Chapter 1
CASEY MADISON veered her little red compact into the Starlight Casino's parking lot, taking a quick glance at her hair in the rear view mirror. Yuck. Bad hair day. She made a face at herself in the mirror, then sneaked a peek at her car's clock.
Ten after eight. The pit boss would read her the riot act.
She jounced over a speed bump, then swerved into an empty parking space, tires squealing. Eyes still on the mirror, she finger-combed her short honey-blonde hair back from her brow. The silky strands crackled with static from the dry-as-dust Reno air. Very bad hair day.
Shifting to climb from the car, she dragged her voluminous canvas bag across the console. It snagged on the brake handle, spilled some of its load of loose change on the floor. Pick it up? Leave it there? She was already late. She untwisted the bag's handle from the brake, straightened and banged her head on the doorjamb. Turning out to be a bad car day, too. Extricating herself from the compact, she slammed the door, then had to give it a shove with her hip when it wouldn't latch. A smear of dirt marked her black pleated slacks.
She slapped away the mess as she serpentined through the parking lot toward the casino entrance. The early morning October air chilled her, seeping through the thin fabric of her white dress shirt. Despite the coolness, a brilliant blue sky arched overhead. It was day to spend outside, not cooped up in a noisy, smoky casino dealing blackjack.
With a sigh, Casey licked her thumb and tried again to blot out the beer stain a customer had spilled on her sleeve last night, but the splash of Bud Lite seemed to have found a home there. Next time she'd cut the guy off one drink sooner.
Casey greeted several Starlight regulars as she strode through the parking lot toward the casino. As she grasped the handle to the heavy glass entrance door, she caught sight of a man standing twenty yards away, just beyond the newspaper stands. The familiarity of the man's face registered first, and she brought one hand up reflexively to wave.
Her hand froze when she recognized Phil Zucher's grin. Fear scrambled up her spine as she jerked the casino door open. Slipping inside, she ducked behind a dollar slot machine.
Lord, what was he doing here? He was supposed to be in jail!
Casey dragged in a deep breath to calm herself. She'd be safe as long as she stayed inside the casino. Zucher wouldn't dare enter. She glanced over at the pit boss, Tommy, who was arguing with a dealer in the blackjack pit. Tommy was the last person she wanted to ask for help, but with Zucher here, she didn't have a choice. Trying to ignore the feel of Zucher's gaze on her, Casey turned and headed for the pit in the center of the casino floor.
"Tommy!" she called out to the beefy man.
Tommy took a moment out from his harangue to snarl at Casey, "You're late, Madison."
"Hung up in traffic." She slipped between two blackjack tables into the pit. Zucher's leer seemed to drill into her back. "Listen, Tommy, there's a problem."
The pit boss rounded on her. "Damn right there's a problem. Third time this week you been late."
Casey tamped down her impatience. "Tommy, it's Zucher. He's here."
"What? Where?" Tommy spun, his mouth set in a mean line as he searched the casino floor.
"There." Casey pointed. "He--"
He was gone. Casey leaned around Tommy, scanned the stretch of plate glass windows that fronted the casino. Not a sign of the card cheater.
Tommy jabbed at her with a thick finger. "What're you trying to pull, Madison?"
"Nothing, I..." Zucher's absence gave her more of a chill than his presence. "Never mind." She edged out of the blackjack pit and headed for the employee locker room. "Be right back."
The bing-bing-clang of slot machines drowned out Tommy's mean-tempered response. Casey escaped into the employee lounge.
It hadn't been traffic that had held her up today, but her neighbor, Mrs. Nesbitt. The elderly woman suffered from Alzheimer's and had locked herself out of her apartment again. Casey had stayed with her until the woman's daughter returned from a quick trip to the corner store.
Casey rooted through her canvas bag and came up with her black pumps, then lowered herself to a chair. As she tugged off her sneakers, the image of Phil Zucher's sneering face wormed its way into her consciousness.
Casey shuddered. The card cheater's phone calls had been bad enough. Zucher's menacing voice asking for her, then the quiet rasp of his breathing. His unspoken threats implicit in the silence.
But she could always hang up a phone. What would she do now that the card cheater was turning up at the Starlight?
She paused in the act of slipping on her left pump as another man's face floated into her mind's eye. The roughly handsome image teased her, set off a twinge in her heart. Jeff Haley could protect her, could shield her from Zucher.
But contacting Jeff Haley again would be a big mistake. She'd dodged heartache six months ago by keeping their contact strictly business. A more personal relationship would surely have ended in disaster. Just as it had with Roger, with Steve, with Tom and Ian.
Casey sighed as she drew on her other shoe. She had to face facts -- she had a knack for picking Mr. Wrongs. Why add Jeff Haley to the list?
Casey allowed herself another moment's pleasure contemplating the lines of his face, then boxed Jeff Haley away in her mind. Intent on forgetting him, Casey left the lounge, turning her focus toward tossing out cards to hopeful gamblers.
JEFF HALEY stared up at the Starlight Casino, watching the glittery, garish pattern of lights chase itself across the tall facade. He'd just as soon turn around and head back to the office, in fact he'd just as soon spend a couple hours trapped in downtown Reno rush hour traffic than walk into that casino and face Casey Madison.
Damn that ditsy clerk at the one-hour photo counter. If he'd been keeping his eye on the automated photo machine instead of his girlfriend's chest, he might have noticed that Jeff's negatives got dumped in with someone else's.
A thorough search of the dozen or so numbered envelopes processed before and after his order came up empty. Two packets in that batch had been picked up already, one by a Mr. Fleming who, when called, told the clerk he had no extra negatives in his envelope. The other packet -- damn his lousy luck -- was Casey Madison's.
Jeff shoved his hands into his slacks and rocked back on the heels of his dress shoes. Out of Reno's hundred thousand plus population, his very incriminating shots of Nevada State Assemblyman Bender frolicking with his mistress had apparently gone home in Casey Madison's photo packet. And since he'd only had the negatives developed -- he hadn't wanted to risk making prints -- he now had no choice. He'd have to contact the one woman he would gladly have never seen again.
He ran an impatient hand over his close-cropped hair. Lord save him from incompetent photo clerks and diminutive honey blondes. When he'd finished his business with Casey six months ago, he'd made it a point to avoid the Starlight. He'd even turned down a lucrative security contract the manager had offered his company, Discreet Investigations, on the off chance he might cross paths with Casey Madison again.
If he never saw the woman, it was easier to ignore the ache in his chest thoughts of her always generated. He could convince himself the yearning he felt for her was lust, pure and simple, not mythical feelings he refused to believe in.
He'd just make this a brief, businesslike encounter, he told himself as he strode toward the entrance. A thirty-one-year-old man ought to have at least that much self-control. He'd get his negatives, say his good-byes and get the hell out.
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