Page 66 of Gamble
What the fuck? The first inkling of realization seeped in.
“But… I thought Elijah Keaton was the manager?” Reagan heard the quaver in her own voice as she pressed down the urge to cry.
The blonde’s eyes widened before answering, “Elijah does work here, yes, but he’s not here right now. May I know who is asking?”
Relief that he at least did work here was replaced with anger that he’d still lied to her. Why would he do that? Was he maybe just a bartender or security guard, and he thought she’d think less of him?
She had just managed a simple, “My name is Reagan,” when a rowdy crowd behind her pressed closer to the open door, trying to peek into the private room.
A young woman’s piercing scream of, “I love you, Shane!” from just a few feet behind her startled her.
Without hesitation, the petite lady named Madison grabbed Reagan’s forearm and pulled her into the private room while apologizing. “Sorry, but we need to keep out the looky-loos,” she said while closing the door behind them.
The commotion had drawn the attention of everyone in the room. She felt the heat creeping up her neck as the room full of celebrities stared at her in an oddly curious way that she couldn’t put her finger on. Despite living in Los Angeles for over a year, she’d never come into contact with anyone more famous than a grown child actor who’d come in for foot surgery the month before. Finding the eyes of so many truly famous people on her was freaking her out.
“I’m so sorry…” she stuttered. Her anger at Elijah had been replaced with embarrassment at interrupting what was clearly an intimate dinner party for friends. “I hate to interrupt… I just thought Elijah would be here.”
Several side conversations she couldn’t hear broke out around the table just as Jaxson Cartwright-Davidson stood atthe head of the table. She felt smaller with each long stride he took in her direction. The tabloids were full of stories of how intense a man he was, and the dark scowl on his handsome face had her quivering even before he stopped next to Madison.
The relief that the owner didn’t yell at her for her interruption was short-lived as he pulled Madison aside to exchange a few words she couldn’t hear. Their body language was animated enough that she knew they were arguing over something.
By the time Jaxson returned his attention to her, Reagan had backed against the door, preparing to bolt out of the room and never return.
Jaxson spoke to her directly, his voice much nicer than she’d been expecting based on the intensity of his scowl. “I’m sure Elijah will be glad you stopped by. We will tell him you asked for him.”
Dismissed, but at least she hadn’t been thrown out yet. Reagan held her breath for a second—torn between her old self that would have run from the room with her tail between her legs and the new, more confident version of herself that Elijah had just awakened. She liked that version of herself so much better.
Be brave. Fight for yourself, if not for Elijah.
Standing taller she replied, “That’s not good enough. He’s been avoiding my calls for two weeks, and now I find out he lied about managing Runway? I’m not leaving until someone tells me what’s going on.”
Jaxson’s scowl deepened as he asked, “Did he ever tell you he managed Runway?”
“Yes. He said he managed the club here that you owned.”
She recognized Jaxson’s wife, Emma, as she arrived next to her husband, slipping her hand into the crook of the man’s arm.Emma was even more beautiful in person as she pressed her husband with a concerned, “We should tell her.”
Reagan’s pulse shot up again.
Tell her what? Had something bad happened to Elijah?
Not realizing just how desperate she was, Jaxson still denied her answers while turning toward his wife. “This is not our information to share. He is our employee. We have NDAs for a reason. She is not a member.”
“But…” Emma threw Reagan a sympathetic glance that spoke volumes.
“Please, I just don’t understand,” Reagan pleaded just as a dark-haired Polynesian woman who’d been sitting next to Shane Covington shot out of her chair and rushed toward the door.
Before she even got close to the group at the door, the woman announced, “Well thank goodness I’m not an employee any more then. I’m not bound by the same HR rules as all of you.”
Jaxson’s heated glare turned in the newcomer’s direction before demanding, “Be careful, young lady. You signed an NDA, too.”
“Oh, who cares,” the beauty retorted, waving her hand in Jaxson’s direction just before taking Reagan’s hands in her own. “This is way more important than that.”
A sad smile lit up the dark-haired beauty’s face, and the second the woman’s hands squeezed hers reassuringly, a new calmness Reagan hadn’t felt in weeks came over her. She did not know why or how, but looking into the kind woman’s eyes as she looked at Reagan with a growing smile eased the worst of her anxiety.
Jaxson was less relieved as he yelled back to Shane still seated at the table. “Hey Covington, are you going to let your woman defy you like this?”
All eyes in the room watched as the award-winning actor grinned. “She’s defying you and Keaton. I never told her shecouldn’t talk with Elijah’s girl,” the A-lister retorted with that sly grin that made women all over the world swoon.
