Loving the Odds (What Happens in Vegas) (3 page)

Her eyes flickered over him and she reached for her wine. “Nothing at all.”

“I call bullshit.”

“You can call whatever you like.” She checked the plain gold watch on her wrist. “Look, I have a flight to catch tonight and I need to figure this out. How would
you
get the watch back?”

He wouldn’t have let someone take it in the first place. But saying that would make him an asshole.

“I would confront him,” he said. “Because that sends two messages. One, that you want the watch back, and two, that he can’t walk all over you anymore.”

“What if he says no?” She sucked on the inside of her cheek.

“Then you open a can of whoop ass.”

“Whoop ass?” She burst out laughing and the sound ran along his skin, making him tingle all over.

“If he’s not going to play ball, then you need to throw the rules out of the window and teach him a lesson.” He dusted his hands together. “Simple.”

“I don’t know if I can do that. I like rules.” A line formed between her brows. “And I’m better with numbers than fists.”

He thought about his clients for a moment. If he was advising one of them to do something that he didn’t want to do, how would he frame it?

It’s all about the end game, Lance,
his mentor had once told him.
Doesn’t matter what path you take so long as you get to where you want to be.

“Why is the watch important to you?” he asked. She needed to be fired up to tackle her ex and drawing her attention to the “why” would bring back her fire.

“My grandfather was my hero.” She blinked, pressing her lips together. “All his family were farmers back home in Idaho, and they didn’t have much money. But he wanted to do something different with his life. He worked at the family orchard and started selling their applesauce to restaurants. By the time he was eighteen, he’d figured out how to expand their operations so they could bottle and ship it to other states. He tripled their income in two years.”

“He sounds like an incredible man.”

“He was.” A wistful smile touched her lips and she fiddled with the coaster holding her wine glass, lining it up perfectly straight with the edge of the bar. “He bought the watch after he turned forty because he said he wanted something to remind him of how far he’d come. What he’d created for his family. He wore it right up until he got sick. Then he gave it to me and told me that when I found the man I wanted to bring into our family, I should give him the watch.”

Lance’s blood boiled in his veins. Instead of firing her up, her story had transferred the intended effect to
him.
He wanted to find this sonofabitch and teach him a lesson.

“I was stupid to give it to Julian,” she said. “But we’d been together a year and I thought…”

“You trusted him.”

“I made a mistake by listening to my gut.” She fiddled with the hem of her skirt. “And now I don’t do that anymore. I only listen to the facts.”

“Why don’t I come with you?” He blurted out the offer, surprising himself and her, if the raised brows were anything to go on. “You might feel better if you had some moral support when you talk to him.”

“Why do you want to help me?”

That was the million-dollar question, ladies and gentlemen. “You look like you need it.”

She shook her head. “I’m not buying that. People only take action when they get something out of it themselves, and you’re not getting anything out of this.”

“That’s a cynical way to look at the world.” Who was he right now? He wasn’t the one being called cynical—that had to be a first.

“It’s not cynical, it’s human nature. Even people who seem charitable and selfless derive some pleasure from helping others. So it serves a personal need for them.” She sipped her drink. “We’re not saints. Hence my question.”

He stared at her for a moment, unsure how to respond. People didn’t often surprise him. In his line of work he’d seen good people exposed at their worst and bad people manipulate a situation to look their best. But this intriguing woman was an open book, and he wasn’t quite sure how to deal with her raw honesty.

“Maybe it’s because I’m secretly craving a distraction from my own problems.” That much he could stand by. He needed to work on a plan to get his boss to stop hating him but deep down he knew it wasn’t going to happen.

Not without a wife or fiancée to make me “responsible.”

“Okay.” She nodded. “I can believe that.”

“Do you normally grill people when they offer you help? Or am I getting special treatment?”

A delicate pink flush fanned out across her cheeks. “This is kind of unchartered territory for me.”

“Accepting help?”

“Technically I haven’t accepted it yet. I only said yes to a drink.” Her lips quirked. Okay, so she
did
have a sense of humor. “And yes, I tend to work alone.”

“What do you do?”

“I’m a credit risk analyst for a bank. I look at credit applications that fall outside the basic decisioning software and determine whether or not we should approve the loan.” She plucked her glasses from her head and cleaned them on the edge of her skirt. “It’s a lot of numbers and thinking. I’m given applications to work on and I tend to do most of it by myself, other than dealing with my boss. What about you?”

