holly-jolly blur of bad singing, mulled wine, and risky bets placed on roulette wheels with a fuck it, it’s Christmas attitude. Condensation mists the portholes, and even the icy breeze trickling in from the cracked French doors does nothing to dull the searing heat burning through my veins.
I’m taking a respite in the bathroom, running my wrists under the tap. As I glance up to check on my makeup, I pause.
I’m grinning.
I guess I get it now, why people love Christmas. I’ve barely drunk but the festive excitement has seeped into my pores and intoxicated me.
Growing up, the holidays were nothing more than a week to muddle through. Some Christmases, I’d receive the most ridiculously expensive presents from my parents, which would then be slowly pawned off throughout the year to fund their binges. Other years, I’d get our DVD player wrapped up in the pages of the Devil’s Coast Herald.
When you’re surrounded by people you actually like, it feels different. Magical, even.
I’m twisting off the tap when I hear a nasal voice seep under the door.
“Oh, boss! I’m glad I caught you. I hope you don’t mind, but I just had to use your private en-suite. Every bathroom on the yacht was in use, and after four glasses of champagne, I didn’t have the patience to wait in line for the Little Girls room.”
A bitterness fills my mouth. It’s Anna. I glare at the empty row of cubicles in the mirror and brace my hands on either side of the sink.
“Mm. All twelve of them were occupied,” Rafe muses. His tone is cashmere-clad but I catch the irritated undercurrent. “Such a coincidence.”
“Indeed. Anyway, I couldn’t help but notice all the female products. So…who’s the lucky lady?”
My brain doesn’t have time to slow my impulse; I yank open the restroom door and stomp down the hall. Rafe’s at the end of it, and Anna with her back to me. His gaze slides to mine over her head, amused and all mine. Deep down, I know why I didn’t wait for his response: if he told a lie, something in me would shatter a little.
My shoulder connects with Anna’s more aggressively than necessary as I slide in beside Rafe. I put a possessive hand on his chest, and when his hand slides around my hip and brings me closer to him, a warm satisfaction runs south.
I turn my attention to Anna. “Mine,” I say sweetly. “Now, fuck off.”
Her shocked expression tastes delicious, but the silence thrums in my ears. I know I’m dipping my toe into bunny-boiler territory but I don’t give a fuck. I guess I’ve learned two things tonight: why people love Christmas and why women do crazy shit like smash up cars with baseball bats over men.
Anna looks up at Rafe as if he’s an SOS signal. He only brushes his thumb over my hip and says, “Happy Christmas, darling.”
She huffs and click-clacks back to the party. When the door slams shut, leaving us alone in the corridor, I twist out of Rafe’s grip to face him.
A hint of a smirk pulls on his lips. He swipes at it with a thumb and slides his hands into his pockets. “Meow.”
Maybe it’s only because the heels I’m wearing are a couple inches taller than usual and all this height is giving me new confidence, but I curl my finger around his collar pin and yank him toward me.
“Call another woman darling again, and she’ll die crossing the road.”
It echoes what he said to me after I gave him a lap dance in his car. Guess that’s why he raises a brow and searches my eyes for humor. When he doesn’t find it, he nods, a small amount of satisfaction leaking through.
“If that’s what you want, Queenie,” he says quietly.
His compliance is so soft, so intense, that I’m instantly breathless. Suddenly needing air that isn’t thick with Raphael Visconti charm, I burst through the side door and out to the deck.
Slow, heavy footsteps follow me to the bow. Gripping the railing, I tilt my head to the ink-black horizon, not caring that the wind is undoing all the hours of work I spent putting rollers in my hair.
My skin prickles with awareness when a silhouette interrupts the glow of the security lamp above me and Rafe’s jacket slides over my shoulders. His hands come either side of me, his lips skimming behind my ear.
“Nice song,” he murmurs, raising a thousand goosebumps along my arms. “Were you trying to hypnotize me?”
I smile into the darkness. “I don’t know what you’re talking about; it’s the only song I know all the lyrics to.” My attention drops to his hand next to mine. Big and busted to my small and smooth. A sick thrill sweeps through me when I remember his hands didn’t used to look like that; every scar is fresh and belongs to me. Skimming my pinky over his bruised knuckle, I add, “Unless it worked?”
He shakes off my light touch and spins me around so my back is pressed against the railing. It’s a stark contrast: the warmth radiating off his body and the icy wind lashing my back. Each feels as dangerous as the other.
Sliding his hands over the lapels of his jacket, he pulls me even deeper into his orbit. Steals my next breath with a brush of his nose against mine.
“It really would be the perfect night to kiss you,” he whispers.
Fuck.
All of my senses sharpen, aside from common sense. I’m suddenly aware of the rhythmic sound the ocean makes when it slaps against the hull. How handsome Rafe looks under the romantic glow of the security light. Wren’s sweet rendition of ABBA’s Lay All Your Love on Me drifts through the glass and grazes my ears.
