odd looking box returned, looking expectantly at Rayne and Pepper.
Josh stepped forward, explaining. “If you give this man your chips, he will cash them in for you. He’ll have a cashier’s check waiting for you when you’re ready to leave.”
Rayne’s eyes widened. “Oh, um…well, can’t we just get cash? I mean, it’s just…it’s only about a hundred dollars, right?”
Sloane carefully watched the casino employee’s reaction. His lips quirked upwards at the corners ever so slightly. Bingo!
“You are a horrible man!” she hissed, emphasizing each word.
“You wound me with your harsh words, my dear,” he replied, but the glint in those devilish eyes told her more than his words. He didn’t give her a chance to argue. He turned to the box-man with a curt nod. Immediately, Pepper and Rayne dumped their chips into the box.
“But how will we know how much we won?” Pepper asked, her eyes following the box as the man closed the lid and left.
“You each won just over one hundred thousand dollars,” he explained. “Sloane won about twenty thousand because she didn’t get as into the spirit of the evening as you two did.” He put a hand on Sloane’s back, nudging her forward slightly. “I think it is time to adjourn to the bar for a drink. Shall we?”
He started moving, but the sisters simply stood there, looking stunned.
“Come along, ladies,” he urged.
Finally, he got them moving towards the hotel bar and seated in a corner booth. He ordered waters all around, and leaned back against the luxurious upholstery, watching them with intense satisfaction, all of them silent for once as the shock of his announcement hit each of them.
Pepper was the first to snap out of her stupor. “Why didn’t you tell us?” she asked, her lips apparently numb with shock.
“I didn’t tell you because then you wouldn’t have had any fun. All three of you have earned your degrees. I wanted you to have fun tonight.”
Rayne shivered, her arms tightly crossed over her stomach. “What if we’d lost?”
“Then you still would have had a fun evening and you never would have been the wiser.”
Pepper opened her mouth, then snapped it shut. She looked at Rayne, then at Sloane, who was trembling slightly, still shocked at the amount of money that had been gambled over the past several hours. Pepper’s eyes narrowed.
“Wait. You just said all three of us graduated.”
Rayne looked at Pepper, then at Sloane, who looked up, surprised. Then all three of them turned to look at Josh.
“Yes, Sloane earned her business degree as well,” he announced.
Again, there was a long moment of stunned silence, then Pepper and Rayne screamed…and pounced on their oldest sister. The elegant atmosphere and sophistication of this corner of the bar was obliterated with the noise of the two youngest laughing and crying as they hugged Sloane, demanding answers one on top of the other.
“Why didn’t you tell us?” Rayne demanded.
“Because I wanted the focus to be on you two. This is your special weekend,” she told them.
Rayne snorted in disgust and Pepper rolled her eyes. “I can’t believe you’ve been going to school all this time and didn’t tell us! How could you be so sneaky?”
She laughed. “I wasn’t trying to be sneaky,” she admitted. “But we’ve all been working pretty hard, studying and going to classes. So both of you have been gone quite a bit lately. There were many nights that I’d be studying at the kitchen table, but you were both at your respective libraries until late so you never saw me.”
Again, Sloane missed the expression in Josh’s eyes, but Rayne didn’t. She caught it and wondered about it, and decided she’d pull Sloane to the side and ask about it later.
Out of the corner of her eye, Rayne caught sight of a man who was taller and…seemed more dangerous than the other patrons in the exclusive bar. And he was watching them.
Having dealt with other men’s intrusiveness over the years, she stared right back at him, daring him to invade their privacy even with his eyes. But he didn’t react like most would have. He didn’t look away in embarrassment. In fact, just the opposite. He locked eyes with her, almost as if he were trying to tell her something. When he lifted his dark eyebrow in question or…challenge? She wasn’t sure what he was attempting to convey, but she felt her heart begin to pound.
Turning away, she focused on her sisters, not sure if she was angry that her sister had