Prologue
“Going to shoot me?” The woman before him taunted. A woman who should have been a ghost. “Going to leave me to die alone? Again?”
Drake Archer circled her. They were in a small apartment, and the scent of death already filled the air around them.
The beautiful woman before him—Anna Jean—she had a knife. He had to get that knife away from her.
She’s already hurt too many people. I have to stop her. He opened his hand. Held it out to her. “Give me the knife.”
She laughed at him.
Her laugh was so familiar. Once that laughter had seemed to warm him, now it made ice grow around his heart because he saw her for exactly what she was.
Her beauty only went skin deep. Evil was at her core.
Drake started to shake his head. How had he been so wrong about her? How?
And in that one moment, Anna Jean attacked. She lunged forward and drove her knife into Drake’s stomach, and then she yanked, jerking the blade to the right. He fell back, stunned, as his blood pumped from him and a chill seemed to consume his whole body.
“This time, you get to die,” Anna Jean told him and she was smiling.
His knees sagged. Drake hit the floor.
No, no, he wasn’t supposed to go out like this. And…it was all his fucking fault. He’d trusted the wrong woman. Fell for lying eyes.
Anna Jean wasn’t going to stop. She was a killer, straight to her soul. There were others in the apartment. Others that she would take out with a cold, calculated brutality. He had to stop her.
His blood soaked his shirt. He tried to look up, to move, but his whole body trembled.
Anna Jean drew closer to him. He could feel her gaze, even though he couldn’t see her face. “Maybe he did love me,” she mused. “Because if he’d been smart, he would’ve shot me when he had the chance. Instead, I had the pleasure of gutting him.” Her voice dropped. “That’s what you get for leaving me in the cold.”
I never loved you. When Anna Jean moved to step around him, his hand flew out. His fingers locked around her ankle. “No…” Drake growled.
“Oh, darling, relax, I’ll slit your throat and end things soon.”
And she would. Without any hesitation. When he’d been the one to foolishly hesitate.
He would never hesitate again. Drake tried to heave his body up. I have to stop her.
He would do anything…anything…to stop her.
Drake pushed through the pain even as more of his blood pumped from his body. He managed to grab the knife that Anna Jean had used on him. She wasn’t expecting another attack from him, not then. She thought he was too weak.
Her mistake. Drake lunged up, and he drove the knife into her heart. Anna Jean gasped. Her eyes widened. She turned her head to look at him.
“I didn’t…miss this time,” he managed to tell her. No, he’d ended Anna Jean.
She died in his arms.
And his blood kept flowing out…
***
Drake jerked upright in bed, his body soaked in sweat and the memories still twisting in his head. Because that hadn’t been a dream. No nightmare to mess with his head.
That had been his sick reality.
His hand slid over the newest scar on his stomach. A wound that had come far too close to taking him out.
Only he’d survived.
His ex-lover hadn’t.
Anna Jean…
She wasn’t his first kill. Not even close. But she was the one who haunted him. Because of her, he’d learned an important lesson.
Drake would never again fall for another woman’s lies.
Not-fucking-ever.
Chapter One
Drake Archer wasn’t looking for trouble. He didn’t want complications. He didn’t want questions.
He wanted to fuck. Wanted to sink into the arms of a sweet-smelling woman and pretend the nightmares that chased him every time he closed his eyes weren’t real.
Even though he knew they were.
The club was packed. His club. He owned the casino and the club that was attached to it. So he stood on the top floor of his domain, behind the tinted glass, and he watched the crowd. Bodies gyrated down there. Women and men heaved against each other. Music was pounding, but he didn’t hear the beat or any of the voices that must be rising down there. He’d soundproofed this room. He liked to watch the others, but he sure as hell didn’t want anyone seeing—or hearing—him.
Some women wore glittering dresses. Some wore scraps that were designed to turn men into lusting monsters.
His gaze swept over the crowd, moving a few more feet, as his attention slowly shifted toward the bar.
Then his eyes narrowed.
The woman standing at the bar—her fingers curled around the slender stem of a martini glass—she wasn’t like the others.
Her hair was a dark red, glinting under the lights. It skimmed her shoulders, moving slightly as she turned her head and gazed—right up at me.
She wore all black. Not some seductive dress. But pants and a form fitting turtle-neck. She reminded him of a sexy jewel thief for a moment, and his lips quirked at the image.
He put his hand to the glass when another man approached her. A slickly dressed guy, oozing pompous confidence and cash. The jerk put his hand on her shoulder.
She shrugged him away.
Then she kept staring right up at Drake.
His jewel thief truly acted as if she saw him. Impossible, of course. There was no way that she could see through that tinted glass.
She crooked her finger at him.
Hell, no.
A wide smile flashed across her face, and the redhead crooked her finger one more time. A dare. A taunt.
She did know he was there. Maybe she’d gotten chatty with the wait staff. Maybe the bartender had told her that Drake would occasionally invite women up to his private lounge.
But the redhead was dead wrong about the way this scene was played. He didn’t dance to anyone else’s tune. A pretty face and a sexy body wasn’t about to get to him.
He needed, he wanted, but he was the one always in control.
In business and in the bedroom, Drake knew how to dominate.
He wouldn’t be going to the little redhead.
He dropped his hand.
That just wasn’t the way he worked.
***