Games of the Heart (Crimson Romance) (23 page)

Tom exhaled, and I swear I could feel it through the cell phone. “Holy moly, Preacher, who have you been talking to?”

Did he need to know? Rather, I said, “Is the noose getting tighter on the PSA? I went to an adoption introductory meeting, and the photos were of babies and kids who looked normal, nary a crutch or wheelchair in sight. But Delta Cheney nearly went into coronary arrest when one of the couples at the meeting demanded to adopt a kid who has special needs.”

He inhaled for what seemed forever, exhaled as if he had all the time in the world. “There’s probably some frickin’ fine print in the ‘kid rental and return agreement’ that doesn’t hold them liable if the baby or child is disabled. It’d make my day to get my hands on some of those forms, but it’s too soon in the investigation to subpoena them.”

“You’re day’s made. I have the forms.”

“What? Are you at church?”

“I’m about a half block from PSA and near … wait, let me see.” I looked out the window. “Do you know the McDonald’s across from the One Horse Club on Tropicana, about a block east of the Strip? Wait, that sounded like I’m in the club but I’m sitting at McDonald’s across the parking lot from it.”

“Hold on a minute, Jane, I’ve got to get this other call.”

So I did and continued to look out a window, which had just been cleaned by a sweating kid dressed in a uniform that needed to be washed. The young man cleaned off the foam, ran the squeegee down the glass, circled it all with a grubby paper towel, and went on to the next window. That’s when I saw it. Pastor Bob’s Lexus, minus the good pastor or Albert Miller, his driver, an arrangement that had come into being with Tom’s help.

Yes, that was the same Albert Miller who wasn’t to come close to any gambling unless he wanted to go back to prison for an exceptionally long time. The car was smack dab in front of the club’s door, in the zone marked “Handicapped Only.”

“Jane? You there? Sorry.”

“I’m here, Tom.” Physically, at least. “Darn it, you jerk, Albert Miller.” I put my hand in front of the phone and grumbled.

“It’s cutting out. Can you hear me? Stay put. I’ll be there in twenty-minutes, twenty-five at the max, even without sirens.”

I tossed the soft drink into the trash. Phewy. No man of God gambles. Period. And you’d better put that in italics and underline it, especially when I realized he was doing it in broad daylight, taking along someone who had to steer clear of casinos like I steer clear of more than one trip into the Godiva’s Chocolate Store per mall visit. You probably won’t see the One Horse Saloon and Game Club on any AAA must-visit list, and forget about getting a glimpse of it on the Travel Channel. Dives like that club stay well below the radar so they won’t be cited for patron endangerment by just breathing the air inside. The grubby gaming hall was sandwiched between two low-end day spas, which in Vegas-ese means houses of prostitution, with a tattoo parlor and a cell phone store finishing the block. There was a fake Western boardwalk and hitching post in front of the casino with a railing that was broken on one side.

I was across that parking lot before sanity reined me in. It was one thing if Ab Normal wanted to ruin his entire life and make Desert Hills Community Church the focus of suspicion and gossip for believers and non-believing folks in a hundred-mile radius, but dragging Harmony’s dad in on his gambling was a shoe of a rotten color.

A stench like bad meat meets sauerkraut throttled my senses as I pulled at the heavy door. I held my breath. But a girl can only do that for so long; I gulped some air before entering the lair of sweat and sorrow.

In a Danielle Steele novel this would be a “despicable den of sin,” with the hero there to convert sinners, and he’d probably have a halo around his head. Sure, there’d be sunlight glimmering down, enshrining him in a Godly glow. But this was Vegas, and inside it was even more icky, sticky, and grimy than I thought it could be. If I were doing a docudrama about out-of-luck gamblers and wasted alcoholics, I’d have filmed it at the One Horse Saloon. The varnished wood bar ran the length of the room. Ten or twelve tables sat in the middle. I blinked from the fumes and darkness.

Oh, yeah, I had one trifling glitch. I hadn’t the foggiest notion of what Arthur Miller looked like other than Harmony’s complaint to Gramps that her dad was, “Gross with that bald head.” Picture this — I was feeling my way into a blackened casino, looking for a bald guy who I didn’t know from Adam. Adam would have been easier to find, fig leaf and all.

