Page 63 of Dating the Rebel
If she’d missed him...
If he’d headed out to the airport she’d just left...
She would have been devastated.
“But he must have gone upstairs to his suite to count his money,” the man continued.
“He has a room at the casino?”
“A suite,” he said and gave her the number for it.
Her heart pounding, she rushed from the private room, through the lobby to the elevators. Her fingers shook as she pressed the button to his floor—the penthouse floor. The elevator was fast, so fast that she felt light-headed and dizzy when the doors opened onto a wide corridor. She stepped out and approached the double doors marked with the number the man had given her.
She drew in a breath, bracing herself, before she knocked.
“Go away,” a gruff voice called out. “I don’t feel like celebrating.”
He must have thought she was his friend. She wanted to be—his friend, his lover, his everything...
“It’s me,” she called out.
The doors jerked open within seconds. “Miranda?” he asked as if he couldn’t believe she was actually standing in front of him.
She wore his favorite outfit—the leather one Blair had given her.
Then he cleared his throat and asked, “What do you want?”
“You,” she replied.
He stepped back as if she’d punched him. Hard. “What?”
“I’ll play for you,” she said. “Winner takes all...”
His forehead furrowed with lines of confusion. “What do you mean?”
“You just won this championship and you can’t understand the rules of the game?” she asked as she stepped inside the suite and shut the doors behind her. Then she walked around him toward a table near the kitchenette part of the suite. A deck of cards sat on the table, and she picked them up. It was probably his winning deck, so maybe she should have asked for another. But she began to deal those.
“What are your rules, Miranda?” he asked as he joined her at the table.
Unlike the game in his hotel suite, this one must have been more formal, because he wore a tuxedo. But the tie was undone, and half the studs were loose on his shirt, leaving it partially open to expose his muscular chest. His scrapes and bruises had healed.
She had to blink to clear the desire and the confusion from her eyes and focus on his handsome face. Dark circles rimmed his dark blue eyes. He looked exhausted. She raised her hand and stroked his jaw. “Or are you too tired to play me?”
He shook his head. “I just need to understand what the stakes are,” he said. “Are you trying to win your sisters’ shares back? Because you don’t have to. I’ll just give them to you.”
“I told you,” she said. “You. I’m playing for you.”
“But why?”
She drew in a deep breath; she owed him the truth. He’d given it to her. “Because I love you, too.”
His eyes widened with shock. “But I thought you couldn’t trust me?”
“Maybe I shouldn’t,” she said, but she smiled to soften her words. “But I will. I trust that you are a good man, Grant Snyder, and you have only the best of intentions for those you love.”
“And I do love you,” he insisted.
She nodded. “I know...so pick up your cards. If I win, you will be my partner—in business and life.”
