This was all a deep pile of crap, which was sure to smell nothing like eucalyptus steam. Lucy’s muscles tensed around her neck, and the tension spread malignantly down her spine to her lower back. She sat forward. The nail tech was finishing up her left hand with pink polish.
“How much longer?” Lucy asked.
“Almost done. But then you need to dry.”
The woman picked up her right hand and looked at her with wide eyes. “Madre de Dios!” Her strong hand gripped Lucy’s fingers tight. Her face went pale, as if she had seen the Blessed Virgin Mary. “El marque del Jer’ol.”
“What?” Lucy tried to pull her right hand free, but the tech held it fast.
Lilly Belle jogged across the room and grabbed Lucy’s right hand from the tech. She said something in a foreign language, and the tiny woman fled. “When did you get this?”
Again, Lucy tried to yank her hand free, but the Viking woman was too strong. “Can I have my hand back?”
Lilly Belle released it and scanned the room like she expected an enemy cavalry.
Lucy examined her hand. There was a dirt smudge in the corner of the “L” of her index finger and thumb. She rubbed it, surprised that anything had survived the scrub down yesterday. It didn’t budge. She brought it closer to her face. It was a colorful circular figure…a phoenix?
No—a dragon—with its wings and tail spread in an arc. It wasn’t a tattoo. She would have noticed that, even with massage brain.
“Did someone stamp me yesterday while I was asleep?”
“No.” Lilly Belle’s voice was emphatic.
“What is it, then?”
“You’ll have to ask Mr. Gerald.” Lilly Belle paced the atrium with long, aggressive strides. “We need to go.”
“Okay.” Lucy sensed her urgency. “Is the nail woman going to finish this hand?”
“No.”
“All righty then.” Lucy got down carefully from the mani pedi throne.
Lilly Belle led her back into the private locker room. “Jane brought you new clothes. They’re on the bench. The shower is through there.” She pointed through an arched doorway.
“Are we in a hurry?” Lucy had no concept of how much time had passed. There were no clocks in the Cathedral Spa—it could have been 9 a.m. or noon.
Lilly Belle gave her a peculiar expression. “You could say that.” She pointed toward the shower. “Take your shower. I’ll figure out what we’re doing next.”
Lucy flip-flopped into the private shower. Like the rest of the spa, it was elegantly tiled, and music played in the background. The vanity counter was outfitted with more beauty products than she had in her own home.
She stepped out of her fluffy robe and took an efficient shower, being careful with her one polished hand. She scrubbed the dragon mark with a scratchy loofah sponge, but the mark still didn’t change. Surely it would come off with rubbing alcohol or something?
When she was done, she went to the mirror in her towel. When she wiped off the steam, she saw herself—plain old Lucy De Luca—staring back. The familiar routine of blow-drying her heavy red hair re-engaged her brain. What was going on with the Viking’s weird behavior, and why had the nail tech run out of the room?
She flipped her wrist and stared at the circular dragon mark. Very strange. Her mind picked back through the events of the previous day, trying to remember if anyone had come close to her hand. It had to have happened when she was asleep.
But why would Lilly Belle tell her to talk to Alec about it?
Was it some kind of sex stamp Alec used to let everyone know who he was sleeping with? She’d heard of being a notch on someone’s bedpost, but this was a step beyond. Did all the women he romanced have marks?
Whoa, back up.
Things were getting weird. Lucy turned off the dryer and joined Lilly Belle in the changing area.
“That was fast,” Lilly Belle said from her post near the door.
“I can normally get ready in less than fifteen minutes.” She was kind of proud of the fact, and had on more than one occasion set a timer.
“Impressive.” But Lilly Belle did not seem impressed. She seemed concerned.
Lucy went around the corner to the bench and pulled on sexy new lingerie, brown wool slacks, and a soft cashmere sweater. New leather flats waited inside a box. The clothes were understated elegance and felt like the softest feathers against her skin.
“I love these clothes,” she called out to Lilly Belle. “But wool in Vegas?”
“Ask Jane.”
“I guess no one plans for me to go outside, leave the casino?”
“No.”
