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So much for his honor. So much for his love.
Bree’s lips twisted. Turning away, she gave the rest of the men a sensual smile. “Win this first hand, and you’ll have me at your mercy. You’ll get your revenge. Humiliate me completely. Take my body, and make your last memory of me one of your own pleasure.” She gave a soft sigh, allowing her lips to part. “My skills at cards are nothing compared to what I can do to you in bed. I’ve learned the art of seduction. You have no idea,” she whispered, “what I can do to you. A single hour with me will change your life.”
Her act was one hundred percent fraud, of course. She, know the art of seduction? What a joke. She’d have no clue what she’d do with a man in bed. Since Vladimir, she’d been very careful never to let any man close to her. At twenty-eight, she was a virgin. But she did know how to bluff.
The men were riveted.
“I’m in,” Greg Hudson croaked.
“And me.”
“I accept.”
“Yes.”
As the men at the table agreed, Bree would have been frightened by all the looks of lust and desire and rage, if she hadn’t frozen her heart against emotion.
But the last set of ice-blue eyes held no lust. No desire for domination. Just pure, cold understanding. As if Vladimir alone could see through all her tricks to the scared woman beneath.
“As you wish,” he said softly. He gave a cold smile. “Let’s play.”
His low, sensual voice slid through her body. When she looked into Vladimir’s eyes, fear pierced her armor. Pierced her heart. She wanted to leap up and run from his knowing gaze, to keep running and never stop. It took every ounce of her willpower to remain in the chair.
Clutching her jacket around her for warmth, she wrenched her gaze away, gripping the black leather so no one could see that her hands were shaking. “Then let’s begin.”
At Greg Hudson’s nod, Chris the dealer dealt the cards. Ignoring the spiteful whispers and daggered glances of the trophy girls, Bree stared at her cards, facedown on the table.
She couldn’t let herself think what would happen if she lost. Couldn’t even imagine what it would be like to let any of these angry, fat, ugly men take their revenge on her virginal body through rough sex.
But even more awful would be having Vladimir win. Giving her virginity to the man who’d once broken her completely? She couldn’t survive it. Not from him.
Just win, she ordered herself. All she had to do was take this first hand, and her virginity would no longer be on offer. It would be a long night of poker trying to win a hundred thousand dollars. But this was the most important hand.
Closing her eyes, she silently prayed. Then she picked up the cards. Careful not to let any of the players see them, she looked at them.
It took every ounce of her skill not to gasp.
Three kings. She had three kings, along with a four and a queen. Three kings. She nearly wept with relief. It was as if fate had decided she was gambling for the right reasons and deserved to win.
Unless it was more than fate …
She looked up through her lashes toward the young dealer. Could he be helping her? Chris was about Josie’s age, and he’d come twice to their apartment for dinner. He wasn’t exactly a close friend, but he’d spoken many times with irritation about Greg Hudson’s poor management skills. “You would do a better job of running this resort, Bree,” he’d grumbled, and she’d agreed with a smile. “But who wouldn’t?”
Now, catching her eye, the young dealer gave her a wink and a smile.
Sucking in her breath, Bree looked away before anyone noticed. Her eyes accidentally fell on Vladimir’s. His eyebrows lowered, and she gulped, looking back down at her cards, hastily making her expression blank. Had he seen? Could he guess?
The dealer turned to his left. “Your Highness?”
Because of his placement at the table, Vladimir was the first one required to add a bet to the pile of chips already in the middle of the table from the ante. “Raise.”
Raise? Bree looked up in surprise. He was looking straight at her as he said, “Five thousand.”
Texas Big-Hat cursed and threw his cards on the table. “Fold.”
“Call,” Silicon Valley said, matching Vladimir’s bet.
“Call,” Mr. Vanderwald puffed, a bead of sweat dripping down his forehead.
“Call,” Greg Hudson said.
All eyes turned to Bree.
“She’s already all in,” Greg Hudson said dismissively. “There’s nothing more she can wager.”
He was right, she thought with a pang. She couldn’t match Vladimir’s raise, and that meant even if she won the hand, she couldn’t win anything beyond the twenty-five thousand dollars’ worth of chips currently in the center. What a waste of three kings …
Bree suddenly smiled. “I call.”
“Call?” Greg Hudson hooted. “You have an extra five thousand dollars hidden in the back pocket of those jeans?”
