Page 47 of Elusive Promise

"Believe me, I very much regret that. I wanted to see if he was there to meet with Sara and Isaac, but I left it too long. It was a mistake."

She could see the anger in his eyes. "And you don’t like to make mistakes."

"No, I don't, not when there are lives on the line. This isn't over, Parisa. They're going to act again. And if they have a fifty-million-dollar diamond, plus another ten million in ransom coming their way, the results could be catastrophic. We have to stop them."

"We will. We'll find a way. Don't give up now,Mr. Confidence."

At her light jab, he blew out a breath, his tension easing at her words. "I'm not giving up. I'm just frustrated, and I hate doing nothing. So, what do you want to do? Watch television? Play cards?"

"Are those my only choices?" she asked.

He gave her a sexy grin. "I have other ideas, but unless you've changed your mind about getting a little closer…"

"I haven't," she said quickly.Or had she?

Eleven

Parisa forced that silly question out of her head. Of course she hadn't changed her mind about fooling around with Jared. "Let's play cards," she said decisively.

"All right. How about poker?"

"As long as it's not strip poker."

"That would make things more interesting."

"Not going to happen," she told him, even though the idea of seeing Jared without clothes was more than a little appealing.

"I thought you'd be more adventurous." Jared got up from the table and opened a nearby drawer, pulling out an unopened pack of cards.

"I'm adventurous. Want to skydive, bungee jump, climb up the face of a skyscraper, I'm your girl, but sex with a mystery man who could be married, be a criminal, or be gone before the sun comes up—not so much."

He sat down across from her and opened the cards, shuffling them like a well-trained dealer. "I'm not married, and I'm not a criminal."

"What about the last part?"

"I could be gone before the sun comes up—if I had a good reason to leave."

"There you go."

"But I think you could do the same—if you had a good reason."

"Maybe," she admitted. "Which is why playing cards and not having sex is the best decision."

"I'd call it a decision, but definitely not the best one," he drawled.

She smiled, enjoying their charged-up conversation and the fact that she felt more like herself than she had in a long time. As he shuffled the cards again, she said, "Did you by chance work at a casino?"

"For a few months actually—in Las Vegas. I worked high stakes poker."

"Sounds like there's a story there."

"It was interesting to watch what people are willing to gamble, how good they are at hiding their emotions, what makes them sweat, and how they interact with people they think are equals versus those who are clearly beneath them."

"I'm guessing they don't act well."

"That probably wasn't a difficult guess since you have moved in a world of privilege."

"That's true. I have met a lot of people with money, but the ones who impressed me the most were the ones who used their financial status to make the world better. I don't have a lot of patience for materialistic people. Not when I've seen so much suffering. I wish there was more sharing of wealth, more working together, because when people do that, lives can be forever changed."

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