Casting the Dice Read online

  “We’re getting there.”

  She dug fingers into her arm rest and scanned both sides of the avenue, looking for some place he could drop her. They stopped for a light, the building across the intersection coming into view. A driveway tunneled underneath a massive roof. People milled around there where cars and taxicabs jockeyed for position. The place looked more like a convention center than a casino, but it was a casino, the one where her mother had worked one of the table games.

  The casino gave her the excuse she needed to get away from Hal. She could also search for her purse because she’d lost it somewhere.

  A glance to the right revealed another traffic lane, empty but for a sightseeing bus parked toward the end of the block behind them. She unlatched her seat belt, grabbed the pharmacy bag, and opened her car door. Hot, humid air swept inside. “You can drop me here.”

  His arm shot across her.

  She slammed back against the seat, and her breath swooshed out. The door handle slipped from her grasp.

  “Close the door,” he yelled.

  “I can’t reach it.” She braced herself on the dash and stretched a hand. “I-I’m slip-ping.”

  He leaned across her and grabbed the door closed.

  Seconds later the motor coach she’d thought out-of-service roared up beside them, and he sank back into the driver’s seat. “Are you nuts?”

  “I wasn’t going to jump.” She crossed her arms, but inside her stomach somersaulted.

  “Looked like it to me.” He shook his head, and the locks snapped down.

  She tried the release latch to no effect and glared at him. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “Keeping you inside.” He raked a hand over his close-cropped hair.

  3

  Annie pulled on her suit jacket and waited for Hal to bust through the casino entrance behind her. He had protested this wasn’t the French Quarter, but she’d finally convinced him she needed to come in here.

  And he didn’t seem to be coming in after her, either.

  She leaned against the wall in the foyer and rubbed her arms through her jacket. Even without factoring in what Hal did for a living, being around such a handsome, fit man made her edgy. The excruciating migraine pain had lessened, but her head still hurt and most likely would for a few days.

  Rows and rows of slot machines stretched in front of her, lights blinking like on a carnival midway. The layout gave off a familiar vibe as did the clacking of the roulette wheel and the whisper of dice on the felt playing tables.

  She drew in a fortifying breath. The prescription bottle bulging in her pocket served as insurance she’d get through this situation.

  Most situations demand money. You don’t have any.

  Yet.

  No way had she wanted to borrow money from a bounty hunter, thus the need to find her lost purse. She wandered the busy aisle searching for an employee who might help.

  A well-groomed man who could be a businessman glanced up from the closest craps table. She looked away, then back. If he knew her, she should talk to him. He might be the “other man” she had supposedly mentioned to Hal.

  The businessman left the table and headed her way.

  “Hello.” She closed the lapels of her jacket. “Do I know you?”

  “Of course.” He smoothed the mustache-goatee around his mouth with a finger and thumb and steered her away from the area of play. “Where’s—?”

  “Excuse me?” She raised the volume on her aids. The neon light from the overhead sign turned the man’s face green, making him look like a comic book monster. A chill swept over her. “Where is who?”

  “Randy.”

  She turned the name over in her mind. “I don’t know. Sorry.”

  “Is he coming here today?” He stepped forward, boxing her in and repeating the mustache stroke.

  Did she have a “Bother Me” sign hanging around her neck? She shifted sideways. “If you’ll excuse me, please.”

  “Don’t go.” He gripped her arm.

  “Please let go.” She wiped his saliva off her cheek. “You’re pinching me.”

  He released her arm and spoke, but he seemed to be whispering. She raised the volume on her aids again. “What did you say?”

  Mr. Persistent moved even closer, smothering her in a blanket of strong aftershave. “Have a drink with me.”

  She bumped her heel on the cool plaster of the pillar behind her. This guy didn’t know her. He was simply hitting on her. She inched around the column. “No thanks.”

