Hold Me (22 page)

Némes spoke again just as they entered the Atlantic City limits.

“Change your mind yet?” The sound of his voice in the stillness was so unexpected that Katie jumped.

“No,” she said, although the butterflies in her stomach had morphed into airplanes.

“Better be sure, because there it is.” He gestured at a sign glittering and blinking on the horizon. The Dream Net Casino.

Katie drew in a deep breath, rolled her shoulders. “I’m sure.”

He shrugged. “So, let’s get you fixed up.”

She followed his directions to a small costume shop where he left her in the car and eventually came back out clutching a black wig. A few minutes later she was parking the Nova in the underground garage of the Dream Net Casino itself.

Némes reached over and did something and Kato’s engine fell silent.

“Last chance to back out,” he said into the stillness.

“Stop trying to scare me because it’s not going to work.” Her hands were trembling. “We have to warn Luc.”

“In the dictionary they have a picture of you as the definition of stubborn.” He sighed and held up the wig. “Well, let’s see if we can jam this thing on your head.”

Pulling the wig over Katie’s hair was far easier said than done, especially when Spot woke up and tried to help. After it was finally on, Némes sat back and looked at her. He didn’t say anything, but the corners of his mouth twitched.

“If you laugh at me, I’ll cut you right now,” Katie warned.

He laughed anyway, then grabbed her wrist when she tried to punch him.

“Such violence. I’m shocked.”

She jerked her hand away from him. “Yeah, well, you don’t have to walk around in a public place looking like a doofus.” What she could see of her reflection told her that the black wig was shaped like a pyramid. “An Egyptian doofus.”

“You look like Cleopatra with freckles.”

“Great. I knew I should have gone into that costume shop with you. Why did you have to pick this one anyway?”

“Just lucky, I guess.” His light blue eyes were twinkling, and Katie realized he would probably be attractive if he let himself loosen up a bit. He didn’t do anything for her, of course, but it was nice to know he actually had a human side.

“If it makes any difference, you certainly don’t look like yourself,” he said. “I don’t even think you need to wear the sunglasses.”

“Wonderful. Then I’ll actually be able to see the people running away in horror.” She got out of the Nova, trying not to hyperventilate. Némes slipped out of the passenger side and watched her over the roof of the car.

She licked her lips. “Maybe Spot—”

“No. The dog stays here unless you want to get us all killed.”

“But it’s going to be hot—”

“She’s not in the sun. We’ll leave the windows open partway. We can come and check on her in a little while, but she is NOT coming into the casino with us.”

“You’re just hoping you’ll be able to stuff me into the car with her when we come back out.”

“That too.”

“Yeah, well, you can always try it, buddy.” She shrugged. “But I guess that you have a point.” A Newfoundland would likely draw attention, even if they could pretend that she was a Seeing Eye dog again.

Spot whined. Katie leaned over to give her a quick hug through the half-open window.

“Okay, girl. Guard the car. And wish me luck.” She closed her eyes briefly, then let go of the dog, threw back her shoulders and grabbed her purse out of the car. “Come on,” she told Némes. “Let’s get this done. I already have a headache.”

“Is the wig too tight?” he asked politely. She really did want to smack the smirk off his face.

“I’m irritated, I look like a pyramid, and my hair can’t breathe.” She glared at him and slung her purse over her shoulder. “Let’s roll.”

They took the elevator from the parking garage up to the casino’s main lobby. Even though Katie knew the wig made a dramatic difference to her appearance, she found herself sticking pretty closely to Justin Némes as they were swept along with the crowd to the casino floor.

Looking up, she stared at the garish gold and silver fishing nets suspended from the ceiling three stories above her. They appeared to be catching huge coins cascading from the sky in an endless, blinking stream. It was hypnotic. Must spend money. Must spend money here.

When she realized she really was going under, Katie let her eyes drop. The room was cavernous, cloaked in perpetual twilight. Slot and poker machines rang and clanged and flickered with strange neon colors. Spotlights pooled on the floor at blackjack and dice tables, highlighting the tense, hopeful faces of the people clustered around them. Music blared. Colored lights flashed.

She tugged on her wig again.

“Stop that.” Némes pulled her into a corner. He looked down at her with amusement.

“It hurts.”

“We should probably have shaved your head.” He ignored her snort and swept the casino floor with his eyes. “Do you have any idea what Luc’s cover was? Any idea at all?”

“No.” She shook her head and grimaced when the wig pulled her hair. “This is going to be like looking for a needle in a haystack, isn’t it?”

