DANE WAITED for me just outside the double bronze doors of Tigris.
I watched him from across the casino as he scanned the crowd, then checked his watch. Already purposely ten minutes late, I decided another few minutes of forcing Dane to cool his heels might get him hot under the collar—a distraction I could use.
Paxton Dane was a veritable living, breathing, reminder of the old adage: If something is too good to be true, it usually is. Tonight, he sported a pair of fitted, creased jeans, a plaid button-down under a camel blazer, a flash of gold on the wrist, and those expensive-looking kickers.
Wavy brown hair begged fingers to run through it. Emerald eyes softened the sharp planes of his face. Full lips, normally curved in wry amusement, now were pulled tight by anger. He wore a look of self-awareness—he was a hunk and he knew it.
I bet Dane hadn’t been turned down by a female since grade school.
Good thing I no longer had that libido problem.
Anger flashed in Dane’s eyes as I walked up, then he hid it behind a forced smile. “There you are. You know, they’ll only hold our reservation for fifteen minutes.”
“I’m really sorry. This job of mine!” I shook my head as I hooked my arm through his.
If he could pretend to be a good guy, I could pretend to be happy to see him.
He visibly relaxed as he escorted me through the bronze doors into another world. The ceilings low, the lighting subtle, Tigris commanded the top of a very short list of exquisite five-star restaurants in Vegas.
Silk carpets in bright colors hung in loops from the ceiling, tightly woven straw mats covered mahogany floors, burnished to a dark shine, palm trees grew from patches of sandy soil—a Vegas interpretation of a sultan’s luxurious tent. Torches, real flame under glass, lit the path through the tables. Sumerian treasures adorned the walls. Somewhere, there was a very early Greek reproduction of the Code of Hammurabi, but I didn’t see it as we followed a young woman to our table next to the window.
In contrast to the slick elegance of most top restaurants, the tables in Tigris were made of intricate inlaid mosaic. The glassware was sturdy and blue. Omer, the culinary genius in charge of Tigris, was an unknown, self-taught, Turkish chef when The Big Boss had found him slaving away at a very nice restaurant in Oman.
Now the toast of Vegas, Omer was no longer little known.
Roham, our waiter tonight, waited at my chair with a big grin. “Miss O’Toole, so good to see you!”
I let him seat me. “I see they haven’t sent you back to Iran.”
“Not yet,” he said. His smile lit his dark eyes. “You want Wild Turkey, neat.” A statement, not a question. He nodded at Dane. “May I offer you a beverage?”
“Bring me a Bud in a cold glass.”
“Ah, Budweiser—full-bodied, with a delicate bouquet and light finish. We recommend that in a pairing with the sea bass tonight—most excellent.”
A smile tugging at one side of his mouth, Dane watched Roham retreat. “Friend of yours?”
“Acquaintance. Why?”
“Same sense of humor.” Dane shook out his napkin and placed it in his lap. “Is he really from Iran? Aren’t we at war with them or something?”
“Not yet. And he’s an American citizen, born in Phoenix to Iranian parents. Roham enjoys pretending he’s the real deal—the girls find it ‘exotic and dangerous’—his words, not mine.”
“You seem to know a lot about him.”
“You’d be amazed at what I know.”
If Dane had a guilty conscience, that didn’t prick it. He was either very good, or totally amoral. Neither of those gave me warm fuzzies.
Fishing for a foothold, I said, “Thanks for backing me up on the cat this morning.”
“Our secret.” He opened his menu, then looked at me over the top of it. “Do you know what you want already?”
“No.” Nervous, I played with my forks. “I usually let Roham order for me.”
“Really?” Dane scanned down the menu. “I don’t even know what some of this stuff is. He could bring you eye of newt and hair of frog and you’d never know.”
“Not if he knows what’s good for him.” I forced myself to quit playing with the flatware. Instead, I folded my hands in my lap. “You, on the other hand, have already offended his sensibilities with your Bud, so I’d be careful.”
He returned to scanning his menu for a moment, then snapped it shut. “There’s only one thing to do.”
“And that is?”
“Throw myself on your mercy and hope that Roham will treat me kindly,” he stated, still avoiding my eyes.
“Coward.”
Dane grinned. “Could you just make sure that, whatever he brings me, I can identify it?”
