A part of her actually wanted to. Dangerous curiosity, she told herself, and retreated to safe ground. “Thank you for the invitation but Mark and I are getting married in a couple of weeks…”
“And I understand you’re busy right now, but when it’s convenient…” He smiled at Mark. “Would touring Africa as my guest appeal?”
“Absolutely,” Mark rushed in, without discussing the choice with her.
They didn’t know the man. Why would Mark want to be his guest on a tour through Africa? It wasn’t on. Not with Damien Wynter. It felt wrong. Apart from anything else, no way could she feel comfortable in his company.
“You’d better take Damien down to the saloon if you’re playing poker with Dad, Peter,” she reminded her brother, wanting this encounter ended.
“Are you playing, Mark?” Damien asked, apparently happy to have her fiancé included in the poker party.
Charlotte resented the gambit to separate them as though she didn’t count. Mark wouldn’t desert her for some all male fun. Certainly not on the first New Year’s Eve they were spending together.
“Not my game, I’m afraid,” he said, which wasn’t as positive about remaining with her as she would have liked. In fact, Mark had sounded downright rueful over missing out.
Damien’s compelling dark eyes targeted her again. “What about you, Charlotte?”
The impertinence of the question left her momentarily speechless. As if she would when Mark couldn’t!
Peter laughed, clapping his friend on the back. “Believe me, Damien, you don’t want to play with Charlotte.”
“Oh? Why not?”
“Because she’ll take you. My sister is a killer player.”
His mouth formed a very sexy moue. His eyes, which hadn’t left hers for a second, simmered a sexy challenge. “I think I’d like the experience of being taken by your sister, Peter.”
Charlotte burned.
Damien Wynter wasn’t talking poker. He’d looked her over, decided he found her desirable, liked the spice that she was engaged to another man and supposedly unattainable, and was now laying out his line, dangling the bait of beating him at a game based on taking chances.
The outrageous arrogance of the man was insufferable. Her mind sizzled with ways to puncture his ego. Before she could come up with the perfect putdown, Mark intervened.
“You know, I’d like to watch that,” he said musingly. “Are spectators allowed at this game?”
Annoyance sharpened her tongue. “Mark, I don’t want to play. I want to be with you.”
“Mark can come and watch, Charlotte,” Peter put in, suddenly eager to oblige his friend’s whim. “He can sit right at your shoulder.”
“That’s not the same,” she shot at her brother.
“Truly, I would enjoy it, darling,” Mark pushed, smiling persuasively as he added, “It’s a part of your life that’s still a mystery to me. I’d like the chance to watch and understand what you were talking about…the percentages.”
“I thought we were going to dance,” she protested, hating his unwitting collusion with a man who would take her if the opportunity presented itself.
“We can dance any night,” he soothed.
“Course you can,” Peter said dismissively. “Come on, Charlotte. You know you love to play. It’s in your blood.”
The sense of being railroaded increased the angry tension Damien Wynter had evoked, and Peter sounded so like their father with his blood comment, she almost stamped her foot in exasperation. “It’s just a game, Peter. I can choose to play or not. I don’t need it in my life!”
“Sorry, darling,” Mark back-pedalled in concern. “Of course, it’s your choice.”
“But it would please all of us if you played,” Damien slid in silkily.
Painting her as a selfish spoilt brat if she refused.
Charlotte grimly took stock. Mark could watch a poker match on television if he was so keen to understand percentages. That seemed like a very specious argument to her. More likely, the drawcard for him was being with Peter and Damien Wynter—part of the privileged circle at her father’s poker game.
A nasty suspicion crawled around her mind. Was Mark using her as a stepping stone to where he wanted to be?
She didn’t want to think that. She didn’t want to but…why leap at the chance of being Damien’s guest in Africa?
Damn Damien Wynter! He’d already spoilt her night with Mark.
“All right! I’m in!” she decided, a reckless streak of belligerence prompting her to take on a straight out fight with the man who had stirred so much unwelcome turmoil inside her.
“Splendid!” Damien approved, grinning like a wolf seeing the jugular of his victim bared.
If luck is with me, it’s your blood that will be spilled, Charlotte thought viciously, turning a smile to Mark. “Let me know when you find it boring and I’ll surrender my chips,” she said, deliberately making it known she was indulging her fiancé, no one else.
Mark touched her cheek in a gentle salute of admiration, his eyes beaming warm pleasure at her. “My brave girl,” he murmured. “I suspect you’ll be swimming amongst sharks at this poker table but I’ll rescue you whenever you say the word.”
The tightness in Charlotte’s chest eased a little. Mark did love her. It was stupid to get worked up over a few little things that could be put down to natural curiosity. Damien Wynter somehow emanated a magnetism that was skewing her thoughts.
As she turned to her brother and said, “Lead on, Peter. We’ll follow you down to the saloon,” she caught Damien staring at Mark as though measuring him for deep, dark annihilation.
So much for wanting him as his guest in Africa! He’d probably feed Mark to the lions so he could have her to himself! That was what he was angling for. Was his pride wounded because she hadn’t instantly been smitten by him, worshipping at his feet for who and what he was, not to mention how much he was worth? Men like him always thought they could get any woman.
Not this one, she silently vowed, aiming the message straight at his back as Peter steered him away from the railing, heading for the lower saloon. Moreover, she wouldn’t engage in any contest with him at the poker table. He’d like nothing better than for her to take him on.
Thwarting him should be the plan, not trying to beat him. If he was betting on his cards, she’d withdraw from betting on her own, regardless of how promising they were. No blood spilled…no grounds for any future comeback.
Satisfied that she had worked out a sensible course—one that Damien Wynter wouldn’t like one bit—Charlotte felt calmer and considerably more confident of handling the situation without any heartburn.
