“Sorry.” Jane steadied her with a hand to the shoulder, her face determined. “You need to come with me.”
“What?” Luciana gave Jane her most withering princess-to-peasant look. “Please. Tell Mr. Gerald that I will not appraise his collection. Not for any price.” Lucy pushed past her to the far edge of the gaming area and saw the welcome silhouette of a wench on the ladies’ bathroom door.
Once again, Jane stepped into her path. “This is not a request.” Jane nodded to the side of the room. Four burly security guards in black suits took ominous steps forward.
Lucy put her hands on her hips, chin jutted forward. “I’m not at Mr. Gerald’s beck and call.”
“Of course not.” Alec stepped forward and took her elbow in his hand. His fingers seemed to sizzle, and Lucy yanked away. “But you’ll have to come with me all the same.”
Jane looked contrite but determined. “I’m sure we can resolve any problems in private.”
Her only hope was delay. “Well, you’ll both have to wait while I go to the bathroom. Excuse me.” Lucy hurried around the assistant and grabbed the cool curve of the bathroom door. It turned slick in her sweaty hand.
She rushed into the handicap stall, locked the door, and sat down on the toilet fully clothed. Kicking off her shoes, she pulled off her hose and put the keycard in her mouth. From inside the maxipad disposal, she pulled out a planted plastic bag. Yes. The keycard fit perfectly in the bag, and she pushed the air out of the bag and sealed it with shaky hands.
The door whooshed open, and Jane cleared her voice. “Mr. Gerald asked that I wait in here for you to finish. I need to wash my hands anyway.”
Water gushed at the sink, and the thump-thump of a hand working the soap dispenser sounded through the bathroom. Damn. Merda. Damn. Jane would hear her putting the card in the toilet tank.
“Are you kidding me?” Luciana raised her voice above polite levels. “This must be some type of labor law violation. I’m trying to pee. You’re giving me stage-fright!”
“Labor law? You said that you wouldn’t do the job for any price.”
“Look, I can appreciate your loyalty to Mr. Gerald, but this is ridiculous. If you don’t leave this instant, I’m going to make a huge scene. Before I’m done, all those women out there will be afraid to use your bathrooms ever again. No pee, no players.”
She could almost hear Jane’s mind calculating the cost-benefit ratio.
“Then I’ll go to the press about harassment!”
“Okay,” Jane said. “Hurry up. I’ll be right outside the door.”
The door closed, and Lucy breathed a sigh of relief. Standing, she pulled off the back of the fancy toilet and tied the hose and plastic-covered keycard to the arm float. She tested it to make sure it wouldn’t interfere with flushing, then replaced the porcelain top and sat down.
Done. Her heart hammered in her chest, and her vision fogged. She was getting too old for this crap. “Joey better be grateful. He better never, ever gamble again in his whole freaking life,” she whispered.
But even as she mouthed the words, she knew it would take a miracle for Joey to be, A. grateful, or B. done with the lure of an easy buck. She sighed, suddenly so tired she could have curled up on the tiled bathroom floor. How could Joey, at age thirty, not know what everyone who grew up in Vegas knew by the time they were ten?
There was no easy buck.
There was no free lunch.
There was no such thing as luck. Hard work—that was the only thing anyone could really depend on.
The door opened and hard shoes clacked over the tiles before a fist pounded on her door.
“Get out of there right now,” Alec’s voice thundered. “Or I’m coming in.”
…
After asking Security to take Lucy to his office, Alec went to the observation room to watch the hellion on camera. The surveillance room had the highest level of technological equipment available, providing constant video feed for every corner of the casino, save for the hotel rooms and toilets. Some things you just didn’t need to see.
Alec stood next to Darius and watched Luciana pace his office. He was unsettled, not sure what to do with the woman. She attacked the floor of his office with short steps. Every turn or so, she pitched sideways and had to throw her arms out for balance. Unless he missed his guess, she wasn’t used to covering ground in such high-heeled shoes.
“Bring up her face,” he told Darius.
The camera zoomed in on Luciana’s tense face, and he saw that she chewed her bottom lip again, and tucked and re-tucked her red hair behind her ears. Alone, she didn’t bother with the bluster she had affected in the exhibit. Her shoulders hunched, and she jerked across the floor with graceless strides. Her hips marched forward with militant precision: back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. He felt sorry for her, caged up and cornered, all her feisty bravado banked behind whatever had motivated her to steal his keycard.
“Face recognition doesn’t show any criminal hits on her,” Darius said. “In fact, she has top security clearance at some of the best museums in the world.”
“Go ahead and remove access to the vault and dragon areas from my keycard,” Alec said to his lieutenant.
“What about the gem exhibit?”
“Leave it, for now.”
“Yes, Jer’ol.” Darius typed on a keyboard next to them, altering the security clearance of his stolen card with a few finger strokes.
“Coward!” Luciana stopped pacing suddenly. “I know you’re watching me!” She faced the camera and shook her fist at the ceiling. “Quit playing games with me.”
A smile stretched Alec’s face, and a tingle of pleasure tightened the back of his neck. He rubbed it with his thumb and forefinger.
“She’s got a redhead’s temper,” Darius noted.
“She’s a redheaded thief.”
“At least she’s not your mate.” Darius’s words were disgruntled in the extreme.
After the strange spark of energy he felt when he touched Luciana in the exhibit, Alec wasn’t so sure what she might or might not be to him personally. “Have you tried just asking Mei out on a date? She might be more receptive to charm than angry demands.”
“Yes, I have.” The Russian fisted his hands over the keyboard. “Mei would not be so willful if it were her dragon form at stake.”
“It’s her right.”
“She won’t even let me touch her.” Darius looked at him with frustrated eyes. His lieutenant was the most brilliant computer programmer alive, but he still couldn’t figure out the code to his destined mate.
“How does it feel?”
“Jer’ol?” Darius frowned at him. “How does what feel?”
Alec regarded him with a direct stare. “When you did touch Mei. Before you two started quarreling. Did you know right away that she was your mate?”
Darius’s expression soured. “No. It was the first time we kissed…it was like an explosion in my gut, and my dragon almost jumped out of my skin.”
Good to know.
“Then, her dragon mark appeared on her hand, and we knew.” Darius shook his head. “Now, she covers my mark with makeup and won’t come into the same room with me.”
“Time is on your side. She won’t let your dragon die.”
“I’m not so sure, Jer’ol.”
Alec was. It was unheard of for a dragon to deny the mating bond. Mei would give in. Darius just had to be patient.
“I want to question the appraiser in private,” Alec said before striding to his elevator. “Turn off the cameras in my office.”
His elevator was made entirely of glass, and it whisked him upward without the slightest moan of effort. He barely noticed the panoramic view of Vegas that usually made his dragon blood race. Outside his office, he paused to smell Luciana’s scent. It was the faint vanilla aroma from before, and it still held the bite of fear.