The One-Night Wife

“It’ll probably sting,” she said, and before he could reply, she moved in and dabbed the cut with the cold, wine-soaked lace.

An understatement, Savannah thought, as Sean O’Connell rocked back on his heels.

“Sorry,” she said politely. The hell she was, she thought.

She’d made a damned fool of herself. Worse, she’d probably blown her chance at setting him up for the kill, but it was his fault.

Why did he have to ruin things by kissing her? If he hadn’t, everything would still be fine. She hadn’t meant for him to kiss her; she was supposed to be the one setting the boundaries for this little escapade, not him.

“Hey! Take it easy with that stuff.”

“Sorry,” she said again, and went right on cleaning the cut with as little delicacy as she could manage.

Some seductress she was. The mark made a move she hadn’t anticipated, gave her one simple kiss, and…

Except, it hadn’t been a simple kiss. It had been as complex as the night sky. She’d trembled under it. The texture of his mouth. The whisper of his breath. The silken glide of his tongue against hers.

And then—then, it had all changed. His hand on her thigh. The quick bloom of heat between her legs. The pressure of his hard, aroused male flesh, the message implicit in its power.

All at once, the terrace had become the yacht. She’d remembered the way Alain’s friends had taken to looking at her and the way Alain talked to them right in front of her, his voice pitched so low she couldn’t hear his words.

She didn’t have to.

She had only to see their hot eyes, see the little smiles they exchanged, feel the way a beefy hand would brush against her breast, her thigh, always accidentally…

“Are you trying to fillet my lip or leave it steak tartare?”

Savannah blinked. O’Connell, arms folded over his chest, was eyeing her narrowly, his face expressionless.

“I, uh, I just wanted to make sure I disinfected the cut properly.” She dropped her hand to her side, peered at his lip as if she knew what she was doing and flashed what she hoped was a brilliant smile. “It looks fine.”

“Does it,” he said coldly.

Oh, this wasn’t any good! She’d had him right where she wanted him, and now she’d lost him. He was furious and she couldn’t blame him.

Well, that would have to change if she was going to get anywhere tonight.

“Yes,” she said, with a little smile. “I’m happy to tell you, you won’t need stitches. No rabies shots, either.”

He didn’t smile back. All right. One more try.

“I suppose I owe you an apology,” she said, looking at him from under her lashes.

Sean almost laughed. The cute smile. The tease. And, when those failed, the demure look coupled with an apology. All designed to tap into his masculine instincts. He was supposed to say “no, it’s okay,” because that was what a gentleman would do.

Unfortunately for Just-Savannah, he was no gentleman.

“No.”

“No?”

“I don’t want an apology.”

She almost sighed with relief. He waited a beat.

“I want an explanation.”

She blinked. Clearly, she hadn’t expected that. Now she was mentally scrambling for a response.

“An explanation,” she parroted. “And—and you’re entitled to one. I, uh, I think it’s just that you—you caught me by surprise.”

“You’ve been coming on to me all evening.”

“Well—well, I told you, you’re an attractive—”

She gasped as he caught hold of her wrists.

“And yet, the first move I make, you react as if I dragged you into an alley.”

“That’s not—”

“Game’s over, sweetheart.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Nobody plays me for a fool.” Sean held her tighter, applying just enough pressure to let her know he was taking charge. “I want answers.”

“To what? Honestly, Mr. O’Connell…”

“Let’s start with the ‘Mr. O’Connell’ routine. I was Just-Sean. You were Just-Savannah. How come it turns out you know my last name?”

Savannah swallowed past the lump in her throat. His face was like a thundercloud; his hands were locked around hers like manacles. Missy, she thought, oh, Missy, I’m so sorry.

“I told you,” she said in a low voice. “I saw you and I found you very—”

“Forget that crap.” His mouth thinned; he tugged on her wrists and she had no choice but to stumble forward until they were only a breath apart. “I knew something was up, but you were determined to keep trying the same con so I decided to go along. You’ve been scamming me, sugar, and I’ve had enough. You tell me what’s going on or I’ll drag you to the manager’s office and see to it you’re barred from ever entering this place again.”

“You can’t do that! I have as much right to be here as you do.”

“Maybe you’re a working girl.”

“A working…” She began to tremble. “That’s a lie.”

