Free Gambling on the Bodyguard by Sarah Ballance Page A

have any kind of fun there, at least on the strip.”
    “I suppose getting someone to buy you a twelve pack at a gas station isn’t exactly Vegas.”
    “Not even close,” he said with a laugh. “But I fell for the city anyway. Never left. I had enough in savings to get an apartment. Found a job, eventually bought a house.”
    “How’d you get into guarding bodies?”
    “Right place, right time. Didn’t take me long to figure out I didn’t like being drunk or throwing money into the abyss on gaming, but I love the atmosphere. It’s just this batshit crazy place. No one cares who you are or where you’re from. You arrive, you’re in.”
    “The party of a lifetime,” she murmured.
    He nodded. “Every day of the week. Anyway, one of the hotel security guys didn’t show up for work one night and they had a big profile client coming in. They knew me. I was there. I agreed to stand in, and they kept me on.”
    “Just like that?”
    “Don’t be impressed. It’s one step to the left of being rent-a-cop. I don’t even carry, although I can lay a guy out with my bare hands in two seconds flat if he wants it bad enough. How’d you get to be a ski instructor?”
    She blinked, still stuck on his oh-so-casual incapacitate a man with my bare hands statement. He fascinated her. She felt like she was on some kind of out of control roller coaster, every little thing she learned about him an increase in speed in the face of another breakneck turn. The crash at the end was inevitable, but completely worth the ride.
    It had to be.
    He was watching her, an expectant look on his face.
    He’d asked her a question. Yeah, that. Memory lane wasn’t her favorite place, but somehow he made it easier to go there again.
    “I grew up in Colorado,” she said. “I’ve always loved the mountains, mostly from a distance at first. I’d watch for hours through my bedroom window just to see the changing light paint the snow.” She laughed quietly. A little bitter, even to her own ears. “It was so much better than TV. My friends thought I was nuts. Anyway, there was this one peak in particular that always fascinated me. I don’t know if it was the shape of the rock or the way the snow or the light touched it, but I was obsessed. I’d stare at it and think one day I’d get the summit, and then I’d be free of everything that bogged me down. Kind of silly, I guess.”
    “But you made it, didn’t you?” His voice was full of reverence. Respect.
    “I did. Felt like the top of the world, even though it wasn’t even the highest peak around.”
    “Was it what you expected?”
    “Yeah, as much as anyone can expect that kind of thing. Problem was, eventually I had to come down. I just never got tired of the summit. Never stopped wanting to recapture that feeling.” She gazed off at the horizon, seeing his mountains. She wondered if he ever felt the same way. “I never set out to be a ski instructor. It was more of an excuse to be out there, to be a part of that world.”
    “Does that feeling ever go away?” he asked quietly.
    She looked away from the horizon and found his eyes far more stunning that the painted sky. “I guess if I ever really found what I was looking for, it might.”
    “You think you ever will?”
    “Two days ago, I would have said no.”
    “What about now?” His words were so serious, they nearly frightened her. Or maybe it was the answer.
    “I don’t know about that feeling,” she said. “Only that right now I’m content to stop looking for what I don’t have and enjoy what I do. Right now I’m quite possibly the luckiest person I know.”
    His expression read not a chance . Gave her chills. But he didn’t say it. Instead, he said, “I couldn’t tell you how many times I’ve been out here and have stood in this very spot to watch the sun set, but I’ve never seen it more beautiful than the reflection in your eyes.”
    “Is that another one of your lines?”
    “Nah.” He stared nonchalantly