Ready to Run (I Do, I Don't 1)

“Last chance to back out. Fold?” Wes asks.

I smile. “Nope. You?”

He gives a slight shake of his head, though I know him well enough to recognize that the flicker in his eyes is nervousness.”

Wes dealt, so I show my hand first. I carefully keep the smugness off my face as I lay down my full house.

Wes stares at my cards for a long moment, the silence in the room nearly deafening as we wait for him to show his hand.

He lifts his gaze to mine, his expression impassive as he sets his cards on the table.

I hold his gaze for another long moment, silently informing him that tonight marks the end of his tantrum. I won’t let him back out of the Pirate Vamps deal, but I won’t razz him either. We’ll put this night behind us and be fucking friends again.

I need a goddamn friend right now.

Finally, I become aware of the fact that everyone is looking at me. That, far from looking distraught, Wes looks…triumphant.

No.

I lower my gaze to the table, to Wes’s poker hand.

Four twos.

It’s the worst four-of-a-kind you can get.

And yet it beats my full house.

“Damn it, Gage,” Dan mutters.

He hasn’t wanted me to be a part of Jilted, for obvious reasons. It’s a career killer—the kind of move that makes you famous, for all the wrong reasons.

I look at Wes once more, know that he expects me to try to back out. Hell, he wants it. So he’ll have one more thing to hate me for.

I feel something tighten in my chest—the realization that I have no one. Nothing.

I force an easy smile and reach out to find the hand of the woman closest to me, a stunning blonde with a great rack. I tug her onto my lap and nuzzle her neck. “What do you think, sweetheart? You gonna watch me on TV?”

“What’s Jilted?”

“Think The Bachelor. With higher stakes.”

Somehow I manage not to grind my teeth as I say it.

She tugs my hair, pulling me back to look at her. “So I’ll have to watch you make out with dozens of other girls? On camera?”

I squeeze her waist and give her a quick wink before looking across the table at Wes, careful to hide my disdain.

Hell, maybe I should be thanking the guy.

He’s just given me one hell of a distraction from my problems.