“Is it? Once I describe your behavior, who’s going to argue with me?”

“You can’t do that!”

His grin was all teeth. “Try me.”

Savannah opened her mouth, then shut it. For all she knew, he could do anything. He was known here. She wasn’t. Everything was coming apart. She’d have to go back to Alain and tell him she’d failed, that his year of planning had led to nothing.

“Well? I’m waiting for that explanation. And I’ll tell you right now, sugar, it damned well better be good.”

Desperate, she searched for anything that might get her out of this mess. What could she possibly say that would change things? O’Connell was right. He wasn’t about to believe she was interested in him, not after she’d almost bitten his face off when he touched her.

She wouldn’t react that way if he did it again.

The realization shocked her. It was true, though. Now that she knew what to expect, if it happened again—which it wouldn’t—but if it did, if she ever felt all that heat, saw the hunger in his eyes, she might just—she might just—

“Okay, that’s it.”

Sean started walking toward the door, dragging her with him. Think, she told herself desperately, think, think!

“All right,” she gasped. “I’ll tell you the truth.”

He swung toward her, towering over her in the moonlight. He said nothing. Clearly, the next move was hers. Savannah took a steadying breath and played for time to work out a story. Something he would buy so she wouldn’t have to return to Alain in failure and see that cool smile, hear him say, Ah, chérie, that’s too bad. I hate to think of your dear little sister in one of those state institutions.

She took a steadying breath. “I owe you an apology, Mr. O’Connell.”

“You already said that.”

“Not for biting you. For—what did you call it? For scamming you.”

It was a start. At least she’d caught his attention.

“I didn’t mean to. Not exactly. I just—”

“You didn’t mean to. Not exactly.” Sean raised an eyebrow. “That’s your explanation?”

“No! There’s more.”

“Damned right, there’s more. Why don’t you start by telling me why you pretended not to know who I was?”

How much of the truth could she tell, without giving everything away?

“I’m waiting.”

“Yes. I know.” She looked down at their hands, still joined, then up at his face. “It’s true. I did know who you were. Well, I knew your name but then, everyone knows your name.”

She fell silent. Sean let go of her wrists and tucked his hands into his pockets. He’d long ago learned the art of keeping quiet. Do it right and the other person felt compelled to babble.

“Everyone knows you’re the world’s best poker player.”

He wasn’t, though he was close to it. Still, he said nothing. She didn’t, either, but he knew his silence was getting to her. She was chewing lightly on her lip. If she wasn’t careful, she’d leave a little wound to match his.

A wound he could easily soothe with a flick of his tongue. Damn, where had that thought come from?

“And all this is leading where?” he said gruffly.

“To—to the reason I came over and spoke to you.”

“Sugar,” he said, smiling tightly, “you didn’t speak to me, you hit on me. Understand, I’ve no objection to a beautiful woman showing her interest.” His smile faded. “I just don’t like being played for a sucker.”

“I didn’t—”

“Yeah, you did. Or you would have, if you could have gotten away with it.” He pulled his hand from his pocket and checked his watch. “I have other things to do tonight. You have two minutes to answer my questions—or we can take that walk to the office.”

Savannah knotted her fingers together. She was going to do the very thing Alain had warned her against, but what other choice did she have?

“I play poker, too, Sean.”

“How nice.” His teeth showed in a chilly smile. “We’re back to first names.”

“Did you hear what I—”

“You said you play poker. What’s that got to do with anything?”

She hesitated. What could she safely tell him? Surely not that the man he’d cheated out of a million dollars had sent her, or that she was going to wipe him out because she was as good a player as he’d ever met.

She certainly couldn’t tell him the rest of it, that she’d planned to work him into such a sexual haze that by the time they sat down to play, he’d be so busy drooling over her that he wouldn’t be able to concentrate on his cards.

But she could tell him part of it, fancy things up to appeal to his ego. She’d blown her cover as a femme fatale. Could she pass herself off as an overeager tourist?

“I’m American. Like you.”

“Congratulations,” Sean said dryly. “So what?”

“So, I’m on vacation. You know. Sun, sea, sand. Gambling. I really like to gamble, even though I’m new at it.”

A muscle flickered in his jaw. “Go on.”

