Beautiful Nightmare (Dark Dream 2)

It was the people.

I recognized some celebrities, an older female popstar I’d listened to since I was a kid, a retired soccer player who’d married a famous actress, even a politician or two I’d met when Caroline hosted a charity brunch last weekend. They were all dressed impeccably, expensively, in outfits that put my new nine-hundred-dollar velvet dress to shame.

And it was only five o’clock in the evening.

I had no doubt the group would swell in numbers as the night went on, too.

The opulence and energy went straight to my head as if I’d had too much champagne.

It was magical.

A smile split my face as I stood in the entry surveying Tiernan’s den of inequity like a glutton faced with an endless feast.

When a gorgeous, model thin woman appeared at my side, she was smiling too.

“I see you like it here already.” She had a thick Russian accent that made it seem as if she was speaking around marbles tucked into her cheeks.

“It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen,” I admitted, watching as a staff member in a slinky gold dress served a tray of champagne to gamblers at a roulette table. “I feel a bit like Alice through the Looking Glass.”

She frowned at me, not understanding the reference. “Well, Mr. Wagner asked me to see that you were settled.”

“I’m looking for Mr. Morelli.”

“He isn’t in yet. May I suggest you wait at one of the tables? Mr. Wagner suggested it himself.”

I was guessing Mr. Wagner was Henrik and it was difficult to imagine pink nail polish wearing, prank-loving Henrik as the stern Mr. Wagner in charge of Inequity beneath Tiernan. At the same time, I loved the dichotomy of it. Of Henrik and Tiernan and everyone in Lion Court.

Even, I was coming to understand, in myself.

Giddiness bubbled up my throat and erupted in something like a giggle. “Lead the way,” I suggested.

I learned the Russian woman’s real name was Inga as she led me to one of the lower stakes poker tables where they were playing Texas Hold ’Em. The dealer was also beautiful––I was sensing a theme––and he carefully explained the rules to me while Inga disappeared for a moment. When she returned, it was to settle a massive stack of chips in front of me.

When I gaped at her, she laughed.

“An early Christmas present,” she said. “From Mr. Wagner.”

I grinned as I picked up a thousand-dollar chip. “Do you know, I’ve never held so much money in my hands before?”

She grinned at me, knocking me in the shoulder in sisterly solidarity. “Enjoy it while it lasts. You know, the house usually wins.”

I knew that even though I wasn’t a gambler (I’d never had any money to spare to risk it on anything). But Inga didn’t know what I did.

If this house was Tiernan’s, technically, it was my house too.

So, when I settled in to play, I did it channeling my scarred guardian’s cool arrogance. I found it wasn’t difficult. I’d always vacillated between a potential career in art or one in environmental business, so math was a proficiency of mine. Before I knew it, I’d forgotten my original intention in seeking out Tiernan and there was a group at our table watching our game.

I’d just won seven hundred dollars when a dark-haired man switched out for a woman beside me at the table. I didn’t look at him, at first, but the hair on the nape of my neck stood on end as the air was filled with static.

“You play well for a beginner,” a low, smoky voice practically purred. “It must be luck.”

I grinned as I stared at my cards, a pair of pocket Queens. “Whatever it is, I’ll take it.”

“Or perhaps you’re just distracting everyone else at the table with your beauty,” he suggested, but the words weren’t an effort at seduction.

They were sharp-edged as knives.

A threat more than a compliment.

I tossed my chips in to call then carefully put my cards down so I could face the newcomer.

The moment I did, my heart stopped.

He was older, maybe early or mid-thirties, but his age only heightened the planes of his symmetrical perfection, roughening the beauty in a way that was utterly masculine. Swarthy, with the olive tinged skin I shared due to my Italian ancestry, and five o’clock shadow as dark as spilled ink across his jawline, he was both striking and vaguely menacing, like something out of an old school mafia film.

But his beauty wasn’t what stole my breath away and left icy panic in its wake.

It was the fact that I knew him.

Remembered him.

How could I ever forget who abducted me as a girl?

He stared at me calmly, almost impassively, but his entire body was turned to me, attuned to me, and when he saw the panic in my face, his lips twitched with triumph.