Hunt the Dragon Read Online Free PDF Page B

Holly were present she’d have scolded him, saying that off the battlefield he let people push him around. And he’d have responded, “No, baby, I respect people. Besides, some things aren’t worth fighting over.”
    As the imaginary argument with Holly continued in his head, Cyndi stepped onto the patio wearing a white baseball hat and a light-blue wrap-type dress, spotted him, and approached.
    Her shadow falling over him, she asked, “Tom Crocker?”
    He looked up into her sunlit face. An impression formed in his head—friendly, unpretentious, pretty. He stood quickly, smiled, and offered his hand.
    “Cyndi? Uh…thanks for coming. It’s really nice to meet you.” He suddenly felt like a teenager on a first date.
    “Mind if I join you?” she asked.
    “Of course. Yes, of course.” He stood up, turned, and offered her his chair.
    Without the least bit of modesty or hesitation, she set down her tote, untied the sash around her dress, removed it, folded it, removed her hat, and shook out her shoulder-length blond hair. Her torso, legs, and arms were strong and toned.
    Crocker couldn’t help but stare and admire her near-perfect proportions and the radiance of her skin. Now he looked away awkwardly. Behind the magazine, Mancini shot him a pirate’s grin.
    “Come with me,” Cyndi said, offering her hand. “Let’s cool off.” So easy and natural, like they’d known each other for years.
    He followed into the waist-high water in the circular pool built around a colonnade with a golden statue of Julius Caesar at the center. She reminded him of someone, one of the many girls he had dated in high school.
    He was trying to remember the girl’s name as he offered, “It’s really nice to meet you.” Then realized he’d said that already.
    “Thanks.”
    “So…uh…how do you know Storm?”
    “He and my brother went to high school together.”
    “Oh, nice.”
    She bounced up and down in the water and pushed back her hair.
    “You’re in great shape,” she said.
    “So are you.”
    “Thanks. You coming to the show tonight?” she asked sweetly, shielding her blue eyes with her hand.
    “No, tomorrow. I’d like to meet you after, for a drink, if you want.”
    “That would be nice.”
    She was younger than he had imagined from the photo she had sent of her with her daughter, and slightly taller.
    Off to the right, glancing off the water, and over “Summertime” by the Zombies playing over the PA system, he heard a man raise his voice. Even in an intimate moment like this, a part of Crocker remained alert to his surroundings. He noticed a large muscular guy standing before two men sitting on the other side of the pool.
    “This your first visit to Vegas?” Cyndi asked, lowering her head into the water, then coming up so that it washed down the front of her pink bikini top.
    “No, sixth or seventh. I’ve lost count. I mean, I like it, but it’s really not my kind of place.”
    “That’s what everybody says, and they keep coming back.”
    “Yeah, you’re right about that.”
    The muscular guy seemed to be complaining that the two other men had been taking pictures of his girlfriend. One of the men—who looked Asian—held a camera with a telephoto lens. That appeared to be the problem. The muscular guy in the bathing suit was demanding to see the camera so he could delete the photos. The second man—tall and stocky with short brown hair—gestured to him to go away.
    “Something the matter?” Cyndi asked, leaning into him.
    “No, no. Not at all.”
    “Storm told me a lot about you.”
    He blushed like a ten-year-old boy. “Really? What?”
    “I’ll tell you later.” She turned, wrapped her legs around his waist, and leaned back in the water. “This helps stretch my back.”
    Playful and pretty, just like Storm had said. His gaze traveled up her smooth thighs, past her pelvis, into her waiting eyes. In his head they were already in his room upstairs, making love.
    He glanced over her right