This is how it’d happen in a film.
Then when this was all over, I’d have to torture myself with the replay forever.
I let out a tense breath and close up my heart. “Nah. I already told you; I want rain. Like in The Notebook.”
A soft laugh escapes him. “I’ll bear that in mind when you write me a check.”
He glances quickly down the deck, then, biting down on his bottom lip, he skims a large hand up the inner seam of my thigh. Christ, his palm sizzles like rain on a hot roof in the height of summer, burning a hole into my lower stomach. When he pushes my thong aside and dips two thick fingers into me, my moan is one of relief.
Sexual tension has tethered me to him all night. Every time his velvet laugh has chafed the back of my neck, every time I’ve been trapped by his wink over the rim of a crystal tumbler, my blood has heated another degree. I don’t know how I’ve gone four hours now without fucking this man.
His stare darkens at my reaction. “But I suppose for now, these lips will have to do.”
Despite rising on my tip-toes to chase his touch, my tone is defiant. “Not yours,” I whisper.
Annoyance threads through his features, just like it does every time we fuck and I scramble enough semblance together to tell him this.
Eyes narrowing, he skims his middle finger over my entrance, then further south. “Then what about this?”
I yelp as he pushes into the entrance of my ass, falling into him. He catches me, his laugh against my chest tightening my nipples.
We’re so close now, his scent consumes me like a drug. I rub my face over his neck, desperate for more of it. All of it.
“It’ll cost you,” I murmur half-heartedly against his pulse.
“I’ll pay it,” he mutters back, resting his chin on the crown of my head. His tone is so simple I know he’s no longer joking.
We stay like this for a while, his jacket warming my shoulders and the rise and fall of his chest lulling me into lethargy.
I sigh against his top button. I’m guarded, but I’m not naive. I know I’m obsessed with this man. He makes me want to do stupid shit, like tell him so. Or even tell everyone else by yelling it from the bow like Jack yells I’m the king of the world! in the Titanic.
That’d be pretty embarrassing, though, so I’d settle for staying here forever in his strong arms, the hum of a good time barely touching us. Although, when the thought of forever comes to mind, it slides down my throat and tightens there like a noose.
There’s no such thing. Even if there was, it’s not made for us, but it’s hard to remember that when his eyes find mine across a packed room. When he puts his hands over my ears during a thunderstorm. When he spends an hour massaging me after he ruins me.
“Tell me why you think I’m unlucky,” I blurt out. Convince me this can’t be forever.
His stomach tenses against mine. “You already know why.”
“No, but why do you think it’s me?” I push off him, tilt my chin, and meet his stony glare. “You might be superstitious but so am I. And even I know coincidences can exist, so why are you so sure it’s me causing you all this bad luck?”
His jaw ticks. When his eyes coast over my head to the black horizon, I think he’s going to shut me down. But then a reluctant puff of air leaves his lips, and his gaze falls back to mine.
“Mama was as stupid as you.” He flicks an irritated look to my necklace. “God, fate, karma—she believed in all the things she couldn’t see. When I was still struggling with my first-ever casino, she came to visit me in Vegas. Dragged me to this fortune teller on Fremont Street.” He runs a hand over his jaw, shaking his head at the memory. “She was a cartomancer—read fortunes with playing cards. At the time, I thought it was total horseshit, but my mama was sold. Anyway, I watched on while the gypsy drew her the Jack of Diamonds, followed by the Ace of Spades.” He pauses, searching my eyes for any sign of recognition, but I only shrug. “Combined, they’re known as the death duo, apparently. Anyone who draws both cards consecutively is destined to die.”
Ice threads through my veins. “Did she…”
His jaw tightens. “Three weeks later. Poisoned at a fair.”
My vision dims. My hand fumbles for Rafe’s, and I bring it to my mouth. “I’m so sorry,” I whisper against his knuckles. My eyes lift to his. “Is that why you’re superstitious?”
A humorless smirk touches his lips. He stretches out his palm and cups my face. “Not quite. After she drew the cards for my mama, the fortune teller told me she had a reading for me, too, but I was too pissed to listen. I thought it was all bullshit, anyway. But then, with both parents dead within a week of each other? I needed answers. So, after the funeral, I skipped the wake and flew back to Vegas to get them.” He swallows, tracking his thumb with a pained expression as he runs it over my cheek. “I don’t know what I was expecting, but it wasn’t for her to put two cards in front of me and tell me I could choose my fate if I so wished.”
“What were the cards?”
“King of Diamonds, or King of Hearts. She told me that in this life, I’d only have one or the other—success in business, or success in love. The caveat was that it could never be both.”
Something sickly spins my stomach. “And what did you choose?” I croak, my mouth drier than it should be.
He smiles sadly and stretches his hands to sweep over the menacing silhouette of the yacht behind him. His yacht. “You know the answer, Penelope.”