With celebrities, football stars, and everyday guys shaving their heads more often that I shave my legs, you’d think this search for a bald man would have turned up lots of possibilities. Not so. I leaned on the bar and my forearms stuck tight. A layer of arm skin ripped off as I stepped back, and the bartender got closer to my chest than my Wonderbra when I said, “I’m looking for a man.”

He drooled, wiped spittle from the corner of his puffy mouth, and said, “Yeah, well, I can certainly help you with that, honey. But if you’re working, looking for a john, you’re on your own. This is a poker club. You know, you are a first-rate-lookin’ specimen of a woman. I like ’em plump, mores to hold on to and squeeze, and I gets off at six. That is, unless you’re working, and in that case, I’m not buying.”

“Thanks. I am employed, but not working in that way. Besides, I’m looking for a specific man, a friend.”

“That’s what they all say. How about a drink while you’re waiting?” He leaned even closer, but I was hip this time, and me and my Wonderbra moved back.

“The guy I’m looking for a guy with a shaved head and he’d be with another man, a short, chunky man with hair that reminds you of Elvis.”

He took a long drag on a cigarette. “Don’t know about the bald dude. But look that way and you’ll see that Elvis hasn’t left the building.” He pointed and, sure as shootin’, Pastor Bob was chatting it up with three of Vegas’s scruffiest.

“Bingo.” Albert had to be nearby, probably in the toilet, although there were no chips at the empty stop next to my good pastor. Probably because Albert had lost his shirt already, I mumbled to myself.

I ached to lash out. Have a hissy fit to beat all hissy fits, both at Albert and Pastor Bob and maybe the creepy bartender too, just for good measure. I wanted to do them serious bodily harm. What would it accomplish to catch Bob in the act of gambling? What would it do for our church? What would it mean for Harmony’s dad, other than a one-way ticket back to prison?

I had been batty to come in, and the dim-witted act swept over me like Gatorade on a football coach. Nearly blinded, I now saw a shadow behind the steering wheel of Ab Normal’s car. The head was clean-shaven, and I dashed to the driver’s side and said, “You’re Albert Miller?”

“Who wants to know?” he grumbled, opening the car door and unfolding his body one part at a time. With each movement, the frown grew deeper. He wasn’t just tall, he was
tall
, basketball player tall.

I bluffed and stepped closer to him. He stepped back. I liked that in a man, that he could read that I meant business. “I’m not threat to you. Besides, I’m Jane Angieski.” Nothing registered, a gal can tell. “You know, like Pastor Jane, the woman who is Harmony’s foster parent and her pastor at church?”

The man grabbed me. Squeezed the breath straight out of my lungs in a crush that would have garnered applause on
Wrestlemania
. “Thank you, ma’am, I cannot thank you enough for taking in my little girl. You are an answer to all of my prayers. Having you and Harmony together is a Godsend.”

The squeezing stopped but then he twirled me, which isn’t an easy task. “Ah, Albert, put me down now.” I gulped in what air I could and pushed on his chest.

“Oops, sorry. Let’s talk in the shade. Thank you and bless you. All those months in jail, I prayed that sweet Harmony would be protected. She shouldn’t suffer for my sins. I don’t understand why you just walked out of that dive. You don’t gamble, too?” He shoved his meaty hands into his jeans and nodded toward the door.

“I thought I’d find you in there. I saw Bob playing cards.”

“Losing at cards,” Albert huffed the correction, and smoothed a hand over his bare head, as if he were used to a full head of hair.

“You’ve been working with him, driving him around for only two days. How can you be sure he’s losing?”

“You’re kidding, right? Believe me, he’s losing, or you can pretend the Easter Bunny is dancing with the tooth fairy on top of the poker table as your pastor is saving lost souls. Give me a break. A guy who spends a lot of time in the cheap casinos, Pastor Jane, and comes out steamed and not plastered or being ushered out by the bouncer as he’s hollering stuff I can’t say to you, my bet is that he’s a loser. I’m no saint. I know what he’s doing, and it’s ruining his life.” He backed off and shrugged. “Yeah, okay, I’m not paid to think. I’m a driver, happy as a hog in new mud to get this gig. But yesterday and into the night, we were doing a version of this. Except it’s hotter today.”

“He’s been gambling for two days straight? You just wait here, Albert. I’ll be back.” Okay, maybe this wasn’t one of my most impressive career decisions, but there was a decent guy sizzling in the sun while a certain unscrupulous Las Vegas minister was inside with air conditioning and losing heaven only knew how much. And, might I add the question: Whose money was he gambling? What would you have done?