I assumed he could identify sheep’s eyes and the pigs’ penises (apparently both delicacies), but I didn’t think that was what he had in mind.
Roham returned with our drinks—mine he set before me with a flourish, Dane’s he held between two fingers, a look of disgust on his face.
“Would you quit?” I laughed. “It’s not like he’s the first Texan you’ve served.”
“Texas! The Lone Star State?” A smile split Roham’s face. His black eyes danced with merriment. “I knew a girl from Texas once. She…how do you say it?” He thought for a moment, then announced, “I know! She filled my hands!”
Dane stared at him blankly.
I burst out laughing—that visual thing again. “I think you mean she was a handful.”
“Yes! That’s it!” His grin disappeared as his brows crinkled. “That’s not what I said?” The kid had the whole Iranian, English-is-my-second-language charade down pat. I wondered if he’d ever thought of doing stand-up.
“Almost, but not quite.”
Roham gestured toward Dane and spoke as if he couldn’t hear. “Who is this man, this Texan, to you?”
“This is Mr. Dane. He works in Security.”
“So sorry, I thought maybe this dinner wasn’t business.” Roham’s face fell as he bowed his head slightly toward Dane. “My pleasure. I am Roham.”
“The pleasure is all mine,” Dane said, with a trace of a smile.
My thoughts whirled as I struggled against falling into an easy camaraderie with him. Something about the whole bum thing didn’t feel right. Maybe my libido was leading me astray again, but smart men like Dane were usually as adept as women with a few bums under their belts at sniffing out creeps like Irv Gittings.
“Roham, why don’t you bring me the sea bass and Mr. Dane a steak? Salads to start?”
“You are not trusting Roham tonight?” He sounded offended.
“I’m not feeling very adventurous. No offense.”
Roham gave me the eye, then turned to Dane and asked, “Mr. Texas, how would you like your steak prepared?”
“Rare.”
“Very good.”
“And your sea bass?” he asked me.
“Not rare.”
Grumbling, but apparently satisfied, he left us.
Outside the window, the hanging gardens and their many waterfalls beckoned—a lush oasis in the desert. Like wild animals clustered around a single pool of freshwater, our guests jostled and jousted for a prime position, angling their chairs so the last ray of sunlight landed on their already bronzed skin. Servers darted between guests, their trays laden with frozen tropical drinks (minus the little umbrellas—The Big Boss hated those things), plates of mouthwatering fruit and bowls of sorbets and ice creams—all designed to sooth and refresh.
Still hours away, nightfall would change the whole feel of the gardens. As the sun disappeared over the horizon, pulling its trailing rays after it, peace would descend on the gardens. Birds would coo in the treetops as they prepared to rest for the night. Under the soft light, lovers would stroll hand in hand along the pathways under the lush vegetation, seeking the darkened corners or private pools.
“You didn’t answer his question.”
“What question?” I asked, still imagining lovers strolling through the gardens, safe from view, hidden by a cloak of darkness. So real was my imagining, I almost had to blink my eyes against the brightness of the day as I fought to bring Dane into focus.
“What I am to you.” Dane took a swig of his beer straight from the bottle. Roham had neglected to bring a glass.
“Now, that’s a good question, isn’t it?”
The rapt attention of an incredibly good-looking man, and I didn’t feel a thing. For once, my body had not only received my brain memo about Dane, it actually listened. I leaned over the table. “Look around you. Do you see this place, these people?”
“Sure.” A quizzical expression replaced his smile. “And your point is?”
“This is my home. These people are all my family—The Big Boss especially. He took me in and gave me a chance when no one else would.”
“You still haven’t made your point.”
“I’ll see you in hell before I let you or anybody jeopardize them.”
“Why would you think I would do that?” He leaned over, putting a hand on top of mine, his eyes like green lasers locked onto mine. “Aren’t you forgetting I work here, too?”
His hand on mine, and still I felt nothing. “You may work here, but you spend a fair amount of time with the competition.”
“The competition?” His voice mocked me.
“Irv Gittings.”
As if singed by a name, he jerked his hand away. “Why the hell would you think that?” His anger didn’t completely hide his surprise.
“Because you visit him on a regular basis.”
“How do you know that?”
