I find it difficult to believe it’s directed at me, but it must be. I mean, there’s nobody else in the room.

I cough. “Are you driving?”

He shakes his head, and his expression clears. “Nah, I think we’ll taxi it. After we get you your eight hundred, we’re going to want to celebrate.” He flashes me a wide, toothy smile.

“Right. I hope not too much. It’s a work night,” I say, unable to help myself. And I had almost pulled off cool. Almost.

Jay’s hand moves to rest on my shoulder, his voice unexpectedly soft. “Don’t worry, Watson. I’ll have you home and tucked in bed by one.”

If I were a provocative person I might say something sassy, like, “Oh, yeah, and are you going to be the one doing the tucking?” But I’m not, so I don’t. Jay says he’ll wait downstairs for me and leaves me to it.

Dad’s coming in the door just as we’re leaving, the taxi idling by the side of the road. He tells us to have a great night, and then Jay’s ushering me in the back of the taxi. I’m nervous on the ride, while Jay makes boisterous small talk with the driver.

I check to make sure I brought my hundred and fifty with me several times. Then I check to make sure I brought my I.D., since you’ve got to be twenty-one to get into some of the casinos.

Jay pays the fare when we arrive in the city a couple of minutes later. I look up at the sleek black front of the building with the flashing sign above the entrance. There’s a bouncer on the door who’s about as wide as he is tall, and I can’t tell if it’s muscle or fat. He’s wearing a suit and has an earpiece.

Unexpectedly, Jay slides his arm around my waist as we approach, pressing the side of my body flush to his. Okay, this is new. I haven’t been this close to a man in quite some time. He looks down at me for a second, and I think I see his gaze zone in on my lips, tracing the lines of my mouth.

And now I think I just came. I really need to get a handle on this crush of mine.

The bouncer lets us in right away, no asking for I.D. It must be Jay’s confidence that got us through without incident. Right now Jay’s hand is resting on my hip, and I can hardly concentrate on anything else. It feels so warm and tingly and good. He shows me how to exchange my cash for chips, his arm dropping and my expectations dropping with it.

I put my chips in my bag, and then Jay’s gripping my chin with his fingers, bringing my eyes up to his. “Okay, Matilda, you’re making me anxious just looking at you. Let’s go get you a drink first to loosen up.”

“I’m not nervous,” I mutter as he guides me to the bar and I slide my bum onto a stool.

He shakes his head and nods for the bartender to come over. “What’s it going to take to get you to stop lying to me?”

“I’m sorry. It’s kind of my default setting,” I reply quietly. “I don’t lie because I’m being duplicitous. I just lie because I don’t want people to know when I’m, like, scared and stuff.”

Whoa, that was quite honest.

His smile when he looks at me is warm. “I know. But you don’t have to lie to me. Plus, I can tell when you’re scared and stuff anyway.”

Well, there is that.

The bartender arrives, and Jay asks for a J.D. and Coke. I’m in the mood for a cocktail, so I scan the menu above the bar. Damn, why do the cocktails that sound the best always have the most embarrassing names?

Fuck it, I might as well order what I want. Jay will probably be able to tell anyway, what with his psychic body-language-reading skills, or whatever it is you’d call them.

“I’ll have the Porn Star Martini, please,” I say decisively.

The bartender doesn’t even bat an eyelid as he goes off to fetch our orders.

“Brave choice,” says Jay with a smirk. “You fixing to get drunk, Watson?”

“Hmm, not until after I win my eight-hundred…or lose my one-fifty. Either scenario will call for alcohol, I’m guessing.”

He touches my elbow for a second. “You won’t lose your one-fifty, I promise.”

“And you have no idea how bad I could be at this.”

Our drinks arrive, and I delight in how there’s an actual passion fruit floating in the yellow liquid. Whenever I see there’s champagne in a cocktail, I just have to have it. My brain tells me it’ll be classy.

I suck it up through a straw (not so classy) and find that Jay was right — it is loosening me up. The place isn’t too packed, since it’s only a Wednesday night, but there are a reasonable number of people around. My attention is drawn to a balding guy who’s swearing like a madman at a slot machine.

“He does realise the machine can’t swear back, right?” I whisper to Jay jokingly.

“Gambling crazies. There’s always one.”

Jay orders another drink and brings it with him as he leads me through the casino. I look around, taking it all in. When I spy the roulette table, I hurry on ahead, eager to see what it’s like. A middle-aged man in a suit makes a bet, and the wheel spins. When he wins, he gets a satisfied look on his face as his businessmen friends congratulate him. I can certainly see how this stuff could become addictive.

When we get to the blackjack table, there’s a guy in his twenties and a woman in maybe her early forties playing. The woman has platinum-blonde hair and is wearing a lot of gold jewellery, a look of faded grandeur about her. The guy is decent-looking, with dark hair and nice eyes. Jay takes a seat, setting his glass down on the edge of the table. The dealer is a tall, bored-looking woman with short black hair and almost as many tattoos as Jay. You can’t see them all, though, since she’s wearing the casino uniform. She also has two silver hoops through her nose and one in the centre of her bottom lip.

She reminds me of one of my lady heroes, Lisbeth Salander, from The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. If only I were half as cool as Lisbeth, I’d be twice as cool as I actually am.

When the dealer sees Jay, her eyes light up and she gives him a measured smile. Hmm, do they know each other?

“Never said you were coming tonight,” she says in a deep, husky voice.

“I’m showing my new friend Matilda here the ropes,” he replies, and I take the seat beside him.

She turns to me, her eyes scanning me up and down before giving me a friendly nod. “Ah, so this is Matilda. She’s exactly like you described her.”

I shoot Jay a questioning glance. He’s been telling people about me already? And more to the vain point, how, pray tell, did he describe me?

“This is my friend Jessie,” he says by way of introduction.

“Hello.” I dip my head and joke, “So, together you’re ‘Jessie J.’”

There’s a moment of silence as Jessie raises an eyebrow and suppresses a smirk while Jay gives my shoulder a pat.

“You know, like the singer?” I go on.

“I told you she has a great offbeat sense of humour,” says Jay to Jessie.

“Yeah, I get that.” Jessie smiles at me before turning back to him. “So are you going to place a bet, or did you just come to stare at my gorgeous mug all night?”

“A bit of both,” Jay responds before placing some chips down in a little circle on the table in front of him. Jessie raises an eyebrow at his chips and then picks up a deck of cards, shuffling them. She takes a plain blue card and hands it to the blonde woman, giving her what I’m thinking is a flirtatious smile. Oh. Oh. For a second there I’d wondered if she and Jay were an item. Now I’m seeing that’s probably not the case.

Jessie starts dealing the cards out. I watch with interest as Jay studies his: a seven of diamonds and a four of clubs.

I crane my neck and ask, “Is that good?”

“She really is a novice,” Jessie murmurs from her spot at the head of the table.

“A blackjack virgin,” says Jay with a mischievous grin. “I’m breaking her in slowly.”

The young guy chuckles quietly while the blonde woman flattens her lips in distaste.

“Nice visual,” I put in sarcastically.