“I’m starting to get a little creeped out by all this.” Lucy walked to the Viking. “I feel like I’m a prisoner.” Lucy said the words like they were ridiculous, gave a little laugh, and waited for Lilly Belle to disagree.
Lilly Belle shook her head. “I’m sorry, Lucy, but you can’t leave now. You’re in danger.”
Whatever Zen remained from her evening with Alec narrowed to tight pinpricks of alarm. She couldn’t convince Joey to leave with her if she was a freakin’ prisoner.
She had to escape.
Chapter Thirteen
Alec met Leo and Tyren near the elevator. “Let’s go.”
The three stepped into a private elevator that whisked them upward, past the regular hotel rooms for humans to the secure living quarters of the dragons. Alec appreciated that his lieutenants didn’t question his strategy—he wasn’t sure himself how he was going to handle the disgruntled Siberians and their new leader.
They stepped off the elevator into the dragons’ communal area. The space was even more elaborate than the main casino. Dragons from around the world had been encouraged to send tribute gifts for their new home. Over the two years it had taken to build the casino, the human construction crew had learned not to ask questions when amazing raw materials just showed up on the job site.
In the communal area, gold and semi-precious jewels glittered from the walls. Mosaic Italian tile lined the floor, old world limestone—not concrete-made to appear like limestone—provided the supports. To a dragon, the sanctuary had a pleasant vibration, akin to the happy humming of a favorite song. It was a haven for them from the chaos of the casino and the world beyond.
“Where are they?” Alec asked Leo.
“Still in the tower.”
Alec walked outside and across the patio roof to the locked door of the unfinished tower. The glass tower stretched thirty stories to the sky without dividing floors. Inside, raw sheetrock and metal girders gaped with all the welcome of cold, creaking steel.
“Siberians!” Alec yelled into the cavernous space, his voice echoing. “Show yourselves.”
Blue dragons with white flames in their eyes and white markings on their tails and wing tips soared from beams like supernatural vultures. Blunted horns grew from their heads. When they roared, sheets of ice spread through the air. The ice fell to the ground and shattered in chunks on the concrete floor.
A large brown dragon coasted among the Siberians. This warrior sported the red markings of a fire dragon. Alec recognized him immediately—his old enemy.
“Ambrogino!” Alec’s dragon blood pumped through his system.
The blue dragons descended in a circle and changed to their clothed human forms. Ambrogino also landed, shifted, and stalked forward. He looked unwashed, which was unusual. He was vain, and in the past, he had always prided himself on his good looks. But now, with his black hair long and grimy and gold hoops in his ears, he looked like a barbarous Treasure Island pirate.
“Why do you stay in your human form? Are you afraid of me?” Ambrogino taunted Alec. “Or have you already lost your wings?” He laughed, and the mangy looking Siberians joined in.
Alec’s dragon roared under his skin, reacting to the insult with bestial instinct. “You think to finally make a stand against me with the support of the northern dragons?”
“North, south, east, west—they
will all be mine soon.”
“The ceremony is only one night away.” Alec clenched his fists. “Many will suffer if the ceremony cannot commence. Despite our history, I’ll allow you to participate, if you’ll drop your challenge and swear your loyalty to me.”
“Never!” His enemy stepped forward until they stood nose to nose. He smelled of stale cigarettes. “I’ve seen your mate. Your very, very succulent human mate.”
Tyren stiffened at his side. How would Ambrogino already know about Lucy? The threat to her made fire flash in his eyes and his wings throb at his back.
“My lineage is not your concern,” Alec said. “Do you join us or do you die?”
“You’ll be the one to die.” His enemy clapped twice and stepped back. “You have your first and second, I see.” He looked scornfully to Alec’s left side. “Poor Tyren, always the bridesmaid, never the bride.”
Fury raced through Alec’s blood, and he changed to his black dragon form in a flash. Soul-deep tremors surged through his body as his dragon gained its full power. He spread his wings and gusted air at the challenger. He waited, as was customary, for his enemy to change forms.
