Escaping Vegas (The Inheritance Book 1) (2 page)

Exchanging part of her winnings for chips, Madalina tucked the rest of the money in her purse except for a tip she left on the waitress’s tray. One long drink later, Madalina swallowed a cough at the sting and drew in a breath. The taste of victory burned all the way down. Her eyes watered.

Swearing she heard muffled laughter from the Grouch’s end of the table, she took another drink out of sheer stubborn pride and set the glass on a square napkin next to her chips. She was ready to bet again, this time on numbers.

“Here, put two on double zeros for me,” the Grouch said, extending his arm in her direction. He held two chips between long, strong fingers. The nails looked well cared for and clean. A businessman’s hands.

Madalina finally noted the ten-dollar denomination of his chips. He had a whole stack sitting in front of him on the table. Tempted to tell him to ask the dealer instead, she snatched the chips out of his hand, a tingle racing up her fingers when her skin brushed his, and reached over to put his bet on the double zeros. He just had to bet on the numbers all the way at the other end of the table, far out of his reach.

“Next time, it’ll cost you,” she quipped.

“How much?”

“That remains to be seen.”

“On what?”

“How much you win or lose.”

“Ah. An entrepreneur. Let’s hope my luck holds.”

Madalina met his eyes. Just for a moment. They shared a charismatic stare-down until she realized she needed to place a bet or miss the next spin. Gathering her own chips—one-dollar denominations rather than ten—she picked out three experimental numbers: 12, 19, 27. All red. She figured that she’d won on black two times in a row, so the next spin had higher odds of being red. Right? She hoped so. While other gamblers placed their bets, she had another long drink. The Grouch was still watching her—she just knew it, although she couldn’t see that much detail in periphery. It just
felt
like someone was boring a stare into the side of her head.

When the ball dropped on
2
, black, Madalina’s shoulders slumped. At least she hadn’t bet another fifty on red, though if she’d let her original bet ride, she would have been up four hundred dollars by now. She didn’t gain much satisfaction from the fact that the Grouch had lost, too.

Trading her empty drink for a new one when the waitress came by, Madalina picked a fresh set of numbers and sat back to wait for the spin. Out of the corner of her eye, Madalina saw the Grouch rise from his seat. A small pang of regret surfaced at the thought of him leaving the table, which surprised her. The next thing she knew, the masculine scent of cologne permeated her space, followed by the heat of his body when he leaned into her shoulder. A jolt rocketed through her at the contact, unexpected but not unpleasant. He stretched a long arm past her to set two chips once more on the double zeros. In that moment, with the contact spreading along the entire left side of her back, Madalina shivered in her seat. She reached for her drink, desperate to distract herself from the hard muscles of his chest and abdomen. He’d removed his blazer at some point, leaving him in the gray shirt.

“You’re just destined to be in the way tonight, aren’t you, gypsy girl?” he said near her ear.

He was so tall that she almost felt smothered by his looming presence. At the same time, the devil on her shoulder insisted she secretly loved it. Loved the brush of bodies, his forthright manner. That he knew what she was drinking shouldn’t have surprised her at all. Her confusion over whether he meant to stay rather than return to his seat vanished when he draped his blazer over the back of her seat. His stack of chips clattered lightly onto the green felt two inches from her own.

“I aim to please, buddy.” He was drinking Budweiser from a bottle; she thought it suitable to return the namesake favor. Madalina couldn’t tell if the quick breath he released was from straightening up or from humor.

She glanced discreetly down at her top, reassuring herself he wasn’t getting a bird’s-eye view of her breasts. The scooped neckline didn’t show anything more than the barest swell. Hardly worth hovering over.

“What numbers are you playing? Your birthday? No, wait, don’t tell me. Your measurements,” he said.

Madalina glanced at the 23, 34, 36 she’d chosen and scoffed. Rearranged into womanly measurements, it should read: 34, 23, 36. She
wished
her waist was a twenty-three.

