Into the Spotlight (4 page)

“Frederick…” Malcolm sighed and unfolded his arms long enough to pinch the bridge of his nose. “That’s called cheating.”

“It was barely breaking even. We lost a hell of a lot more than we won. So now I’m into them for a bit of money.”

Malcolm tried to ignore that statement. If Frederick was into the Arcana Royale for over one million, then he’d lost more than a “bit” of money. “Where did you get the line of credit?” Because Frederick’s trust was locked and it took Matthias’s or Malcolm’s signature to release funds beyond his monthly stipend which was considerably less than a few million.

Frederick responded with a mumble of breath that was too faint for even Malcolm to discern.

“What?”

“I’ve been letting the girls shop on the credit card, and then their accountant pays out the cash back.”

Rolling his head from side to side, cracking vertebrae, helped Malcolm focus. Frederick’s credit cards were paid by his office and, outside of a yearly audit, he rarely reviewed what the boy spent his money on. “So you were trading credit card points for straight cash.”

“Yeah, for a while. I’m a little old to be coming to you or Mom with my hand out.”

“Well, at least on that point we can agree.” He held up a hand when Frederick opened his mouth. “No, the adult is talking now and you’re going to shut up. First, you stole the jet. You didn’t borrow it. Since there was no report of the jet’s usage, I can only think you
persuaded
the pilots. Second, you’re embezzling money from the family corporations using bait and switch with your credit card. Third, you violated the laws of the casino by
persuading
an employee to cheat for you. Am I missing anything?”

“Well, there might have been a small incident with one of the incubi the first night we were here, but he’ll recover.”

Staring at the younger vampire across the table, Malcolm counted to one hundred. In Latin. Pampered and spoiled his entire adult life by parents who spent seven centuries longing for a child had done his cousin no good.

“Mal, if you just pay the fine, I’m sure we can sort it all out. You can take it out of my trust fund. I’ll even agree to banishment from the casino. It’s all good, right?”

“No, Frederick. It’s not all good.” In fact, it was beyond the pale just how bad this was. Naiveté was no excuse for stupidity. Exhaling slowly, he tapped his index finger against the table. “Start at the beginning, in Montauk. Leave
nothing
out.”

His cousin deflated before his eyes and in a cruel, quiet part of his soul, Malcolm smiled. Maybe the danger Frederick found himself in was finally sinking into his empty head. And maybe that was just wishful thinking.

For a moment, his mind turned to the beautiful woman sitting across the table last night, her emerald eyes beckoning with her haunting request.
I need your help
. With a sigh, he forced his mind away to listen carefully for anything he could use to defend Frederick’s inexcusable actions.

By sunset on the second night, Malcolm still cooled his heels, waiting for an audience with the Overseers. They’d sent two aides to placate him. Aides he’d sent back with firmer requests each time. The Overseers were powerful, of that he possessed no doubt. They carved an entire slice of the prince of Las Vegas’s kingdom out for themselves. They made the rules, they set the tone and they had the final say. They took personally the human slogan of what happened in Vegas, stayed in Vegas.

One phone call to Richard, the prince of New York, and he cashed in a long-owed favor. The prince would apply pressure to the princes in Monte Carlo, St. Petersburg and Shreveport, as well as send emissaries to the South American princes. The Arcana Royale’s vassal holdings extended around the globe and Malcolm could make their businesses very uncomfortable for them.

He reconsidered his intentions to return to the Midnight Mystery Lounge. Pandora proved a wild distraction for most of the day. He was better off concentrating on freeing his cousin from the interminable mess, particularly since the terrible twins remained firmly absent from the property. They’d apparently left as soon as casino security took Frederick into custody.

They also took one of the casino’s coveted incubi and casino hosts with them. One or two discreet phone calls put the Reynolds’s corporate bloodhounds on their trail, but there seemed little chance of locating them swiftly, and returning the incubi would only mitigate one of the lesser offenses.

