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“Interesting advice,” Bastien said from behind her. His hands were jammed into his pockets and he was glaring at her.
“I guess.” Mikelina’s head was whirling. Her parents were getting divorced.
“Who was that?”
Mikelina thought about lying, but she didn’t want to start now. It was bad enough she was going all out to keep Bastien from finding out her last name. “That was my mom,” she said faintly.
“Is Kirk your father?”
Mikelina barked out a laugh. “I wish. No. He’s just a family friend.”
“Looks like more than friends to me.”
“I guess it’s gotten a bit more serious.” She looked into his eyes. He still looked on edge, but it was replaced with curiosity. “That was a bit of a shock.”
“I take it you don’t get along with your father?”
“That would be safe to say, and since my mother just told me she filed for divorce yesterday, my guess is it’s over between them. I’m not sure how I feel about it.”
“Was your dad surprised?”
“Wouldn’t you be?” Mikelina was desperate to get off this subject. “I don’t think Jace is here,” she said. “Let’s take the drive to Hard Rock and see if they’re there.”
“Are you okay?”
“I will be. I just need a distraction. Let’s stop on the way for snacks and we can listen to the music or discuss geeky TV shows. I don’t care. Anything. I need to get out of here. It’s getting hard to breathe.”
She hurried toward the exit, not even looking back to see if he was following her.
But Jace wasn’t at the Hard Rock and he and his dipshit friends weren’t answering their phones either. “I’ve about had enough of their shit,” Mikelina said and then winced. They were paying her to put up with their shit.
“Is there another casino?”
“Yeah, but we went to the most popular ones.” She rattled off a few, one of which she wouldn’t be caught dead in.
The next casino they went to had a live racetrack and Mikelina schmoozed the desk to let them go down to the horse pens.
“Tell me again why I had to get dressed up like this to dodge horse shit?”
“Smile for the camera,” she said to him, handing him a glass of champagne as they appeared on the big screen for the entire casino to see. “Tell me that if Jace and his friends are here, they wouldn’t want to be down here with us. Enough of this running around. Let them come to us if they’re here.”
“You’re smart and beautiful. I like that in a woman.”
They made their way to the showing pen where the jockey led around a horse with a red number five on his bard.
“He’s a pretty one,” Mikelina said as the jockey patted the horse and crooned to him. “We should bet on him. Do you know anything about horses?”
“My dad always said bet on the one that does his business before the race.”
“That’s profound.”
“That’s my dad. Did your dad have any nuggets of wisdom like that?”
Did he? Mikelina couldn’t even remember. It was like her brain stalled on seeing him taken out of the courtroom in cuffs. “About horse racing?” she said, recalling an old joke. “Don’t bet on a horse named Jetlag.”
“Was it expected? The divorce?”
“No, I suppose I should have known it was coming. They’ve been separated for over a year. I guess I just thought they’d always be together. It’s a bit of a shock to see my mom with another man. I mean, how would you feel?”