  He pulled a cell phone from a pocket. She turned to run—and came face-to-face with the backside of a row of slot machines. A heavy hand landed on her shoulder. Mr. Persistent was speaking. This time she didn’t even try to understand.

  “I’m not thirsty, and I really do need to leave.” She followed his gaze to a casino employee in an embroidered vest, pushing through the crowd in the aisle toward them. Help? Or reinforcements?

  Car keys in hand, Hal stepped onto the sidewalk. A breeze whipped through the vaulted driveway, and he lowered the zipper of his windbreaker but made sure to keep his SIG Sauer hidden.

  At the casino entrance the push bars on the doors gleamed as someone from inside exited. The man emerging didn’t look a thing like the woman he’d rescued only to foolishly turn loose here.

  Annie Swanson had sounded coherent enough, and he’d let her go against his better judgement. With her blond hair and well-toned, athletic body, she’d snag attention easily—and get in trouble. Some of the baby birds he’d rescued had tried to escape only to hurt themselves worse.

  He spun his keys on a finger and studied the red carpeted entrance. Kurt had sent a nagging message, but he’d told Annie he’d wait in case she changed her mind, and he tried to always keep his word.

  A uniformed employee strode over, tugging down his ornate vest. “You can’t stop here.”

  “There’s a limousine right there.” Hal lifted his chin toward the Lincoln idling three feet away. “Looks stopped to me.”

  The parking attendant crossed his arms. “This zone is reserved for customer pick up and drop off.”

  “What makes you think I’m not doing that?” Hal leaned his shoulders against his ride.

  “This curb is for valet parking. If you’re staying, I need your keys.”

  Hal stiffened. “The limo’s been here longer. Go pick on him.”

  “Mister—” The valet got in his face.

  To hell with this. Hal pushed off his car. Annie hadn’t returned, and he wasn’t that little kid who needed to take care of injured animals. He’d rescued her from poisonous snakes, made sure she recovered from her disorientation. He had no obligations to her, and he needed to sink a three-pointer. Bad.

  Besides, she’d distinctly told him not to bother waiting. For all Hal knew, she’d slipped out another exit. She sure had wanted to get away from him. He fingered his key. “I’m leaving.”

  Before he could take a step, movement rippled through the crowd on the curb. Seconds later, Annie plowed into his chest, immediately wrapping her arms around him. “So glad you waited.”

  He glanced over her head toward the two men jogging after her. One wore a summer suit like a lot of downtown businessmen. The other, a fancy vest like the valet.

  The man in the suit panted to a stop. “Sorry. She wasn’t watching where she was going.” He tugged on her arm. “Come along. I promised you a drink.”

  “Get your hands off her.” Hal tucked Annie under his arm and glowered. “Now.”

  The suit lifted his hand clear, glaring at him. “Who do you think you are?”

  “None of your business.” Beside him, Annie rubbed the skin where the other man’s fingers had dug, and Hal lowered his arm to her waist. “Come along, love.”

  The casino guy stepped closer. “You oughta know what she gets up to when you’re not around.”

  Hal moved her behind him and faced off, fists on his hips.

  She pulled on his arm and reached
for his door handle. “Can we go, please?”

  “With pleasure.” Hal wasted no time getting behind the wheel. He hit the door locks and stared long and hard at the men in his side mirror. They stood talking, heads bent close.

  Sweat beaded Annie’s cheeks, and her chest still heaved. After a moment, she pulled the shoulder strap around and clicked the buckle, leaning toward him enough for him to catch the spring-flower scent of her hair.

  Hal beat down his instant reaction and started the car. “Are you okay?”

  She shivered and clutched her arms. He adjusted the air conditioning. She waved a hand. “The temperature’s fine.”

  “What happened?”

  She turned to look out the rear window. “Can’t we please leave?”

  They couldn’t talk with the car in motion. He could talk, but, based on their previous interaction, she wouldn’t understand unless he took his eyes off traffic and turned her way, a dangerous thing to do in downtown New Orleans.

