d swung by his apartment and picked up some of his things. When we got here, Jack not only pulled Gus’ things out of his car trunk, but a duffel bag of his own.

I hadn’t said a word, but gave Jack’s arm a squeeze, letting him know he was welcome—whether he was on duty or not.

After Gus had rested for a while, he insisted on playing cards with us, so we had his leg propped up on another chair. He wore silk pajamas and a robe. Very Hugh Hefner.

“I’m fine, Anna. All I need is better cards. Can you do something about that?”

“If I could, we’d all be wearing diamonds,” I said.

“We do just fine,” Ben said sternly to me. “Nobody here needs diamonds.”

I looked at him. I knew he was scared, and freaked out, and probably sore as hell from falling yesterday. But this was the first time that anything even close to censure about my gambling came out of him.

“I know, Ben,” I said softly.
 

He looked around the table, saw the game had pretty much come to a stop and everyone was looking at him. His brown eyes grew soft. “Hannah, I…”

“Well, nobody
needs
diamonds,” Lorelei jumped in, saving the day. “But I sure wouldn’t turn ‘em down.”

“Next big win, get yourself some, Lor,” I said.
 

“I’m going to hold you to that,” she said.

“Good. You deserve them.”

“Every pretty girl deserves to wear diamonds,” Gus said, winking at Lorelei.
 

She gave him a girlish giggle that earned a groan from Jimmy “Guess that bullet didn’t do too much damage,” he said, as the hand came to an end. He headed to the sideboard that Lorelei had once again prepared with a great spread.

A ding went off and I saw Jack start to rise. I put a hand on his arm. “Oven,” I said, knowing he thought it was Ben’s door being opened. A door that with all the others—and windows—had been locked up tight. And then double-checked by Jack.

He sat back down, semi-embarrassed. “They sound a lot a like,” I said.
 

Lorelei started to rise but I motioned for her to sit. “I got it, Lor,” I said.

“Really?” she said with disbelief.

Now I was semi-embarrassed in front of Jack. “Just take whatever’s in the oven out and turn it off, right? How hard can that be?”

She opened her mouth, no doubt to give me oodles of directions, but saw me glance to the back of Jack’s head, and just said, “Thanks, Jo,” and returned to her cards.

I headed to the kitchen wondering why I cared that Jack not think I was an idiot in the kitchen.

Okay, I’ll admit it. It took me some time to find where Lorelei kept the oven mitts. When I had the incredible smelling dish that Lorelei had prepared out, I tried to figure out how to turn the oven off. In my defense, it’s state-of-the-art and completely digital.

Finally managing it, I was just about to head back to the dining room and turn it all back over to Lorelei when Jimmy came with a plate in his hand and said, “Lorelei said the ziti was done.”

I looked back in the baking dish. Baked ziti. “Looks done to me,” I said as Jimmy leaned over my shoulder and took a peek.

“Nah, the cheese on top needs to be browned a little. Put it back in and turn it to broil for a couple of minutes.”

When he saw my look of helplessness, he sighed and pushed me out of the way, handing me his empty plate to hold while he took the mitts and the pan and placed it back in the oven. To my delight, he took a couple of minutes to figure out the settings on the stove himself, but eventually it clicked on and he stepped back and leaned against the counter facing me.