20. Wren

CHAPTER 20

Wren

I t should have been awkward.

More awkward, I mean. Of course it was weird—I was having a candlelit dinner with my freaking boss, my hot freaking boss—but it could have been so much worse. I could have been squirming in my seat.

Instead, all I felt was a mild sense of unease as Blane chatted about the gambling industry and asked me how I liked living in Las Vegas.

“In a normal month, I mean,” he clarified. “Obviously, things are difficult at the moment.”

“It’s better than Wyoming.”

“In what way?”

“I guess…I guess it’s easier to slide by unnoticed.”

“You don’t want to be noticed?”

Instinctively, I shuddered. After Dominic cheated on me, it hadn’t taken long for the whispers to spread through the neighbourhood in Cheyenne, probably because he’d begun parading Becky around like some kind of prize. Everyone knew he’d done me dirty. And even though it was him who cheated, him who schemed and lied, somehow it was my reputation that had ended up in tatters. Poor little Wren Gillebrand, not good enough to keep a man. Not pretty enough. Not smart enough. Not ambitious enough. Everywhere I went, the pitying looks had followed.

“Better to stay anonymous than to be noticed for the wrong reasons.” I forced a smile and nudged the conversation in a better direction. “Plus there’s so much vibrance here. So much positive energy. Where else can you go with a handful of quarters and turn it into a million bucks?”

“Atlantic City.”

At first, I thought he was being flippant, trying to put me down the way Dominic always used to. Reminding me that he was the knowledgeable one. But then I realised there was no snark in Blane’s tone. No, it was another of those weird cultural missteps he seemed to make on occasion. He genuinely thought I’d asked a question, and he was offering the answer he assumed I wanted.

“Right. Atlantic City.”

“Or Macau, if you want to travel farther afield.”

“Have you been to Macau?”

“A few times.”

Of course he had. Men like Blane travelled the world. Girls like me took the bus from flyover country to Sin City when there was nothing left for us at home.

“How about Atlantic City?”

“A few times,” he said again, but this time, he pulled a face.

“You don’t like it there?”

“The locals leave something to be desired.”

“The locals? Do you mean the Mob or New Jerseyans in general?”

Blane crinkled his nose. “Now that I think about it, I suppose there might have been Mob involvement. ”

He supposed ?

“Are we talking about a particular incident here?”

“Joseph and I were on the Boardwalk two or three years ago, and a woman got upset with him.”

“Why did she get upset?”

“She accused him of staring at her breasts.”

Yikes. “And…was he doing that?”

“Not staring, exactly. But the way they defied gravity was fascinating. And she seemed quite proud of them, judging by her choice of outfit.”

“What was she wearing?”

“A rhinestone-spangled bikini. It did draw the eye somewhat. Anyhow, she threw her soda at Joseph, and then her boyfriend pulled a gun and told us to get out of town if we knew what was good for us. After that, we never went back.”

“Did you report him?”

Blane shook his head, which was odd, seeing as he’d encouraged me to go to the police about Zion. But what would the authorities have done? Probably nothing. If criminals owned cops in Vegas, they sure as heck owned more in Atlantic City.

“There was no need,” Blane said. “Karma took care of the problem.”

“Karma?”

He ate a forkful of caramelised cauliflower. Tonight’s menu was nouvelle cuisine, plate after plate of prettily presented morsels that took us on a culinary tour of Europe. Possibly the most delicious meal I’d ever eaten, but undoubtedly standard fare for a man like Blane.

“The funniest thing happened—his pants caught on fire. And he must have missed the ‘stop, drop, and roll’ lesson because he danced around for a while and then ran into the ocean. ”

“His pants just…caught on fire?”

How could that even happen?

“His lady friend flicked her cigarette end at me, and I guess there was a spark. The big man moves in mysterious ways. Anyhow, I prefer Vegas over Atlantic City, so I can’t say I was devastated when we had to leave.” Blane pointed to my wine glass. “Top up?”

Before we sat down for dinner, I’d vowed to keep my wits about me. I barely knew Blane, and in my experience, no man was this nice without having an angle. He’d said I didn’t need to pay him money for room and board, but what if he expected another type of compensation? The thought should have horrified me, but to my shock, I found I didn’t hate the idea. Not that Blane would ever be interested in a woman like me for more than a quick roll in the sack. A few mindless hours in that enormous bed I’d glimpsed, naked and sweaty and— Stop. What was wrong with me? Blane was my boss . I should be grateful he was acting professional, not wondering if he looked as good out of his suit as he did in it.

“Wren?” He was staring at me expectantly.

“Uh, no. No, thanks. No more wine.” Definitely no more wine. I’d already drunk too much. “Have you always lived in Vegas?”

“No, I moved here six years ago. Coming up to seven soon.”

“Where did you live before?”

He paused to take a mouthful of steamed lemon sole. “I moved around. Vegas is the first place I’ve really felt at home.”

“I guess I can understand that.” Once, I’d hoped Cheyenne might become home, but now that I looked back, I saw I’d only ever been a guest there. No, not a guest. More of an accessory. A small part of Dominic’s life to be taken advantage of until I was no longer useful. The apartment in Vegas might have been small, but it was mine—as long as I paid the rent, anyway—and I hated the idea that I might be forced to leave. “Did you hear anything from Zion yet?”

