Breaking Beauty (Devils Aces MC): Vegas Titans Series (20 page)

The room temperature seemed to drop suddenly, as if in
accordance with the awful new mood spreading across the Needle's floor. Romy
shivered in her paper-thin uniform and the players remained silent and still.
The game was clicking along swiftly now, gathering speed and momentum like an
avalanche.

Bryson paced anxiously, eyeing the players and their
remaining chip stacks.

Meanwhile, Romy was beginning to embrace numbness. Her
imagination had already spiraled across all possible outcomes of this
tournament, and in no scenario could she contrive a bright future. It now
seemed clear that Lefty had brought them here only to demonstrate his absolute power;
with every swig from his gin and tonic, her cruel boss seemed to guarantee that
there would be no riding-off-into-the-sunset, there would be no happy ending
for his treacherous “employee.”

She cast a surreptitious glance in the direction of Lefty's
two henchmen, Titus and an unknown man, both clad in severe black, manning
their posts by the elevator doors. She saw the thick leather straps binding
their mid-sections: holsters, she thought.
Guns.

The geezer bowed out fast at the end of the next round
(sinking on a 17), and the man's sullen-looking aid wheeled him towards the
bar. Lefty cracked a wicked grin in the direction of Bryson's turned back. The
Dap, who was impressively still in play despite a buzz approaching catatonia,
began to futz impatiently with his paper crown. She could see the heaving mass
of his belly when he raised his arms.

“Oh, sweetcheeks?” Lefty slurred in the direction of the
bar. “I'll have another of these DIVINE Tanquerays!” By now, the boss was raising
an uncharacteristic hell; his cheeks had turned a ruddy, alcoholic red. On the
other hand, Kellan—who had entered the room smelling sharply of whiskey—seemed
to have regained full composure. She contemplated the younger brother at the
table, where he was gazing at the visible hands with a sharp concentration. Was
it possible he was counting cards? That would be far too risky a move in their
current position. Romy tried to catch his eye in caution.

Lefty was standing now; or rather, trying to stand. He
teetered on his feet. She could smell the booze on his skin from feet away.

“I have...an announcement,” the boss began, his voice a
bellow. “Gentleman's intermission. Everyone, gather round. Gather, damn it!”

Romy set the shoe aside and locked up her chips. Zaida, the
outed geezer and the bartender ambled back towards the table. Bryson, still
drumming patterns in the floor, merely turned his head.

“I just wanted to say...to my nearest and dearest, gathered
here in my favorite room of my favorite casino: thank you. Truly. Thank you for
coming.” Humoring him, the audience clapped lightly. Bryson crept a few feet
closer to the action.

“Thank you for coming,” Lefty continued, seeming briefly to
lose his train of thought. “...and thank you for spending your hard-earned cash
in pursuit of the world's greatest ambition: getting MORE. HARD. EARNED. CASH!”
The spectators led a sprinkle of confused applause. Rousing slightly, The Dap
attempted an enthusiastic cheer, but with a single glare, Lefty motioned him
quiet.

The room followed suit and everyone now craned to follow
their host's speech. Bryson inched closer still. Romy could now feel the
sweetness of his breath on the back of her neck.

“Now I know a lot of people have a lot of shit to say about
the morality of the casino business. How gambling is evil, how it breeds
addiction, blah, blah, blah. But I take the opposite tack. Everything we do is
a gamble. We gamble for career, for home, for love—” He threw a pointed gaze in
Romy and Bryson's direction, “—and the best part is, as in life, gambling
rewards the winners and punishes the losers. It re-assigns. It takes away. And
if I take something from you, it becomes mine.” For emphasis, Lefty lunged
across the table, seizing a neat handful of The Dap's chips. The Dap looked
bewildered, but for the first time Romy spotted a twitch of fear moving in his
jowly face. So even this monster was afraid of Lefty DiMartino.

“Now I've always been very, very good at gambling. You might
have guessed. So good, in fact, that I
never
lose.”

Then Lefty wheeled on Bryson, extending a shaky figure.

