Falcon's Flight Read Free Page A

it.”
    “But—” Marie began.
    “But it isn’t the gambling I need,” Leslie said, interrupting the other woman again. “It’s the escape that I need.” Her lips tilted up as Marie’s curved down in a frown of confusion. “It’s the ambience of the casinos, the atmosphere,” she explained. “For some inexplicable reason I forget everything else while I’m there, whether I’m actually playing or merely drifting around observing others at play.” She laughed softly. “I’m probably not explaining this very well, but while I’m there there is no pressure, no stress, no sense of time either running out or closing in. While there, I feel unencumbered....” She hesitated a moment, then murmured, “Free.” Leslie’s green eyes glowed as she smiled at Marie. “I have no idea how long it will last,
    but for now the casinos are my boit-hole, my hideout. And yes, I do need that escape.”
    “And you don’t consider it a weakness?” Marie studied her friend carefully, for the first time noting the taut lines of strain bracketing her fantastic eyes and the vulnerable look about her sculpted lips. She felt a pang when those vulnerable lips parted to release a weary-sounding sigh.
    “You’ll never know how much I appreciate your concern, Marie,” Leslie said, her eyes brightening suspiciously. “But for now, my periodic escapes are the only thing keeping me strong.”
    “Then go to it!” Marie urged intensely. “And to hell with the cost!”
    Leslie’s laughter burst around them like a sudden shower of shimmering sunlight. The advice was completely out of character for her frugal friend, and as such it was all the more warming to hear. Grasping her hand again, Leslie smiled directly into Marie’s serious brown eyes. “Thank you, friend,” she murmured around the thickness closing her throat.
    “For what?” Marie’s voice was also husky.
    “For your support, even though you’re not convinced that I’m doing the right thing.”
    Five days later, Leslie tossed her luggage into the midsize car she rarely got the opportunity to drive and paid a small fortune to garage, and put her defensive-driving lessons into practice weaving in and out of the congested Manhattan traffic. Once clear of the city, she loosened her white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel and relaxed to enjoy the relatively short run to Atlantic City.
    Since she’d deliberately chosen the off-peak hours to make the trip, traffic was light and moved smoothly on the New Jersey Garden State Parkway, allowing Leslie some leeway to ruminate on the events of the night before.
    Surprisingly, since the role she’d been doing for nearly a year had begun to stagnate for her, there had been an electricity to Leslie’s final performance that had brought the audience to their feet with a standing ovation for her as the final curtain had been lowered. She had been presented with four bouquets of roses, and numerous single blossoms had been tossed onto the stage at her feet. Laughing, crying, Leslie had taken three curtain calls and had greeted what seemed to her to be a horde of well-wishers in her dressing room afterward.
    After the crowd had finally dispersed, she had barely had time to remove her stage makeup and change before being whisked from the theater to a cab and then into the current in nightspot, where a party for her had been arranged by the cast and crew of the production company.
    Marie and her husband had been waiting there for Leslie’s arrival along with most of her other friends. There had been music and an abundance of food, a few more tears and a lot of laughter before the party had wound down in the early hours of the morning. As the group had parted company, there had been reminders called out to Leslie to keep in touch, and there had been warm handshakes and even warmer hugs and again a few more tears. And then Leslie had gone home.. .alone.
    Blinking against a surge of tears, Leslie steered the car onto the off ramp,