“No, but I gave him a week to find Caria. I’ll check in with him in the morning. Give him some gentle encouragement.”

A week. So much could happen in a week. Caria could be dead, I could be homeless, and the corrupt cops could sweep it under the carpet.

“I hate the waiting. Can’t you call him tonight?”

“Patience is a virtue, my dad always says, but I view it as more of a necessary evil. And I doubt Zion will have spent much time on the matter so far. He had to get his nose reset, and by all accounts, there’s a multitude of possible locations he needs to check for Caria.”

“I thought you said he just had a nosebleed?”

“Cause and effect.”

“How did his nose get broken?”

“He tripped and ran into my fist.”

I put my head in my hands, and a groan escaped. Making a man like Zion angry definitely wasn’t the smart thing to do.

“What’s wrong?” Blane asked. “You don’t like fish?”

How could he be so dense? “The food is fine. I’m just not sure…” I trailed off because I couldn’t afford to alienate this man, not when he was providing my income, my food, and a roof over my head. And what if he was right and I was wrong? Instinct told me Zion was a loose cannon, but what did I really know about the criminal underworld? Maybe not as much as Blane. Not that I thought he was a criminal or anything, but he had a greyness around the edges.

And perhaps that was why I didn’t push him to act differently… Because if we found Caria, we’d need every bit of that murkiness to set her free.

“No, there’s no problem.” I made an effort to smile. “The food is delicious. You mentioned your dad—are the two of you close?”

“My parents live in a retirement community not too far from here.”

“I meant close as in…close. Like, do you have a good relationship?”

“Right, I see.” He took a sip of wine and considered the question. That alone told me their relationship wasn’t the best. “We’ve had some differences of opinion over the years, but he’s family.”

So was my mom, but I never spoke to her anymore. She hadn’t even put me on her visitor list.

“Do you have any brothers or sisters?”

“Two sisters, one older, one younger. Decima is the bane of my existence, but Aurelia’s a darling. You’ll love her.”

He wanted me to meet his sister? That was…weird.

“Does she live around here?”

“Not too far away—she likes to drop in on occasion. How about you—is Kayden your only sibling?”

“Yup, it’s just the two of us. I haven’t seen my mom in years, and I don’t even know who my dad was.” That was the wine talking because I never normally discussed my screwed-up past. “I guess that’s why Caria means so much to me. Because I’m mostly alone, and she was the first…”—I sniffed back tears—“the first real friend I made.”

Caria was the busiest person I knew. She worked as a waitress in a fancy bar—that was where she’d had the misfortune to meet Laurent—and she studied interior design at college during the day. Part-time, but she’d almost earned her degree now. Plus she went to yoga classes at the Fitness Factory, she jogged in the mornings, and in the pre- Laurent days, she’d ventured out on several dates a week. Despite all that, she’d still found time for me.

She messaged every day, and when I was feeling down, which was often, she always cheered me up.

Her loss was one I’d never get over.

“We’ll find her, I promise. Whatever it takes.”

Blane sounded so confident that I wanted to believe him. Later, I’d look back on that statement and realise it was the one time he didn’t skirt around the truth. Whatever it takes. Would I have acted differently if I’d known what was to come? Would I have run screaming from the building and jumped into the Grand freaking Canyon?

Quite possibly.

“I miss her.”

I struggled to hold back my emotions, and that night, I saw Blane’s sweet side. He dried my cheeks with a handkerchief, then appeared perplexed when the tears kept coming. Finally, he crouched at my side, a little awkwardly, it appeared.

“Aurelia tells me that hugs are the best medicine. Which seems bizarre when you consider that hospitals exist, but if it would help, I’m open to the idea.”

“Caria was a hugger,” I said miserably.

“Caria is a hugger. Think positive.”

“I’m trying,” I whispered.

That was the moment everything changed. When Blane’s arms wrapped around me, I stiffened for a second, then relaxed as the strangest warmth spread through every atom in me. My head fell against his shoulder. His arms tightened, and I’d never felt so safe, so protected, so calm as I did in his embrace. Even with chaos all around, Blane’s aura soothed my senses.

“Aurelia is right,” I mumbled against his shirt.

“So she always tells me. ”

Was this normal? To feel so utterly at peace in a man’s arms? With Dom, all I’d experienced was an unpleasant sense of trepidation because his hugs were usually accompanied by a request to iron his shirts or pick up a slice of pecan pie from the diner.

“I feel weird,” I murmured.

“I feel…confused.”

Confused? I leaned back to look at Blane, to gaze into amber eyes that had lost their usual sharpness. He brushed the hair away from my damp cheeks, and for the briefest moment, I thought he might kiss me. But he only sighed.

“You should get some sleep.”

I didn’t say a word when he picked me up and carried me to the guest room. By rights, I shouldn’t have slept a wink, but when Blane laid me on the thousand-thread-count sheets, my eyelids were so heavy that I couldn’t keep them open.

Maybe I imagined him kissing me on the forehead before he left the room?

Maybe I imagined the brush of his fingertips across my cheek?

Maybe I imagined his whispered words?

Who are you?