Tall Tales and Wedding Veils Read Online Free PDF Page A

beer and tossed the bottle into a nearby trash can. “This wasn’t one of those times.”

    Heather couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen anyone looking quite as miserable as Tony did right then, and suddenly she knew that buying McMillan’s wasn’t just a whim of his. He was desperate to have it.

    Desperate enough to risk everything on a trip to Vegas.

    “Why don’t you try again?” she asked.

    “Nope. I’m completely tapped out. I shouldn’t be spending one more dime tonight.”

    Heather heard the
ping
of the elevator, and the doors finally opened. Tony started to get on.

    “Wait,” Heather said.

    “What?”

    “Just wait.”

    He held the elevator as she dug through her purse and came up with the ten-dollar chip she’d found in the hallway outside her room. She held it up. “Here. Play this.”

    “No. I can’t take your money.”

    “Play the chip. If you lose, you owe me ten bucks. If you win, I’ll take back my ten and you can keep on betting with the winnings.”

    He laughed, but there was no humor in it. “Thanks, sweetheart. But I need a bigger stake than ten bucks if I expect to turn it into twenty thousand.”

    He got onto the elevator. Heather followed, still holding the chip. The doors closed. She punched 22. He punched 24.

    The elevator ascended. Silence, except for the mechanical noise of the elevator and the
ping, ping, ping
as it passed one floor after another.

    “You’re making a mistake,” Heather said.

    “I doubt that.”

    “I think this is a lucky chip.”

    “Yeah? What makes you say that?”

    “I found it in the hall near my room. Maybe there’s a reason I found it, you know? Fate, or something.”

    He turned away again. “Sorry. I don’t believe in fate.”

    Stubborn,
stubborn
man.

    This was making Heather crazy. She could think of very few situations where gambling was a logical thing to do, but this was one of them. When a person had only one shot left at something that was important to him, no matter how small, wouldn’t he be smart to take it?

    When the elevator doors opened on her floor and he still hadn’t given in, she casually let the chip fall out of her hand. It clicked against the marble tile floor, then came to rest near Tony’s foot.

    “Oops,” she said. “Look at that. I dropped it.” Then she smiled sweetly. “Good night.”

    She left the elevator and walked in the direction of her room, listening intently for the doors to close behind her. They didn’t.

    “Wait,” Tony said.

    She turned around to see him holding up the chip. “Do you have any idea what the odds are of turning this into twenty thousand bucks?”

    “Zero if you don’t play.”

    “It’s one chance in a million.”

    “Beats no chance at all.”

    “The way my luck has been, it’s not worth the trip downstairs.”

    She walked back to the elevator and got on. “Then I’ll play it for you. I once won a hundred dollars at the El Dorado in Shreveport.”

    “That’s a far cry from twenty grand.”

    “I wasn’t shooting for twenty grand.”

    “What’s your game?”

    “Craps. I don’t like blackjack, and it’s got the next lowest house advantage.”

    Tony nodded. “That’s my game, too. Hope you have more luck with it than I’ve had tonight.”

    Heather was a realist. No doubt about that. But as she stood in that elevator giving this tiny bit of hope to a man who five minutes ago had had none at all, she felt an amazing surge of optimism. Or maybe it was a surge of gin to her brain.

    Either way, it felt
wonderful.

    As the elevator descended, Tony took a deep breath and let it out slowly, all the while tapping his fingertips nervously against his thigh. He’d told her this was a chance in a million, but by the look on his face, she knew just how much he was counting on it.
    Chapter 3

    T ony knew there was no way under the sun they could turn ten dollars into twenty thousand. So why was he standing at a craps table next to a