The two million his cousin cheated stood as the far more dangerous allegation. A headache throbbed behind one eye when Malcolm saw that his path across the lobby abandoned the rich marble tile to descend red carpeted steps, and he hesitated before the very lounge he’d already talked himself out of visiting.

Sliding his hands into his pockets, Malcolm wrestled with his conscience. Pandora said she needed his help. But that could just be a ploy by the Overseers to throw him off his game. Cynical as the thought may have seemed, he would hardly be the first man distracted by the most desirable creature he’d ever met.

Irritation flared at the concept that she baited some kind of trap. Despite the gloriously sexual allure she wore like a second skin, an air of innocence gleamed in her green eyes. The tremble in her words hesitated genuinely.

He descended the last three steps into the shadowy lounge. The quiet tables hummed with life and the show unfolded on the stage below. If it was a game the Overseers wanted to play, then he would not allow them the satisfaction of chasing him off.

It had nothing to do with the intense desire to see her again.

As though on cue, a spotlight burned through the blackness and illuminated the woman in question, standing center stage. Her hands clasped together and unlike her bejeweled appearance the night before, she wore the simplest of strapless, floor-length black dresses. Her skin shone like the richest gold.

His breath clogged in his throat. Her blonde hair fell in long tendrils from an elegant twist atop her head. Her green eyes glittered among the barest traces of makeup. She was like a splash of sunshine, vibrant and alive.

The stirring crowd stilled and even the succubus walking up to greet him went silent.

Pandora stared up into the light and began to sing. The words barely registered as her silken voice, low and throaty, rippled throughout the theatre. She sang of being bound in chains, lost and buried in dust. The power in her lyrics slammed into his gut and lit a slow fuse in his blood.

The music faded beneath her voice, leaving only Pandora as she stood, arms extending as she decried her fate, lost to the world and desperate to find her way. His legs began to move, as if by their own volition and he descended deeper into the theatre, following the haunting invitation in Pandora’s song. She wanted to trust, to reach out and to be free from the darkness threatening to swallow her.

Youth, vitality, innocence and a need to believe filled every nuance of the music wrapping around him. Awareness of the succubus trailing after him faded. He found a chair and sat down, hands clasped together, elbows on his knees, and leaned forward.

He wanted Pandora to know he was here, that he listened to her entreaty and his conscience reminded him that she’d already asked for his help. His fangs pushed at his gums, sharpening. The music thrummed through his blood, pounding long after the last note faded away and the spotlight went dark, erasing her from the stage.

He exhaled and released the breath he hadn’t even realized he held. The crowd stirred, released from her spell as the stage lit up and the other dancers exploded to life, shattering the compulsion binding him in place.

“Drink, sir?” The succubus at his elbow pushed against his awareness and he nodded once.

“Please send an invitation back to Pandora. I would like her to join me after the show.” So much for not allowing her to distract him, but even if she was a game the Overseers played with him, he could use that to his advantage. In the back of his mind, guilt nibbled on him. Would using the singer’s need against her really solve any problems?

He sat through the full set of performances. His doubt fled every time she walked onto the stage. The long strands of pearls stroking her breasts through the final dance sent all the blood in his body rushing to his cock. Her dusky nipples peaked with every caress of the hard little beads.

His palms itched to replace them. His cock pulsed with desire all its own. By the time the show ended, he ordered and downed another two glasses of blood-flavored brandy, fighting the visceral need to descend into the darkness and take what he wanted.

She will come to me.

She will come for me.

His fangs nicked at his tongue, a reminder that he needed to find control before he fell on her the moment she approached his table.

It took forever for her to make an appearance, the dim lighting turned up with the show’s final curtain. She wore a red dress that glided provocatively over her curves. She walked toward him at a slow, hip-swaying gait that pushed more vital blood away from his brain. Behind her, the salt-and-pepper guard shadowed her steps. But Malcolm dismissed him, rising and holding his hand out to the goddess in her shimmering heels.

