Lucy shook her head. “Quit messing with me, or you can find another appraiser.”
“Okay,” Alec said. “No more messing.”
“Okay?” Lucy stepped backward—heel to toe, heel to toe—to the stair landing. “Just like that, you’re going to back off?”
“Just like that.” Alec held still, waiting to see what she would do. “What do you need to start your appraisal tomorrow?”
Lucy looked behind her to the steel door on the bottom level. “I’ve changed my mind. I don’t think this is a good idea.” She clomped down the stairs, the sexy sway of her hips completely gone in her hurry to escape.
The exhilaration of the hunt flared through Alec’s system.
Silly woman. You should never, never run from a dragon.
“One hundred thousand dollars.” He followed her flight down the stairs with a light step.
“What?” Lucy stood in front of the closed steel door, her eyes wide and unbelieving.
“One hundred thousand dollars now. And an additional one hundred thousand when you finish the appraisal.”
“That’s three times my usual fee,” Luciana said, anger again firing her face. “I told you, I don’t do etchings.”
“The fee is just for appraising the exhibit, but you must begin tomorrow and be done in a month.”
“Mr. Gerald, thank you for your generous offer, but I’m going to have to decline.”
“I have important guests arriving specifically to see the exhibit.” Alec let his aggravation coat his words, but from the way Luciana’s eyes flitted from him to the closed door, he could tell she wasn’t listening. She wanted out of the room.
Alec closed in on her and considered her nervous side-to-side movements. If she hadn’t taken his keycard for a surprise rendezvous, what was she up to?
“I want to leave now.” Luciana met his stare but couldn’t disguise the strain in her voice.
“Dr. De Luca. Is there something else going on here? Something you need to tell me?” Alec let the question dangle, and the woman’s quick averted glance told him he was right. She was hiding something.
Something big. His predator’s instincts flared and his keen hearing picked up the pounding of her pulse under her skin.
“Of course not,” she insisted and put her hands on her hips, affronted. “Open this door.”
Again with the demands. Alec smiled, admiring her bravery. He reached around her and pushed the door release, letting the back of his hand brush her bare arm.
Luciana jumped at the contact, and Alec smelled the sharp release of adrenaline as it rushed through her body. She was scared. Why?
Alec stepped out of her way and swept his hand to the beckoning hallway. “After you.”
Luciana gave him a quick nervous glance, seeming to sense that his words were more than just gallantry. Then she fled, as if she knew she had just stolen from the very lair of a dragon.
Chapter Three
Lucy squeezed through the opening exhibit door and rushed through the medieval timbered corridors as fast as her Manolos would go. The massive casino had no windows, no clocks, no way for guests to be distracted from their pleasurable pursuits with the call of responsibility from the outside world.
“Which way?” She slowed down and took a deep breath. Think. Alec Gerald had rattled her good brain. The man exuded sexual chemistry like a tomcat on the prowl.
Make that a panther on the prowl.
God help her, she needed to focus.
The keycard lift had gone remarkably well—now she just needed to find the drop spot and get the hell out of there. Luciana took another deep breath in, held it, and released it slowly. Alec’s card rubbed inside the band of her hose and bit into her inner thigh, making the stowaway card inch downward. Down, down, downward…
She was on the north side of the building, near the gem exhibit and upscale shops. She needed to cut across the gaming floor to get to the drop in the south-end bathrooms.
Easy peasy.
“Luciana, wait,” Alec called behind her.
She hobbled away. Around her, hundreds of people pulled levers and grasped plastic containers filled with coins.
Luciana hurried by, avoiding eye contact. She glanced over her shoulder. Alec still followed her at a distance. She ducked past the slot machines to the poker tables, where tavern wenches dealt cards of Texas Hold ‘Em on green half-moon shaped tables.
“Dr. De Luca,” Jane’s voice called just as she cleared the poker area.
“Jane,” she said politely, but lengthened her stride. The right hose gave way and slipped to the top of her knee.
“Mr. Gerald has asked me to escort you to his office.” Jane moved alongside her, matching her stride.
Luciana ignored her, but when Jane stepped into her path, she couldn’t avoid slamming into the tall brunette. “Umph.”
“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. gratefu
l, 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.
A security guard dressed in a black suit greeted him. “Jer’ol.”
“She give you any trouble?”
“Lots.” The man’s face remained expressionless. “She made a run for it outside the elevators.”
“You didn’t hurt her?” His words were more menacing than he had intended.
The guard’s face paled, and the vein on his neck kicked into high gear. “No, Jer’ol. She’s unharmed.”