She stretched back her shoulders and felt the eyes of the men linger on the shape of her breasts beneath her black T-shirt. “I can match the bet in other ways. Instead of just an hour in bed, I’ll offer an entire night.” She tilted back her head, allowing her long blond hair to tumble provocatively down her shoulders. “Many chances. Multiple positions. As fast or slow or hard as you like it, all night long, and each time better than the last. Against the wall. Bent over the bed. In my mouth.”
She felt like a total fool. She hoped she sounded like a woman who knew what she was talking about, not a scared virgin whose idea of lovemaking was vague at best, based only on movies and novels. But as she looked at each man at the table they seemed captivated. She exhaled. Her mask was holding. She was convincing them. Even Chris the dealer looked entranced.
Vladimir alone seemed completely unaffected. Bored, even. His lips twisted with scorn. And his eyes—
His blue eyes saw straight through her. A hot blush burned her cheeks as she said to him, “Do you agree my bet is commensurate with your five thousand dollar raise?”
“No,” Vladimir said coldly. “That is not a call.”
Her heart sank. “You …”
He gave her a calm smile. “That is an additional raise.”
“A … a raise?” she echoed uncertainly.
“Obviously. Let us say … your added services are equivalent to an additional five thousand dollars? Yes. A full night with you would surely be worth that.” He lifted a dark eyebrow. “Would you not agree?”
“Five thousand more?” Greg Hudson’s voice hit a false note. Catching himself, he shifted uncomfortably in his chair and snickered, “Fine with me. I’m half raised already.”
“Good,” Vladimir said softly, never looking away from Bree. “So we are in agreement.”
Bree’s brow furrowed as she tried to read his expression. What on earth was he doing?
Trying to help her? Or giving her more rope to hang herself with?
Repressing her inner tumult, she stared him down. In for a penny … She lifted her chin. “If it’s worth five more, then why not ten more?”
The corners of Vladimir’s mouth lifted. “Yes, indeed. Why not?” He looked around the table. “Miss Dalton has raised the wager by ten thousand dollars.”
To her shock, one by one the men agreed to her supposed “raise,” except for the Belgian, who folded with an unintelligible curse.
And just like that—oh, merciful heavens—there was suddenly a pile of chips at the center of the table worth seventy-five thousand dollars.
She looked at each man as they discarded cards and got new ones from the dealer.
Don’t play the hand, her father had always said. Play the man.
She forced herself to look across the table at Vladimir. His face was inscrutable as he discarded a card and got a new one. When she’d played him ten years ago, he’d had a tight style of play. He did not bluff, he did not overbet—the exact opposite of Bree’s strategy.
He lifted his eyes to hers, and against her will, her heart turned over in her chest. His handsome face revealed nothing. The poverty of his homesteading Alaskan childhood, so different from hers, had pushed him to create a billion-dollar business across the world, primarily in metals and diamonds. He was so ruthless he had cut his own younger brother out of their partnership right before a multimillion-dollar deal. It was said Vladimir Xendzov had molten gold in his veins and a flinty diamond instead of a heart. That he wasn’t flesh and blood.
But if Bree closed her eyes, she could still remember their last night together, when they’d almost made love on a bearskin rug beneath the Christmas tree. She could remember the heat and searing pleasure of his lips against her skin in the deep hush of that cold winter’s night.
I love you, Breanna. As I’ve never loved anyone.
No one else had ever called Bree by her full name. Not like that. Now, as they looked at each other across the poker table, they were two enemies with battle lines drawn. Everything she’d ever thought him to be was a dream. All that was left was a savagely handsome man with hard blue eyes and an emotionless face.
She turned away. Greg Hudson and the Silicon Valley tycoon were far easier to read. She watched her boss get three new cards, saw the sweat on his face and the way he licked his thick, rubbery lips as he stared down at his hand. Hudson had nothing. A pair of twos, maybe.
She looked at Silicon Valley. His lips were tight, his eyes irritated as he stared down moodily at his cards. He was probably already thinking about the twenty thousand dollars he’d wagered in the pot. She hid a smile.
“Miss Dalton?” Chris the dealer said. Stone-faced, she handed in the four of spades. Waited. And got back …
A queen.
She forced herself not to react, not even to breathe. Three kings and two queens. A full house.
