I kept tabs on her, saw her career blooming and I was proud to know that the shy girl who'd had such low self-esteem when it came to her academic studies had blossomed into one of the top reporters in New York. "You know Sebastian has got a lot on his mind; you just have to give him a chance."She nodded as if she was telling me, rather than asking me, to give him another try. I had already decided that I was going to tell Coach Thomas that Sebastian was jeopardizing his recovery by partying and then let him suffer the consequences. After all, I was his doctor, not his babysitter. "I need this job," I pleaded with her, because I couldn't cover for him as it would be unethical. I had just reconnected with her. Now that we were in the same town. I didn't want us to fall apart again. "So does he." She paused before continuing. "He's scared that this could be the end of the road for him. He's been under the doctor's knife so many times and he's taken more meds than candy at a ca
"Sophia, you were always getting me into trouble," I said as I was danced with some guy that looked as if he'd had more cocktails then we had. As I got closer to-ward him, I realized that he was old; he made my dad look youthful. Fuck!"I'm not ready to be any guy's sugar baby!" I said as I pushed him away and started to scan the bar for someone else. Anyone younger than Grandpa!"Let's see if we've still got it." Sophia had said when she winked at me earlier. "What do you mean?""Remember we never had any money, so we used to get all these guys to buy us cocktails? Then by the end of the night, we'd tell them that you and I are more than friends.""That's so wrong!""Emma, remember that guy? The one that told you that his dick was so big, that he could convert you!"I squeal as I remember the guy, the idiot telling me that he converted his last girlfriend!That was when we had started scanning the place for guys to buy us drinks and for some reason she had ended up
I had held my phone in my hand for the last twen-ty minutes with only one thing on my mind, and that was to call Emma and apologize for what had happened last night. I had managed to grab her card from Mason. The stripper was good, real good at stripping. But I'd lost track of what she was doing, thinking about Emma in my house. She had really brought it all back home. The girl that I'd met when I dropped my big sister at college-and hadn't stopped thinking about since then-had walked back into my life. That wasn't something you forgot about in a heartbeat. My parents used to tease me about wanting to go to see my big sis at college all the time. Sure, Sophia and I were close when she was at home. She used to drop me at practice and all that kind of considerate stuff that a big sister would do. But when I first met Emma, she felt like she had put me under her spell or something. I just wanted to go back to that col-lege every damn weekend. Now I thought about it, Emma was my inspira
"Why did I agree to this?" I had asked Mason the same question when we left the house and again as we sat in the car. But I had to ask him one more time as we sat on the plane. I was supposed to be resting before the next season, and so far my best friend had me doing eve-rything but rest.He whispered, as he looked around the plane as though someone might be interested in our conversation, "You know why. You were sitting there this morning, just staring at the doc's card. And let's not even get started what happened with the stripper." He held his head down in shame. "A hot, sexy stripper and you were dead man. You think I didn't know?" I shook my head. "You're dead down there and if anything can wake you back up, it's Vegas."He patted me on the leg as if it was as simple as that. I didn't even want to go out of town for a day, let alone a weekend, because on Monday Mom would get the results of her biopsy and I wanted to know once and for all if the cancer was back or not. "Ev
"Strippers, again!" I said as soon as we were in our suite of the Wynn Las Vegas Casino Hotel. Mason must have shares in strip joints or something 'cause he never seemed to have a problem booking one. "What's up with you?" I play-punched Mason to let him know that I was thinking more about the adrena-line of losing money and winning on the tables. About drinking too much and perhaps flirting with the odd girl. Seeing another stripper just brought Emma to mind. It had made me laugh when Mia accused Emma of having work done. When I used to visit Sophia in college, every guy wanted a piece of Emma. Even since she was nine-teen, she had those same big boobs and ass to match. Shit, I knew it was all natural and as a teen, I was hot for her. I was young, and she was like this goddess that used to share a room with my sister. Back then she had glasses and whenever she used to sway her long dark hair back to get it out of her eyes, it only made my crush even worse. Now I was all grown up
"This is crazy; you know that, right?"Sophia nodded as we stood in line to check into the Wynn. The place was wild; from the number of guests that were checking in to the tiled multi-colored flooring, it was a place to have fun. I just didn't see why we had to come here and couldn't just wait until the weekend was over. Why did she insist on us coming to act as her baby brother's sitter? I was a doctor, not a babysitter!She asked me one question; "You ever been to Ve-gas?" When I told her that I hadn't, she'd insisted that we came to rescue her brother. I had never been to Ve-gas, and I hated to admit how naive I felt coming here. I never expected it to be like this, but then I suppose that's why everyone gets wild in Vegas. It wasn't because it was a quiet destination; it was the complete opposite. The lighting in the reception was unreal. I felt like a kid visiting the candy store for the first time. They had lights on the walls which looked as if they were spitting fire.
What was it about the roulette table? Even when you don't want women to hang around you, they see you winning, and they swarm around you like bees to honey. It was only nine, so it was pretty early for Vegas. I had been to Vegas a few times, so I knew my way around. But no matter how much they updated the hotel, the people never changed.Mason was acting suspicious; checking out his phone all the time. Then he'd be looking around as if he was on the lookout for someone. I was just about to ask him if the stripper-or strippers, if Mason had hired one for all of us-were due to meet us at the table or some-thing. But then Paul won and was jumping up and down as if he had made a touchdown. In the midst of it all, I saw who Mason was looking out for as I saw Sophia ap-proaching our table slowly. My eyes darted in his direc-tion, but he ignored me."Who won? Who won?" Sophia said I ignored her question. "What are you doing here?""Me?" she asked innocently while putting her ha
I took a deep breath, wondering what I'd got my-self into. I should tell Sebastian that this wasn't going to happen, I hated losing, and most of all I hated casinos. I had a feeling that he knew exactly what was going to happen next; I had been naive thinking that I had the up-per hand. As they called for the last bidder I wondered if Sebastian knew that he was about to win. "You're not tricking me are you?"Sebastian smirked, wordlessly answering my ques-tion, which should in itself have made me want to leave the table. But my feet felt as if they were stuck in quick-sand as curiosity got the better of me. Sophia's brother had filled out and was so fucking hot. Like too hot. He was once a spotty little kid that used to hang on to my every word. That was back when we'd first met, when Sophia was my roommate back in college. Since then he'd filled out, and judging by the tight biceps that were holding onto me, in more places than one.I could smell his strong musk, and as I tu