Against The Odds (Anna Dawson #1) by Mara Jacobs Page B

lie?
    Loyalty. And shame. Those were the emotions that won out. Mostly shame. “Could you take Ben shopping for a new car in the next few days?”
    Relief washed over her face. “Yes. Of course.”
    I nodded. “Something big, that’s easy for him to get in and out of. Make sure you have him test a couple of them out. He’s not going to like it, but make him.”
    She was nodding, grabbing for her pad and pen, which always seemed to be just a reach away from Lorelei. “Right. Right. This is good. It’ll take his mind off Danny.”
    I nodded, like that had been my plan all along. Who knows, maybe it had been.
    She was writing furiously on the pad. “What about the Porsche? You want me to trade it in?”
    I looked behind me, through the windows to my baby parked in the driveway, next to Lorelei’s BMW. “Nah, not if the slush fund can swing it without it.”
    “It can. No problem.” She wrote something else.
    Another thought occurred to me, and I pulled my cell phone out of my cargo pants pocket, laid it on the table. “While you’re at it. You’re right, it’s time to upgrade our phones. Go to town.”
    A look of bliss passed over her face. For a dancer by trade, Lorelei had an odd penchant for techno gizmos. Thank goodness someone in the household did or we’d still just have a toaster in the kitchen and be woken up each day by hand-wound alarm clocks.
    “Iphones,” she whispered with reverence.
    “Really? That fancy? I won’t know how to use it.” And if I couldn’t, Ben probably wouldn’t be able to either.
    She rushed on, not wanting to lose me. “I’ll do everything. I’ll totally set it up for you. It’ll just take a couple of clicks for you to do anything.”
    “I don’t know,” I hedged. Technology kind of intimidated me. We had one family computer in our house growing up, and not even internet access until after I left for college. Which was just before every student had a cell phone and a laptop. I was out here by then, and those first few years either didn’t have the time—because I was busy winning at cards—or the money—because I was losing—to buy all that stuff.  
      I still got all my scores from newspapers unless Lorelei got online and printed them out for me. I was the only poker player I knew that didn’t play online.
    Fifty-two playing cards had been working for hundreds of years—that was my kind of technology.
    I could still learn all of that stuff, it wouldn’t be hard, but I don’t trust myself to not be online all day playing poker if I did.
    Yeah, much better to be in a smoke-filled casino all day playing poker.
    “And I’ll set it up so with just one little click you’ll be able to get scores,” Lorelei pulled me back into the conversation.  
    Ah, Lorelei, a born saleswoman, which is probably why she still got an occasional dancing gig at the ripe old age—for dancers in Vegas—of forty.
    “Okay. Iphones,” I said and was instantly rewarded with a squeal of delight.  
    “You’re more excited about a phone than a new car?” I asked.   She just shrugged.  
    “Make sure mine is idiot-proof,” I said. “And set up a separate ring tone for Ben and a separate one for you,” I said, remembering my looking around stupidly when my phone had rung at the poker game earlier.
    “And a separate one for Jeffrey?”
    I shrugged. “Nah,” I said. Lorelei shook her head with dismay. “He doesn’t call much, we see each other at the Bellagio,” I rationalized to her, but she wasn’t buying it.
    Neither was I.
    I rose from the table, taking my phone with me. “I’m going to hang on to this one. Even after the new ones, so keep getting me a refill card every now and then, okay?” She nodded, lost in her Iphone victory. Good. I really didn’t want her thinking too much about why I wanted a phone that wasn’t traceable to any account or contract.
    “I’m headed for bed. You need anything from me before I go?”  
    She shook her head. “Oh. Wait.