I marched right back inside and over to Bob and put a Vulcan Death Grip, straight from
Star Trek
, on his shoulder. “May I have a word with you?”

Bob flinched, and the cards flew across the table. Another guy at the table spilled his beer. One swore. The dealer grunted, “That’s it. Table closed.”

Guess they figured I was the wife. Probably looked like it, too.

Pastor Bob’s eyes got twice the size of the chip on the table. “Jane. Oh, my. You don’t understand.”

“Oh, I am certain I do.”

“No, Pastor Jane, you don’t. Let’s get out of here. This is so easy to explain.” He laughed, high and unmanly. “I’ll explain everything, everything you need to know. And only what you need to know.”

He took my arm, I yanked away, but took off ahead out of him and out of the casino, squinting in the light, tripping over the railing of the One Horse Saloon. I caught myself, regaining my balance as Albert looked the other way.

I glared at Pastor Bob. “I don’t have time to listen right now, Pastor. Get help, please. If not for yourself, then for our congregation, your flock.”

“Wait. I order you to wait,” he hollered in my direction, but I was moving toward the tan cruiser with the LVPD insignia on the side as it pulled into the McDonald’s across the parking lot.

Ab Normal could concoct whatever story he wanted; I’d seen the truth with the IOUs and him in action. What did he think I planned to do with these tidbits of incriminating evidence? Phewy, what did I plan to do?

I was boiling, and it had nothing to do with Las Vegas in July. Should I go to the church board? Best to write or email the District Council? Bob needed help, but Lord help me, I didn’t want to be his counselor.

As I stormed into McDonald’s at the same second grabbing the PSA adoption application papers from my big ol’ purse. Tom was just inside the doors and I, shoved the papers into his extended hand, and flipped around. I’d had enough of human nature for one afternoon.

“Whoa. Hold it.” Tom held fast to my elbow, and quickly, for a guy his size, he was in front of me. Think brick wall. There was a lot of him. “What’s the rush?” His chocolate eyes squinted.

“You would not believe who I just saw in that place over there.” I pointed. My finger quivered.

Tom’s eyes followed my finger. “The devil himself? Hey, just joking. You too ticked to laugh? You can’t drive anywhere in this condition. Take some breaths. And sit with me for a few minutes. I need a break. My, you are a fine-looking woman when you’re steamed.”

“Put a sock in it. I have decisions to make.” But my feet didn’t scamper away, and my elbow felt all tingly in a delicious way. Okay, my body was easily nudged into a booth.

“Can you wait until we have iced tea? I won’t make any more ‘gosh, you’re beautiful when you’re angry’ remarks, either. Promise. That was daft of me, but gosh, I haven’t had much practice being with a woman in a long while.”

“What about your Officer Christy?” How that “your” got into the question, I have no clue. I regretted it the second the cop’s eyes sparkled.

“She’s a co-worker, Jane, a co-worker who happens to be married. To a fullback with the San Diego Chargers.” His eyebrows, which were lush, went up and down. “You care.” He made a fist like he’d just gotten the winning touchdown, which I felt was cute and weird at the same time. Then he said, “I don’t have much experience with dating a smart kind of woman like you. Sit still, will you? Don’t move. I’ll be right back.”

“I’m making myself nervous, Tom.” I shrugged, attempting to shake off the stench of Pastor Bob as I watched Tom head to the counter. I said to his back, “Just a few minutes and then I’m off to dance class.”

“Need a partner?” He handed me one of the iced teas he had carried to a booth.

“No. Um, Gramps is expecting me to dance with him.” I didn’t want Tom with me. Okay, my brain didn’t, but my body seemed to have other longings. But brain won when I realized that having Tom there when I just might do something not fully appreciated by the law, like serious snooping without a license, could be bad for our budding relationship.

“I’ve been dumped plenty of times, Preacher, but I’ve never heard that line.” He sipped the tea like it was the most important thing in life.

Was he kidding me or did he feel bad about being shot down? “Handsome guy like you never gets dumped. It’s in the Code Book of Cute Men, isn’t it?” I flipped out the line, and then wanted to slap my mouth. I was flirting, in public and in less than ten minutes after my senior pastor was found gambling, by me, no less. “Wow, I’m out of practice, if I ever had any practice at making suggestive repartee, that is in the last decade. As for being dumped, seriously, I find it hard to believe that you’d have any trouble with women.”