For the first hour or so, I played just about any two cards and I played passively enough that everyone was eyeing me like a malfunctioning ATM. I handed out my four hundred pretty fast and bought in again. I did it with such good humor that everyone had a nice time.
When I felt like Adan had to be feeling the drinks, I switched gears. I was sitting to his right, and I started to put some pressure on him. I wanted him thinking about his cards and his chips more than what I was doing with the drinks I was passing him.
Finally a hand came along that allowed me to get heads-up with him. I drew jack-ten of hearts on the big blind, which meant Adan was the first to bet. He stacked off four ten-dollar chips. That kind of bet in first position told the rest of the table he was playing a premium hand, probably a big pair. The guy on the button had been playing almost as loose as I had, and he cold-called Adan's open. I did the same, adding thirty dollars to the big blind that was already on the table.
The flop came down nine, eight, deuce, and the last two were hearts. This was just about the perfect flop for me. I had an open-ended straight draw and a flush draw, which gave me better than even odds to get ahead of Adan's big pair by the river. I'd also be the first to act and Adan would be sure to raise any bet I made. That kind of action would likely be too much for our third wheel, and Adan and I would play the rest of the hand mano a mano.
I opened for seventy dollars, a little more than half the size of the pot. Adan could see the straight and flush possibilities as well as I could, and he wanted to take the pot down right there rather than give them a chance to hit. He pushed all his chips in. The guy to my right pretended to think about it a while and then threw in his cards.
Now it was on me to either call Adan's bet or fold. It really wasn't much of a decision. I was almost certainly behind in the hand-Adan's bets told me he had a pair, and I had nothing. But I'd win the hand if I caught a heart, queen or seven on either of the last two cards. The rest of the table couldn't know I had so many outs, though, and that gave me license to stare at Adan a while.
I probably stared at him longer than I had license to-long enough for the dealer to remind me a couple times that it was my action, and long enough for the cocktail waitress to deliver another round. Everyone else at the table was staring at Adan, too, trying to pick up something on him. He stared straight ahead, looking at nothing.
I leaned back in my chair, tipped the waitress, took the drinks off her tray and poured the vial I was palming into Adan's Scotch.
'Well,' I said, 'at least I've got a fresh drink,' then I pushed my chips in and called Adan's raise. Adan let out a deep breath and everyone laughed, then nodded sagely when we turned over our cards. Adan was holding kings. The eight of spades came on the turn and the four of diamonds on the river, neither of which was any help to me.
'You should have folded,' Adan said, smiling as he raked in my chips. I didn't mind, because everyone at the table wanted to tell me I misplayed the hand.
'I thought you were bluffing, you bully.'
'I never bluff,' he said, and winked. Then he lifted his drink to his lips…and froze. He frowned.
'Something wrong?' I asked. My blood pressure spiked a hell of a lot higher than it ever did during the poker hand. Did the potion have an odor? Honey hadn't said anything about it…
Then Adan laughed and took a drink. 'No,' he said, smiling at me over his glass, 'I was just thinking that I'm getting drunk, but then I decided that was probably your plan.'
I laughed, too. 'Sure,' I said, 'that's obviously the only way I'm going to get my money back.'
'You sure that's the only reason?' he said, and a boyish grin brought those dimples out.
'A player never shows her cards.'
'I call,' he said and drained his glass.
I woke up at about ten the next morning draped over Adan's chest. He was still asleep, and his soft breaths raised goose bumps on my skin.
We'd left the card room after one in the morning and gotten back to his loft about half an hour later. We'd started kissing before the front door was closed and we laid down a trail of clothes leading to the stairs up to the bedroom.
I'd mustered enough moral fortitude to mention the complexity of the situation we were getting ourselves into as I took off my clothes.
'This is probably a bad idea,' I said as I sat on the edge of the bed and fought with my zipper. Adan was kneeling on the floor in front of me. His hands were on my breasts and he leaned in and kissed my neck.
'You should have thought of that before you got me drunk,' he mumbled.
'Yeah, probably,' I said, pulling off my jeans.
'Oh, well,' he said, and nibbled my ear.
'Yeah.'
'I'll still respect you in the morning.'
'Really?'
'I mean, I won't respect you any less.'
'Good enough.'
We'd made love most of the night. We did it well enough that, like Honey's glamour, it didn't want to come unmade in the sunlight. Now was the time for morning-after regrets and self-recrimination, but I didn't have either. I was feeling pretty good about the world. After a few days of getting stuffed at the scrimmage line, I felt like I'd finally made some forward progress.
At the very least, we'd made it through the evening's activities without Adan's evil twin making an appearance. Maybe the potion was working, or maybe it was just dumb luck. Either way, I hadn't had any trouble falling asleep with him, and I still had all my skin where it was supposed to be.
Despite the weak protests of the night before, I'd blown by the point of no return in our relationship with a smile and a wave. Adan had been plenty of trouble already and he'd probably be even more when I told his father how it was. But I had the idea he'd be worth a lot more trouble than I'd actually get. I didn't feel inclined to worry too much about my boss unless and until.
There weren't many guys in L.A. I could ever have something with that amounted to more than a friendly roll in the hay. Most of the guys I met were interested in me because I was a gangster, and those were the ones I'd never take seriously. The rest weren't interested in me for the same reason, and those were the ones who made me feel sorry for myself. I couldn't hope for any better than a gangster's son who didn't care either way what I was. Adan, I knew, was a lot better than I deserved.
Adan stirred and then tilted my chin up to plant a kiss on my mouth. 'Good morning,' he said, grinning.
'One of the best,' I said and kissed him back. 'Sorry, my mouth probably tastes like I brought the casino home in it.' Adan tasted just like he always did, like the apples and cinnamon on a freshly baked Washington. That didn't seem fair, and I wondered why I'd never worked up a spell for morning breath.
'It just tastes like you. I like it.' As if to prove it, his head disappeared under the sheets and I stopped thinking for a while.
Later, we took a shower together, dressed and breakfasted on our cinnamon apple pizza. It tasted so much like Adan it was almost like making love again.
'Do you have to work today?' he asked when we were done.
'Yeah, actually, I have a lot to do.' I looked at my watch. 'I should get going.'
'I want you to stay.'
'I want to, too, but I can't. I still have a job, and it's more important than ever that I do it well. The only legitimate objection your father can make about this is that it interferes with my work.' That wasn't the only reason it was more important than ever, but I didn't tell Adan that.
'You're a very responsible gangster, aren't you?'
I almost choked on my coffee. Spending the night with Adan was about as far as I could get from responsible. I wasn't going to feel anything but great about it but I wasn't going to call it responsible, either.
'This thing I'm working on,' I said, 'it's pretty important. About as important as my job ever gets. If it weren't for that, you'd have to kick me out.'
'The murders,' he said.