“I’m a personal image consultant.” He waited for the standard response of judgment but Bailey simply waited for him to expand. “I work with people to improve the way they’re perceived by others. Sometimes it’s people who’ve ended up in a situation where the media is painting them in a poor light or they’ve had an interview go badly and now out of context quotes are being circulated. We have a digital team that helps improve the search engine results associated with their name or business as well.”

“So you make people look good?”

“That’s pretty much it. I work mostly with people in the entertainment industry.”

“Why did you pick that job?”

He thought about giving her some smooth, non-committal answer but something prompted him to share a real piece of himself. Perhaps it was because she appeared to have no hidden agenda, nothing to hide. It seemed kind of liberating.

“I had a bit of a reputation growing up. I struggled through school, hung out with a bad crowd…caused my parents a lot of grief.” He regretted every gray hair he’d put on his parents’ heads. “But I realized that reputation doesn’t always reflect what a person is really like. People thought I was worse than what I was. They placed blame on me for things I didn’t do because they thought I was bad. So now I help people with perception issues because I know what it’s like to be in their shoes.”

She nodded, seemingly satisfied with his answer. “Are you here for the convention?”

“Yeah. There’s an author here who I want on my client list, but my boss is trying to give the lead to another colleague.” His lip curled at the thought.

“I’m assuming this is the problem you want to be distracted from.” She drained the last of her wine and he was struck by how smooth and creamy her neck was. In contrast to the black silk top, her skin was porcelain white. Unmarked and lustrous, like a pearl.

He swallowed against the dryness in his mouth. “That would be it.”

“Why is she giving your client to someone else?”

“She wants me out, so she’s trying to make her prize poodle look better than I do. She’ll block me from having a client and then pass the lead off to him. He’s a yes-man.” He grunted. “He’s also not as good at his job as I am. He
won’t
be able to handle the client.”

“There must be a reason she’s doing this. I find it hard to believe it’s simply because she wants someone other than you to be successful.” Lines formed across her nose as she scrunched it up.

“Oh, there’s another reason all right.”

Pause. “Do I have to drag it out of you?”

“I slept with her daughter.” God, it sounded so slimy without the context. And it
was
slimy, but not because of him. “I didn’t know they were related at the time.”

“Oh.”

“We met at some industry thing and we hit it off,” Lance said, feeling the need to defend himself further. “She knew who I was and that her mother wouldn’t approve, so she kept it quiet. I would have backed the hell away if I’d realized the connection.”

“How did you figure out who she was?”

“I saw a picture of them together on my boss’s desk. I confronted her and she admitted then that she knew I worked for her mother.” He shook his head, still remembering how duped he’d felt. “So I called it off and that’s when she went to mommy dearest to get revenge.”

Too bad his boss was well-versed in the art of misdirection. None of his usual image improvement techniques would work on her. As for her sneaky daughter, well…she might have caused him hell at work but he had the feeling he’d dodged a bullet with that one.

“I would like to accept your help,” Bailey said suddenly, with a sharp nod of her head.

After he’d told her that story? “You sure about that?”

“Yes. You said before that a stalker wouldn’t call attention to stalking.” Her eyes sparkled. “And an asshole wouldn’t bring attention to…asshole-ing.”

A laugh rumbled deep in his chest. “No, I guess they wouldn’t.”

He’d probably be in a world of pain tomorrow when he went back to the convention without a plan on how to sign Braxton St. John, but he was going to have a hell of a time tonight. And if he was doomed to fail with Janet, why not do it impulsively and with a gorgeous girl by his side? A gorgeous girl who also happened to be serious, responsible, and a whole host of other things that normally turned him off.

But there was also something vulnerable about her beneath the tidy exterior and sharp, assessing gaze. She’d been hurt. Badly.

“You know,” he said, drumming his fingers against his thigh. “We could do more than get your watch back.”

“What do you mean?”

“Your ex is a jerk. Why not use this opportunity to teach him a lesson?” Lance grinned. “Make him jealous. Let him know what he’s missing.”

There was a strange impulse swirling around inside him; he wanted to avenge Bailey’s honor. Help her get one over the guy who’d stolen something precious from her. And, from what he could tell, the ex had gotten away scot-free. Which wasn’t right.

