Bet Me

by Catherine Mann

  With most any other local cop, he would have dictated the way they’d handle the operation, but he’d seen Dorian work before and knew she brought a lot of investigative smarts to the table.

  She leaned a shoulder into a decorative Roman column separating the living area from the kitchen of the suite. A fresco of the Roman god Bacchus languished over her head, his arm looped about the shoulders of a curvy servant who seemed to be falling out of her toga.

  “Since I can’t work this assignment with a pimp who acts like he owns me, I think you ought to pose as the john who wants to buy me.” She arched a speculative eyebrow in his direction. “It might be a stretch to pretend you want me, but you’re a pro, right? Make it work.”

  And wasn’t that just the way of a woman? She might feed you all the right lines about putting the past behind, but in the end, she made sure you never forgot your mistakes.

  With Dorian intent on avenging her pride, this was going to be one hell of a weekend reunion.

  CHAPTER TWO

  IF REVENGE WAS PETTY, why did it make her feel so good?

  Did that make her a petty female? The thought tormented Dorian as she strode through the miles of hallway leading to the Abundance Thoroughfare inside Pompeii Casino’s subterranean shopping area. Private card games populated the rooms on either side of the faux street, the gathering of modern merchants made to look like a Roman marketplace complete with bright silk awnings and woven shopping baskets for browsers.

  Maybe working with Simon this weekend wasn’t such a bad idea, since she obviously had a few unresolved issues where he was concerned. They’d shared a good working relationship at one time and she owed it to this job—and to the mission itself—to repair things between them.

  “Dorian?” His voice from behind forced her to slow down.

  “Yes?” She checked out the terrain and wished they didn’t have to speak to one another here—in plain view of the marketplace where they should have their covers nailed into place ASAP.

  He nodded toward an open supply room with a maid’s cart out front. The room was full of towel racks and bins of mini hotel soaps, shampoos and lotions. She didn’t mention this had been the same storage space that had supplied her with extra coffee for her unexpected intoxication earlier.

  Slipping into the unoccupied space, she figured anyone who saw them would think they were zipping inside for a quickie, a scenario that worked well with the cover. But then Simon had always been good at thinking on his feet.

  “I know you’ve been up in arms every time I make a suggestion, but I gotta toss out one more comment because there’s no way you’ve got the walk right.”

  She stared hard at him, knowing what he was saying but not ready to give in to Simon being right just yet.

  They were in a too-small space that forced her to really see him in a way she hadn’t back in his spacious suite. He had West Coast good looks from his blue eyes to his square jaw and his surfer-dude scruffy haircut. His brown hair had been sunbleached at the ends for as long as she’d known him, even though there were sure as heck no waves to ride in Vegas. Something else must keep him outdoors and…fit. At an even six foot he had one of the most remarkable bodies she’d ever seen on a law enforcement guy. Not all bulging muscles like the workout freaks who filled the local gyms on the weekends, but lean and toned, solid and strong. He could outrun any of the muscle heads, and that was a big-time plus in this business.

  “Dor? You know what I’m saying?” He stalked even closer in their tiny room, oblivious to her corporeal line of thinking.

  Thank goodness.

  “I’ve got the walk wrong.” She repeated the gist of his issue, knowing he had a point and that she had to snap out of it.

  “You’re motoring through the building like a cop on a mission,” he informed her with a lowered voice. “I think you need to slow down and add a little more hip action.”

  She knew exactly what he meant, but recreating that walk was going to come at a high price. Damn this stupid job. Blinking, she waited for her old ghosts to scatter so she could move ahead.

  “I think you lead with your hips, actually.” Simon frowned, staring down at her pelvis as if he’d come upon an unsolvable riddle. “Have you ever seen those models on TV where their hips come down the runway before they do?”

  “I’ve got it. I’ll straighten out the walk.”

  Her eyes burned for an interminable second before she forced herself forward. She’d do the walk in the hotel corridor, not in a supply closet with her audience of one.

  “I know this has to suck for you.” Simon’s unexpected insight made her pause.

  “What do you mean?” She froze.

  How would Simon Ramsey have any idea what made this assignment so tough for her?

  “Any kick-ass woman would resent hiding her strengths behind a camisole and garter stockings. I know you’ve gotta feel fairly—uh—naked to the world parading around the casino like that and I think it takes major guts.”

  He didn’t know the half of it, and for that, she was grateful.

  “It does suck.” She pushed up her sleeves and gritted her teeth in what she hoped would pass for a smile. “Thanks for noticing.”

  She started out the door then and ran straight into a tall, bony older woman in a gray maid’s uniform. The woman’s lips pursed tight with disapproval as she took in Dorian’s outfit.

  “This room is off-limits to the public.” The maid’s holier-than-thou stance was full of judgments and assumptions.

  “Don’t worry, I didn’t steal any of your soaps.” She winked as she shouldered past the woman. “I don’t have anyplace to hide them in this outfit.”

