Raising the Stakes

He would, tonight. And if Ballard didn’t phone by this evening… Why wait for evening? He zipped his fly, slid his feet into a pair of mocs and reached for his cell phone, frowning when he got Jack’s answering machine.

“Jack, it’s Gray. I need that data about Dawn Kitteridge’s kid ASAP. I’m counting on you, man. Get the info to me fast, okay?”

Gray snapped the phone shut. Ten to one, she had the boy living somewhere along that road where he’d chased her and her car ran out of gas. She’d probably been visiting the kid that day. Thomas, his name was. Jack had learned that much. Tommy. Nice name for a boy. He’d be, what, six? Seven? What did kids that age like? Baseball? Football? He’d never thought much about kids one way or another except for his ever-expanding batch of cousins, but he could…

“Whoa.”

He blinked. He was going from being a bachelor to being a husband and father, and he hadn’t even consulted with the lady he wanted to marry. Intended to marry. Gray shook his head as he switched on the light over the bathroom sink.

His friends back east would never believe it. Graham Baron, a study in domesticity. His cousins wouldn’t believe it, either, although they’d all taken turns teasing him, saying that one day he’d fall and when he did, he’d fall hard. Wishful thinking, he’d figured—but they were right. He’d gone down like the proverbial ton of bricks and the craziest thing was, he was happy about it.

Whistling softly, he lathered his face and drew the razor along his jaw. One more hour until he saw Dawn. Until he went for broke and told her everything. What if he said the hell with waiting that hour? If he went straight downstairs, to where she worked, swung her into his arms and kissed her and never mind modesty and propriety or anything else. Would she kiss him back or would she slug him? Knowing Dawn, she might do both. First the kiss, because he wouldn’t let her go until he felt her mouth soften under his and, yes, it would soften. She couldn’t resist his kisses any more than he could resist hers. Then the slap, because no matter how wonderful the kiss, she’d be brimming with indignation. He loved that about her, all that fire and strength—

Gray cocked his head. Was that somebody at the door? He turned off the water, swabbed at his face with a towel, looped it around his neck and went to find out. Maybe it was the guy who restocked the minibar. When he fished out that can of soda, he’d noticed…

It wasn’t the minibar guy or the chambermaid. It was Dawn. He’d thought about her, wanted her…and she was here, yet another small miracle in a week of them. He felt a foolish smile curl over his mouth.

“Sweetheart. Honey, I was just thinking of—”

The words died on his tongue. Something was wrong. Terribly wrong. Dawn’s eyes were wild; her face was drained of all color. She was trembling. Visibly trembling, and when he reached out to draw her into his arms she jerked away from his hands. A chill lanced through him, drove straight to the marrow of his bones as a dozen explanations ran through his head, every last one of them bearing the name Harman Kitteridge.

“Dawn? Sweetheart, what’s happened?”

She slipped past him, drawing in her breath as if she couldn’t bear the thought of her body brushing his. He caught her by the shoulders. She tried to pull away but he held on tight.

“Talk to me,” he demanded. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

Dawn stared at him. She’d come here on impulse. It was either that or go crazy. Lunch with Cassie had triggered it but the truth was that horrible questions and doubts had been tormenting her for days, buzzing around inside her head like tiny insects. She’d done her best to ignore them but, just like a swarm of mosquitoes, they kept coming back no matter how hard she swatted them away.

Who was Graham Baron? A lawyer from New York, he said, but the only thing she really knew was that he was a stranger who had entered her life with the force of a storm coming down from the mountains. Why had he come to Vegas? He said he was on vacation, but he didn’t like gambling any more than she did. And then there was the most important question of all. Why her? In a town filled with beautiful women, why had he chosen her? She never deceived herself about her looks. She was attractive, yes, maybe even pretty, but competition for the showgirls, the models, the would-be actresses who were a dime a dozen in Las Vegas? No way.

Why would a man who was so good-looking, so intelligent, so obviously rich and eligible, pick her?

All those questions, and then her conversation with Cassie. It had left her shaken though she’d tried not to show it. She’d spent the afternoon doing the scut work of the wealthy and important guests who demanded her services, performing her duties by rote while she tried to make sense of things, but how could you make sense of a puzzle when the important pieces were missing?

For four years she’d led a quiet, careful existence. She’d been content with her job, happy with the little home she’d made for herself, and thrilled with the knowledge that her son was safe. She’d lived by a set of self-imposed rules meant to protect her and Tommy—and then, in what she could only think of as one explosive moment of madness, she’d broken them all.

She’d gotten involved with a man. Gotten involved? What a stupid, empty phrase. What she’d done was a thousand times more dangerous.

She’d fallen in love.

She’d been sitting in her office after lunch, talking on the phone with an up-and-coming Hollywood director who was babbling about how he could only drink water bottled in a spring that bubbled up in a particular valley rimmed by a particular set of mountains, and she’d been saying yes, uh-huh, I understand, when all at once she’d thought, Cassie’s right. I’m in love with Gray.

And hot on the heels of that dizzying realization had come another.

A man who sounded as if he might be Harman was hanging around the casino.

How could those two things happen at the same time? Was Cassie right about that, too? Was it coincidence, that Gray had come into her life and now Harman had found her, or was it something else?

“You must understand,” she’d heard the director say, “only that specific water…” and she broke into his stupid little speech and said all right, she’d take care of it. Then she’d dropped the phone and run from her office because if she thought too long about where she was going or what she was about to do, she’d have lost her courage.

Riding the elevator to Gray’s floor, listening to the pounding of her heart, she’d tried to imagine what he’d say when she confronted him. Questioning him could be the most risky thing she’d done since the night she ran away from the mountain.

If Cassie was wrong and there wasn’t a connection between Gray and Harman, she’d have a lot of explaining to do. Once Gray knew everything, how would he look at her? Her past. Her secrets. She’d kept the most important parts of herself hidden from him…and yet, that wasn’t the worst of it.

What if Cassie was right? Could there be some awful link between Gray and Harman?

No, she’d thought as she hurried down the hall, no, there couldn’t be. Just imagining the two men in the same room was impossible.