“You’re right about my name. I was born in Georgia but I live in Louisiana. That’s where I learned to play cards. On a riverboat. You know, on the Mississippi? A date took me, the first time.” She grinned, hoped it was disarming and that mixing lies and truth proved the ticket to success. “I picked up the game fast. I’m pretty good, if I must say so myself, but I’ve never played against serious competition. Against, say, a man like you.”

Sean lifted an eyebrow. Was this the whole thing? Had she flirted with him just to convince him to take a seat at the same poker table? Anything was possible. Novices approached him all the time. In his own tight little world, he was a celebrity of sorts.

Except, he didn’t buy it.

All this subterfuge, so he could beat her pretty tail off in a game of cards? So she could go home and say she’d played Sean O’Connell?

No way.

“I’d be thrilled if you’d let me sit at a table with you, Sean. I could go home and tell everyone—”

“Anybody can sit at any table. You must know that.”

“Well—well, of course I know that. But I’m not that forward. I know you think I am, after all that’s happened, but the truth is, I wouldn’t have the courage to take a seat at a table you were at unless I cleared it with you first.”

He still didn’t buy it. She wouldn’t have the courage? This woman who’d done everything but jump his bones?

“And that’s it?”

Savannah nodded. “That’s it.”

He moved fast, closed the distance between them before she could even draw a breath. All at once, her back was to the wall and his hands were flattened against it on either side of her.

“You took a big risk, sugar,” he said softly. “Coming on to me as hard as you did without knowing a damned thing about me except that I play cards. You got me going a few minutes ago. If your luck had gone bad, you might have gotten hurt.”

He saw her throat constrict as she swallowed, but her eyes stayed right on his.

“I told you that I knew you were Sean O’Connell. And Sean O’Connell isn’t known for hurting women.”

“No.” His gaze fell to her mouth. He looked up and smiled. “He’s known for liking them, though.”

“Sean. About what I’ve asked…”

“Why did you panic?”

“I didn’t. I—”

Sean put one finger gently over her lips. “Yeah, you did. I kissed you, you kissed me back, and then you got scared.” His finger slid across the fullness of her mouth. “How come? What frightened you?”

“Nothing frightened me.”

She was lying. He could sense it. There was something going on he still didn’t understand and, all at once, he wanted to.

“Savannah.” Sean cupped her face. “What’s the matter? Tell me what it is. Let me help you.”

Her eyes glittered. Was it because of the moonlight, or were those tears?

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Sean smoothed back her hair. “Just as long as you’re not afraid of me,” he said gruffly, and kissed her.

She let it happen, let herself drown in the heat of his kiss. She told herself it was what she had to do but when he drew back, she had to grasp his shoulders for support.

“Tell me what you want,” he said softly.

Savannah willed her heart to stop racing. Then she took a deep breath and said the only thing she could.

“I told you. I want to play cards. Then I can go home and tell everybody that I played against the great Sean O’Connell.”

“And that’s it? That’s all you need from me?”

His eyes were steady on hers, his body strong under her hands. For one endless moment, she thought of telling him the truth. That she was here to destroy him. That she was in trouble and had no one to turn to for help but herself.

Then she remembered that he was a thief, and she forced a smile to her lips.

“That’s it,” she said lightly. “That’s all I need.”

CHAPTER FOUR

TWO HOURS LATER, Sean was sitting across from Savannah at a poker table in the high-stakes area of the casino and the warning bells in his head were clamoring like bells inside a firehouse.

The game was draw poker. She was still playing. He’d already folded, just as he’d done half a dozen times since they’d started. His fault, he knew. He’d played with lazy disinterest, underestimated the lady’s skill.

And her skill was considerable.

The realization had caught him by surprise. Once it had, he’d played a couple of hands as he should have from the start. She’d folded. He’d won.

That had led to another realization. Goldilocks wasn’t a good loser.

Oh, she said all the right things, the clever patter card-players used to defuse tension. She flashed that megawatt smile across the table straight at him. But her eyes didn’t smile. They were dark with distress. What she’d said about simply wanting to play him wasn’t true.

Just-Savannah needed to win. He decided to let her. There were all kinds of ways to up the ante.

And if she was new to the game, he was Mighty Mouse.

She played with the cool concentration of someone who’d had years to hone her talent. Her instincts were good, her judgment sharp, and by now he’d determined that the cute little things she did when she played, things he’d at first thought were unconscious habits, were deliberate shticks meant to distract him.