  He drove toward the driveway exit, his gaze straight ahead, but everything inside him swiveled in her direction, as if she were his magnetic north. “You never answered my question. Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine.” Her fingers gripped the edge of her seat so hard, her knuckles turned white.

  “I know fine when I see it, and you’re not fine.” He should comfort her, but what could he say? “You still want the French Quarter?”

  “You can drop me in a few blocks if you prefer, and I can walk the rest of the way.”

  “I don’t mind taking you all the way home.” Then he’d be satisfied he’d done as much as he could for her. He flicked her a glance. “How well did you know those men at the casino?”

  She raised winged brows. “How well do I know you?”

  “That’s irrelevant.” He made a U-turn. “I’ve had to rescue you twice today. Would one of those guys have done that?”

  “I never saw them before.” Her exasperation rang loud and clear. “How am I supposed to make that sort of judgment?”

  “They sounded like they knew you.”

  Her mouth twisted. “They were just men being men.”

  The suit had talked about having a drink with her. Hal figured they must have been hitting on her, and he didn’t want her to put him in the same category. “Give me a break. Not all men are jerks.”

  She shrugged and leaned forward when they stopped at the next light. “How close are we to the French Quarter?”

  “Right in front of you.” He swept his hand to the row of buildings facing them across Canal Street. The light turned green, and he crossed in front of a stopped streetcar. “You don’t live there.”

  “Did I say that?” She stared out the passenger window.

  Hal rubbed a hand over his head, confused again. “I need a straight answer. Are you staying at a hotel?”

  “No.” Her slim shoulders rose and fell in a sigh.

  He considered asking about friends, but the car in front braked and he had to keep his eyes on the road. At the next red light, he opened the map app and handed her his cell. His dyslexia tended to flare up when he felt stressed. “Why don’t you enter the address?”

  Another dramatic sigh. He waited, and she finally turned those tropical blues on him. “I guess I might as well tell you.”

  “I can’t take you there if you don’t.” This woman was going to drive him crazy, but she hadn’t mentioned getting out again which he counted a victory.

  She held his cell close and shut one eye as if the sunlight still bothered her.

  The doctor had been right. Annie would need a few days to recover. Hal ignored the ache in his gut to focus on getting her to family or friends—someone who could look after her until she recovered.

  Hal retrieved the phone, accidentally brushing her fingers. Sparks skittered along his nerves. He ignored the sizzle to study the pointer on the digital app. “I know where this is.”

  She grimaced. “There’s no point in going there.”

  He gaped at her. “Why not?”

  “I don’t have a key.”

  “Some people keep one hidden on the premises. Like under a rock.”

  Another heavy sigh came from the passenger seat. “That would be a miracle.”

  He would apparently need one to get Annie Swanson settled safely. “We should at least check the address out.”

  Minutes later, Hal drove Royal Street, searching for numbers on the buildings on either side.

  “Stop.” She grabbed his arm.

  Fire raced through his blood. He slammed on the brake, noticing too late, the delivery van surging forward and stopping inches from his rear bumper. He flicked sweat from his temple.

  “Let me out.” She unlatched her belt.

  Not happening. Not yet. Soon, though. He had to get rid of her. The more time he spent with her, the closer his control came to a tailspin.

  “I’m blocking traffic.” He continued driving. “Let me find a place to park.”

  They circled the area another seven minutes before someone pulled away from the curb. He swung into the space, waited a few minutes for anyone tailing them to appear, then scanned the neighborhood for trouble. He’d found Annie in a fragile state. Alone with poisonous snakes. And he couldn’t shake the feeling she’d been left that way deliberately.

  They walked sidewalks for two blocks and stopped in front of a shop’s display window. The shelf inside displayed a bunch of books. Ornate gold lettering scrolled across the covers of several. Others wore faded paper jackets. Beyond an empty desk stood shelves and shelves of books like in his worst nightmares.