“Finally.” Ambrogino smirked and jumped into the air, changing into his brown dragon form mid-leap. He surged toward Alec with his fangs bared and spiked tail swinging.
Alec’s talons met the attack, and he slammed the lighter-bodied dragon to the ground. The hard floor absorbed the impact with a shudder. The brown dragon flipped over and crawled to his feet. Alec blew smoke around the room, obscuring the fight from the others.
Inside the column of smoke, Alec circled. The brown dragon feinted, left, then right, and blew a stream of fire at Alec. Alec dodged and waited. The highest dragon always had the advantage in a fight. His enemy was trying to trick him into giving up his superior position.
Ambrogino soon grew impatient and stalked to the perimeter of the smoke, looking for a different advantage. Fury raged through Alec at the thought that he might escape. With a roar, he dove on the brown dragon, pinning his enemy to the ground.
“You’ll never win.” His enemy heckled him in the old language. “You have become soft and predictable.” He wound his tail between their bodies and pointed the razor sharp tip at Alec’s heart. He pushed the tip between Alec scales, and to Alec’s astonishment, the tip speared through his scales to his rib cage.
Pain exploded, and his vision wavered. Alec roared and jumped off. The barbed tail imbedded inside his chest yanked free, pulling his scales out with it. Blood dripped over the brown dragon.
The brown dragon roared in short and staccato bursts, the equivalent of human laughter. He jumped in the air and met Alec eye to eye. “You’re dead.”
“Not even close.” Alec lunged at him, clamping the brown dragon’s tail between his vise-like jaws. Alec shook his head back and forth, shaking the dragon like a bullwhip. Finally he slung Ambrogino to the ground. He followed him to the floor and held his back leg on his flailing tail.
“Submit!” Alec latched his jaws around his neck.
The brown dragon bucked under him, trying to get leverage. Alec tightened his mouth, and his caustic saliva coated the brown dragon’s face. The furious beat of the brown dragon’s pulse hammered on his tongue, and Alec’s blood fury rose. He bit harder, until his enemy roared in pain.
“Submit!” Alec repeated with mind speak.
Through the smoke, Tyren and Leo marched forward. “Swear your loyalty, Ambrogino,” Leo ordered. “You’re beaten.”
One of the Siberians came forward and bowed. “I am Ambrogino’s first, and the former leader of the northern fold. The fire dragon is beaten. We pledge our loyalty to the black dragon in return for attending the ceremony.”
Ambrogino roared underneath Alec, and Alec gave his neck a shake until his enemy stilled.
“And the brown dragon?” Leo asked.
“I cannot speak for him,” the man said.
Alec pushed his teeth into his enemy’s neck. Blood oozed. His life would end with one more squeeze of Alec’s jaw. Since the day his former friend had tried to take the throne from him, he had waited for this moment. The moment when he would push his fangs into his enemy’s throat, his death just moments away. He wanted to do it, end the fight for good.
Alec firmed his mouth, ready to bite—
“I submit,” Ambrogino gurgled. Alec paused, feeling his frantic pulse and the taste of his metallic blood against his tongue.
“Jer’ol,” Leo called. “He is done.”
Frustration beat through Alec. This wasn’t over. His enemy would challenge him again, and again until he was dead. But he was the Jer’ol, the leader of the dragons. How could he expect others to follow the ancient ways if he did not?
Alec released his enemy and leaped off his body. In a soul-trembling quiver, he changed back to his human form. His rational human mind exerted welcome control over the beast.
In his human form, Ambrogino cowered, looking pathetic. It was an act.
The Siberians hurried forward to help him to his feet.
“All of you, on your knees before your Jer’ol.” Alec’s chest throbbed, and hot sticky blood wept from his chest wound. He didn’t feel the pain, just fury at the missed kill.
The group fell to their knees and bent their heads.
“Do you swear to adhere to the ancient ways, swearing loyalty to me as your Jer’ol?”
“Yes, Jer’ol,” everyone chorused.
Alec surveyed the group for any dissention—none so much as lifted their head to look at him. “The Siberians may join the ceremony,” Alec said. There was a murmur of excitement through the group. Siberian, or Russian, or African…every dragon alive wanted to find his mate. “First sign of trouble and all of you will be banished. Police yourselves if you have a hope for your lineage.”
