Lucky Streak by Carly Phillips Page A

“Here.” He slapped seventy-five thousand dollars onto her lap.
    â€œThat isn’t enough.”
    â€œToo bad. You were fingered and we had an agreement. Cut and run at the first sign of trouble.”
    Amber was so furious she could barely think straight. “That idiot Howard wouldn’t know what to do with the information anyway. It didn’t matter. There was no danger. You just wanted to play chicken with my cut! ”
    He turned toward her. “Chicken?” He shook his head. “I’m just being damn smart. I’m out of hot water. But what are you going to do? Go back to your husband with half his money and explain why you ran out on him?” He laughed at her predicament. “Or are you going to hide out here in Vegas? I don’t much care. But I wasn’t about to make your life any easier. Not after you screwed me by walking out of mine. And after all I’ve done for you.” He shook his head and put the car in Drive.
    She clamped her mouth shut tight. He’d left her twisting in the wind on purpose. Giving her the option to return to Mike with half the money or run away from him for good, assuming he didn’t track her down and press charges. The man was a cop, after all.
    She squeezed her temples with her hands. Neither option held much appeal.
    Â 
    A MBER KNOCKED on Mike’s hotel-room door, her stomach churning with cold fear. Facing him again wouldn’t be easy, but even if he turned her away, she owed him an explanation. That and another seventy-five thousand dollars, she thought, wondering how in the hell she’d raise that kind of money while paying for her father’s care.
    Maybe Mike took MasterCard.
    Or maybe he’d understand and let her pay him back over time. She seemed like a different woman than the one who was spinning fantasies of a new life with Mike just this very morning.
    Five minutes later, someone from housekeeping arrived with a cart to clean the room, and informed her the guest had checked out. Amber returned to the elevator, disappointed but not completely defeated.
    She had his full name and knew he was a cop who lived in Boston. She stepped through the lobby, engrossed in devising a plan to find him, when she caught sight of a ten-gallon hat and the big man wearing it.
    King Bobby Boyd stood at the concierge desk talking to Amber’s friend Caroline. Beside him stood Emmy Lou. Their game had been in a room in another hotel. None of the high-stakes players knew where anyone else was staying. For all she knew, King Bobby could be staying at the Bellagio, too. It suited his larger-than-life taste. He hadn’t been pleased at the outcome of the night and Amber didn’t want to have a conversation with him now, not with seventy-five thousand dollars hanging from the large handbag on her shoulder.
    Not wanting to be seen, Amber ducked behind a pole, and when a large group of people passed by, she strode out among them, hoping to get lost in the crowd.
    â€œAmber, honey!”
    Amber recognized Emmy Lou’s distinctive Texas drawl and her stomach rolled in a panic. Gut instinct told her to run, so she did, ducking past all the people in the cab line, slipping a twenty into the valet’s hand and grabbing the first open taxi, ahead of the line of people waiting.
    â€œJust drive,” she told the man, not sure where she wanted to go yet. Her heart pounding, she needed to calm down and think.
    First she had to find out why King Bobby had been at the hotel. Had he been asking about her? She pulled out her cell phone and searched her contacts for the direct line to Caroline at the concierge deskin the Bellagio. Although it had been a while since she’d had to utilize them, Amber had friends like Caroline all around the country, especially in L.A. and here in her hometown. In her former job, she had to be connected to anyone who could find anything at all hours of the day or night. She’d prided