The young woman handed Korey a small envelope. “In there you’ll find two keys to your room, Mr. Walker. You’re in room ten-sixteen, in the second tower. You want to go through the lobby,” she said pointing over his shoulder, “make a left at the Aphrodite statue, then another left at the giant seashell, and you’ll find the bank of elevators that will take you to your floor.”
“Thank you.” He tucked the magnetic cards into the back pocket of his jeans. “Hey, would you happen to know what restaurants I can—”
“Oh, for chrissake, Korey!” Cynthia threw up her hands, making the woman at the reservation desk jump in surprise. “I can’t take any more of this crap! Would you just ask her already?” She then barged forward, shoving him aside.
The young woman at the desk looked aghast. Korey merely shook his head in exasperation. He should have known Cynthia wouldn’t stay quiet and leave this up to him.
“Look, we’re looking for a girl and a boy, okay?” Cynthia said, dropping her hands to her hips. “Two black kids in their late teens. The girl kind of looks like me—but darker. They probably checked in earlier today. The girl’s name is Clarissa Simpson. The boy’s name is Jared Walker. They would have booked the room under her name, more likely.”
“I’m . . . I’m sorry. I don’t remember anyone like that checking in today,” the young woman said uneasily.
“Well, can you check your database to see if they checked in?” Cynthia asked, pointing down at the reservation screen. “I gave you their names!”
“Ma’am, we have to respect the privacy of our guests. We can’t reveal if they—”
“Are you telling me,” Cynthia said between clenched teeth, “that child can steal my credit card, use it to get a hotel room where she could be doing God knows what with that boy, and you have to respect her privacy?” she bellowed, making several people who were lounging on the lobby’s plush chairs stop their conversations to look at her. Even the koi in the nearby oversized fish tank seemed to do a double take. “Are you kidding me?” Cynthia screeched. “She got that privacy with my credit card! She’s not even twenty years old!”
Out of the corner of his eye, Korey could see an officious-looking older white man in a suit with a gold nameplate near his lapel walking toward the reservation counter. A deep frown marred his wrinkled face. A security guard trailed after him. Korey suspected Cynthia’s little meltdown was about to get them politely escorted out of the Pompeii Hotel and Casino only fifteen minutes after arriving there.
He instantly stepped forward, grabbed Cynthia’s arm, and pulled her away from the counter.
“Uh, thank you for your help,” he said to the woman behind the desk. “We’ll just head to our room now.”
“I’m not going anywhere until I find out what room Clarissa’s staying in!” Cynthia shouted. “Do you hear me?”
Korey forced a grin. “It was nice talking to you, Judy.” He then yanked Cynthia across the lobby.
“If my daughter ends up pregnant,” she yelled as she was dragged toward the elevators, “I’m suing all of you!”
Chapter 13
“Have you lost your damn mind?” Korey asked as the elevator doors opened.
He shoved Cynthia inside the circular elevator car, catching her off guard. She almost stumbled in her heels on the Berber carpet.
“That was some crazy shit! Crazy even for you! Were you trying to get us kicked out of here?”
His mouth was tense. His dark eyes were set in a steely glare. Cynthia had never seen Korey so angry. She would have told him he looked damned sexy if he didn’t also look like he wanted to murder her at that moment.
“I wouldn’t have flipped out if you’d handled it like you said you would! What was with all the conversation? Were you trying to find out where the kids are or get her phone number?”
He slipped his magnetic card key into the elevator wall-panel slot, then punched in the number ten. The elevator instantly shot into motion, zipping up its glass tube, emitting a soft beep as they ascended from floor to floor.
“How could you even ask that question? Of course, I was trying to find out about the kids . . . and I would have if you would’ve just shut the hell up!” He fell back onto the glass wall and gripped the metal wall bar so tightly it looked like he was trying to rip it out of the glass.
While he continued to grouse as they shot to the tenth floor, she fell silent—feeling her first pangs of guilt.
“Would it have killed you to just let me handle it? Huh?” he asked. “Would it have killed you?”
