He paused for a moment, and then sighed. “Fine, be difficult. We’ll play as a team.”
“And I don’t keep a dime of the winnings,” she added, her tone firm.
“And you won’t keep a dime of the winnings,” he echoed grudgingly.
The card dealer’s lips twitched, and Maggie suspected he found the entire exchange amusing. He’d probably never encountered a woman so willing to kiss a thousand bucks goodbye.
“Ready to play some cards?” the man asked, glancing from her to Ben.
They spent the next hour at the blackjack table, with Ben explaining the game to her with the utmost of patience. After a few big wins, Maggie started to relax. She smiled at the tuxedo-clad men who joined them, sipped a glass of champagne, and stared at a familiar-looking woman in a gold sequined dress for ten minutes before Ben finally whispered that she was the lead anchor for NBC’s evening news.
“You do watch the news, don’t you?” he teased.
“Sometimes.”
The laugh he gave sent a flurry of shivers up her spine. “Don’t you feel alienated sometimes, being so out of touch with the world?”
She shrugged. “I’m too busy to feel alienated.”
He tweaked one of the wavy tendrils framing her cheeks. “We really need to talk about this jam-packed schedule of yours.”
Maggie’s reply was cut off by the sound of a throaty female voice squealing, “Benjamin?”
An unbelievably tall, unbelievably beautiful woman with raven hair and sparkling blue eyes sauntered over in an indecent red dress and a pair of three-inch heels. Before Maggie could blink, the giant sexpot threw her arms around Ben and splattered kisses on his cheeks.
“Benjamin! It is you!” With her heavy South American accent, it sounded more like “Ben-ja-meeen, eet eeez you!” Something about the way the woman’s eyes twinkled suggestively hinted that this beauty knew Ben on a very intimate level. In fact, at a closer examination of the black-haired beauty’s face, Maggie realized she was the supermodel at Ben’s side in the picture she’d found on the Internet.
“Sonja,” Ben said in a warm voice, gingerly disentangling himself from the woman’s embrace, “I should’ve known I’d run into you here.”
“Well, of course. This is my second home. Do you remember when we summered here, Benjamin?” Sonja licked her bottom lip, a move so blatantly sexual Maggie wanted to tear out the woman’s tongue.
Meow.
“And who is your lovely friend?” Sonja added.
Maggie had to hand it to the woman. She made the phrase “lovely friend” seem like the most contemptible insult ever composed.
“This is Maggie Reilly.” Ben’s features looked strained, his discomfort evident in his eyes.
“It is wonderful to meet you, Maggie.”
Damn, even her name coming out of Sonja’s lush red lips sounded like an affront.
“Yeah, same here,” she replied.
“And are you also a model, Maggie?”
She swallowed, feeling horribly exposed as Sonja looked her up and down. “Actually, I’m a waitress. From New York.”
There was a moment’s silence, finally broken by a long tinkling laugh from Sonja, who turned to grin at Ben. “So you’re—how do you Americans say it? Slumming it?”
The callous words sliced into Maggie’s chest like a blade and caused her breath to jam in her throat. She no longer felt exposed. She felt gutted, humiliated, and even though nobody was looking their way, she felt like every eye in the room was glued on her.
Her hands started to tremble. She wanted to reply with a catty comment, slap this Brazilian bitch the way she’d slapped Robbie Hanson when he’d called her a foster-freak back in the ninth grade, but for the life of her she couldn’t make her vocal cords work.
So she did the only other thing she could think of. She straightened her back, lifted her chin and walked away as steadily as her legs would allow and with as much dignity as she could muster.
“Oopsy. I seem to have upset your little friend.”
Ben’s heart shrank in his chest as he stared after Maggie’s retreating back. Next to him, Sonja looked pleased as punch, which made him rethink every positive thing he’d ever thought of the woman. She was a snob, yes. Self-absorbed, totally. But he’d never taken her for downright cruel.
“That was uncalled for,” he snapped.
Sonja just laughed. “Oh, Benjamin, I was only—how do you say?—goofing around. Your friend is much too sensitive. This is why you need a real woman, caro.”
The air sizzled from the hot sparks of fury he shot in his former flame’s direction. “I have a real woman.” He hooked his thumb at the exit. “She went thataway.”