An amused snort escaped her lips. “Yeah, Luis loves new bait in here. Did he tell you he used to make a living as a pool shark? Because he’s supposed to, but he sometimes conveniently ‘forgets.’” She curled her fingers around the last word. “The regulars tend to avoid playing him—unless he’s handicapped with a less stellar partner—so when someone new comes in, the shark smells blood in the water and tries to take a bite.”
Jordan frowned. “He made a living...?”
The stricken look in his eyes suggested he’d been bitten. Cam’s impatience rose. “You didn’t play for money, did you?”
His cheeks flushed. “He took me for fifty bucks.”
“Oh, for God’s sake.” She slid to the edge of the booth and came up short due to the proximity of his wheels. “Back up a little, wouldja?”
“Let it go, Cam. I can afford the loss.”
“That’s not the point. Now, skootch.”
He backed up a few feet, and she strode to the back room with purpose. “Luis!”
A half-dozen men stood around the pool table, some laughing, others sipping from beer bottles.
Her target had his back to the doorway, but turned at her shout. “Hey, Cam! How’s it going? You here for another humiliating loss?”
“No. I’m here to make sure you give Jordan back his money.”
“What are you, his mommy?” Guffaws erupted around them, but she planted her fists on her hips and waited, tight-lipped, until Luis stamped his cue stick on the scarred wooden floor. “Aw, c’mon! It’s fifty bucks. Big shot can afford it.”
“It’s illegal, and you know it.”
He shrugged. “Who’s gonna tell?” His comrades continued laughing, adding choruses of “Yeah,” and “You tell her,” and “No snitching.”
The tension of the last few hours got the best of her, and she snatched the pool stick out of his hand.
Her voice increased in volume and fury with every syllable. “You wanna get this place shut down? Now, give him back his money. You play for bragging rights, nothing more. Got it?”
The last two words came out in a shout loud enough to shake the walls. All five men facing her stood slack-jawed at her outburst. Reason returned, along with a heavy dose of embarrassment.
“Sorry,” she said in a much softer tone. She passed the pool stick back to Luis. “Just pay him back. Okay?”
Without waiting for a reply or viewing the reactions to her tantrum, she turned, skittered past Jordan in his wheelchair, and returned to her booth then buried her face behind her hands. Damn, damn, damn! She should cut her losses, go home, dive head-first into that bag of tortilla chips that had been whispering come-hithers to her since before she arrived at her mother’s home earlier this evening and hide from the world until Doomsday.
“Care to talk about it?” Jordan whispered.
She spread her fingers wide enough to see him through the gaps and found him in the exact place he’d been before she’d lost her mind in the back room. After that blowup back there with Luis, coming on the heels of their previous disastrous meeting, she would’ve bet her last pair of clean underwear he’d stay far the hell away from her right now.
Why was he suddenly being so nice to her?
At that moment, Sal appeared with her drink, placed a napkin on the table and set the glass on top. “Kitchen’s still open if you want something to eat.” He looked at Jordan. “Can I get you anything?”
“A ginger ale would be great, thanks.”
“No sweat. You want anything to eat with that?”
Jordan waved a hand in dismissal. “I’m good. Cam?”
“No thanks.” On a sigh, Cam dropped her hands to the table and shook her head. “I had a slice or two of pineapple pizza an hour ago.”
Jordan cocked his head at her. “Pineapple? Since when do you indulge in that sacrilege?”
“Since a friend insisted,” she retorted, then sighed at her short fuse. “Sorry. I shouldn’t have snapped. The pie wasn’t awful, but it’s definitely not something I’d choose to eat on my own.”
She knew why she’d snapped. She found it disheartening he still knew her habits so well, particularly since he’d made it plain he wanted nothing more to do with her, except business. She couldn’t compete with a beauty like Paris Redmond, who could be both a romantic interest and a business partner. What was the line from that old movie? I have a head for business and a bod for sin.
Cam had the brains, but her figure was all “too” for sin, especially when compared to the wives and girlfriends of Vanguard players. Too tall, too big, too buxom, too... too.
It didn’t matter that all her doctors assured her she was healthy and her weight wasn’t an issue. As long as she couldn’t fit into a size two like Mom, she’d never be good enough in some people’s eyes. Certainly, not for her mother—and, apparently, compared to Paris Redmond, not for Jordan, either.
Maybe she should shake things up a bit in her routine. Try that new diet Val told her about earlier. Eat only foods that started with the letter L.
Oh, who was she kidding? Years of fasting and gallons of lemon water with cayenne pepper hadn’t changed her shape or frame. She was built like her father, like her father’s sister, and like the generations of Delgados who’d come before them both. Good peasant stock, Bertie called it. Able to withstand life’s tragedies and remain on her feet. Capable of inordinate amounts of love.
In the good old days, before Houston came calling, she’d never doubted Jordan loved all of her, including her size. But after that incident in the hospital and the smug smile on Paris’s face, the insecurities flooded in, pushed along on her mother’s continuous tides of criticism. Bertie was the one man to pull her up out of her self-pity, to insist she value herself. And she did—or at least, she had. Until Jordan returned,