“And because I'm no loser, I know what you're up to. You
sack
of shit
.”

The room was tomb-silent now. Romy didn't dare look to her
lover. She steadied herself against the table instead, as if maintaining perfect
balance might help her disappear.

“I don't tolerate cheaters,” Lefty went on. He was gaining
steam now. His voice was cracking with fury, spit was flying from his lips.
“But I especially don't tolerate people trying to take my property away from
me. I
never
tolerate thieves.” Now suddenly, awfully, the mob boss was
flanking Romy. She felt a thick, muscular hand encircle the soft skin of her
throat like a noose. His fingers dug into her flesh. In a panic, she tried to
cry out but his grip was so firm that her voice caught.

“So, Mr. Bryson Vaughn: if you want my filthy whore, you'll
need to win her back
fair and square.
”

Everything that followed happened in a tight blur. Romy
remembered the corners of her vision growing dark, a few last gasps of air
slithering from her aching lungs. She remembered the sharp, terrible sound of a
bullet cracking the air, then the sink of it finding its target. Someone pushed
her to the floor after that. She remembered the smell and feel of the Needle's
grimy carpet, rising up to braid her face. Then... nothing.

Bryson had pulled the first gun. On his signal, Kellan had
swiftly removed the .44 Magnum from his leg strap and shot an advancing Titus
square in the chest—his aviator sun glasses flung from his face. The Sallow Man
had pulled a glock on the other bouncer, popped him first in the right knee and
then in the neck. A fine spray of blood had sooted the room. Zaida and the
bartender had screamed and cowered, while the geezer's aid fainted in a heap
from sheer terror.

A slight silence had followed, during which the air was
filled with the painful last cries of dying men. Romy learned later that Lefty
had expired with a sick smirk still etched on his face. She would try, in the
days to come, to conjure sympathy for the dead tyrant: but it wouldn't come.
She wasn't sorry.

In the midst of the carnage The Dap had struggled to remove
his own Jericho 941, but his drunkenness had proved an obstacle. Before the
cretin had even reached the trigger, Bryson shot him dead. Three fat bullets
straight into his wide heaving chest.

The first thing Romy saw on waking was Kellan's frightened
face, hovering inches above her own. He stroked the side of her cheek with a
frantic tenderness.

“Get her up, Kelly! We don't have much time,” cried Bryson,
from the far end of the room.

He was crouching out of sight,
somewhere behind the bar.

“What's happening?” Romy asked. Had she dreamt it? But no, even
in the dark light, her eyes began to discern the hulking corpses of four men,
the sheen of red liquid making rivulets on the playing cards. So. Much. Blood.

“Don't worry, Ro. We're going to be just fine. Just listen
to everything I say.” Even from inside her panic, it occurred to Romy that this
was the first time she'd spoken to Kellan Vaughn outside the ruse. She nearly
smiled at him—his floppy hair, his friendly gaze—it was refreshing to hear him
call her name, a spell unbroken. But then she remembered herself and the fact they
remained in incredible, incredible danger.

Kellan helped her slowly to her feet. He held her gaze. In
her periphery, Romy glimpsed a figure darting back and forth in the shadows.
Out of instinct, she screamed.

“Ro! Don't scream! Hush!” Bryson said. His voice sounded
wrought, fractured. He now stood above the bar, so she could see his face. It
was cracked and manic, there was sweat pouring down his handsome face. She
wondered if he'd ever done this before...killed a man.
Men.

Kellan tracked her gaze, then placed his spindly musician's
hands on her shoulders. His hold was strong. He could guide her. “Don't worry,
Ro. The man running around, he's just Brownstein. He's a Devil's Ace.”

“And a great fucking shot!” called Bryson, attempting a
laugh. Now Romy could hear the plaintive wails of women, and a ragged, harsh
breath. She scanned the bar area, where Bryson stood. Of course: Zaida, the
aid, the geezer, the bartender, all of them were witnesses. They'd been left
alive.