“Try looking for a needle in about a hundred haystacks.”

Katie sighed. “So, I guess we’d better get started.”

“Frankie,” Joey Silvano said. “What the hell’s going on?”

Frankie Silvano met his father’s hard, black-eyed stare. Once again he sat in front of Joey’s big oak desk in the penthouse office at the Dream Net Casino. He’d gotten sewn up from where the FBI guy had shot him, but the wounds still fucking hurt. Plus, the pain meds made his head spin, he had bulky bandages on his thigh and upper arm, and he had to use a damn cane to get around. When his father’s doctor had suggested crutches, he’d almost shoved them up the guy’s ass.

Frankie was fucking pissed off. He looked at his father, sitting there like a smug little king, and his jaw ached with tension. The anger, humiliation swirled inside him, and all he wanted to do was hurt and maim and kill and take everything out on Poppa. He wanted to tear the old man’s heart out and feed it to him. He wanted to slice at the old bastard until he was ripped and bleeding on the floor. Maybe that would work off some of the rage eating at his insides.

But Carlos had said it would be a mistake to take his father out now, and Carlos was one of the few people Frankie actually listened to.

With an effort, he wrestled his fury back into a box, leveled his breathing. “Nothing’s going on,” he said.

“Nothing? What the fuck do you mean, nothing?” Poppa lumbered to his feet. Frankie realized his father was angrier than he’d seen him in quite some time. “First you get arrested when you chase after the FBI agent nosing around the big house, now you get shot up chasing the same fucking FBI agent. And the guy gets away again!”

“Yeah.” The woman had gotten away too. Katie McCabe. The woman who had caused all his embarrassment, all his humiliation. She had to pay. Had to.

Poppa was still talking. “—and now I fucking find out you have some fucking broad in the fucking basement. Here in this fucking basement. And it’s not the broad who was helping the FBI agent, it’s another broad. What the fuck is going on?”

“Some of the boys caught her at the woman’s apartment. I had them bring her here so I could talk to her.”

“Talk. Right.” His father’s eyes traveled over him. Frankie saw them linger on the way his suit hung on his slight frame, on the bandages and the cane. Watched the old bastard’s lip curl with undisguised contempt. “Frankie, that broad in the basement is trouble. Fucking trouble I don’t fucking need, you fucking moron.”

“I need her,” he said.

The old man’s face grew red, and his barrel of a chest expanded until the buttons on his shirt strained. Frankie wondered idly if Poppa would just explode into a thousand pieces.

“I don’t care what you need!” his father practically screamed the words. “Get rid of her. I want her gone or I want her dead. Just get rid of her before the don finds out what’s going on and goes fucking ballistic. Jesus God, I can’t believe you’re so fucking stupid!”

Frankie didn’t bother responding. He watched Poppa pace back and forth. Back and forth.

“And for fuck’s sake, watch out for that FBI guy. All we’d need would be for him to show up too. I feel like I’m running a fucking zoo.”

“I doubt the FBI guy will come here now.” Frankie kept his voice flat. “He’s probably still holed up with his little slut.” The slut Frankie was going to enjoy bringing down a notch or two. He’d play with her a little bit before he killed her…

“Watch for him anyway. I don’t want him in the fucking place.” His father turned back to face him and now his voice was cold and deadly. “You made this fucking mess, Frankie. You fucking clean it up. Now!”

Frankie rose, bowed ironically. “Certainly, Poppa.”

He limped out of the room, his father’s curses following him into the hall.

Obviously one of the guys at the house this morning had run right to dear old Dad and told him everything that had gone down. Maybe more than one of the guys had squealed. Maybe all of them. He couldn’t trust them.

When he took over the organization, when Uncle Roberto finally got fed up and iced Joey, he’d get rid of all of the guys who used to work for his father and bring on a whole new crew. Carlos would help him. Carlos wanted him to be in charge. Carlos felt like Frankie was his own son—he’d said so.

But that was the glorious future. In the meantime, there was only one person Frankie knew he could trust. One person he was sure he owned.

Liza.

Tall and blond, built and beautiful. His first love. Really, his only love. Ever since the day when he was sixteen and she was fifteen and Poppa had brought her home and told him that she was his half-sister. In the beginning he’d tried not to want her, but it hadn’t taken long before he’d realized they were inevitable. She’d been so beautiful then. Was so beautiful now.

His.

