chapter One
"I'd like to speak to the owner of this casino." Alexis Baldizzi flashed her prosecutor's badge at the door minion, and fought the urge to just shove past him and start screaming her sister's name. That wouldn't get the results she wanted.
The guard showed no emotion. He just stared down at her from his foot-and-a-half height advantage. "Mr. Carrick is unavailable."
Well, no kidding. He had no appointments open for the next three months, which was why she was flashing her badge. Mr. Carrick could be in the middle of packing away a sushi dinner, schmoozing his way through a shareholders meeting, or reading the latest John Grisham on the commode, and she couldn't care less? she was going to talk to him.Now.
"Look." Alexis fought the crick in her neck from staring up at tall, dark, and dumb. "I can talk to Mr. Carrick now or I can come back with a warrant for his arrest on kidnapping charges." You know, she really loved her job. Power was a beautiful thing. Especially since it was her lovable but naive sister, Brittany, who was the victim she was rescuing this time.
One thick, black eyebrow went up. Then without a word, the guard turned and went to the reception desk a few feet away and spoke to the woman sitting there. They put their heads together and murmured while Alexis rocked on her heels impatiently, scanning the quiet lobby.
Both the guard and the receptionist were tall, with dark hair and luminous, ivory skin. The woman in particular wasgorgeous, the perfect accessory to a well-decorated office building, and Alex was annoyed even further. She had a personal grudge against tall women who looked good in sleek black pantsuits and red lipstick, since they embodied everything that was lacking in Alexis's own appearance.
It also creepedher out a little that the pair looked like twins escaped from a Goth concert. They blended with their surroundings, the modern black-and-white furnishings cool and sleek, industrial design. The entire room?including its inhabitants?had about as much color and appeal as a skunk.
Alexis simultaneously cursed Brittany while praying she was okay. It was typical of her sister to get coaxed into something like this, and while Alexis didn't think she had been harmed in any way, she didn't like that Brittany was living with an eccentric, rich casino owner as his personal blow-up doll.
Really, really didn't like that.
The very thought sent her striding forward, right past the desk.
"Where are you going?" the startled receptionist called.
"To see your boss."Duh.Alexis picked up the pace when she heard the security guard's heavy tread following her.
Obviously Mr. Carrick's office was right down the hall, since she had been told at the reception area on the twelfth floor that Mr. Carrick's private offices took up the entire twenty-second floor. Goth Guy was gaining on her, yelling, "Hey!" so Alexis kicked it into gear and started running, looking for a door that seemed appropriately impressive enough for a self-important rich bastard.
Double doors.Bingo. Alexis reached for the handle and turned it right as the guard reached her. He touched her shoulder, and before Alexis could even figure out what was happening, she was sailing through the air like water tossed from a bucket. She landed with a bone-crunching smack?nerves firing, muscles jarring, face grinding into the gray carpet.
" Ow," she said. Damn, double damn, she had broken every bone in her frickin ' body.Including her nose, which she grabbed, eyes watering. Like she didn't have enough problems at the moment? now she was going to have to suffer through rhinoplasty to fix a broken nose.
"I'm sorry, Mr. Carrick. I tried to stop her," Big Stupid Jerk said.
"Apologize to the lady, James, and help her up. I'm sure you didn't mean to trip her."
First of all, she hadn't been tripped. He had pushed her, though she didn't see how one little shoulder shove could toss her five feet across the room. Second of all, that voice just sent shivers down her probably broken spine. Dang, no wonder the guy was successful. He sounded commanding and cultured, confident and calm.
Which pissed her off.
"James can keep his goddamn hands off of me," she said, peeling her face from the floor like old wallpaper.
Doing so brought legs into her line of vision. Not just one pair.Or two. But a dozen pairs of legs, some in dress pants, some wearing pantyhose, one lone rebel in jeans.
Whoops.Looked like Carrick was having a dinner party. She felt so bad for interrupting.Not .
Thick hands touched the back of her own pantyhose-covered calves and Alexis kicked out in reflex, making contact with a hard surface. Perfect. It was Stupid Jerk James's chest, she saw with satisfaction as he grunted in what she hoped like hell was pain.
"Hello? Keep your hands off me!"
"I was just going to uh flip " He was making motions with his hands like he was folding a tortilla in half.
Alexis glanced down.Lovely. Her suit skirt had ridden up during impact and thebottom of her buns were peeking out. This was why she hated girl clothes. Couldn't do a damn thing in them, couldn't look like a heterosexual without them.
James, who apparently had a death wish, yanked her skirt back into place quickly. But not so quickly that he missed getting cracked on the hand when Alexis reached back and popped him one.
