Into the Night (28 page)

Sloane slid into the chair next to Nicole; one of the hired staff set a plate of food in front of him, and delivered one for Lisa, too. He instructed the waiter to pour them each a glass of wine, then he picked his up by the crystal stem and tilted it toward Nicole in a toast. She touched her glass to his and forced a smile.

He looked into her eyes, and she nearly jumped out of her skin when he splayed a hand on her thigh beneath the table and gave it a squeeze. “To an unforgettable weekend.”

Her belly lurched at the insinuation in his tone, and unable to find anything witty to say in response, she gave him a nod and sipped her wine. She also very subtly shifted closer to Nathan, and Sloane took the hint and removed his hand from her leg. For now. Unfortunately, her show of modesty seemed to fascinate him, and she had a feeling the man liked a challenge when it came to seducing a girl.

“So, are you having a nice evening so far?” Sloane asked as he cut into his prime rib.

“Yes, I am.” With Lisa doing her best to flirt with Nathan and keep his attention on her, Nicole had no choice but to converse with Sloane. She and Nathan had yet to see anyone who resembled Angela, and until they learned where she was, they had no choice but to play Sloane’s game his way.

“Good. It’s important to me that all my guests are happy, so if there’s anything at all you want or need, you only have to ask,” he said, his gaze warm and indulgent. “Also, I don’t believe I told you and Nathan, but tomorrow night is a masquerade theme, which makes the parties more interesting and fun. I’ll have outfits and masks delivered to your room tomorrow afternoon.”

She infused a believable amount of excitement into her expression. “I’ve never been to a real masquerade party before. Will it be like that Mardi Gras parade they have at the Rio?” she said, referring to the Vegas hotel that was well known for its carnival production.

He chuckled at her guileless enthusiasm. “Yes, it’s just like that, but so much better here at my place since all of us are a part of the Mardi Gras experience.” He winked at her.

Dinner couldn’t end quickly enough for Nicole, and as soon as everyone finished eating, Sloane announced that the entertainment would commence in the playroom downstairs. The guests filtered out of the dining room, and Nicole trailed behind with Nathan, not in any big hurry to be in the midst of such vile debauchery.

They were among the last to arrive, and already guests were pairing up with one or two of the girls and heading off to private rooms, the grotto, or hanging out in the main bar area. Out of the corner of her eye, Nicole saw Holly disappear by herself into the restroom she’d seen during the tour Sloane had given them earlier. Since this was most likely her only chance to talk to Holly privately, she decided to take advantage of the opportunity.

“I need to use the restroom,” Nicole told Nathan, and deliberately left out the part about her plan to have a little one-on-one time with Holly. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

She headed across the room and slipped into the women’s lounge, where a few of the young girls were fussing with their hair and makeup. Because she was a new face in the crowd, they eyed her curiously, but didn’t say anything as she walked over to the closed door marked
WOMEN
and knocked.

There was no answer, but Nicole knew the girl was inside. “Holly?” she said through the door as she knocked again, more insistently this time. “It’s Nikki.”

“Go away,” Holly said, and sniffled.

Nicole closed her eyes for a moment. The despondent note to the young girl’s voice nearly broke her heart. The need to talk to her, to make sure she was okay, made her more persistent. “Let me in, Holly. Please?”

“No.”

Nicole sighed but refused to give up. “I’m not going away until you do. If I have to, I’ll wait right here until you open the door to leave.” The girl had to come out sometime.

Much to Nicole’s relief, less than a minute later the locked unlatched and the door opened a few inches. Nicole took it as an invitation to enter and quickly stepped inside, then rebolted the lock behind her so they weren’t interrupted.

Her first thought was that Holly looked a wreck, physically and emotionally. Her puffy, red eyes revealed she’d been crying, and her makeup was smudged from wiping away her tears. Her eyes were filled with such hopelessness that Nicole had to resist the urge to reach out and take the young girl into her arms for a comforting hug.

Holly’s chin lifted in a show of belligerence. The small, diamond heart pendant glittered from the hollow of her throat, a stark reminder of who she belonged to. “What do you want?”

“Are you okay?” Nicole asked, and leaned back against the closed door.

The other girl crossed her arms over her chest and narrowed her gaze. “Why do you care how I am?”

Holly was back to being the hostile girl Nicole had initially met back at the nightclub. Remembering how she’d been able to reach past those defensive barriers, she attempted to do so again now. “Because I think you could use a friend.”

She scoffed at that. “And you think you can be that friend? You’re the one that Preston wants,” she added bitterly. “If anything, you’re the enemy!”

“I swear I’m not,” Nicole said, trying to convince her, and at the same time striving to establish some kind of trust between them. “I don’t want Preston.”

“Whatever Preston wants, he gets.” Holly turned back to the vanity mirror and tried to repair her smeared makeup with her compact.

Not this time,
Nicole wanted to say, but couldn’t.

Holly dropped the compact back into her purse and met Nicole’s gaze in the reflection. “Sloane told me I’m his favorite, and that’s why he likes to share me,” she said, her unsteady voice not holding as much conviction as it should have, as if Holly had her own doubts but was too terrified to speak them out loud.

God, how Nicole understood how the other girl felt. Hadn’t Mark used the same tactics on her to persuade Nicole to engage in a threesome with a virtual stranger? The similarities made her feel nauseous.

“Right now, I’m entertaining one of his friends, and when Preston sees how good I’m being, he’ll take me back and not want to share me anymore.”

Nicole had to forcibly swallow back her anger at the situation. “Are you sure about that, Holly?”

The young girl’s eyes flashed with irritation before she looked away and began digging through her purse. “I
know
he will. I just need a few of my pills to get me through the rest of the night.”