She didn’t answer him. Instead, she stubbornly crossed her arms over her chest again, refusing to look at him and gazing at the view of the Las Vegas Strip outside the elevator compartment instead. Cynthia couldn’t explain to Korey that the whole time he was charming Chatty Cathy, she was envisioning what Clarissa and Jared were doing in their hotel room, and it made her sick to her stomach. What if they were already married and the newlyweds were enjoying their wedding night? What if they were long past kissing? Long past fondling? Dear God, what if they were—like Korey had said—having sex on the regular?
They can’t! They just can’t, she thought desperately. And she wasn’t speaking from the perspective of an overprotective mother, concerned about her daughter’s virtue. Nope. There was a lot more at stake here than Clarissa’s virginity.
Cynthia couldn’t tell Korey her real worry about the kids getting married. If she did, he would definitely lose it. Her worry was rooted in something that had lingered in the back of her mind for more than a decade. It had eaten at her like an insidious disease, lying in wait until it came bursting to the forefront when Keith first mentioned the name Jared Walker and Cynthia realized Jared was Korey’s son.
Congratulations, Cynthia Gibbons! You could have a catastrophe on your hands!
Her worry started years ago, soon after she discovered she was pregnant with Clarissa. It came as surprise to both her and Bill. He had been married twice before, and none of his previous wives had gotten pregnant, even after fertility treatments. Bill was eventually diagnosed with a low sperm count and weak swimmers. But, wonder of wonders, he had managed to knock up Cynthia within a month and half of them sharing a bed together.
“It’s a miracle!” the jubilant father-to-be had proclaimed when she told him the news.
Bill had taken the pregnancy as a definite sign that he and Cynthia were meant to be. But what Cynthia didn’t tell him is that it was less likely a miracle—and more likely a case of her horrifically bad luck. She had slept with Korey the last time only days before she had slept with Bill. She hadn’t had any pregnancy scares with Korey before, but there was a first time for everything. She just hoped that this wasn’t the first time.
Korey, by then, had already hooked up with Vivian. It would be a waste of time to run back to him, Cynthia had thought. No, it was better to stick with what she had, to stay with Bill and hope for the best, that the baby was his child.
But after Clarissa was born and Cynthia marveled at her beautiful baby girl, her suspicions returned. She counted Clarissa’s fingers and toes. She played with her black curls and her button nose. Everything seemed in order on her little girl, but as Cynthia gazed into her daughter’s big brown eyes, something seemed . . . off.
Everyone remarked about how Clarissa was the spitting image of Cynthia, but few paid Bill a similar compliment. That’s because Clarissa didn’t look a damn thing like him! She didn’t have his beady little eyes or his pale complexion. She didn’t have his stubby fingers or his proud brow. As Clarissa grew older, you couldn’t find two people who looked more different than Clarissa and her dad. Cynthia started to wonder if, over time, Bill started to notice it too since he became colder and colder to this daughter over the years. But Cynthia tried diligently to brush it off.
So she doesn’t look like him, Cynthia had convinced herself. So what? Lots of children don’t look like their fathers!
But the worry stayed there in the back closet of he
r mind, under the piles of day-to-day concerns like picking up the dry cleaning and getting her oil changed. The worry got wrinkled, dirty, and dusty, but it didn’t disappear.
And now that Clarissa had met Jared and the two had fallen in love, all those old suspicions and worries became brand-spanking-new! Cynthia couldn’t say for sure that Korey was Clarissa’s father—not without a DNA test. But part of her knew, deep down, that he probably was. And if he was, what the hell did that mean for Clarissa and Jared? A brother and sister couldn’t get married or have sex! What would Korey do if he found out about Cynthia’s long-held suspicions regarding his paternity? He’d probably be furious! He’d never forgive her.
“Those are a lot of ‘what-ifs.’ Don’t lose it just quite yet,” a voice in her head urged soothingly. “You don’t know any of this for sure. Korey might not be her father.”
But what if you’re wrong, Cynthia thought frantically in reply. What if you’re WRONG?