“Good.” Alec opened the door to face 130 pounds of fury.
“I am a respected professional and you are manhandling me and treating me like a criminal!” Luciana yelled at him. “No one on the planet will appraise your exhibit when I get through telling them what you’ve done to me.”
Alec made a show of locking the door and strolling across the expansive room to the bar. The room was paneled in dark wood, with deep reds and blues in the carpet and paintings. The one wall facing the outside was made of two-inch thick glass. Alec poured Kentucky bourbon into a tumbler and a double-shot of single malt scotch over two ice cubes into another.
He handed her the scotch and sat in a deep-seated leather chair. The chair sighed with ease when he leaned back. He crossed his ankle at his knee and took a sip. “Luciana—”
“Oh, please, all my captors call me Lucy.” She glared at him. “You sound like a priest hearing confession when you call me Luciana.”
“Well, we can’t have that.” Alec chuckled and sipped his drink, the taste of mellow corn mash and oak barrels tingling over his tongue. Alcohol did not affect dragons in the way it affected the feeble humans. He drank the bourbon purely because he liked the taste.
“Does this have Rohypnol in it?” Luciana held the drink to the light like it might contain the date rape drug.
“I wouldn’t harm you.” Alec took a second sip of his drink, and it fired down his throat to his belly in a pleasing trail.
Lucy set her drink on his desk, untouched. “I’m not the trusting sort.”
Alec gave her what he hoped was a charming look. “You can trust me. I can help you.”
“You’ve got to be kidding,” Lucy said in a voice used to stopping cabs.
“Fine, don’t trust me, but I need you to start your appraisal tomorrow,” Alec said in a voice used to calling stretch limos.
Lucy’s face flushed. Her collarbones rose and fell under her pale skin in elegant lines. So dainty and fragile, this one. She stomped toward him and pointed a finger at him. “Let me out of here right now.”
Good. Come a little closer. Alec set his drink on the side table. “The exhibit has to open on time. You’ve reneged on our deal.”
“Testa di merda.” Lucy threw her hands in the air. “We had no deal.”
“What does that mean?”
“Shit head, we had no deal.” Lucy bared her teeth, turning her kittenish persona distinctively feral.
Alec shook his head, strangely put-off by her crudeness. “Such language from a lady.” He wanted to kiss her, to see if the zing of electricity was a fluke, or if the fates had gone mad and paired him with a human mate.
She might bite him.
He might like it.
“You’re not going anywhere until we have an agreement on the exhibit.”<
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Lucy stomped toward the exit. “Let me out of here!” She banged her closed fist on the solid wood door, and her furious action exposed her scantily clad backside to him again.
Alec admired the view, tracing the lines of her body with his eyes, walking his gaze up her gold heels to her elegant calves, up the curve of her hip to the daisy tattoo, up the indent of her spinal column to the riot of dark red hair. Need clenched his gut, and he wanted to touch her soft, pale skin, discover all her hidden hollows.
“Culo!” Lucy turned back to him.
“Ah, I know that one.” Alec took a deliberate drink and swallowed down his raging desire. He set down his glass on the side table, leaned toward her, and rested his elbows on his knees. “Luck. Culo means ‘lucky’ in Italian.”
“It means ‘asshole.’”
“A matter of interpretation.” Alec smiled. “I prefer ‘lucky.’”
“Look, Mr. Lucky, I get it,” Lucy said. “Women just throw themselves at you. You are lucky, lucky, lucky.” She paused for a quick breath. “Lucky Mr. Casino Owner. The King of Las Vegas! But I’m not interested in you or your exhibit. Let me out of here.”
“I can’t find another appraiser of your caliber before we need to open.” Alec was certain he could have five appraisers there by morning, but he wanted her. “It has to be you.”
“Please. I’m sure you’ll have no trouble finding someone to satisfy your every whim.” She said in a level voice. “Just let me leave and we’ll call the whole thing even.”
“My every whim?” Now that she was calming down, he perversely wanted to see the fire in her eyes again, hear a few more melodious Italian vulgarities. “How much will that cost me?”
Luciana inhaled sharply, her jaw dropped, and she stepped to him and raised her hand to strike him. Alec stood in a fluid motion and grasped her hand in his as she swung. With her fist in his hand, Alec remembered his caution to Darius, to ask and not demand, with distant humor.
“I’ll make you a deal.”
“For the last time, I’m not interested in your deals.” Lucy tugged against him.
Luck of the Dragon (Entangled Covet) Page 3