“This is Vegas—you can find out anything if you know who to ask.” I watched him working hard to control his temper. “What I can’t figure out is, are you a good witch or a bad witch?”
“Look, I didn’t want to lie to you, but I wasn’t sure who I could trust.”
“You said that before—after your first lie, right before your second.” I placed my napkin on the table and stood to leave. “All I want to know is whose side are you on? Apparently, you aren’t going to tell me. If that’s the case, this dinner is over.”
“Want to fill me in on those e-mails Irv’s been sending to you? Those were pretty remarkable e-mails, by the way.” Dane looked up at me, accusation in his eyes. “If you tell me what you two are planning, perhaps I can get the district attorney to go easy on you.”
“What?” I said, my voice raised in indignation, the white-hot heat of fury barely contained. I felt rather than saw heads turn in our direction. “How dare you! Did you see any replies?”
“Only one.” He glanced nervously around. “Would you sit down? Everyone is staring.”
“And what was my reply?” My voice was low, cold. My eyes all slitty. The son of a bitch.
“I’m paraphrasing here, but pretty much you told him to go to hell—in a nice way, of course.” He tossed the line off as if he didn’t put any credence in my response.
“Of course, always the lady, just like my mother taught me to be,” I sneered. “So, let me get this straight. You accuse me of the most vile form of betrayal imaginable based solely on several e-mails from Irv, which you took at face value. Yet, you declined to give the same consideration to my response, because it refuted what you wanted to believe—that I was a traitor to those I hold dear?”
Dane eyed me calmly, his arms crossed over his chest.
For once, I was glad the steak knife was out of my reach.
“Irv’s e-mails implied you two were negotiating—he kept upping the ante. For all I know, you could have been meeting him somewhere.”
I was standing there, my face flushed, my breathing rapid, weighing the punishment for homicide against the benefits, when Cindy, the head cocktail waitress, tapped me on the shoulder. “Ms. O’Toole, if you’re looking for the ladies room, head toward the bar and hang a left. It’s down the hall on your right.”
“Thanks, but I’m not looking for the bathroom,” I said. “I’m debating whether to throw my drink on my dinner partner or just leave with my dignity intact. The latter would be classier, but the first option would be so much more satisfying. What do you think? The drink in his face or the high road?”
A smile tugged at the corner of the girl’s mouth as she put a hand on her hip and gave Dane the once-over. “Good-lookin’ guys are the worst, but no reason to sacrifice your dignity, you know.”
“So, the high road?”
“Yeah, don’t give him the satisfaction.” With that, she stuck her nose in the air, whirled on her heels, and retreated to the bar.
“I’m beginning to understand the term ‘rapier wit,’” Dane said with a grimace.
“Anger sharpens it to a fine point,” I snarled.
“Would you sit down? People are watching,” Dane asked again.
“You said that before.” I looked around the room. Nobody would meet my eye. “Do you think I give a rat’s ass?”
“You are the most difficult woman.” Dane took a deep breath then let it out. “Look, I’ve missed a lot in this investigation—there’s a bunch about Vegas I don’t understand. And, I’ve gotten a girl killed. So please, sit, listen to me.” He tugged my hand. “I was wrong about you in the beginning. Tonight, I wanted to punch your buttons, see how you reacted. Look at it from my position—”
“Everyone’s guilty until proven innocent?” Tired of being the center of attention and secretly afraid someone would call Security—which would be rather interesting, but not exactly what I wanted to deal with right now, I sat back down and refolded my napkin in my lap.
“I walked in here cold—I didn’t know who I could trust, so I trusted no one.” Dane sighed and ran his fingers through his wavy hair. Under the facade he presented, he looked worn out, ragged around the edges. “I would like the chance to tell you the truth—I hope you believe me.”
“I’ll listen, but if I get even a whiff of bullshit, I’m outta here.”
“I understand your feelings—” Dane started.
“Patronizing a woman hovering on the brink of homicide is not wise.”
He took a deep breath and glanced around at the people near us. “I’m one of the good guys.”
His timing impeccable, Roham interrupted with our salads, which he placed before us with a flourish. “Would you like fresh ground pepper?”
We both shook our heads. Neither one of us picked up a fork as we watched him walk away. And then, as if all the lights of understanding lit in my head at once, all the pieces of the puzzle came together, and I saw it whole for the first time.