A little tug at a curl as it kissed the curve of her cheek. A brush of her tongue across her mouth. A winsome smile accompanied by a look from under the thick sweep of her gold-tipped lashes.

Most effective of all, a sigh that lifted her breasts.

The air-conditioned chill in the casino was cooperating. Each time her breasts rose, the nipples pressed like pearls against the red silk that covered them.

Forget about the odds, she all but purred. Forget about the game. Just think about me. What I have to offer, you’ll never get by winning this silly game of cards.

It was hard not to do exactly that. The man in him wanted what she was selling with every beat of his heart. The gambler in him knew it was all a lie. And there it was again. The smile, just oozing with little-girl amazement that she was actually winning.

Bull.

Savannah wasn’t a novice, she was an expert. Playing without using any of those distractions, she’d beat every man at the table on ability alone.

Every man but him.

She was good, but he was better. And once he knew what in hell was happening, he’d prove it to her.

Meanwhile, the action was fascinating to watch. Not just her moves but the moves of the rest of the players. Two—a German industrialist and a Texas oil billionaire—were good. The others—a prince from some godforsaken principality, a Spanish banker, a has-been American movie star and an Italian who had something to do with designing shoes—weren’t. It didn’t matter. The men were all happy to be losing.

Sean didn’t think Savannah gave a damn. He’d have bet everything he owned that she was putting on this little show solely for him.

Why? No way was it so she could go home and boast about having played against him. That story leaked like a sieve, especially because he could see past the smile, the cleavage, the performance art.

Under all that clever artifice, she was playing with a determination so grim it chilled him straight down to the marrow of his bones.

So he’d decided to lay back. Win a couple of hands, lose a couple. Fold early. Look as if he was as taken in as the others while he tried to figure out what was going on.

Right now, he and she were the only ones playing. The rest had all folded. She sighed. Her cleavage rose. She licked her lips. She twirled a curl of golden hair around her index finger. Then she looked at him and fluttered her lashes.

“I’ll see your five,” she said, “and raise you ten.”

Sean smiled back at her. He didn’t bother looking at his cards. He knew what he had and he was damned sure it beat what she was holding.

“Too rich for my blood,” he said lazily, and dropped his cards on the green baize tabletop.

The German smiled. “The fraulein wins again.”

Savannah gathered in the chips. “Beginner’s luck,” she said demurely, and smiled at him again.

It wasn’t luck, beginner’s or otherwise. The luck of the draw was a big part of winning but from what he’d observed, it had little to do with her success at this table.

The lady was good.

He watched as she picked up her cards, fanned them just enough to check the upper right-hand corners, then put them down again. It was a pro’s trick. When your old man owned one of the biggest hotels and casinos in Vegas, you learned their tricks early.

Not that Sean had spent much time in the casino. State law prohibited minors from being in the gaming areas. More importantly, so did his mother.

One gambler in the family was enough for Mary Elizabeth O’Connell. She’d never complained about her husband’s love of cards, dice, the wheel, whatever a man could lay a wager on, but she also made it clear she didn’t want to see her children develop any such interests.

Still, Sean had been drawn to the life as surely as ocean waves are drawn to the shore.

He began gambling when he was in his teens. By his senior year in high school, he bet on anything and everything. Basketball. Football. Baseball. A friend’s grades. His pals thought he was lucky. Sean knew better. It was more than luck. He had a feel for mathematics, especially for those parts of it that dealt in probability, combinations and permutations. Show him the grade spread for, say, Mrs. Keany’s classes in Trig over the past five years, he could predict how the current grades would play out with startling accuracy.

It was fun.

Then he went away to college, discovered poker and fell in love with it. He loved everything about the game. The cool, smooth feel of a new deck of cards. The numbers that danced in his head as he figured out who was holding what. The kick of playing a hand he knew he couldn’t lose or, conversely, playing a hand no sane man would hold on to and winning anyway because he was good and because, in the final analysis, even the risk of losing could give you an adrenaline rush.

By the time he graduated from Harvard with a degree in business, he had a small fortune stashed in the bank.

Sean handed his degree to Mary Elizabeth, kissed her on both cheeks and said he knew he was disappointing her but he wasn’t going to need that degree for a while.

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