“Better than playing my
IQ
,” she said with a smug look at his 8, 13, 15.

That time, he laughed. The same sensuous sound as before. Maybe he always laughed like that. Madalina finished her second drink in record time. The effect of the first had started to settle in, adding a comfortable buzz to the swirl of thoughts in her head.

“Feisty. I like it,” he said.

“Are you going to stand behind my chair the whole night?”

“I might.”

“I don’t recall issuing an invitation.”

“Sure you did. With every look you sent my way.”

“You’re imagining things. How many beers have you had?” she asked.

“If we’re measuring alcohol content, about a fourth of what you’ve hastily inhaled.”

“Are you suggesting that I’m drinking fast because of your presence?”

“No. But now that you mention it, that must be the reason. Alcohol affects some people like a truth serum.” He tipped his mouth closer to her ear to add, “If you wanted me closer, all you had to do was ask, gypsy girl.”

Twisting in the seat, she looked back . . . and up. Heat curled through her loins at the directness of his gaze. Whatever smart remark she’d been about to deliver evaporated under the sudden and intense surge of lust his presence inspired. What was she doing bantering with him, anyway? Wasn’t this the same man who had gotten snippy with her earlier? Turning to the table, she cleared her throat and stiffened her spine, sending silent messages for him to
back off
. It wasn’t that she didn’t find his immediate presence pleasurable—she did. And that was the problem. The Grouch and men of his ilk didn’t interest her. She’d wanted to find a
gentleman
to flirt with, not a silver-tongued devil.

The instant she felt his heat leave her back, Madalina was almost sorry she didn’t go for the rakish, disarming type. She sent a quick, curious glance over her shoulder. The Grouch stood with a waitress, smiling down into her beaming face while he dropped a few bills on her tray in exchange for another bottle of Budweiser. It was easy to see how infatuated the waitress was and how his effect on her would assure that his drinks were delivered in a timely manner.

By the time she returned her attention to the roulette game, she realized they’d both lost the last spin. Feeling adventurous all of a sudden, she pushed a stack of chips onto black. It had brought her luck before, and she could do with another win. Wishing for a fan to reduce the flush on her skin, Madalina watched the ball roll around the rim of the roulette wheel.

The Grouch leaned against her shoulder once more, sliding a pile of chips next to her own.

“Do you mind?” she said with just the faintest amount of irritation. Whether it was at him for his potency or herself for her weakness, she couldn’t be sure.

“Not at all. I’m doing you a favor, you know. You’re weaving on your seat—too many drinks, too fast—and it’s my duty to make sure you don’t topple onto the floor. What would people say?” he retorted in a dry tone.

Was she weaving on her seat? The drinks
were
catching up to her rather quickly. “I’m not weaving. I’ve only had two Gypsy Girls—as you probably know.” The tart reply earned a rumbling chuckle from the Grouch.

“You should have a care how you word things,” he said, settling his body between her seat and the next
.

Madalina, fascinated by the broad knuckles and tapered fingers of Grouch’s hand, studied the pattern of veins running under the skin and contemplated whether he had soft palms or the rough ones of a man used to hard labor. As if he had caught her looking and guessed what she was thinking, he turned his hand over. A row of calluses greeted her questing gaze, which she diverted as soon as she realized what
he’d
done and what
she
was doing.

The ball landed on black, she realized belatedly. She smiled in triumph. Reaching over at the same time as the Grouch, she bumped her arm into his by accident. An awkward rearranging of limbs ensued until she exhaled in exasperation and pulled her stack of winning chips closer. For all her bluster, Madalina admitted to herself that the Grouch wasn’t all that bad to be around. She could be standoffish all she wanted, but the stark reality was that she eagerly awaited the next lean of his body into hers when he placed his bet.

It’s the alcohol talking
, she argued with herself.

“What numbers or colors are we playing this time?” he asked, interrupting her thoughts.