"Isaid, keep your hands off me." Alexis pushed herself up onto her knees.
"Mr. Carrick," James whined, "I was just?"
"Let her alone, James. She obviously doesn't appreciate your gentlemanly assistance."
There was humor in Carrick's voice, and Alexis felt her already tested temper flare. She stood up, adjusted her jacket and skirt, and turned to her audience. "He's the one who pushed me in the first place!"
Her gaze floated from the receptionist to James and on past, trying to find the source of the voice that was pissing her off. Well, they were all pissing her off, but Carrick more so because he was laughing at her. No one laughed at Alexis Baldizzi or her baby sister, Brittany. Okay, so people probably laughed at Alexis Baldizzi . But never so she could see or hear it.
Prepared to rip the bastard's face off, Alexis dismissed an aging hippie in jeans, passed over a brunette in a cocktail dress, and landed on a man in the center of the room, one hand casually in the pocket of his gray pants. Damn it, he was gorgeous.
Not that she had expected her sister would run off with a mutant, but this guy was hot. Tall, blond, blue-eyed, well dressed, muscular but not too pumped up crap. It might be harder than she'd thought to drag Brittany away from this guy.
But no matter how difficult, or how well Carrick's pants fit, Alexis was going to succeed."Carrick?"
"I am Ethan Carrick, yes. And to whom do I have the pleasure of speaking?" He took several steps closer to her and smiled.
The calm, casual tone he was using was unnerving. But Alexis readjusted her mental strategy. She was a prosecutor and she knew how to switch gears based on people's reactions to her. So she stood a little straighter and stuck her hand out. "Alexis Baldizzi , county prosecutor. I need to speak with you for a minute."And rip your nuts off .
Face, nuts, something needed to be ripped off.
He stopped in front of her. Took her hand, and slowly, slowly shook it, clasping her tightly in his grip."Right this moment?"
"Yes." Shake, shake, her hand still went up and down in his. She gave a little tug, but couldn't escape the contact. He wasn't letting go of her, which was just weird. Tugging again as he smiled?an innocent Botticelli blond angel smile?she asked, "Do you have an office we could step into?'
There was just a slight pause,then he dropped her hand so quickly, her whole arm careened into her leg."Certainly, Ms. Baldizzi ." He turned to his ten or soguests . "Excuse us momentarily. I'm so sorry for the interruption."
Then he gestured for her to walk in front of him. "I have a private office right down the hall. Would you like some coffee, water, wine?"
"No, thank you." Alexis adjusted the strap of her handbag on her shoulder. His aplomb was really starting to bug her. He didn't look the least bit curious as to why she had barged into his reception room at six o'clock on a Friday night. In her job, she was used to people reacting to her with suspicion, yet this guy was completely unconcerned.
"Are you perhaps any relation to Brittany Baldizzi ?" he asked conversationally. "She's a dentist."
Weeelll.Slick Rick.Bringing Brittany up first.Alexis had to give him credit. He was smooth, and oh-so-polite. Charm personified. He had gone on the attack, mating the first move, which put her on the defensive. And she hated him all the more for it.
"She's my sister." Alexis stopped walking toward the door and whirled to face him, temper getting the best of her rationality.
His eyebrow rose."Sister?Really? You don't look a thing alike, though you're both lovely. And at this exact moment, I couldn't say where Brittany is, but I would guess she's in her room. She's planning on joining me at the informal dinner I'm having."
Not if Alexis had to kill him first. "Where's her room?" she asked through clenched teeth. Good thing her sister did her dental work because she was probably cracking a filling.
"Suite twenty-three twenty.There's a private elevator from this floor. Is there a problem?A family emergency? Perhaps I can be of assistance."
"You can assist me by getting the hell out of my way." Alexis was upset. Really upset. Like her eyelids were twitching and her hands were fisting and her legs were jiggling. Brittany had abandoned her dental practice, moved into aLas Vegas casino that looked remarkably like a giant dildo, had not spoken to her sister in three weeks, and this guy was acting like they were at a goddamn Meet and Greet.
As far as she was concerned, Brittany had been kidnapped and brainwashed, and this man in front of her was responsible for the whole nightmare.
"Is there something wrong with your eye?"
"No. Now show me the elevator." Alexis headed back toward the hall, barging past him. Her shoulder clipped his forearm, and instead of stumbling back, he never moved an inch. She, on the other hand, bounced back like a tennis ball making contact with a racket.
"Will you get out of my way?" Alexis brushed at her jacket, not wanting any part of him touching her. "Give your guests Brittany 's apologies, but she won't be attending any dinner party."
"Why would that be?"