Her eyes caught the mysterious Brownstein again by the
makeshift dealer's bank, in the Needle's far right corner. He seemed to be
scooping handfuls and handfuls of stacks of hundred dollar bills into one of four
huge duffle bags. Looking down, she saw that the table before her was already
clear of loot.

“Seven....seven and a quarter...seven and a half...” Brownstein
sang. “Seven and...nearly three quarters.”

“We've got ten minutes!” Bryson called in response. “The
automatic locks are going to click on. Hurry, hurry, hurry!”

Kellan now lead a dazed Romy across the spattered Needle. He
wouldn't let her look down, or to either side. “Stay focused on me,” he
repeated, all sweetness. “We're going to be fine now. You're going to be safe.”

“Seven and three quarters...annnnnd....eight!” Now, a
less-sallow Brownstein darted towards the elevator banks, where all of the little
party but Bryson had assembled. “Eight fucking
million dollars,”
Kellan
murmured. “Christ Almighty.”

Finally, Bryson himself emerged from behind the bar. He had
the barrel of his gun pressed firm against a quivering Zaida's shoulder blades.
Romy nearly felt sorry for the Queen Bitch right then, though as supervisor,
she'd so recently been the object of Romy's unequivocal hatred and fear. Now,
Zaida's always-perfect ponytail was askew, and her kohl-rimmed eyes glimmered
with tears. She walked quickly, tripping over her high-heels.

“Zaida's going to show us out of the casino. Aren't you, Z?”
Bryson asked, nudging her back with the gun's barrel. The woman nodded dully.
“She's going to see we aren't bothered until we reach city limits. If she does
that, she's free to go back to Russia or whatever shithole she crawled out of.”

Sighing shakily, Bryson surveyed the rest of the room. Romy
couldn't help following his suit. Behind the bar, the motley remaining crew had
been loosely tied together with bands of bungee cord. The old man seemed to be
rolling in and out of a troubled sleep, completely oblivious to the current
situation.

“What's going to happen to them?” Romy stuttered. To her
right, Kellan squeezed her hand.

“As soon as we're out of sight, the casino staff will find
them and help them to safety,” he said. Then he tilted her chin, so their eyes
met once more. His eyes like shallow pools, blue like his brother's but much
less deep. She felt the jab of a memory moving in her heart...something about
those silly, sweet songs he'd written in high school. That life seemed
laughably far away now, in this room full up with murdered men. And she was an
accessory...

“Don't worry, Ro,” Kellan repeated, in the same sure tone.
“No one else is going to die here tonight.”

Once they were all sandwiched into the tiny elevator, Romy
at last let her gaze come to rest on Bryson. Her hero. He was flustered. His
eyes were darting madly around every corner of the small space. She imagined he
was replaying the recent scene over and over in his mind, experiencing again
the feel under his fingers of a smoking gun, seeing in vivid picture all that
flying blood. She fought the urge to reach for him then and there, to quiet his
churning spirit. For whatever the awful consequence, he had saved her life. All
their lives. That much she knew.

They were quiet as they reached the hotel main floors,
switching to a central elevator as a single, swift unit. Romy imagined all of
their hearts beating in unison, chiming together in elevated terror.

After what felt like forever, they had reached the main
floor. Bryson sheathed his gun in the long sleeve of his blazer.
We must
look so suspicious,
Romy worried to herself, but they were moving too
quickly now and there was no going back. The only thing to focus on was the
exit: as soon as they were free of the lobby, all of Vegas could rise up to
cover their deeds. From the corners of her eyes, she could tell that the
blackjack tables were as empty as they'd been earlier in the day, though
everything looked so different. The slot machines, the varnished bar, the cheap
chandeliers... the world had changed. They were all of them aliens now.
Criminals.

“Walk faster, Z,” Bryson muttered into his hostage's back,
his voice spiking as they neared the heavy glass entrance doors. Zaida did.
Romy couldn't bring herself to pause and look around the space, for fear she'd
give something away to some curious onlooker. It didn't occur to her until
they'd reached the outside foyer that this would probably be the last time she
ever set foot in the Windsor, her home for all these years.