A Poker Mystery Series

Belinda “Bee Cool” Cooley is back in Vegas for the World Series of Poker. Bee’s always played to win, but some sinister stranger has decided she needs an extra incentive. He’s kidnapped Bee’s goddaughter and has threatened to kill her if Bee doesn’t win the WSOP and hand over the pot: “Remember: If you bust out, so does she.”
 
Toss in a bloody knife left on the poker table, a mysterious tattooed tough guy, a dead man floating in a lagoon, religious right protestors outside the casino, suspicious cops, and her brother Ben acting uncharacteristically serious, and Bee’s having a little trouble getting her game on.
 
Time is running out as the Texas Hold ’Em champ uses all her sleuthing skills to track down the kidnapper—and all her poker prowess to go the distance.

Amateur Texas Hold ’Em champ Belinda Cooley, aka “Bee Cool,” has left the desert sands of Vegas for the cool clear waters of the Gulf of Mexico. With her newfound fame she has a free buy-in on a high-profile poker cruise aboard the Sea Gambler. The catch: her manipulative manager (who’s also her twin brother) is driving her crazy, her pesky parents are tagging along, and there’s no place to hide from the throngs seeking poker tips from Bee Cool.

If that wasn’t enough to throw off a girl’s game, Belinda soon finds her fellow poker pros disappearing faster than chips on a bad night. It seems someone on board is out to turn the card sharks into shark bait—and Belinda might be next.

Belinda Cooley just turned forty, got dumped by her fiancé, and quit her dream job—all in the same week. It’s enough to make a girl think her best years are behind her. So when her bad boy twin brother Ben tries to talk her into a spur-of-the-moment trip to Vegas, where he’s set his sights on winning the Big Kahuna of Texas Hold ’em tournaments, Belinda agrees to go. She figures she may get lucky at love, even if Ben loses his shirt playing the Cincinnati Kid. 
 
But instead of having the time of her life, Belinda ends up deep in the hole because of Ben’s obsession with beating Steely Stan, the most dangerous poker player this side of the Rio Grande—a man who’s got his fingers in everything from the casinos on the strip to the local police force. After Ben is abducted, she knows she has learn to play Hold’ em and take his place at the table. Because if Belinda can’t play her way to the final round, Ben will be retired from tournament poker permanently.