Ambrogino regarded him with a pleased smile that made Alec’s skin crawl. He was beaten. He had just pledged his loyalty publicly.
Why did he appear so content?
Chapter Fourteen
“Do you like the name Lilly Belle?” Lucy hurried beside the Viking, taking two steps for the tall woman’s every one.
“It’s my name.” Lilly Belle glanced at her.
“I know, but do you prefer something else?”
They strode across the casino floor toward the gem exhibit. Lilly Belle grabbed her arm and stopped her when they came to a branching hall. She looked both ways, like a crossing guard, and then pulled Lucy forward.
“Do you have a nickname or something?” Lucy said.
Lilly Belle glanced down at her. “Yes.”
Okey dokey. She only asked because she didn’t want to know.
Ahead of them, a short-haired woman stood between the guards watching the sealed gem exhibit. As they drew closer, Lucy saw that the woman had something in her hand, something big and metallic.
“Is that a sword?” Lucy asked. “How can you have a sword in here?”
“Thank you, Mia,” Lilly Belle said to the woman and pulled the sword blade, checking the edge before sheathing it and unbuckling the harness straps. It was a sword, real and deadly, with honed steel and a three-inch wide blade. The two dark-suited guards did not react, but stood as still as the Beefeaters at the Buckingham Palace.
“I thought it was illegal to carry weapons in a casino?” Lucy whispered.
The new woman grimaced at her like she had grown two heads. “The human?” The brunette had a slight accent. She reached for Lucy’s right hand and examined the stamp, then muttered a foreign-sounding expletive.
Lilly Belle answered in the same singsong language.
Lucy pulled her hand back and cradled it over her stomach. She knew five languages, including Latin. Their words did not sound Nordic, or Russian, and definitely not Italian. “What language are you speaking?”
The dark-haired woman shook her head. “Be careful, Lil,” she said before she turned and left.
“Lil,” Lucy said, glad to grab onto a safe topic. �
��Your nickname is Lil. It fits.”
Lilly Belle buckled the sword’s leather harness to her chest.
“You’re like the Beatles song. ‘Her name was MacGill, she called herself Lil, but everyone knew her as Nancy…’”
“You like the Beatles?” Lil gave her a surprised look when Lucy nodded. “They’re a little old for you, aren’t they?”
“Are you kidding? The Beatles are timeless. My Mom and Dad used to dance to them, before my Dad went away…”
It was one of the best childhood memories she and Joey had. Lucy could still remember her parents moving all the living room furniture and dancing to songs from their youth after dinner. Lucy relished the bittersweet memory and heard again in her head the tinny tunes of The Long and Winding Road. Their Mom had giggled at Dad’s off-key baritone. He always sang along. He knew every song, and every single word.
They had been a family then. They had been happy.
Little did they all know, the winding road would soon dead-end.
Next to them, a uniformed staff member pushed a cleaning cart toward the bathroom. Lucy watched the cart with unfocused eyes, her mind still in the past. A wheel squeaked on the cart, and Lucy focused on the janitor.
Joey smiled back at her and blew her a kiss.
Joey. Her breath stuck in her throat and her mind careened out of the past and into her present pile of shit-o-la. “I need to use the restroom,” she said to Lil. Her voice sounded shaky, but Lil didn’t seem to notice.
“I’ll go with you.”
“Can’t a girl do anything alone?”
“No.” Lil seemed unfazed. “I need to stay with you at all times.”
Lucy walked to the restroom with Lil at her side. She stopped beside Joey, who was straightening the supplies on his cart. What a joke. He wouldn’t know how to clean a bathroom if his life depended on it.
“You done in there?” she asked him.
“Yes, ma’am.” The way he said the word ma’am with two syllables and a fake southern drawl got her hackles up. What were he and Gino planning now?
“What kind of cleaning are you doing?” The question sounded rather obvious since he was outside the bathrooms, but Joey would know what she meant.
Luck of the Dragon (Entangled Covet) Page 12