Just as she opened her mouth to deliver a cunning little retort, a gentle yet firm pair of hands landed beneath her other elbow. Instinctively clutching her purse, Madalina glanced over her right shoulder. A man of Asian descent, attired in a sharp suit of black and white with an ice-blue tie, eased her from the seat with a cordial smile and gleaming dark eyes.

“Pardon, Miss. There’s been a slight problem with your room,” the man said in a quiet voice. “May I have a word for a moment?” Not as steady on her feet as she hoped to be, she started to mention her forgotten chips. The Asian gentleman seemed to understand her hesitation.

“The dealer will hold your chips and your place at the table. We’ll just be a few minutes.” With momentum on his side, he escorted her from the table.

Madalina cut a quick look back at the Grouch, who stood near her empty seat, posture alert, eyes glinting with curiosity.

I’ll be right back
, she mouthed. Madalina thought she imagined the way his curiosity shifted to displeasure.

“You see,” the Asian man said, drawing her attention back, “we are doing some remodeling on the room erroneously rented to you. Workers begin tomorrow at six in the morning, so we would like to relocate you to a suite—if that’s acceptable to you.”

Madalina walked at his side, forced to take small, quick steps to keep up. The casino was a blur in periphery while she focused on her escort. They wanted to upgrade her to a suite? She wouldn’t have been able to afford such luxury on her own.

“Well, that’s fine. Where are we going?” she asked as they left the gaming area. She recognized the tall archway leading to the foyer—the same foyer where she’d bumped into the Grouch earlier in the day.

Another Asian man appeared at her other side, a similar cordial smile preceding his answer. “Upstairs to finalize the arrangement, Miss Maitland. The entryway is right up here.”

The pace quickened once they passed beneath the enormous arch into the foyer, until she had to trot to keep up. Guests trickled in through the glass doors leading outside, barely paying the trio any attention. Madalina figured there was a hidden entrance to the interior of the casino where the employees gathered in break rooms and where elevators whisked those in higher positions to upper floors.

When they aimed for the front doors, Madalina frowned. She wished, just for a moment, that her thought process wasn’t clouded by alcohol. Something didn’t seem quite right.

“Wait—we have to go outside? I thought we were going upstairs?” she said, glancing aside to one man, then the other. Security, she guessed, though she didn’t see any logo on their suits or name tags on their lapels. They
were
security, right? Neither man held walkie-talkies, although one did have a device in his ear, the kind used to talk hands free to someone else.

Instinct demanded she bring the marching party to a halt. She slowed, applying pressure on the hold to her elbows.

“Our office entrance is just outside,” one man replied. The doors opened to a hot gust of arid, desert night.

Madalina twisted in their grasp, exerting more pressure, to which they responded by tightening their hold on her elbows. A sleek, shiny black sedan sat next to the curb beyond the sidewalk, a back door open as if awaiting their arrival. A well-timed hand over Madalina’s mouth cut off a shout of alarm, and her purse banged against her legs as she actively resisted their hold. Fear latched onto her spine, sending fissures of shock through her body. This couldn’t be happening.

Impossibly, it seemed as if the men meant to stuff her into the backseat and abscond with her to destinations unknown. She struggled in the tight grip of her abductors, who, she realized far too late, were not casino security at all.

C
HAPTER
T
WO

S
trobe-like imagery flashed across Madalina’s vision while she fought for her life: sharply creased pants, the carved button on a jacket, perfectly manicured nails on a masculine hand. A gold necklace, the glint of a dark brown eye, the edge of the curb.

Moonlight gleamed off the silver trim of the sedan, shoes scuffed concrete, and locks of loose hair swung wildly around her cheeks. It seemed as if a lifetime had passed in the few seconds since leaving the casino. She writhed and jerked and twisted, not about to be taken without a fight. The open door of the car was the portal to hell, a gaping hole of darkness from which she was sure she would never return.