They’d handle things themselves, just like old times. She’d watch his back while he talked to the woman in the basement, found out what she knew. His father could go fuck himself.

Leaning on the cane, Frankie walked down the corridor, rang for the elevator and headed to the next floor down. To the room where Liza was staying.

Luc Vasco was mortified.

Sure, he’d gotten into the Dream Net Casino without tipping off any of the Silvano goons. And yes, he had a cover. An excellent cover, come to that, one nobody would even think of examining, but…

Lights came up, blinding him. He felt like a bug pinned on the small stage. Thank Christ he was wearing a cheesy Zorro costume. At least the thing came with a mask.

Music started playing, a slow Latin tango. Awkwardly, clumsily, Luc began to dance, calling on whatever recessive Latin rhythm gene he might have inherited from his father. The Zorro costume was so tight he almost castrated himself.

An exotic dancer, for sweet Christ’s sake. A stripper. A stripper! What if David heard about this? What if the other guys…what if Némes found out? He’d never live it down. Never. He was glad the mask covered most of his face, because he was sure as shit that he was blushing. Thank God Katie wasn’t there to see him.

Not once, not when he’d been a scrawny, malnourished and mistreated kid, not when he’d survived on the streets and in the shadows, not even when he’d left the Army and hadn’t known how he was going to get by, had Luc imagined this day. His nightmares had not even encompassed the merest possibility. And once it was over, he was going to kill—fucking kill—John Carter. The man might have been one of the best officers he’d ever served with, he might be a valuable contact at the casino, but as of right now, he was officially dead. Dead man walking. Deceased. Take your bow, Carter and exit, stage right. You little shit.

Why was the crowd so fucking quiet? Yeah, there were some screams, but the women had practically molested the other dancers. They were just kind of…staring at him. Maybe he was boring.

He deliberately thought about Katie, how the two of them had “danced” in the hotel room and back at the Museum. His pelvis shifted from side to side and he let his backbone slip, so to speak, moving with thoughts of her in his mind. Her wild red hair. Her freckles. Her lush body. Hell, yeah. Then he had to quickly think about something else before he grew too aroused. Inspiration, good. Erection, bad.

He couldn’t actually see the crowd of women beyond the light, but he heard them breathing, smelled the combination of alcohol and perfume and sweat hanging heavy in the air. This was like one of those dreams where you go to work naked, only it was worse because it was real. The stage he was on was in the middle of what looked like a cattle pen and he was the prime bull. The focus of all of the attention in the room.

It was fucking humiliating. Which Luc was pretty sure had been Carter’s intention all along. But shit, it had been years since he’d stolen the man’s girlfriend. Surely the guy couldn’t be that anxious for revenge. Hundreds of eyes watched him, waiting for him to start peeling off.

They were so goddamn quiet. The people who said men were the aggressive sex had never been to one of these shows, that was for damn sure. When he’d seen the crowd’s reaction to the other dancers, he’d just barely resisted the urge to cover his privates and make a break for it. But they weren’t mauling him. He wondered what he was doing wrong. He hoped he wasn’t making a complete ass out of himself. He hoped they wouldn’t all just start laughing.

He’d been concentrating on holding onto as much of his clothing as he could for as long as possible, but finally he couldn’t delay any longer and untied his cape fastening. Kind of proud of himself for the timing, he whipped it off to coincide perfectly with the music. And the place just…erupted.

Luc thought he must have jumped about ten feet at the sudden noise. He paused, a little bit frightened by the deafening screams and all of the women waving money. He just barely resisted the urge to bolt for the nearest door.

Okay. Man up, Vasco. You can do this. You survived a whole hell of a lot of bad stuff in your life, you can survive this.

Maybe.

He started to dance again, but a little more hesitantly. Then he realized that slowing the steps down had put him into a kind of bump n’ grind rhythm that served to emphasize his, uh, attributes. The screams intensified. Bills wove wildly like little green flags. Women leaned over the fence so far that they were in danger of falling into the pen and out of their shirts.

Unless somebody had an electric cattle prod, he was probably within seconds of being mobbed.

He realized he was supposed to be kissing people, so he ran around and grabbed one or two of the bills, twisting away when arms came out to clutch him. He tried to keep his tongue in his own mouth, but those of the women kept invading his personal space. Panting, he scrambled backwards, out of the kill zone.

Time to take off more clothes. He unbuttoned his black shirt, stumbling a little in his dance as he worked on the buttons.

He wondered if he’d be able to keep on his jockey shorts.