“And how exactly would I do that?” Bailey asked with a raised brow. “It’s not like he’s pining over the loss of our relationship. He was practically laughing as he walked out the door.”

“People want what they can’t have. It’s fundamental human behavior. When you were together you were available and for guys like him that’s too easy.”

“You say that like you know him,” she said with a smirk.

“Trust me, I may not know him personally but I know the type. And I also know how to make a person look appealing.”

“And you think you can do that for me?” she scoffed. “What are you going to do, whip off my glasses and fluff out my hair? This isn’t Strictly Ballroom.”

“It’s nothing to do with how you look; you’re gorgeous as you are. And I happen to think the glasses are goddamn sexy.”

A pink flush crept up her neck as she cleared her throat. “Okay then, Mr. Image Consultant. How are we going to make Julian realize what he’s missing?”

“I’m going to pretend to be your boyfriend.”

Chapter Three

Bailey shook her head to make sure she hadn’t accidentally fallen asleep and started dreaming. “Say what now?”

“I’ll pretend to be your boyfriend,” Lance repeated. “He’ll see you with another man and you can approach him in front of the new girlfriend so she knows what a bastard he is. Get the watch, get revenge. It’s perfect.”

“It’s risky.”

“Risky is what I do best. Besides, don’t you think a little public humiliation is in order?”

“He
would
find it embarrassing.” She tapped a finger to her chin. “He hates any kind of ‘dirty laundry’ being aired.”

Bailey had decided that she liked Lance the Image Consultant. And that was always a decision she made consciously based on how a person presented himself to her. So far he’d proven himself to be helpful
and
truthful, qualities she regarded highly in companions. Not that she viewed him as a companion…more of an accomplice.

Although that did have a kind of criminal vibe to it.

“What happens if he doesn’t believe us? I’m not a good actress and he might not buy that someone like you would be interested in someone like me.”

Lance frowned. “Why the hell not?”

“Because you’re…well…” Oh dear, now she’d said too much. “I’m not exactly the kind of woman who attracts a lot of suitors.”

“Suitors?” Lance blinked.

“I don’t go on a lot of dates.” God, how could this conversation be any more awkward? “I’m not the kind of woman that men are generally attracted to.”

“How do you know that?”

“I just do. So,” she said, wanting to move the conversation on before she mortified herself further, “you think acting as my fake boyfriend will convince him to give the watch back?”

“I think it will rattle him, which is exactly what we want. Get him off guard so that he can’t dodge your request. Plus, it sounds like you deserve a little payback, don’t you think?”

Payback. She would never have thought herself a vindictive person. Such emotions didn’t fit with her view of the world. But after seeing Julian on the arm of some gorgeous—not to mention famous—woman, she couldn’t deny that making him think she’d moved on so easily would soothe some of the scratches and dents on her ego.

“You’re right. Besides, I don’t see any major risks.” She thought hard for a moment, running through some possible scenarios in her head. “I mean, if this is what it will take to get my watch back, then I’ll do it.”

A thrill shot through her. She felt daring and mischievous; nothing like the boring prude Julian had made her out to be. And the thought of getting to pretend—even if only for a few moments—that a guy like Lance would be interested in her made her tummy flip.

“According to the conference schedule, Selena is having a meet and greet with her super fans at the moment,” he said, tapping at his phone’s screen. “That should finish up in about half an hour. Do you think he’s with her?”

She fingered the neatly tied bow at the neckline of her blouse. “I’m not sure.”

Julian hadn’t spent a lot of time with Bailey, but she wasn’t sure if that was because it was her preference or his. Alone time was an important part of her day and she thought he respected that. Turned out that
his
alone time wasn’t quite as solitary as she’d thought.

“Why don’t we swing by and take a look?” Lance brought the scotch glass to his lips and tipped his head back, exposing the bob of his Adam’s apple as he swallowed.

A tingling sensation skittered over her skin and her hands contracted as if warming up for something. She had to fight the urge to splay her fingers against his chest.

What on earth is wrong with you? You came here to finally cut ties with one man, not replace him with another.

“Sure. Do you know where it is?” She pushed off the chair and adjusted her skirt.

His gray-green eyes swept over her without rushing. When some men looked at her, it felt as if it was an invasion of privacy. But with Lance it was different. He made her feel soft and gooey, like her bones were made of caramel. A thought whispered to her, telling her how good it would feel if it were his hands all over her rather than his eyes.

