Guardian (32 page)

She grabbed the blackjack table for leverage as she stood. She shook her skirt in place with a little shimmy, not wanting to know how much she’d exposed during their impromptu game of Twister. “Did I inflict permanent damage?”

“Everything seems intact.”

“Good.” Jolynn looked down at the kneeling man staring back up with mesmerizing mocha dark eyes.

She’d never been much of a romantic, but his eyes seemed to glint with hidden depths…Okay, okay, light from the crystal chandelier may have added something to the dreamy effect. Even so, she couldn’t look away.

He shook his sleek black hair into place again. His forearm rested on his bent knee, his other hand pressed to the floor. He had a broad forehead, a firm chin, and fine creases around exotic eyes, perhaps with a hint of Polynesian ancestry. He was a total package kind of guy, with a strong, handsome face. She judged him to be in his late twenties or early thirties.

He rose, finally stopping just at her level, around six feet in her heels. Perfect. In her father’s world of burly men and overblown personalities, she found calming reassurance in the man’s understated power.

Safe. Sexy, yet safe. “Are you sure you’re all right? Your kidney, I mean.”

“I’ve taken worse hits and survived,” he said softly. “How about you?”

Better than three minutes ago. She welcomed the opportunity to think of something, anything other than where she was. “Just fine.”

“Glad to hear it.” He nodded slowly, his thick hair sliding over his brow.

Smiling, she backed away—and bumped into a waitress who shouldn’t have even been in the pit area. A tray of drinks flew from the woman’s hand and crashed to the floor. Jolynn winced.

Not even back in her family circle for a full day and already she’d reverted to her gangly teen moves. Years of cultivating a poise that rivaled her father’s multitude of Greek and Roman goddess statues evaporated with a simple glance from this guy.

He grinned, creasing dimples in his cheeks. “Sorry to trip you up like that—again.” He extended his hand, offering her the silver token gleaming in his palm. “I didn’t mean to start such a ruckus just to retrieve this.”

“No harm done.” Jolynn accepted the token with an ironic smile.

“I’ll be happy to pay for your dry cleaning.”

“You don’t have to do that.” She would settle for another one of those distracting smiles instead.

“At least let me help you dry off.” He grabbed a stack of cocktail napkins and reached out to blot her travel-weary suit jacket. His fist clenched just beside the damp fabric covering her breasts.

He passed the wadded clump to her. “You may, uh, want to take care of this yourself.”

“Uh, thanks.”

Fantasy gave way to reality as she refocused on the man in front of her. He wore the standard casino uniform of creased black pants, a loose white shirt, a red bow tie…and a name tag.
Charles Tomas: Blackjack Dealer.

Her safe, beautiful man was a two-bit blackjack dealer. Of course he was. How could she have forgotten where she was?

Jolynn resurrected the vapid facade she used as a defense against the smarmy losers she attracted like flies to sticky paper. “See you around, sugar.”

She watched his smile fade.

“Jolynn Taylor!”

The high-pitched squeal of her only cousin carried over the mayhem, breaking into any further temptation to daydream.

Long ago, when she’d learned the truth about her father’s international mob connections, Jolynn had quit believing in fantasy princes. Trusting in fairy tales got people killed. She’d toughened up fast and didn’t plan to change.

As soon as she helped her father settle in on his floating barge of iniquity, she’d be back on a plane to a normal life. By then, the nagging ache to reconnect with the old man would be soothed and all thoughts of dark-eyed princes would be left behind with the Mediterranean Sea.

*    *    *

Chuck Tanaka watched Jolynn hug the casino’s director of operations, before the cousins commandeered stools at the bar.

When the leggy redhead had charged through the casino, he hadn’t even needed to glance at her security pass to clue him in. He’d recognized Jolynn Taylor, knew
her bio in the report he’d received on Josiah Taylor’s operation. The past week had been spent packing his head full of information, preparing as the CIA brought in the NSA as well as the air force OSI and their special ops test unit.

Some of the briefing had been done in person, some by telecom, some anonymously. For their own protection, supposedly, but it sucked not knowing who all the players were.

For his own protection, they’d assured him. But then he already knew he couldn’t only rely on his test squadron brothers.

Implementing their setup and cover stories had been easier than expected with the rest of the world preoccupied with the soldier who’d open fired on the deploying troops.

Thank God no one had been killed.

He brought his attention back to the moment. He was in the game again. A last-ditch effort to resurrect himself. Do or die.

Already he’d almost fumbled when the colonel had slipped the warning about Jolynn’s unplanned arrival. Chuck had nearly botched calling the game when from across the room Colonel Scanlon had pointed her out by that British dude.

Chuck had known it must be important for Scanlon to break their established routine of exchanging info at designated times. The colonel had whispered the alert under the guise of asking for directions to the lounge to hear his Italian girlfriend sing. The warning that Josiah Taylor’s daughter was due in for an obligatory sickbed visit had come just in time for him to toss himself in her path, literally. Not one of his smoother moves, but his klutz act had gotten the job done. Contact had been made.

Except she’d rocked his balance right back.

He monitored Jolynn and her cousin as they ordered drinks. He’d made the requisite attempts to cultivate a low-key relationship with the director of operations. But she was too wrapped up in her security guard fiancé to talk about anything other than wedding plans.

Chuck mentally reviewed the facts on file about Jolynn Taylor. Boarding school education. Six-figure accounting job in Dallas and dating life that made the social pages. The rumor mill churned with stories of Josiah’s estranged daughter.

His systematic analysis faded as he remembered the press of her breasts against his chest. He’d almost forgotten to breathe. She’d come too damned close to finding his Beretta strapped in the ankle holster.

Across the room, her auburn hair gleamed like a warning light. Damn, he’d been too long without. His breakup was already six months old and that relationship had been, well, a mixed-up mess.

He was better served staying clear of female entanglements. Making contact was one thing. Letting attraction get the better of him was another. A mistake he’d made two years ago and it had cost him. Big-time.

Chuck turned his back on Jolynn Taylor and dealt the next hand. He wasn’t done with her yet. Thanks to the surveillance device in the token he’d given her—which she’d so accommodatingly placed in her purse—he would be reviewing tapes of her conversation well into the night.