As if driven forward by some unearthly force, the man on Madalina’s right slammed into the car, cheek bouncing off the metal frame. A fist flew in out of nowhere, landing a blow to the side of the man’s head.

Madalina figured security—real security—had finally arrived.

Yanking against the hold on her other arm, and thinking to take advantage of the sudden disruption, she yelped in surprise when the Asian man shoved her into the backseat. Into the black hole she so desperately wished to avoid. Instead of fighting it, she went with the momentum, scrambling forward while ignoring a terse Chinese command. Catching the opposite handle, she opened the door and all but fell out onto the asphalt. Her purse, straps tangled around her forearm, landed next to her head.

Surging to her feet, the world spinning dizzily, Madalina shot a hand out to brace against the car.

“Run. Right now. Run!” the Grouch said, scooping a strong arm around her waist and rushing her forward toward rows of cars in the parking lot.

“But . . . wait . . . ” She couldn’t catch her breath. Madalina, forced to use small, quick steps to keep up with his longer stride, allowed him to bear the brunt of her weight. Behind them came the sound of running feet. Hard soles slapped down in quick pursuit.

“Trust me. Go to the black Jaguar straight ahead. Right there.” He pushed her forward just as two men jumped him from behind.

Madalina glanced back with a gasp. The Grouch might have been self-serving and arrogant, but he had a mean punch. One man went down; the next got slammed into the nearest vehicle.

The blip of an alarm sounded on the Jaguar, taillights flashing red to denote the deactivation. She ran for all she was worth, panting breathlessly. Adrenaline caused the fine hairs on the back of her neck to stand on end. Inside the Jaguar, she fumbled for the safety belt and wrenched a look out the back window. The Grouch was already falling into the driver’s seat. He started the engine, movements quick and efficient.

“Who the hell were they?” he asked as he sped through the lot toward the nearest exit.

“I don’t know! Why are you asking me? The next thing I knew, two men were politely guiding me through the casino, then to the doors, and then into a strange car—”

“That was a swift move, by the way. Crawling all the way through. They didn’t expect you to do that. You’re lucky the doors weren’t locked.”

The seat belt finally clicked into place. Madalina faced forward, hands over her tingling cheeks. Shock made it difficult to think. With the Grouch’s compliment ringing in her ears, she realized that she was
still
in a strange car with someone who was technically a stranger. The only difference—and it was an important one—was that the Grouch had come to her rescue.

“Why are you here? Why did you come to my defense? I mean, I don’t even know your name . . . ” Madalina glanced away from the busy street to the man she’d silently called the Grouch from the moment she’d met him.

“Cole. Cole West. What’s yours? I came to your defense because I could tell after a few seconds that something was wrong. I didn’t know what, but when I saw you resisting outside, I took matters into my own hands. If I had to guess, I’d say they were about to abduct you.” He didn’t look away from the road. Handling the elegant car like a professional driver, Cole swerved in and out of traffic, glancing in the rearview mirror often.

“They were! About to abduct me, I mean. I have no idea why. One of them said they wanted a few minutes of my time, something about my room being remodeled and that they were upgrading me to a suite. I thought it was hotel security or management, you know? Then suddenly we were outside, and someone put a hand over my mouth, and they wouldn’t let me go.” She closed her eyes against the blur of neon lights, willing away another bout of dizziness. Of all nights to have sucked down alcohol like it was water. Two drinks wasn’t a devastating amount and she wouldn’t have a hangover come morning, but the content was enough to set her balance on edge and leave a streak of wooziness behind.

“You didn’t tell me your name,” he said.

“What?”

“Your name?”

“Madalina Maitland.”

“Tell me something, Madalina. Why would anyone have cause to try and abduct you?”

“I don’t know.”

“There has to be something. Some reason. Have you been robbed recently? Attacked coming out of a store? Your bank card went missing?”

“No, nothing.”

“A pissed-off coworker?”