It was an almost unbeatable hand. Careful not to meet Vladimir’s eyes, she placed her cards facedown on the table. How she wished she could raise again! If only she had more to offer, she could have finished off her sister’s debt right now—with a single hand!
Don’t be greedy, she ordered herself. Seventy-five thousand dollars was plenty. Once she had it safely in her possession, the offer of her body—and unbeknownst to the men, her virginity—would be off the table.
But still. A full house. Her heart filled with regret.
“Raise,” Vladimir said.
She looked up with a frown. Why would he raise now?
His eyes met hers. “Fifteen thousand.”
“Fold.” With a growl, Silicon Valley tossed his cards on the table. “Damn you.”
Greg Hudson nervously wiped his forehead. For several seconds, he stared at his cards. Then he said in a small voice, “Call.”
They all looked at her. Bree hesitated. She wanted to match Vladimir’s raise. Yearned to. She had an amazing hand, and the amount now in the pot was even more than her sister’s debt. But without anything more to offer, she was already all in. Even if she won, she wouldn’t get the additional amount.
If only she had something more to offer!
“Well?” Vladimir’s eyes met hers. “Will you call? Perhaps,” he said in a sardonic voice, “you wish to raise your offer to an entire weekend of your charms?”
Bree stared at him in shock. A weekend?
She didn’t know why he was helping her—or if he thought he could hurt her. But with this hand, it didn’t matter. She was going to win.
“Great idea,” she said coolly. “I’ll match your raise with a full weekend of my—how did you put it? My charms?”
Vladimir’s lips turned up slightly at the edges, though his eyes revealed nothing.
Heart pounding, she waited for Greg Hudson to object. But he didn’t even look up. He just kept staring at his own cards, chewing on his lower lip.
It was time to reveal cards. Vladimir, based on his position at the table, went first. Slowly, he turned over his cards. He had two pairs—sevens and nines.
Relief flooded through Bree, making her body almost limp. She hadn’t realized until that moment how scared she’d been that even with her completely unbeatable hand, Vladimir might find a way to beat her.
Greg Hudson’s cards, on the other hand, were a foregone conclusion. He muttered a curse as he revealed a pair of threes.
Blinking back tears, Bree turned over her cards to reveal her full house, the three kings and two queens. There was a smattering of applause, exclamations and cursing across the room. She nearly wept as she reached for the pile of chips at the center of the table.
She’d saved Josie.
She’d won.
Bree’s legs trembled beneath her as she rose unsteadily to her feet, swaying in her high-heeled stiletto boots. She pushed the bulk of the chips toward Greg Hudson, keeping only a handful for herself. “This pays my sister’s debt completely, yes? We are free of you now?”
“Free?” Greg Hudson glared at her, then his piggy eyes narrowed. “Yes, you’re free. In fact, I want you and your sister off this property tonight.”
“You’re firing us?” Her jaw dropped. “For what cause?”
“I don’t need one,” he said coldly.
She stiffened. She hadn’t seen that coming. She should have. A small-minded man like her boss would never stand being beaten in a card game by a female employee. He’d already resented her for weeks, for the respect she’d quickly gained from the staff, and all the notes she’d left in the suggestion box, listing possible ways to improve his management of the resort.
“Fine.” She grabbed her handful of chips and glared at him. “Then I’ll tell you what I should have written up in the suggestion box weeks ago. This resort is a mess. You’re being overcharged by your vendors, half your employees are stealing from you and the other half are ready to quit. You couldn’t manage your way out of a paper bag!”
Mr. Hudson’s face went apoplectic. “You—”
She barely heard him as he cursed at her. These extra chips, worth thousands of dollars, would give both Dalton girls a new start—buy them a plane trip back to the Mainland, first and last months’ rent on a new apartment, and a little something extra to save for emergencies. And she would go someplace where she’d be sure she never, ever saw Vladimir Xendzov again. “I’ll just cash in these chips, collect our last paychecks, and we’ll be on our way.”
“Wait, Miss Dalton,” Vladimir said from behind her in a low, husky voice.
Her body obeyed, without asking her brain. Slowly, she turned. She couldn’t help herself.
He was sitting calmly at the table, looking up at her with heavily lidded eyes. “I wish to play one more game with you.”
Nervousness rose in her belly, but she tossed her head. “So desperate to win your money back? Are times so tough for billionaires these days?”
He smiled, and it did not meet his eyes. “A game for just the two of us. Winner take all.”