“You work undercover for the Gaming Control Board,” I said when we were again alone.
Dane looked at me for a moment. Was he weighing whether to tell me the truth, or inventing another lie? “How’d you know?”
“I didn’t, and I still don’t know it for sure—if you think I’m going to take your word for it, then I got a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. But it fits.” I picked up my fork and attacked my salad. “I’ll check out your story tomorrow.”
“Check away.” Dane crinkled his brow. “Fits with what?”
“The Control Board knew about the irregularities at the Athena—”
“How did you—?” Dane interrupted.
“This is Vegas…”
“You can find out anything if you know who to ask,” he finished my sentence.
“Anyway,” I continued. “If they knew about the fancy bookkeeping and no arrests had been made, then it figures they have an investigator in place.”
I forked in another bite of salad. I never knew goat cheese, pine nuts, pears and avocado, all on a bed of tender baby spinach and dripped in balsamic vinaigrette worked so well together. “Lyda Sue tipped you guys off, then she became your insider.”
“Did she tell you that?”
I shook my head. “She didn’t have to. She was in line for a management job at a hotel on the Strip. I’m guessing it was the Athena. But she had a problem—a less than stellar background. The Big Boss was helping her fix that.”
“Fix it?” Dane cocked one eyebrow at me.
“Erase it, change it. Why should Lyda Sue be punished for a bad choice circumstances forced on her when she was a kid?”
“I’ll overlook the obvious illegality of tampering with state records.”
“Sometimes—”
“You need to do the wrong thing for the right reasons?” Again, Dane completed my sentence. I wasn’t sure I liked it.
“Lyda Sue met you out at Mona’s place, didn’t she?”
He nodded.
“So, how come you were surprised she was a former hooker?” I asked. “One would suspect that anyone who had intimate knowledge of a whorehouse used to work there.”
“She told me the madam was the mother of a friend of hers. I had no reason not to believe her—and it wasn’t important enough to check out anyway,” Dane said, as he concentrated on pushing the spinach leaves around his plate.
After polishing off the last bite of my salad, I shoved my plate to the side. Some friend I turned out to be. “Irv got wise to The Big Boss and Lyda Sue—Willie probably told Felicia, who took it to Irv.”
“How would Willie know?” Dane was clearly interested in the story now.
“He sat in Security every time he waited to fly.”
Dane nodded as the light dawned. “If you have access to Security, you have access to the world. You see a lot of stuff.”
“Felicia has worked here a long time—long enough to know Lyda Sue’s former profession. Irv used it to blackmail Lyda Sue into getting The Big Boss on that helicopter.” I smiled and shook my head. “I’d even be willing to bet she told The Big Boss the whole scheme as she knew it, and he agreed to play along, hoping to turn the tables on Ol’ Irv.”
“So, did Irv plot the murder or was it Felicia Reilly?” Dane asked.
“That we don’t know—not without Miss Reilly.”
“She’s long gone,” Dane said, then waited while Roham delivered fresh drinks and whisked away the empties. “She didn’t strike me as stupid—she’s smart enough to know she’s up shit creek without a paddle.”
“Maybe so, but it’s hard to go far without any cash.”
“How do you know she’s short on cash?”
“Let’s just say I’ve made an educated guess.”
Dane took a sip of beer, his eyes never leaving mine. “You know where she is?”
“I’m working on that.”
“You’re not going to tell me?”
I held his gaze. “No.”
Roham interrupted the tension with our dinner. We both sat in silence as he placed our plates in front of us, then removed the covers with a flourish. My mouth watered at the aroma rising from the sea bass. One bite and I knew the master himself had assisted in the preparation.
When we were alone again, I asked Dane, “Did The Big Boss know you were playing both sides?”
“No, but to his credit, he didn’t trust me. He made you my keeper. I’ll have to remember to thank him for that.” Dane forked in a bite of the bloodiest piece of steak I’d ever seen, a look of gustatory delight on his face.
“Does cannibalism run in your family?”
“No? We’re Methodists,” he said. “Why?”
I motioned to the steak.
“Oh, it’s a Texas thing.”
As I settled into my meal, I said, “Why don’t you tell me about Texas?”
We lingered over the exquisite food. Omer would have had my head if I’d rushed, so it was a good thing Dane was a fairly adept conversationalist—for a Texan. And he could spin the tale tall about three boys growing up in west Texas.