His faint British accent was as annoying as his perfect good looks. Alexis knew his type. He was like a poster child forSinCity . Come to Vegas and get swept off your feet by a tasteful, rich Brit who will make you a star or more likely, charm you out of your panties and leave you a pregnant cocktail waitress.
"I would have thought it was obvious, but since you need it spelled out?she's leaving with me," Alexis tossed over her shoulder, heading toward the door, hoping the location of a private elevator to the twenty-third floor would be obvious. That exit line would sound just plain old stupid if she couldn't figure out where she was going, but sometimes acting confident was more important than actually knowing anything.
" Brittany doesn't want to leave. She's quite happy here."
That smug, arrogant tone had Alexis jerking to a stop, thoroughly irritated. She whirled around. "You're an asshole." With that, she stomped to the elevator, hit the up button, and gave him her back.
Ethan watched Alexis Baldiz/i punch the elevator button a second time, her foot tapping impatiently, her hand clutching her purse. A few moments earlier, he had been thinking that perhaps just one hot little affair before he settled down would be a really smart idea, and that the feisty Alexiswas a damn good candidate for such a partner. He'd been thinking that she was sensual, passionate, erotic, and would taste juicy and feel soft as he took her.
But that was a few minutes in the past.
Before she'd called him an asshole.
Now desire had been replaced by annoyance. No one in nine hundred years had called him an asshole.To his face anyway. Who talked like that? Well, he did, but what woman said that to him? It was crude and unnecessary and he completely failed to see what he had done to inspire such rudeness.
Seamus came up behind him as he leaned against the doorframe of the reception room.
"Who the hell is that?" he asked in a low voice audible to vampire ears, but not mortals. "And why are you letting her go upstairs?"
Ethan forced himself to relax. For several hundred years, he had been gaining steadily on his temper, displacing his passions from the battlefield to the bedroom, and he wasn't going to let one ill-mannered woman destroy that progress. "She says she's Brittany 's sister. But I can't say I see the resemblance."
His dentist was tall, slender, with fair skin and dark, straight hair. This Alexis was flat-out short, not much higher than his shoulder. She had wispy blond hair that had been escaping from a twist at the back of her neck. She was curvier, too, if that glimpse he'd caught of her backside when she was sprawled out on his carpet was any indication.
She was the complete genetic opposite of Brittany .
"That can't be Brittany 's sister." Seamus adjusted his red tie and shook his head, dark eyes' clouded with disbelief. " Brittany is sweet."
"Yes, she is," Ethan said, rather grimly. " Brittany is pleasant, naive, cheerful "And got on his everlasting nerves. Being with her was rather like ingesting too many sweets in a short period of time.
But that was his problem, not hers. He clearly was a bloody in-grate, and not nearly as civilized as he liked to think. Yet he still didn't see how a "woman like Alexis?pushy, impatient, short? could share the same DNA with Brittany .
"That woman is a harpy," Seamus said firmly, as Alexis slapped the elevator door with her hand and swore eloquently at it.
"That's a little harsh, don't you think?" Ethan spoke with little conviction. Alexis had been, well, harping at him. But what puzzled him?or rather irritated him?was the realization that Brittany in all her sweet feminine perfection got on his nerves, while Alexis, who certainly had shades of the harpy about her, stirred his blood.
Just a little.
Enough to puzzle him.
Well, hell, actually a lot.
Which infuriated him.He was supposed to be giving up on women. He had promised Seamus and the entire Vampire Nation that his randy days were over and he had grown serious and wise with age. He was supposed to chose a suitable wife andget on with i it, not visualize a most unsuitable woman lifting her skirt for him.
"Harpy's not quite the right word for her."Luscious 'tsexy edible, maybe.
"Bitch?"Seamus asked with a grimace.
Ethan laughed loudly, earning him a glare tossed over Alexis's shoulder. "No. Not what I had in mind. And I suppose she has the right to feel put off, you know. That was a nasty spill she took when James pushed her."
"I thought you said James tripped her on accident. I wasn't looking too busy checking the latest exit polls on my Sidekick."
Holding his hand up, Ethan prevented Seamus from spewing out a half-dozen statistics that meant nothing to him.One of the downsides of his career choice. "Later on the exit polls, please. And James didn't push or trip Alexis, technically. I think he was reaching out to get her attention and forgot that he is much stronger than he used to be."
"Ah, to be a young vampire again."Seamus shook his head. "Whenall the world was new and exciting and everyone looked like a meal " He grinned. "It's hell to get old. Now it's all responsibilities and shaping a new world order. I haven't even put the bite on anyone in a hundred years."