My heart beats double-time, a question more loaded than a gun shooting up my throat. “You chose this over being in love?” I jerk a thumb to the ship, wave the watch on my wrist in his face. “Materialistic shit over true feelings?”
The words are desperate and venomous, floating between us like soap bubbles. I wish I could pop them as easily. He regards me with suspicion. “You don’t believe in love either, remember?”
Yeah. Grinding my teeth so nothing else stupid can escape my lips, I wait for him to continue.
“I returned to the fortune teller when I was jaded and confused. My parents had just died; their love meant nothing now.” He pauses. “Well, it wasn’t really love, but I didn’t learn that until later. And Angelo had just told me he wasn’t returning to Devil’s Dip to take over my father’s role as capo, which meant I wouldn’t be his underboss. All I had was a hotel room in Vegas and a shitty casino that was barely earning enough to keep the lights on.” He shrugs carelessly. “I had nothing to lose and a lot to gain, so I tapped the King of Diamonds.”
A few heavy seconds pass. The wind fills them with the faint hum of laughter and Mariah Carey’s All I Want for Christmas is You.
“So, you’ve explained why you’re richer than God himself, and why you don’t usually fuck the same girl twice,” I say sharply, “but I don’t get what this story has to do with me?”
Rafe runs his tongue over his teeth, his focus shifting behind me. I swear, he hasn’t moved an inch, but he suddenly feels further away. “As I was leaving, she told me that, just like every action has a reaction, every fate card has a doom card. A card that, if you let into your life, it’ll ruin you. Bring you to your knees.” He laughs, like he’s just remembered a private joke. I have a feeling I wouldn’t find it funny.
“What was the card?” I grind out.
He glances at me quickly. “The Queen of Hearts.”
The deck spins in a haze of black, gold, and green. “Queenie.”
I’m brought back to rights by a soft tug on my hair. “The red-haired lady,” Rafe says pensively, staring at my strands around his fingers. “Of course, I thought she was talking shit and my mother’s death was a coincidence, but then almost overnight my casino had all this interest from investors. My bank balance grew as fast as my reputation, and within three years, I owned most of Vegas. If the gypsy was right about my mother and about the King of Diamonds, then why wouldn’t she be right about the doom card? For years, I avoided red-haired women like the plague, just in case.” He tugs sharply on my strands, his stare hardening as it meets mine. “Then you stomped down the stairs of the Blues Den. Red hair, stolen dress, an attitude I wanted to fuck out of you.” He shakes his head. “You were magnetic, and I couldn’t resist giving you the time of day. You turning up at my brother’s wedding could have been a coincidence. It’s a small town, after all. And the port explosion; we had it coming, but when I saw you at the hospital and realized you’d been there, my skepticism began to wane.” He glances along the deck, his jaw ticking. “I didn’t give you a job as a favor to Nico, but to convince myself I was only being paranoid.”
I let out a shaky breath. Fuck, I don’t know what I was expecting, but it wasn’t that. “Well, I knew you didn’t hire me because of my bullshit resume,” I say weakly.
His smile doesn’t touch his eyes. “The night you started, I lost forty grand on the tables and had to sever ties with one of my most lucrative investments. And then it never fucking stopped, Penny. Every call and email I got was bad news. Shares sliding, stocks crashing. My first casino got hit. Christ.” He runs a careless hand through his hair. “Griffin tried to kill me yesterday.”
I blink. “What?”
His hand slides up to the nape of my neck, his squeeze cutting me off. “A story for another time.” We breathe in each other’s air for a few seconds, my pulse beating off-kilter in my ears. With a heavy puff of breath, Rafe drops his forehead down to mine, his imposing silhouette obscuring the outside world. “I don’t care how lucky you think you are,” he murmurs. “To me, you’re the unluckiest girl in the world.” Instinct pulls me away from him, but he only tightens his grip on my neck. “But you’re also the prettiest. The funniest. The fucking rudest. You’ve ruined my life but I’m not strong enough to stop you.”
As his admission tickles my top lip, panic rises up my throat. I can’t pin down its source; all I know is that it’s deep-rooted and desperate. “Go back to her,” I whisper. “Go back to the gypsy and ask her to reverse it or something.”
Keeping his grip on my neck, he slides his other hand around my waist and rubs a thumb over the small of my back, where his name is fading. “I can’t. You’re not the only one who likes to start fires, Queenie.”
Maybe it’s just the wind, but now my eyes are stinging. His next words feel like a punch to the throat. “We always knew this was only temporary, right?” His gaze sparks with bitter amusement. “We wouldn’t want you falling into that trap now, would we?”
My vision blurs at the edges. All I can focus on are his eyes searching mine. I hope he can’t see the realization behind them. I take a steadying breath, choke down my emotion, and nod.
“Temporary,” I rasp.
He’s right. Despite the ache that pounds in my chest, the common sense beneath it knows this can never be permanent.
I’ll ruin his life.
He’ll break my heart.
In the end, neither of us will win this game.