“My coworker is my best friend. She wouldn’t do anything like that. She has
no
reason to have me abducted.”

“What about other coworkers?”

“It’s just me and Lianne, a few part-timers, and a manager. The part-timers are high school students. You can’t find sweeter girls. There’s no way this has anything to do with them.” Madalina rubbed her temples, then clutched the purse in her lap when Cole took a right turn a little too fast. “Where are we going? All my things are back at the Luxor.”

“I don’t advise going back. They knew where to find you, and if you return, they’ll probably try to take you again.” Cole approached a stop sign and rolled right through the intersection when he saw no cross traffic.

Madalina didn’t berate him for not coming to a complete stop. He was acting in her best interests, which meant putting as much distance between them and their pursuers as possible. She glanced in her side mirror often, terrified that whoever had tried to abduct her would show up unexpectedly. “But all my clothes and everything are in my suitcase. My makeup, my—”

“Do you really think makeup is worth risking your life for?” he asked with an impatient edge to his voice.

“But I can’t just leave it there.” She’d brought many of her best outfits, some of which she used for work. Unlike the apparently rich playboy with the new Jaguar, Madalina had to spend her pennies wisely. She remembered the money she’d left behind at the roulette table and groaned. At least she’d gotten away with most of it.

“Why are you making that noise?” he asked with a frown, glancing at her as if he thought he’d find blood or bruises on her person.

“The money. At the roulette table—”

“I grabbed it. It’s in my front pocket.”

She glanced at the denim encasing his thigh and the flex of muscle beneath. No way was she reaching her hand in there to dig the chips out. It wasn’t
that
important. “Thanks for thinking ahead.”

“Well, at first I thought you knew the man, or that security at the hotel had perceived a threat for you. Someone trying to rip you off or whatever. Then I realized something else was wrong and snagged your chips just in case. I didn’t have time to cash them. Sorry about that.” Cole turned right into the L-shaped parking lot of a busy restaurant. The one-story eatery, with indoor and outdoor seating, shunned the usual glitz of Vegas and had gone, instead, with an Italian theme of stone fountains, trailing ivy, and two separate pergolas that loomed over the enclosed patio. Darkly tinted windows refracted the shapes of customers and briefly gleamed from the glare of Cole’s headlights as he swung into an empty slot. He put the car in park, left the engine running, and scanned the area as if he, too, wanted to keep an eye out for a tail.

“Don’t worry about the money right now. Should we be stopping? What if someone followed us?” she asked, peering out her window, then twisted in the seat to stare out the back.

“I haven’t seen anything suspicious. Doesn’t mean they’re not back there. If they want you that bad, then it’s likely we haven’t seen the last of them yet.”

Madalina wanted to protest that no one could possibly be
that
interested in a woman whose clothing boutique struggled from month to month just to pay the astronomical lease, who had more pairs of shoes than she would ever wear in a lifetime, who thought french fries were a food group, and who lived alone in a tiny house that she rented instead of owned. Expensive jewelry didn’t drip off her fingers or from her ears. She wasn’t politically active, had less than a thousand dollars in savings, and only went out on the town every other Saturday night. What could two men want with someone like her?

“Then we should go—somewhere. Why are we parked?” she asked with a glance his way, temporarily putting her search for enemies on hold. Cole West overpowered the interior of the sleek, classy car. It wasn’t just the breadth of his shoulders, but his larger-than-life demeanor. This was a man confident in his abilities, a man secure with himself and his surroundings. Even when he was currently on the run.

He met her eyes for an electrifying moment. “We need to figure out why they want you. They’re definitely Chinese; I recognized the language during the scuffle. Think. Think about anything odd that’s happened in the last month or so. This looks like a professional job to me, and we need to trace their interest back to the source.”

“How do you know it’s a professional job?” she asked. The more Cole talked, the more nervous she became. She wasn’t nearly recovered from the abduction attempt, and hearing that professionals might be after her caused her heart to flutter in her chest.