"Whine to me when you hit your five-hundredth birthday. Until then I don't want to hear it." Especially since Ethan was distracted at the moment. "So why do you think Alexis is here?" he asked quietly, aware that mortal ears had severe limits, but not wanting to chance Alexis hearing him.
"To save her sister from your evil clutches, I take it."
That was what concerned Ethan. His mild interest in Brittany had become much more when he had realized who she was. What she was. And Seamus had been ecstatic. Neither one of them wanted to give up the idea of Brittany .
"I don't have any evil clutches.Haven't since at least the sixteenth century. But if they are well and truly sisters is Alexis an Impure like Brittany is?" He wasn't sure if that was a plus or a minus, or if it mattered in the slightest. Alexis was not a woman who could be easily persuaded or guided.
During the time he had been with her, Ethan hadn't been able to pick up on any of Alexis's thoughts. Not that he had really been trying to probe her mind, but nothing had come across to him.
"I don't know. I didn't sense anything from her, but I wasn't focusing on it. I was focusing more on staying out of her firing range.Not my kind of woman, Ethan, seriously." Seamus shuddered.
Ethan looked at his friend and campaign manager, suddenly curious, and unable to resist the chance to give Seamus a hard time. "Whatis your type of woman? I haven't seen you with a female since that little French girl tried to get you to take a turn on the guillotine. Are you saving yourself for marriage or something?"
Seamus scowled. "With all due respect, Mr. President, mind your own damn business."
With a laugh, Ethan clapped Seamus on the back, as the elevator finally opened for Alexis. "Let's go back to the guests. Brittany won't leave, I can guarantee it."
Because Brittany could not leave.As an Impure, she was his ticket to reelection for the presidency of the Vampire Nation. She would appease his minority constituents, and lend credence to his claim that he was older, wiser, less inclined to violence than he had been in his youth.
Which was true.He did see the value of negotiation and democracy now, whereas at one time he'd thought the only solution to a problem was to raise his sword. Now he was ready for diplomacy, and Brittany would make a truly valuable first lady.
"Are you sure? You haven't exactly been, uh, aggressive with Brittany . You're usually much more, well, successful earlier on with women." Seamus cleared his throat.
"I'm wooing her, Seamus." Ethan glared at his friend. "This is a serious venture, not a hot tumble in the barn. I'm being delicate."
Which was a laugh in itself.Ethan hadn't wooed any woman with the intention of doing more than getting her out of her clothes.
This was different, and he was having a little trouble adjusting himself to the prospect of a monogamous relationship.Marriage. Jesus. He got vampire sweat in his armpits just thinking about it. And with Brittany an Impure, their marriage could last some sixty years or more.
"Well, pick up the pace on the wooing. It looks like you're not interested in her. If Iwere a girl, I wouldn't think you were being delicate, I'd think you wanted to be 'just friends.'" Seamus made quote marks with his fingers.
Everyone was a critic. "If you were a girl, I wouldn't be pursuing your platter-face. But do you think you can do this better? You woo her. Let's see how far you get, Mr. No Date This Century. At least I'm still having sex."
"You're having sex? You're not supposed to be having sex!" Seamus looked instantly alarmed. "You're supposed to be convincing Brittany and every other undead that you've reformed. You can't be whoring around at the same time you're 'wooing' Brittany ."
"Will you quit with the damn quote marks in the air? And I didn't mean I was having sex this minute. I just meant I have recently. You know, more recently than you, who last had sex when Napoleon was alive."
"Kiss my arse ." Seamus's brogue, which he had lost over the centuries, reappeared in his anger.
Ethan laughed. "Relax. If you want to be a monk, that's your business. And I'll turn on the charm with Brittany if you feel things are moving too slowly. I agreed to get myself a wife, didn't I? My word is sacred."
Yet for some reason, instead of picturing serene Brittany at his side, a vision of her obnoxious sister rose in his mind.
And his thoughts regarding her had nothing to do with marriage and everything to do with arousal.
Shit. Seamus was right. He wasn't trying to charm Brittany . Not with much enthusiasm anyway.Because the thought of bedding Brittany left him cold.
And the thought of Alexis made him lava-hot.
Which was one more reason to avoid Alexis.
It didn't matter if she had challenged him by her dismissal and insult. He was a Master Vampire, elected president of all undead registered voters. He knew plenty of women who would sleep with him willingly and with great pleasure.Scores of women.
Her attitude was not a reflection on his manhood in any way, and he did not need to prove himself to her.
Ethan grimaced.Liar. Itmattered a hell of a lot that Alexis Baldizzi had looked at him like he was a troll.
Which wasn't a positive thing at all.
He had sworn to give up violence and casual sex, and in ten minutes Alexis Baldizzi had him contemplating doing both to her.