  Immersing herself in her cover with newfound zest, Dorian strutted down the hall, letting her hips lead the way just like Simon suggested. She wouldn’t let hangovers, old grudges or judgmental maids distract her from what she’d come to the Pompeii to do. No matter what happened this weekend, she would be nailing the people who were taking advantage of women trying to make a living in impossible circumstances.

  IT HAD BEEN A BIG MISTAKE to accept this assignment.

  Simon watched Dorian flirt openly with some yahoo in a Stetson and alligator boots two hours later and tried to swallow enough of his frustration to do his job. She’d flipped some kind of internal switch after their supply closet chat, and ever since then she had absorbed the call-girl role and made it her own. She practically oozed sex as she stroked an idle finger along her collarbone and batted her long eyelashes at Tex.

  Had she ever looked at Simon that way? It ate him up that he couldn’t have celebrated their night together the way he’d wanted to. But he’d been deep undercover and violating every kind of professional protocol by being with her at all. He’d only flown to Vegas for a day to report in from some casework in L.A. By all rights, he should have told Dorian he was leaving town, but his brain had been muddled by a lousy case and the two glasses of Scotch she’d insisted on buying him when he met up with her at a dive bar where he’d never expected to see her.

  Sleeping with her when he hadn’t been totally aboveboard ranked high on a long list of personal stupid moves, especially when he knew she’d refrained from dating him because of his reputation as a wildcard.

  Damn.

  When Tex’s hand slid around her waist to the small of her back, Simon’s fingers curled into a fist at his side. He walked away from the display of imported watches he’d been browsing and veered closer to Dorian and her grope-happy friend.

  Faking an interest in the jewels at the booth closest to where she stood, Simon eavesdropped on her conversation with the scum-sucking cowboy.

  “I’d love to hear more about the party.” She spoke in a breathless voice women usually saved for sex.

  The wispy tone sent a shot of heat straight to Simon’s groin.

  “Why don’t we head somewhere more private and I’ll tell you all about it,” Tex drawled, his voice lowered to ensure privacy. “In intimate detail.”


  Dorian giggled as if that was the most amusing suggestion she’d ever heard. Simon braved a glance their way to see the stranger’s hand moving south on her hip.

  The bastard. The guy’s fast hands were ticking Simon off more with every inch they traveled. He took deep breaths to cool the red fog falling over the whole scene as he watched them together.

  He shouldn’t interrupt yet. Not unless the jerk tried to take her somewhere else. But oh man, it wouldn’t be easy to just stand here much longer.

  “Hey numb nut, you got a problem?”

  Several beats of Simon’s heart passed before he realized Tex had been talking to him.

  He’d been caught staring like a drooling kid at the video game store.

  “Yeah, I do.” Never one to back down from a challenge, Simon brought over that bravado to any cover he might adopt. His supervisors could only expect him to fake so much.

  “It’s okay, baby.” Dorian ran her fingers up one side of Tex’s cheek, attempting to draw his attention back to her. “He can look but he can’t touch without my say-so.”

  But Tex wasn’t that easily swayed and he swung his big shoulders toward Simon in a blatant invitation to make something of it.

  “Well, bring it on, pretty boy. I can settle your problem in about ten seconds.”

  The guy’s raised voice drew stares, and Simon could tell from a glance at Dorian’s face that she was none too pleased over his interference. He’d tried to let her handle it. Really he had. But wasn’t it his job to watch over her?

  “I don’t think so.” Thinking fast, Simon shuffled aside the cover she’d suggested for him, knowing he needed more clout to put this guy in his place than a competing john would offer. He stepped closer to Tex and lowered his voice. “If you want a piece of her, you need to see me first. Understand?”

  Tex appeared confused for a second before comprehension dawned in his eyes. He removed his hands from Dorian’s butt, much to Simon’s satisfaction. Simon nodded meaningfully toward a quiet corner off to one side of the busy market, and the two of them walked away from the shopper’s thoroughfare to do business. Dorian didn’t protest, but he knew that was only because of the role she played.

  He’d figure out a way to get the information on the party from Tex without having to send Dorian into his hotel suite. He just hoped his efforts would be rewarded with a measure of forgiveness from Dorian, because the woman sure did stare daggers into his back as he walked away.

  “WHAT THE HELL was that all about?” Dorian exercised great restraint not to tackle Simon the moment he walked into his hotel suite three hours later.

  Three. Hours. Later.

  After Simon had disappeared with the best lead she’d had on her case, she’d smoothed over the ruffled feathers of the women who ran the booth that sold jewelry and leather goods as a cover to promote local prostitutes. After Dorian nailed the bigger criminals in the ring selling women abroad, she’d be making other arrests around the Pompeii, including the bogus leather goods folks who expected a piece of the action any of the girls received while at their booth. Until then, she couldn’t make waves.