“It’s in Café Mascarade, the French place.” He stood and held a hand out for her to walk ahead. “Ready?”

Hell no, I’m not ready.

Confronting Julian was going to push her to her limits and even though she knew her reasoning was sound on paper, a good argument didn’t always get her what she wanted. Apparently that was called the “Human Element” according to her boss.

Well, according to
her,
the Human Element sucked.

“Yep, ready as ever,” she said, sliding her bag over one shoulder and walking past Lance toward the exit.

He followed her as they wove through the crowd and made their way out of the bar. She felt his presence with each step, felt the heat radiating from him. Felt the slow, sensual coil of his spicy aftershave winding its way through her nervous system.

If her cheeks reflected her internal temperature, she’d be able to stop traffic.

“Café Mascarade is over there,” he said as they found themselves in the lobby.

A group of women in “My Book Boyfriend Is Better than Yours” T-shirts walked past, laughing and chatting like a flock of happy birds. They were all carrying tote bags filled to bursting point.

“So all these people are here because they like romance novels?” she asked as they crossed the lobby.

“Yep. Romance is big business.” A wicked smile curved on his lips. “Are you a fan?”

“I may have read one or two,” she replied. “My mother was into Kathleen Woodiwiss. I stole
The Flame and the Flower
off her bookshelf and read it under the covers with a flashlight when I was fourteen.”

But the truth was she didn’t read much romance these days. Perhaps it was because it reminded her of how she’d never felt the way the women did in romance novels. Cherished. Special.

Loved
.

Nowadays she read mostly nonfiction because those books had a tangibly positive effect on her, rather than acting like a giant neon sign that flashed the word “loser” over and over.

“What about you?” she asked. “Are you a closet romance fanatic?”

“I’m more of a fantasy reader. Dragons, medieval politics, death, and mayhem…that kind of thing.”

They stopped in the entrance of the café, which had been decked out to look like a Paris sidewalk. Ornate chairs were seated at small, square tables and fancy chalkboards hung from the walls with crescent-shaped croissants drawn in the corners. A large group was buzzing with energy in the back of the café, and Bailey easily spotted Selena reigning over her fans like a beloved queen.

It took a moment for her to spot Julian. But there he was, seated beside Selena and looking up at her adoringly.

Gimme a bucket.

“Why don’t we sit down and have something to eat? That way they won’t slip out without us noticing.” He grabbed her hand and tugged her towards an empty table at the front.

“How did you two meet?” he asked.

“We worked together,” she said, flipping a menu open. “We
still
work together.”

“That must be awkward.”

She shrugged. “I keep to myself, so I don’t have to deal with it. Not a lot of people realized we were dating anyway.”

“Did you keep it a secret?”

“Not on purpose. I’m not big on having everyone know my business. He didn’t seem to tell people, either. So it never got around.”

“Why did you break up?”

“I found him sexting with one of the women from our office.” She chewed at the inside of her lip until the metallic twang of blood seeped onto her tongue. “I don’t know if he ever went through with the stuff they talked about in the messages, but it didn’t matter. I can’t be with someone like that.”

You deserve more.
Sometimes she didn’t believe the words, but her grandfather had said she had to repeat them over and over until it came naturally. Then one day she might believe it.

The conversation paused as the server took their orders. Thinking about confronting Julian had stolen Bailey’s appetite but she hadn’t eaten anything since before she got on the plane. Her stomach grumbled as if trying to remind her of its existence.

“So he’s a thief and a cheat,” he said.

“And a liar. I think they call that the hat trick.”

He chuckled and popped the cufflinks out of his shirt, pocketing them and then rolling his sleeve up his well-defined forearm. Bailey had a thing for forearms and his were the kind that looked like a tall glass of water to a thirsty woman.

Her gaze zeroed in on the fine blond hairs sprinkled like gold dust along his sun-tanned skin. The silver band of his watch glinted in the light as he moved, switching to his other arm. Rolled up sleeves should have made her feel anything unusual, but the way he did it, so slow and languid—as though he was fully aware of the effect he had on her—made it all the more enticing.

Her mind carried the action forward, this tame and benign form of undressing extrapolating out until she pictured him unbuttoning his shirt and yanking at the belt on his waist. Sliding the wool pants down his legs.

“So, how long have we been going out?” she asked, cringing at how soft and breathy her voice had become.