“I just do.”

“That doesn’t tell me anything. What about it, specifically, makes you say that?”

“Think, Madalina. Think hard instead of asking so many questions.” He swiveled a look out the window, eyes sharp on the night. “Is anyone in your family a politician? Involved in research? Work for the government? A cop?”

“No, no, no. My mom was a teacher, and my dad worked for an insurance company. No one in my extended family is any of those things.”

“Was? Are your parents deceased?”

“No. They’re retired.”

“Give me a rundown of your life for the last six months.”

Madalina made a noise of protest. “What? No.”

“Do you want to find out what’s going on, or do you want to look over your shoulder for the foreseeable future?” he asked with obvious impatience.

“I work five, six days a week, depending. My schedule shifts so that some days I open, and others I close. I can’t remember anything unusual or different in the last six months regarding work. No odd customers, no threats, nothing stolen. Nothing has woken me in the middle of the night, I haven’t had weird phone calls, and no one unusual came to my door. At work—”

“What do you do again?”

“I co-own a clothing boutique in Los Angeles.”

“And you’re sure nothing strange has happened there?”

“No. We weren’t ever missing money, we paid our bills on time, our deliveries came when they were supposed to. No one threw a fit, got in a fight, or threatened me or Lianne.”

“Your co-owner.”

“Yes. It’s been business as usual.”

“What else? Where did you go? Did you date, break up with a boyfriend, get into an altercation driving?”

Her cheeks flamed with embarrassment. “I only go out a few times a month. Usually Saturdays, with Lianne. We haven’t had any problems that I can remember. And I don’t have a boyfriend.”

“Dates?” He arched a brow.

“I haven’t been on any. Lately.”

“Within the last month?”

“No.” How humiliating. To salvage some of her pride, she added, “I’ve been busy. After my grandpa died—”

“You didn’t mention that. When did he die?”

“Look, Cole. I don’t want to talk about it. He was my grandpa, you know?”

“I know it’s difficult. But when did he pass?”

“Six weeks ago. He left me a very small inheritance, and that’s why I’m here. He knew I hadn’t been on a vacation in a long time, that I’ve been working my fingers to the bone, and wanted me to use a little of it for some ‘me’ time. I decided to take him up on it, and that’s why I came to Vegas.” Madalina tried diligently not to be overwhelmed by emotion. She was already overwhelmed with panic and shock; she didn’t need to wallow in grief all over again.

“How much did he leave you?”

“Cole . . .”

“It might be relevant.”

“Thirteen hundred dollars. Oh, and some strange little dragon that was in the safe deposit box. I don’t think it’s worth anything, but he left it for me, so I’m keeping it.”

“A dragon?” He frowned. “Like one of those cheap jade things?”

“No. Like stone. It looks old, but I think it’s supposed to look old on purpose. You know, how certain collectibles are made to appear as if they’re ancient. It has red beads for eyes.”

“How big is it?”

Madalina put two fingers approximately four inches apart, then three inches high. “That big. Roughly. Not big at all. Why?”

“Did he leave you any information on it? Where he got it, how long he’s had it? And how did he die?”

Madalina rubbed her forehead. Discussing her grandfather’s recent passing bothered her more than she wanted to admit. “He hadn’t been well for a while. Then he got pneumonia and deteriorated quickly. There isn’t any information on the dragon, no. Just the money and that in the safe deposit box. But I’m telling you. I think that dragon is worthless. It means a lot to me, though, so in my eyes, it’s priceless. Lianne convinced me to post a picture of it on one of those antique sites, the ones where they’ll give you a quote about how much it’s worth. No one ever left a note or got back to me. I tried to tell Lianne it was a waste of time.”

“Where is it now?”

“The dragon? I just told you that I don’t think it’s worth—”

“It’s the best lead we’ve got. If that’s the only odd thing in the last month, then we need to look into it.”