Death On the Flop

Table of Contents

 

 

“We have to operate on the assumption that Conner is hunting down his witness—you—and that he is pretty much ruthless,” Frank said. “That means you have to stay in hiding.”

“Great idea,” I agreed.

“That doesn’t sound like you. You must be really scared.”

“Sure, I’m scared, but the best place to hide is in plain sight,” I reminded him. His mouth tightened, but he didn’t interrupt me. “So first I’ll register for the tournament—”

“Too late, entries are closed,” Frank said.

“In Ben’s place,” I finished.

Frank shook his head. “They won’t allow substitutions.”

“I won’t have to be one. He registered as B. Cooley. I am B. Cooley. I’ll just adopt his address and phone number.”

“And you’ll sure make it easy for Conner to find you.” Frank gave me a wry grin. “Bee, understand that I’m agreeing to it, but I don’t like it. And there’s one part of the plan you haven’t covered: How are you going to learn Texas Hold ’Em by tomorrow night?”

I smiled. “You’re going to teach me.”

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DEATH ON THE FLOP

 
A Berkley Prime Crime Book / published by arrangement with the author

 
PRINTING HISTORY
Berkley Prime Crime mass-market edition / January 2007

 
Copyright © 2007 by The Berkley Publishing Group.

 
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eISBN: 9781101378977

 
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As always, thanks to my daughters who are the first readers of all I write and make all my books better. I love you.

 
This book is for the members of my family who always had cards in their hands, especially my grandfather, Orlin Copeland, who would have loved that I wrote a book about his favorite game. There is a reason my first word was “pass,” after all those bridge games I had to watch from my high chair!

I must acknowledge the help I received in researching this book. I couldn’t have done it without the assistance of so many. My eternal gratitude to all those in law enforcement, wishing to remain anonymous, who’ve shared their knowledge and to my brother-in-law, cop-in-the-family, who prefers not to remain anonymous. Thanks Mike Zimmerhanzel with the Sugarland Police Department for all the cop stories over the years. The gambling expertise came to me especially from two people: Donna Drayton, who introduced me to Las Vegas for the first time and showed me her cards (even when she didn’t have to), and Dr. Jake R. Wells, Jr., who not only gave me time off work to write but invited a neophyte to his Texas Hold ’Em table to teach me secrets behind the chips. Any errors on the felt are mine and not theirs.

—Charles Lamb,
Essays of Elia
(1832)

“
Ugh. Why are you half-naked? It’s disgusting.”

Without answering, I turned my back on my grinning visitor, leaving the front door standing wide open. Not my first mistake of the day, not by a long shot, and I could tell it was about to get worse. He caught me before I could even get out of the tiny foyer of my condo, grabbing me by the hand and the waist, spinning me around to bump and grind to AC/DC blaring out of the stereo. Trust me,
Back In Black
doesn’t lend itself well to dancing. That only one of my stilettos had a heel didn’t help me keep time either.

“Ben, I’m really not in the mood,” I groused as I pushed my brother away and resumed limping my way back to the kitchen table, where I’d sat since my day went to hell.

He danced up next to me. “Is your mood the reason you look like you’re fresh out of a bar fight? You know you have two black eyes, don’t you?” Ben observed, cheerfully, putting his hands on my shoulders and pivoting me so I could see my reflection in the hall mirror.

Ugh. Soggy mascara ringed my eyes, left tracks on my cheeks and stained my satin camisole (thank goodness I hadn’t put on my favorite silk blouse). Who knew mascara could spread so far? So much for opting for the waterproof variety.

My pity party was going into its eighth hour. It all started when the heel of my left shoe gave way with a crack as I tried to zip up a skirt that was perhaps a bit too snug. I lost my balance, flailed about until I heard the aforementioned skirt rip straight up the seam in back, all the way to the waistband, which induced the bottomless supply of tears, snorts and hiccups. Needless to say, I never made it to where I was supposed to go—an interview for a much-needed job.

Ben now spun me around so I could see my backside in the mirror. And I thought I couldn’t get more depressed. He raised his eyebrows at my Hanes Her Ways. “And the reason you have a hard time keeping a man is you wear old lady undies. The thong is the thing, you know.”

“I don’t remember inviting you over.” I pointed out as I resumed my pilgrimage to the kitchen table where I’d sat staring out the window all day. “Especially not for an underwear appraisal.”

“Hey, you’re the one with your ass hanging out for God and everybody to see. You’re just lucky it was me and not Ma at the door.”

I grunted and reached for the remote on the side table to turn the music up. Ben beat me to it and silenced it. I felt bereft without the CD that had accompanied my sobs. I think AC/DC and I had become codependent. Ben cleared his throat and sounded about ten years old as he said softly, “Hey, I heard about Toby.”

I narrowed my eyes. “
Obviously
, considering your ultra-sensitive ‘unable to keep a man’ comment.”

“Hey, Bee Bee, I’m sorry.” Ben snatched me in a quick hug and kissed me on the top of my head. “I’m a jerk, which is the reason I can’t keep a woman.”

If I were feeling like myself, I would’ve jumped on that open invitation to dispense some love life advice, which incidentally, he sorely needed. Instead, I wiggled out of his grasp, plopped into the chair, pressed my face to the tabletop and peered down through the glass and wrought iron design at the chipped Tangerine Trouble nail polish on my big toe peeking out of the wounded footwear. I had a brief automatic urge to grab the polish remover and repaint it before Toby could see it—he hated when my polish chipped. He’d even given me a gift to celebrate our recent engagement; a year’s worth of weekly visits to his pedicurist. But then I remembered Toby McKnight wouldn’t be seeing my big toe, or any part of me, ever again.

“Wow, you must really be depressed, I just declared open season on Bad Boy Ben and you didn’t even fire a single shot,” Ben said, ruffling my hair.

When I still didn’t respond, Ben leaned over to open the refrigerator. I heard him slide open the hydrator. A cellophane bag full of carrots slapped down next to my face on the table. Ben eased into the seat across from me. I stared at his denim knees. “You could’ve called me, you know,” he said reproachfully, now sounding about eight years old.

“Why?” I raised my head. “So you could say I told you so?”

Ben raised his eyebrows over devilish green eyes, ran his hand through his longish silken black hair, blew a breath out of lips surrounded by a carefully crafted day old dark stubble and gave me every reason to start crying all over again. After all, it wasn’t fair. He was older by ten minutes and looked ten years younger and ten times sexier than I did. Ben could be Colin Farrell’s twin and instead he was mine. Go figure fate on this one. Somehow I ended up with pale freckled skin to his suave olive complexion. Somehow I ended up with soft curves that resisted every fitness machine known to man while he got six-pack abs simply from breathing. Somehow he had an endless supply of lovers when I couldn’t even hang on to the only one I’d had for the last five years. Somehow, I thought, as I watched him gnawing on his third carrot, he ended up with a maniacal drive and I was so laid back I could barely get up and get dressed in time to make it to work.