Cynthia Thomason - Deal Me In

Brady smiled, an easy full-bodied grin that had her believing he could talk people into almost anything, just as she knew he had. The younger Carrick resembled his father in stature and size. But Brady’s bronzed complexion was less weathered. His light brown hair was sun-streaked and just long enough to fall over his forehead. The collar of his blue oxford-cloth shirt had a distinctive lack of Western ornamentation. Unusual for a horseman in the heart of Texas.

“It’s okay, Molly,” Brady said, his voice a smooth, cultured version of typical ranch-hand drawl. “We were just playing a game of ‘what if’ over lunch.”

Dobbs leaned forward. “‘What if?’ So now you’re backing out?”

“No. But there isn’t any reason to get Molly mixed up in this.”

“Of course there is,” Dobbs insisted. “We picked her.”

“This is getting weird.” Molly waved the check in the air. “Who’s going to pay this bill?”

Dobbs pointed to Brady. “Mr. Big Shot.”

Brady pulled his wallet out of his jeans.

“Here’s the thing, Molly,” Dobbs said. “Brady claims he can take a novice card player and lead him—or her—all the way to a final table at the Texas Hold ’Em quarter finals U.S. Poker Play-offs in Las Vegas in February.”

Molly had some knowledge of Texas Hold ’Em. Her husband, Kevin, had played the game when he was away on the rodeo circuit. “I’ve seen that on TV.”

“Sure you have,” Dobbs said. “The players that get to the last table in just the quarter finals can win, what, Brady? Thousands of dollars?”

He nodded. “This quarterly event draws mostly local players, and even sixth place can be a decent payoff.”

She pointed her pen at him. “And you think you can coach somebody who’s never played before to the final table?”

He shrugged. “Look, we were just shooting off steam.”

Marshall leaned back and smiled. “So you’re saying you can’t do it now?”

Brady scowled. “I can do it. But Molly doesn’t want to be involved. She must be thinking we’re crazy.”

“She’s involved already,” Dobbs said. “I told you—we picked her, didn’t we Marshall?”

“We were sure talking about it.”

“And Brady said it was our choice.”

“Yep, he did.”

Brady folded some bills in his hand. “Don’t let us keep you, Molly. Do I pay you or up at the counter?”

Determined he wasn’t about to put her off, she stared into the deepest green eyes she’d ever seen. “Pay me. And you’re not keeping me. It’s almost time for my break. I’ve known Dobbs for years. If he says they picked me for this wager, then I guess that puts the cards on my table.”

Brady chuckled, but it seemed a self-conscious effort to appear unruffled. He handed her the money.

She tucked it into her pocket. “So you can do it? You can teach me to play poker?”

“Sure, I could, but…”

“What would you get out of this?” she asked. “What’s at stake for you?”

“It’s personal.”

“Tell her,” Marshall said. “She’s got a right to know what we’re betting on.”

Brady stared at his father a good long moment before he said, “Not that I think that’s true, but okay.” He looked up at her. “I win the right to train the horse we just bought.”

“And this is important to you?” Molly said.

He didn’t answer that. He didn’t have to. The fire in his eyes was proof enough. “I see that it is,” she added.

Brady darted a quick uncomfortable glance at his companions before turning back to Molly. “But look, all that doesn’t matter. You have to understand what it would take to get to the final table. Long hours. Personal sacrifice. This is a tough training regimen for a woman.”

“For a woman? ” Molly repeated.

Brady looked down. “Don’t take that the wrong way.”

The part of Molly that her father said she inherited from her mother and called her “rebel soul” flared to life. She was suddenly interested in this proposition for two reasons. She stated the first one. “If I won, would I get to keep the money?”

Marshall muffled his laughter behind his cupped hand. Dobbs didn’t even try.

“I don’t know,” Brady said. “We’d have to work that out. But we could come up with a fair split I suppose.” He shook his head, glared at Dobbs. “Look, I’m sorry we brought this up. Like I said, it’s a crazy idea and you can’t seriously be thinking of pursuing it.”

Oh, but she was. After all these years of Trevor Dobbs coming into this diner, fate had finally sent the legend of Cross Fox Ranch himself, Brady Carrick. Who was Molly Davis to spit in the eye of fate?

The name Brady Carrick had been playing like a sad movie in her head for a year and a half now. Every time she cried herself to sleep. Every time she carried another plate of runny eggs to a table in the diner. Every time she tried to tell her son why his daddy wasn’t coming home. So even without the substantial financial payoff he’d mentioned, reason number two for considering this would be incentive enough. She could ease some of that heartache Brady Carrick had inflicted on her and let him finance her way to a new beginning.

She’d never get her life back the way it was, but just maybe the guy who stood to inherit Cross Fox Ranch would pay for what he’d done to Kevin by helping his widow and son start over. If she won, she could buy a nice, cozy house for her and Sam far away from Prairie Bend and the rules set by Luther Whelan. She stacked the empty plates from the table and gave the men her most winning smile. No matter what happened, she had to think of the tip.

Brady slid out of his seat. “It was nice meeting you, Molly.”

The first signs of panic tingled down her spine. They were leaving. “Have a good trip back,” she said.

The three walked out of the restaurant, and Molly went over to the cash register. Struggling with a mountain of indecision, she absently passed the money over the counter. You’d better do something pretty darn quick, Molly Jean, she said to herself. When these men drive out of the parking lot, they’re taking your opportunity with them. You’ll probably never see Brady Carrick again or get the chance to make him pay .

She watched out the window as the men crossed the lot to a pickup truck with a horse trailer hitched to the back. Brady opened the driver’s side door and got in, and in that split second she made up her mind.

“I’m going on break, Uncle Cliff.”

He picked up the money. “Okay, but hurry back. I need you to fill the ketchup bottles.”

She headed to the door.

“Wait a minute, Molly,” her uncle called. “Your tip’s in here.”

She hurried back. The lunch tab had been just under twenty-two dollars, and Brady had given her thirty. She took the eight dollars change and stuffed it in her pocket.

“That’s a good tip,” Cliff said.

“Yeah.” Though she definitely needed the money, she grumbled to herself, “No wonder Dobbs called him Mr. Big Shot.”

LEANING OVER to look out the passenger door, Brady watched Molly come across the parking lot. A cool breeze whipped the ends of her ponytail around her face and shaped her skirt to the curvy outline of her legs. Brady couldn’t look away. For a moment he imagined her in the hill country around River Bluff standing on a rolling green crest, not here in a dusty diner parking lot.

“Look there,” Dobbs said. “Molly’s walking over.”

Brady patted his pockets. “We must have left something on the table. Did either of you forget something?”

Marshall shook his head. “Got my wallet and checkbook. Cell phone’s in the glove box.”