Nan Ryan Read Online Free Page B

thrust a hand down into his trouser pocket, and lift his glass in salute.
    His presence was so overpowering, Nevada couldn’t take her eyes off him. Soon she stopped trying. She wanted, she thought fleetingly with the part of her brain that was still functioning, to memorize everything about this magnificent man.
    A man she recognized at once to be the handsome, infamous Johnny Roulette. No wonder the girls were excited that he was back in town!
    Nevada was far too young and naive ever to have had sexual fantasies. Until tonight. With a jolt of shock and shame, she looked at Johnny Roulette and imagined what it would be like to be held and loved by him.
    His thick wavy hair gleamed in the illumination of the stage’s footlights and his eyes, almost as dark as his hair, flashed with heat and mischief. His nose was straight and pleasingly prominent, his cheekbones high and chiseled. His mouth was wide and full, and as he smiled—he hadn’t stopped smiling from the first moment she saw him—his even teeth shone starkly white in his dark, handsome face. Most appealing of all was a sleek, well-trimmed mustache above those heavy male lips.
    Nevada forced her eyes from that marvelous mouth and down over his strong brown throat. An ebony European-cut evening jacket strained across a pair of broad shoulders, while fashionably long matching trousers fell to a perfect break atop shiny black leather shoes that were apart in a distinctly arrogant stance. His starched snow-white shirt contrasted dramatically with the darkness of his smooth olive skin and, going down the shirt’s carefully pleated front, gold studs glittered in the footlights.
    Most disturbing of all was the fact that with only the slightest movements of his big lean body, the dark handsome man was expressing emotion and sensuality with an extraordinary potency. So powerful was the language of his body, Nevada was weak and awed and ready to follow him anywhere, though they’d not yet spoken a word.
    She had, she knew beyond any doubt, met her rich, handsome gentleman her very first night onstage. Now all she had to do was make Johnny Roulette realize that he was meant only for her. Maybe he could see it too. He was looking at her as though she was special, as if she were already his sweetheart. And she would be, if he wanted her, because she sure wanted him to be her man.
    Excitement and hope building, Nevada, looking straight into Johnny Roulette’s flashing dark eyes, sang the closing line of her song, never suspecting that the sad, mournful words might prove prophetic:
    He was her man, but he done her wrong.

4

    The song had ended. The heavy red velvet curtains were slowly descending. The crowd of captivated men whistled and clapped and shouted for more!
    All, that is, but one.
    The darkly handsome Johnny Roulette neither whistled nor clapped nor shouted for another song. Instead the tall, smiling man casually turned and walked away as the curtain came down.
    The billowing curtain was immediately raised so Nevada could give the enthralled crowd a few extra bows. But she gave no bows or kisses; she was too preoccupied with looking for the tall, deeply tanned man with the coal-black hair.
    But Johnny Roulette was gone.
    Nevada’s hopes came crashing down with the second lowering of the red curtains. What should have been a moment of glory and triumph was instead one of disappointment and confusion.
    Heartsick, she made her way to the dressing quarters and managed to smile bravely when Lilly and Belle and Julia and Betsy all crowded around to offer their sincere congratulations. Guiding Nevada into the cramped quarters, the women were all talking at once but Nevada, distracted, caught only a word here and there. She did hear enough to know they were all keenly aware that Johnny Roulette was aboard the Gambler .
    A loud knock didn’t silence the excitedly chattering women, but when Lilly opened the door to admit Stryker, the enormous bouncer lifted a hand for