  The wooden sign hanging under the balcony of the apartment upstairs identified the place as Old Mint Books. That made sense. Coins had been minted in a nearby landmark.

  A closed sign hung in the shop’s recessed French doors, but someone could still be on the premises, either in the patio, the former servants’ quarters facing that or elsewhere. He rang the doorbell. No one buzzed them through or called from above. He pursed his mouth and scanned the empty sidewalk, urgent warnings racing along his nerves.

  Sun flashed off a passing car. Something else flickered on the edge of his sight.

  Hal reacted on instinct.

  4

  A hard body wedged her against the door jamb.

  Her pulse thundered.

  Annie gasped for air, the intensity of her headache shooting off the Richter scale.

  “What are you doing?” She gave an experimental push against solid abs. Hal shifted, and she glimpsed the gray-haired man beckoning to them from the opposite sidewalk.

  Hal’s dark gaze found hers. “You know this man?”

  “He runs the dry cleaners.” What was his name? Oh, yeah. “Louis Costanza. I better find out what he wants.”

  She waited for a car to pass then crossed the narrow one-lane street with Hal. The shop bell jangled when she opened the door.

  “Hold it open, please.” A woman in spike heels gathered a pile of bagged dresses and hustled through the door Hal held. Annie winced when the bell jangled again and moved to the counter.

  “I shoulda told you when you came in before.” Mr. Costanza tucked a pencil behind an ear. “Got busy, you know how that is.”

  “No problem. I understand.” She must have stopped in here… She couldn’t recall when. Time had contracted. With luck by tomorrow her mental fog would be gone.

  “I looked for ya later but never seen ya.”

  Hal introduced himself, and the men shook hands.

  “Your aunt always left an extra key with me.” Mr. Costanza opened a drawer beneath the counter.

  That’s right! I have an aunt. Tears welled as she glanced through the French doors at the bookshop. The inheritance her aunt had left her was the reason she’d come to New Orleans in the first place.

  “Your aunt June wanted to be sure she could get inside in case she ever got locked out or lost her purse or got it stolen.” He pawed through the odds and ends. “It’s a real shame
about her passing. She was such a nice person, always coming in to chat. Never in a hurry. I didn’t mind holding onto her key cause everybody’s got to look after one another in this world.”

  He closed a drawer and opened another, and Annie’s insides lurched. If he couldn’t find the key, she had no idea how she’d escape again from the bounty hunter.

  “After her boyfriend died, I kept telling June she should get rid of all those old books and lay in the souvenirs tourists want to buy, but she never would.” Mr. Costanza lifted a key with a strip of purple net knotted through the hole. “There you go. That’s the key to the side alley, you know. I don’t know if it fits the front doors.”

  “Thank you so much.” Annie clutched the key and beamed at Hal.

  He nodded. “Your miracle.”

  Now all she had to do was send Hal on his way. But how?

  Mr. Costanza propped a shoe on a stool. “What are you going to do with the store?”

  “I need to sell it.” Her throbbing headache made thinking hard, but this particular memory materialized clearly. She rubbed her temple. “I have a headache. Can we talk another time?”

  Louis Costanza offered her aspirin, but she declined. “I’ve got something for the pain, thanks. And thanks for the key.”

  The key slid easily into the lock. She pushed open the panel and gestured down the dim alley. “Ta-da.”

  Hal stared at the sun-lit patio at the end. “I can stay if you want. The cleaners will close in a few hours, and Mr. Costanza won’t be around if you need help.”

  “I don’t anticipate needing any.” Not after she finally got rid of him.

  He pulled his wallet and a pen from his cargo pants, scribbled something, and extended a business card. “Here’s my cellphone. Call me if you need anything.”

  “I’ll be all right now.” She backed into the alley. “Besides, I’m not calling someone who goes around arresting people.”

  “Criminals.” His expression darkened, and a muscle jumped in his hard jaw. “What’s wrong with that?”