“My lady.” He waited for her arrival and captured the hand she extended, turning it over to brush a kiss to her knuckles. The scent of wild orchids, vanilla and something utterly feminine tingled in his nostrils. Heat pounded in his temples.

Desire transforming into a need to possess. A need to be away from intrusive eyes. “Would you care to share a supper with me in a more a private setting?” The politeness of the inquiry belied the heat pumping through his body. The thumping of her heart—or maybe it was his—tripled in cadence.

Jeannie’s eyelashes descended, shielding her verdant green eyes, but the corner of her mouth quirked into a half smile, quick and forbidden. “If it would please you, Mr. Reynolds.”

“Oh. It would absolutely please me.” Malcolm turned and tugged her lightly to his side, holding fast to the hand he’d captured when she’d arrived. He angled their passage from the table to put himself directly between Jeannie and her escort.

The man pushed away from the wall and colorless eyes flickered to the dancer and back to Malcolm.

“We will be dining in my suite.” The
you’re-not-invited
lingered in the air, a punctuation of unspoken emotion.

The man ignored Malcolm, focusing on Jeannie. His slender, lean appearance likely disguised a far more dangerous ferocity. Malcolm didn’t allow himself to be swayed by appearances.

“I will go up with you.”

“You weren’t invited.” Malcolm’s back stiffened. He might be an attorney this century, but it was hardly his only profession. Bar brawler could easily be added to his list of accomplishments.

“I
will
escort her.”

“No.”

“Please.” Jeannie’s single word punctured the violence burning in his veins. He wanted privacy—that meant her escort had to go. But her fingers squeezing his hand were ice-cold. “Stan can escort us upstairs and then remain in the hallway. All right?”

Stan bowed his head once. “That will be sufficient.”

Malcolm frowned. The escort’s ready agreement rang alarm bells. He inhaled a deep breath, scenting both. The clean, sweet scent of vanilla and honeysuckle that was Jeannie filled his lungs. Stan had no scent.

None.

Wariness encouraged Malcolm to tuck Jeannie against his side, away from the man. Few things had no scent. No scent. No color to his eyes. No expression. No inflection.

The trio remained silent on the short passage from the lounge through the terraced lobby with its waterfalls, dancing lights, loud music and boisterous conversations playing out under the watchful gaze of a silent Sphinx.

The elevator ride to the twenty-eighth floor passed in tense quiet. His showgirl’s heart raced, thundering inside her chest like a filly exploding out of the gate at Pimlico. Warnings tingled along Malcolm’s senses. What game was being played? She couldn’t be a willing trap by the Overseers. Maybe she was an emissary. Was she truly in need, as his senses screamed? Or was his desire overwhelming his reason?

The elevator chimed a soft welcome to the private floor. Key access was required to ascend above the thirteenth floor, allowing guests private security in their suites and residences, as negotiated with the Royale directly.

The Reynolds family maintained a suite of rooms on the twenty-eighth floor, a benefit of their early investment in the first half of the twentieth century. A gamble in the 1960s expanded the holdings to a full half of the floor. Malcolm moved all the other guests out before arriving in Las Vegas. He preferred his privacy.

At the door to his suite, he let Jeannie step inside and then looked at her escort, Stan. “You are not welcome to enter.” The forced non-invitation would have the effect of a movie’s invitation to a vampire. The escort would literally be unable to enter. Unless he was an Overseer or extended an unimpeachable invitation from a member of the Reynolds clan, he was effectively blocked.

Stan’s bland expression was unmoved by Malcolm’s announcement. He merely assumed a leaning position against the wall opposite the door and folded his arms.

Malcolm studied Stan’s posture for a long moment, searching for any clues beyond the man’s obvious willingness to wait. Finding nothing, he followed his goddess into the well-appointed suite with its golden oak floors, Italian grottos, frescos and Roman columns etched in pure gold. It was a temple to pure gluttony, from the imported Florentine marble to the Venetian glass that overlooked the strip, or could darken to block the sun’s brutal rays, a truly marvelous effect in the desert palace.