The elevator slid to a smooth stop and the metal doors opened, revealing a small lobby on the hotel’s tenth floor. Korey strode out, then paused and turned when he saw Cynthia wasn’t following him. He raised his brows expectantly.
“You coming?”
She looked around her. She had been so lost in thought she hadn’t realized they’d arrived at his floor. She hesitated.
“But I thought . . . I thought we weren’t staying in a room together,” she said.
Mild irritation crossed across his face. “We’re not. Believe me. But I don’t think you want to go back down there and try to book a room right now. Do you?”
He had a point.
“Look, I’m going to my room to drop off my things and then try to find a business center with a computer. I need to try to track down Jared’s phone since now we have no chance in hell of finding their room from anyone who works at this hotel,” Korey muttered. “You can either come with me or keep riding up and down these elevators.”
He then turned away from her, glanced up at the fake marble plaques on the wall, and followed one of the arrows in search of his hotel room.
The elevator doors slowly began to close. Cynthia grimaced as she shoved the doors back open, causing a loud buzzing sound to fill the compartment. She then ran onto the landing and followed Korey down the hall. She reached him just as he inserted his key card into the door of his room.
“You don’t need to find a computer!” she shouted after him, making him pause. “We can . . . we can use my phone. I can get the tracking Web site on it.”
He turned the door handle and shoved it open. He then stepped inside, beckoning her to follow him. “Then let’s drop off our stuff and get started.”
“Are you sure this is right?” Cynthia asked as they waited for the doorman to hail them a cab.
“That’s the address the Web site gave us,” Korey replied. “I don’t see why it wouldn’t be right.”
When a white taxi pulled up to the curb, Korey opened the door for her, letting her climb in first. He jumped in after her and gave the address to the driver.
Cynthia grimaced as the car lurched forward on squeaking tires. She gazed down at her phone screen, looking at the little red pin on the digital map. Their destination was somewhere on South Las Vegas Boulevard, but they had no idea what the place was since the map wasn’t accurate to that level of detail.
“What if this damn thing is sending us on a wild goose chase?” she mumbled, tossing her phone back into her purse.
“It’s legit. Say what you want about Viv, but she knows how to keep tabs on her son. She wouldn’t invest her husband’s hard-earned money in software that was crap. Believe me.”
Cynthia pursed her lips, deciding to keep quiet on that one. If all of this was based on her confidence in Vivian, then Cynthia knew they were definitely screwed. She glared at the bumper-to-bumper traffic outside the cab window. Even if the spyware was right and Clarissa and Jared were at that address, she wondered if she and Korey could make it there before the kids left.
“Hey! How long before we get there?” she shouted to the cabby.
“In this traffic?” The older white man with salt-and-pepper beard stubble tilted his head and shrugged. “Maybe twenty . . . twenty-five minutes.”
Twenty-five minutes? She slumped back into her seat and closed her eyes. This was going to take for-damn-ever!
The older man laughed a grainy smoker’s laugh, then coughed. “Hey, at least you’ve got time to hop out and grab yourself some flowers if you need ’em.”
Korey frowned. “Why would she need flowers?”
“For your wedding.” The cabdriver gazed at their reflection. Cynthia could see his watery gray eyes in the rearview mirror. “That’s where you’re headed, right? To get hitched?”
“Why do you think we’re getting married?” Korey asked.
“Because that’s the address you gave me . . . you know, to the wedding chapel.”
Cynthia’s blood ran cold. She gulped for air. “Wait! What? We’re headed to a wedding chapel?” she squeaked, her throat tightening.
“Yeah,” the driver said. “It’s one of the most famous chapels around here! You guys didn’t know that?”
Cynthia instantly scooted forward. She slapped her hands flat against the bulletproof glass and almost climbed through the small opening between the back and front seat. “I don’t care what you have to do,” she said in a low, menacing voice, “but you get us to that wedding chapel in ten minutes or less! Do you hear me?”