Dane polished off dessert and two cups of fully leaded coffee, both of which would have kept me awake into next week. I watched in awe.
Finally, when the plates were cleared, I rose to go and said, “Come with me. I need to make a quick trip through the kitchen.”
Dane followed as I burst through the kitchen doors. “Omer! What a feast! You outdid yourself once again.”
The rotund chef bristled with pride. He bowed his head, acknowledging my praise.
“And Roham—a delight as always.” I turned and applauded the entire staff in the kitchen. “Bravo to all and many thanks.”
Dane again trailed in my wake as I made my way through the bar, calling each of the wait staff and bartenders by name. I paused at the hostess stand to add a tip to the bill and sign it.
“Do you know everybody in this hotel?” Dane whispered.
“Almost. These folks are my family”
“Hey, the dinner was supposed to be on me,” Dane said, when he realized what I was doing.
“Tonight it’s on The Big Boss. I figure he owes us.”
“How so? He’s still in up to his eyeballs.” Dane reached for my hand.
I shook my head and put my hands in my pockets as we pushed out the doors and into the barely controlled chaos of another night just getting underway in the casino.
“He’s in the clear—at least that’s what Willie told the police.”
Dane stopped midstride, then he shook his head and chuckled. “You really play your cards close to the vest, don’t you?”
I didn’t feel the need to answer. The question was probably rhetorical anyway.
“So, what about Felicia Reilly?” Dane put a hand on my elbow, steering me through the crowd. “What do we do about her?”
“I have a plan, but I need to work on it a bit before I tell you.”
“Still don’t trust me?”
“Would you trust you if you were me?”
“Somewhere in that fractured syntax lurks a good question.” Dane’s lips curled into a smile, this time one that actually reached his eyes. “And my answer would be no; I wouldn’t trust me if I were you.”
At least he’d dropped the lying thing.
“So, you left Pahrump when you were fifteen?” Dane maneuvered me around the blackjack tables toward the rear doors.
“If you really must know?”
“I must.”
“I’ll give you the short history of Lucky O’Toole, then I want to talk about something else. I moved here when I was fifteen and started working for The Big Boss as a cabana girl. Worked my way up from there. Got a college degree. Kept moving up the food chain.”
“And your mother?”
“She waved good-bye as I left.”
“I see.”
He didn’t see at all, but I didn’t want to discuss it. What kind of mother would let her fifteen-year-old daughter move to Vegas, lie about her age, and go to work every day in a bikini?
“Any other family?”
“You got the short history. Now, pick another topic.”
“Okay.” Dane stood and extended his hand. “Let’s walk.”
Again, I ignored his proffered hand. “A walk would be good, then I need to hit the trade show opening.”
“Trade show?”
“In conjunction with the adult movie awards. Sex-a-Rama. You might want to come; I understand Miranda’s doing a pole dance.”
He shot me a pained look. “I think I’ve reached my humiliation quota for the week.”
We decided on a stroll through the hanging gardens. Dusk diffused the sunlight into gossamer shimmers that filtered through the leaves of the trees high above. A few straggling sun worshipers, either desperate to catch the waning sunlight or comatose after an afternoon of margaritas, lay prostrate on the lounge chairs in the few remaining pockets of sunlight. Soon, the shadows would chase them inside.
The deck hands and cabana girls busied themselves with cleanup. One cocktail waitress wandered through the dwindling crowd.
“Can I ask you a personal question?” Dane said.
“Another one?” I bent down to retrieve a plastic cup from under one of the chairs. “One was your quota.”
“What’s up with you and Theodore?”
I searched for a trash can and disposed of the cup.
“Avoiding the question?” he asked when I returned.
“No, formulating an answer.”
We sat on boulders next to one of the waterfalls. The sound of cascading water had a primal effect on me—I could sit for hours listening to the gurgles and crashes as if the water could wash my soul clean. Trailing my fingers through the cool water, I smiled at its sensuous feel as it tripped past.
“I really don’t know what’s up with Teddie and me.”
“That’s not an answer, that’s evasion.”
“No, it’s honesty,” I replied. “Teddie is my best friend, but he wants to be more. I don’t know if I can handle that.”
“So, you’re still fair game?”