You’re one step short of being a drooling animal.
Get a goddamn grip, Bailey Amanda Reuben!

But the only thing she wanted to get a grip on was
him
.

“How long ago did you break up?”

“Only six weeks.”

“Okay, why don’t we say we’ve been dating for a month?” A slow grin stretched across his face. “We’re still in the honeymoon phase and having lots of fantastic sex. How does that sound?”

How did it sound? Like everything she hadn’t realized that she’d wanted until this very moment.

Sipping on her water, she willed her hormones to stop screaming at her. “That sounds good.”

Now she understood how Lance had been duped by his boss’s daughter. He was the kind of guy who inadvertently encouraged women to do stupid things to be with him. Lying, scheming, deception. All of it.

Magic wasn’t something she believed in, of course, but he had a charisma that bordered on supernatural in the way that it pulled you in. Like an otherworldly magnetic force that plugged straight into her lady parts.

“My boyfriend…” She played with the idea in her mind as a cat might play with a toy on a string.

Want curled low in her gut. For once she wouldn’t seem weak. She wouldn’t be poor little Bailey, “the weird girl,” ending up on her own yet again. False as it might be, the promise of Julian’s shocked face was tempting.
Very
tempting.

“How do you think he’ll react?” Lance asked as their food arrived at the table.

“He’ll be surprised, I think.” The scent of freshly baked pastries wafted up and tickled her nose. She tore off one end of the croissant and then popped it into her mouth, chewing as she considered the possibilities. “Jealous? I don’t know. I guess I’m not too good at predicting these kinds of things.”

“Right.”

“He’s the kind of guy who always likes to have the upper hand and to be the one in a position of power. Seeing me with you…” She busied herself with pulling apart the rest of the flaky pastry. “Well, you’re clearly an upgrade.”

“Are you flirting with me, Bailey?”

“I don’t flirt.” She reached for her drink and relished the cooling liquid rushing down her throat. “I’m simply stating a fact. According to the things humans find conventionally attractive, you tick many boxes.”

He raised a blond brow. “How so?”

“You’re very…symmetrical.”

The sound of his laugh was like thunder rumbling in the distance. Something she should have taken as a warning but instead she found compelling and kind of thrilling. “I don’t think anyone has ever said that to me before.”

“Oh, it’s true. Your eyes are set apart a nice distance and your nose is straight. I can see…” She paused when she realized that he hadn’t meant it as an invitation for her to explain her theory. “You have a nice face.”

“So do you.”

She shrugged and fought the natural urge to dodge the compliment with a counter argument. “Thanks.”

“I don’t know your ex, but my gut tells me that he made a stupid mistake in letting you go.” Lance bit into his cherry Danish and his tongue darted out to catch a smear of red jam at the corner of his lip. “People don’t usually get you, do they?”

A lump formed in her throat. “What makes you say that?”

“You’re quirky.”

She rolled her eyes. “That’s a polite way of putting it.”

She’d been called a lot of things over the years—weirdo, freak, oddball. All because she preferred to work on puzzles and equations rather than play kickball with the neighborhood kids. Then when she’d come to San Francisco to start her career, she hadn’t fit in there either. She might have studied in a big city, but she was still a small town country girl at heart. Quirky, as far as name-calling went, was a tiny pebble among much bigger sticks and stones.

“It’s a good thing. Everyone else is so concerned with being normal that they squish themselves into these molds until we can’t tell one person from the next.” Lance paused. “I find you refreshing.”

That was certainly a first. “Thank you?”

“You can drop the question mark. I mean it as a compliment.”

Bailey was pondering what to say next when there was movement at the back of the café. She turned as people poured out, the women chatting to one another as they went. They all carried matching pink bags with
Lockhart’s Lovelies
printed on the side. Gifts, she presumed, from the queen herself.

“Get ready,” he said. “They’re headed our way.”

…

Lance watched a wave of changing emotion roll over Bailey’s face like the shifting colors of a kaleidoscope. Day after day, he worked with people trying to make some kind of impression—good, bad, or in-between—and yet none of them had the impact on him that she did.

She had her back to Selena and her ex. But the closer they came, the more she sat frozen like an ice sculpture. They neared the table, Selena’s heels clicking nosily across the floor, and Bailey hadn’t moved a muscle. In a few seconds they’d walk right on by, the opportunity to catch them unawares would be lost.