“I can’t get you there in ten minutes!” The driver’s bushy eyebrows bunched together as he pointed a gnarled finger at the windshield. “You blind, lady? You can’t see all those cars?” He slowly shook his head. “Crazy damn tourists,” he muttered, digging the same gnarled finger into his hairy ear. “Act like you’re supposed to work a friggin’ miracle.”
Cynthia’s face contorted with rage. She was just about to spew a few choice four-letter words at the curmudgeon driving their cab when Korey clapped a hand on her shoulder. She turned and found him shaking his head at her.
“What?” she snapped.
“Remember . . . think honey, not vinegar,” he whispered. “Just try it for once.”
Oh, to hell with that! She reserved her honey for rich men who drove sports cars and kept summer homes. The rest of the world would just have to accept what she gave it.
“But Korey’s right,” the logical voice in her head urged. “You want to find the kids. Just be nice for once.”
Cynthia slowly released air through her clenched teeth and flared nostrils. When she turned back around to face the cabdriver, she had a smile so sweet it gave her a toothache.
“Sir,” she began calmly, “we would greatly, greatly appreciate it if you can do everything humanly possible to get us to that wedding chapel in the next ten minutes—please,” she added as an afterthought. “You see, it’s very important that we get there, and we don’t have a lot of time.”
“What do you want me to do? Sprinkle fairy dust on the car so I can float above traffic? I told you how long it’ll take, and nothing is—”
“I’ll give you an extra hundred if you get us there in less than ten, all right?” Korey said from behind her, catching her by surprise.
“A hundred?” The cabdriver paused and squinted into the rearview mirror again. “Let me see it first.”
“No, he’s not letting you see it!” Cynthia slapped an open palm against the glass, making the driver jump in alarm. “You better just—”
“Here! Here’s the hundred!” Korey said after opening his wallet. He held the Benjamin in plain view of the rearview mirror. He glanced at his watch. “I’ve got three minutes past eleven. If you want this hundred, you find a way to get us through this traffic so that we’re pulling up in front of that chapel at eleven thirteen. No later! You got me?”
“All right, but you’re ponying up more cash if I get a ticket, buddy.” He then put on his turn signal and suddenly veered to the left, almost taki
ng out a group of drunken pedestrians who were stumbling their way through a crosswalk. The driver punched down on the gas pedal and threw Korey and Cynthia back against their seats. She gripped the door handle so hard that her fingernails dug into the door’s grubby upholstery. She tried more than once to put on her seat belt, but it was broken. She had a hard time steadying herself as the driver made a series of wild turns. More than once she landed face-first in Korey’s lap.
They arrived at the wedding chapel nine minutes later, in less time than the cabdriver had said was possible. After Korey handed him the money, they strode toward the chapel’s entrance.
“I can’t believe you gave him a hundred bucks! Aren’t you the same guy who rather than give a bum a whole dollar asked him if he could give you back fifty cents in change?”
“That was then. This is now. I’m older. Maybe I’ve changed.”
“Uh-huh.” She stared at him warily. “Well, don’t get too crazy with your generosity, big spender. You’re gonna go broke out here if you keep doing that.”
“I’m not worried. We made it here, didn’t we?”
They had indeed, and the Las Vegas wedding chapel was just as Cynthia had envisioned—or, more accurately, what she had feared.
A giant, flashing, heart-shaped neon sign was out front, two stories above the roadway, advertising complimentary Vegas show tickets with each wedding ceremony. Dancing cherubs were positioned over the archway entrance, and when Cynthia and Korey stepped through the double doors, an organ rendition of Elvis Presley’s “Love Me Tender” greeted them, courtesy of hidden speakers.
Cynthia looked around the semicircular lobby—at the dusty plastic flowers and ivy, the glass-paneled walls, the fire-engine-red carpet, and the sundry photos on the walls of couples throughout the ages who had gotten married at the chapel—and she felt almost faint. She wasn’t sure if she was more alarmed at the idea that Clarissa could be behind one of those doors fifteen feet away, exchanging wedding vows with Jared, her possible brother—or that Clarissa, her own flesh and blood, could get married in a place this cheap and tacky!
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