  After that, she’d canvassed the hotel on her own to drum up more information, finally retiring to her room and then—after another hour passed—filching a key to Simon’s suite from the front desk with the help of a call from her captain. She’d gone from furious to worried and back again.

  “It was about getting information from a good lead before the guy turned so horny he couldn’t talk straight anymore.” Simon bolted the door to his suite, locking them into the privacy of his decadent room. “Do you have a problem with that?”

  Damn the man for being so confrontational. With any other guy she worked with, she could voice a gripe without it exploding into World War Three, but Simon had always known how to push her every last button.

  Some buttons, she recalled, had been very pleasurable under his touch. But when it came to messing around with her investigation, she was less impressed.

  “Yes, I have a problem with that.” She marched across the room for the showdown, unwilling to concede this point after his Lone Ranger ways had caused her extra worry, work and stress.

  “Why? Were you hoping Tex would feel you up in the middle of a public venue? How much longer did you expect me to wait before I deflected the guy?”

  Simon met her midway across the living room, the two of them engaged in an angry stare-off so quietly intense she could hear the sounds of their breathing.

  “I can handle myself and you know it. But instead of letting me redirect the guy, you had to barge onto the scene, playing white knight to destroy my credibility with the women who pony up the cash for that booth on the mall week after week.” She stood close enough to breathe in the scent of him, close enough to remember exactly why she’d fallen into his bed a year ago.

  And didn’t that say a lot about a man’s appeal when a woman could still want him even when she was this mad at him?

  “What do you mean?” He crossed his arms and spread his feet apart in that “king of the world” stance men sometimes took.

  The posture pissed her off more than it should have, but wasn’t that indicative of her whole problem with him? He couldn’t share control to save his life. Oh, he’d made surface attempts in the past—like earlier today when he’d agreed to the role of a john—but when push came to shove, he expected to get his own way. Two hours into their shared assignment he was already breaking team.

  “I mean that most of the working girls in this town don’t have pimps. It’s a benefit of legalized prostitution that hookers don’t need as much protection as they might in some other places, and a lot of the independent earners look at women still connected to a pimp as sort of low class and antifeminist.”

  “Antifeminist?” He had the nerve to quirk a smile.

  “Yes, damn it. And don’t you smirk at me when you don’t understand squat about this end of the operation. Women operate differently from men. We have social hierarchies and complex relationship structures. Thanks to you, I’m now at the lowest end of the totem pole.”

  She didn’t bother pointing out that she wouldn’t be privy to much inside information if the women in the business all stared down their noses at her. He knew that as well as she did, even if he hadn’t bothered to show the least bit of remorse about the fact.

  “Lucky for us both then, I wasn’t dealing with a woman when I asked Tex to step aside. We both said exactly what we were thinking, no bullshit social structures getting in the way. And wouldn’t you know, even with my testosterone-impaired communication skills, I still managed to find out that the party he wants you at tomorrow night is probably a mass viewing of women for potentially ‘unlimited’ work down the road.” Simon turned on his heel, pacing the polished tile floor as he shrugged off his jacket, his body silhouetted by the fresco of Bacchus on the wall behind him. Bacchus didn’t come close to measuring up.

  Dorian stared at Simon’s shoulders shrouded in an ice-blue silk T-shirt and tried to focus on his words.

  “Unlimited work? He said that?” She tried to envision the slow-talking Southern boy who’d propositioned her being involved in the darker crime of selling women on the black market. “Could anyone possibly connect sex slavery to unlimited prostitution? At least hookers get paid.”

  “I don’t know. Tex—says his name is Matt Gaines, by the way—he tried to make it out like the party would have a lot of high rollers who like to impress each other with their taste in women. He implied the most coveted females get passed around and go home with the fattest purses.”

  Dorian shuddered. “Did you call in his name yet to run it for past arrests? And do you think he’s being up-front about the party?”

  Simon moved toward the laptop open on the desk and hit a few keys.

  “I’m entering the name now to see what happens, and it’s tough to say whether the guy was telling the truth. He sure seemed intent on getting you there, even though I warned him you’d c
harge full price for each new…uh…taker.” He looked up at her from over the top of his computer monitor, his eyes inscrutable.

  For a moment she had the impression that this cover might not be so easy for him, either. The possibility spoke to emotions about Simon she thought she’d paced long ago. Emotions she couldn’t afford to feel now with so much riding on her ability to remain focused on the job.

  “So you’re okay with me attending a party behind closed doors with multiple alleged sex offenders, but if I talk to one in public in full view of a busy shopping area, that’s too dangerous?” She retreated into the safer mode of verbal sparring, an arena where she could at least pretend she didn’t care about him.

  “I bought my way into the party, so you won’t be alone.” He pointed to the computer screen. “I’ve got nothing on Matt Gaines yet, but I took a photo of him on my cell phone when he was talking to a waitress. I’m going to submit the photo and see if that yields any hits.”