Here Comes Trouble Page 0,7

his life, and Brett had been happy for the distraction.

The missing materials had been irritating, but he’d resolved that, only to have his work truck broken into. It was a pain in the ass to fix the jammed door lock, and he’d wondered what the hell anyone thought they were going to steal out of the old rust bucket, but it had never occurred to him to tie those minor annoyances to the barrage of requests that continued to pour in for him to come back to the tables and play.

The bad luck streak had continued, though, with the stakes escalating each time. Dan’s brand-new work truck had been stolen and found in a drainage ditch, half bashed in, tires gone, one door missing, and another job site had flooded due to a water pipe break that hadn’t been anywhere near where Brett’s crew had been working at the time. Brett had begun to wonder what in the hell was going on, but the cops hadn’t turned up any evidence on who might have been responsible for the stolen truck much less tied it to the job site problem he’d been sure was vandalism, so he’d done a little digging on his own, but got no answers. Then another one of his job sites half burned down, his landlady started having a string of trouble at the boarding house she owned and he lived in…and the demands for his return to the tables had taken on a decidedly…concerned tone.

And he’d finally put two and two together.

So he did the only thing he could do. He got out of Vegas, putting as much distance between the folks he cared about and himself as possible. He’d let it be known that he was leaving town, leaving Dan’s employ, his leased rooms at Vanetta’s place…all of it, behind him. If somebody wanted him that badly, they were going to have to come after him, and no one else.

And here he was, four, almost five weeks later, in Vermont, of all places, exhausted, confused, and no longer sure he’d done the right thing in leaving. Nothing else had happened since he’d left, which initially he’d taken as proof that he’d been the target all along. Only, as the weeks continued to pass, no one was tracking him down as far as he could tell, and no one was trying to contact him, either, much less pressure him to return. Apparently his blunt declaration of permanent retirement and the added step of leaving his hometown completely had been taken seriously.

He’d talked to Dan throughout his cross-country sabbatical, who’d been monitoring everyone Brett was worried about, and…nothing. Not a single incident. He’d begun to think Dan was right, that it was just a string of incredibly bad luck. That, maybe, after all his amazing good fortune, the odds had simply finally caught up with him. But there was still that niggle, that suspicion, that wouldn’t entirely go away.

If he was right, and returned, as Dan was encouraging him to do…he was afraid it would stir things up again. And, to be honest, he didn’t know if he wanted to return or what, exactly, he’d be returning to. Dan’s renovation business was something Brett had done while figuring out his next step, but working for or with Dan wasn’t the actual step he wanted to take. Not in the big picture, anyway. He wanted to finally put all his education to use, do something that energized him, that he could be passionate about. He just didn’t know exactly how to go about doing that, or what form, exactly, that passion would take.

But it was time he figured his shit out. So he’d stopped running, stopped trying to second guess, just…stopped. He’d checked into Kirby’s bed-and-breakfast because it was as good a place as any to stop his flight…and because the unique architecture of the old place called to him.

His thoughts turned to his hostess. Kirby Farrell. It was true that he’d been a little self-involved of late—okay, more than a little—but not so much so that he wasn’t aware of the way she’d been watching him. And that, more surprisingly, he’d wanted to watch her right back. She hadn’t recognized him, which he’d have never presumed she should, at least not outside Vegas. But on his trek around the country, he’d been amazed at the number of people whose paths he’d crossed who apparently had nothing better to do than watch a bunch of strangers bet ridiculously