Nicole’s stomach roiled as she watched Holly shake two white tablets from a small container. “Getting wasted isn’t the answer,” she said, speaking from her own experience.

Holly clutched the pills in her fist. “I
need
them.”

“What are you taking?” Nicole was not only curious, but concerned about what the girl was ingesting.

“I don’t know and I don’t care.” Despair etched Holly’s features, and her bottom lip quivered. “Gwen gave them to me to take and they make me feel relaxed and calm. Taking the pills is the only way I can bring myself to let anyone other than Sloane touch me. They make me forget things I don’t want to remember.”

“It’s only a temporary fix, Holly.” Nicole took a small step toward the girl, then another. “In the morning, nothing will have changed.”

“You don’t understand!” Her voice rose in anger, and she popped the pills before Nicole could stop her, then scooped up water with her hands from the sink faucet to wash them down.

Nicole felt so damn helpless, and hated the fact that she couldn’t get through to Holly. She watched as the girl closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and tried to recompose herself.

When Holly looked at her again, it was with reluctant determination. “I need to be good,” she said, calmer now. “I need to make Preston’s friend happy. If I do whatever Preston asks me to do, then he’ll know how much I love him.”

The anguish Nicole witnessed in Holly’s gaze twisted her insides into knots, and she gently touched the girl’s arm. “Honey, you’re not old enough to know what real love with a man is.”

Holly jerked away from her, a renewed fire igniting in her eyes. “So what if I’m only fifteen? I’ve had more experience than most girls my age.”

Nicole didn’t hesitate to call Holly on her slip. “Fifteen?”

Panic chased across Holly’s face as she realized her mistake, though she did nothing to correct it. Instead, she grabbed her purse and started past Nicole. “I need to get back to Richard before Gwen comes looking for me.”

Nicole stepped in front of the girl and blocked her path to the door. “You don’t have to do this, Holly. Let me help you. Let me get you out of this place.”

“I don’t want to leave,” Holly said, her voice choked with emotion. “I just want
Preston
.”

“What happens when he no longer wants you?” Nicole asked softly, but her words were direct and painfully honest.

Holly shook her head, as if she wouldn’t even consider that as an option. “I have to
go
.”

Knowing there was nothing else she could do right now, Nicole stepped aside and watched as Holly walked out. Tonight, she didn’t have any choice but to let the young girl
entertain
one of Sloane’s guests, but somewhere along the way Holly had become Nicole’s personal mission.

She wasn’t sure how Nathan was going to react to her decision, but Nicole wasn’t leaving this hellhole without Holly.

Chapter Sixteen

“See anything you like?”

Nathan wasn’t surprised that Sloane had sought him out, especially since he was standing alone in the lounge area of the playroom as he waited for Nicole to return from the restroom. It was the perfect opportunity for Sloane to try to negotiate with him, but Nathan was holding firm until the other man offered him what he’d come here for.

“No, not yet,” Nathan replied, smiling amicably at Sloane.

“What did you think of Lisa?” he asked, his gaze both curious and hopeful. “She’s quite willing to be your plaything for the night. Just say the word, and she’s yours.”

The thought of that young, naive girl giving her body so freely to a stranger was enough to turn Nathan’s stomach. Thanks to years of undercover work, though, feigning a nonchalant attitude came easily, despite his internal frustration. “Nice girl, but there just wasn’t any chemistry with her on my end.”

“I’ve been hearing that a lot lately about Lisa.” Sloane grew thoughtful, a small frown marring his brow. “I’m thinking it’s time for Lisa to move on to make room for fresh, new young blood for my friends to enjoy.”

Nathan didn’t care for the underlying tone in Sloane’s comment, and what it implied. “How do you mean?” he asked casually.

“There comes a time when each of the girls has served her purpose, and that seems to be the case with Lisa.” He shrugged, as if the two of them were discussing the weather, instead of a human life. “It’s time for her to go.”

“Go where?” Nathan kept his voice mildly curious, but deep in his gut he knew exactly what Sloane meant. He just needed the man to say the words out loud to confirm Nathan’s suspicions.

Sloane leaned closer and let his voice drop in tone, as if he didn’t want others to hear what he was about to share with Nathan. “Let’s just say I have a very profitable arrangement with a Russian businessman who is more than happy to take the girls off my hands when I’m done with them. Sending them off to Russia keeps things much simpler and cleaner than putting the girls back out on the street here in Vegas.”

Jesus
. Nathan’s mind reeled with the knowledge that not only was Sloane engaging in underage prostitution, he was also involved in human trafficking. The thought of him using these girls, then selling them off to another country to be used for white slavery was enough to make Nathan want to puke.

Somehow, someway, Sloane
had
to be stopped.

“But back to you, Keller, and finding you a girl who’ll pique your interest,” Sloane went on, forcing Nathan’s attention back to the business at hand. “You’re a hard man to please.”

He shrugged, even as the urgency of getting Angela out of this place heightened. “I’m just very particular, and I want to make this worth my while.”

“I completely understand. That’s why I’ve saved the best for last.” A crafty smile curved Sloane’s lips. “I figured if no one else appealed to you, my Angel definitely would.”

Now,
that
grabbed Nathan’s attention, and the interest he displayed on his face was genuine. “Angel? Sounds promising.”

Nathan followed Sloane’s gaze as he glanced across the room and motioned with his fingers. From the shadows, a young girl emerged, escorted by Gwen. From a distance, Nathan could make out flowing blond hair and a petite, slender body draped in a white slip-style dress as she glided toward them on flat slippers.

The illusion of being an
angel
was apparent—from her choice of dress to the fresh innocence of her ethereal appearance. The other men in the room watched in envy while the girl passed by, and as she neared and her vivid blue eyes and face became more visible, Nathan felt a jolt to his system.