Could she really where a lizard on her feet? Hmm. With those straps and those heels, she could.
Behind her, in the reflection, she saw a tall white man wearing a black tuxedo complete with a tall top hat set at a rakish angle.
Katie whirled around, bumping into several people as she did. They all kept going without even noticing her.
The man in the top hat was gone.
She took a deep breath, and told herself that she was just keyed up. There couldn’t have been someone watching her. Not here. No one knew her here. She must have been imagining it. Or maybe Top Hat Man was just a fan of alligator leather.
Her watch told her that it was getting late. She didn’t know where the night would end up but she knew it wouldn’t go anywhere if she didn’t get started.
Just one more block Uptown she found the club that Carlson had told her about. She was going to like using the terms he used for directions. They actually made a lot of sense now that she was thinking about them. You went exactly in the direction you wanted to go.
Katie knew that the people of New Orleans had a reputation for being sleepy and plodding and a little slow. She suspected, however, that they were a lot smarter in their own way than anyone was willing to give them credit for.
The Spiral Club was thumping with a deep techno beat that penetrated out through the painted cement walls. Windows that would have looked in on the action were blacked out so that no one standing on the street could see in. There were a lot of people on the street, too. Young guys in tight pants and open-front shirts, young girls in skimpy dance clothes--some of them wearing less than Katie would have been comfortable wearing to the beach. Everything was illuminated in pulsing green and red neon light.
There were some older people, too. Hot men and women in their thirties and forties stood by with all the rest waiting their turn to get in. Katie suddenly felt out of place, being among the older people here. This might not be her kind of scene, after all. There were heavy velvet ropes hung from brass poles in a semi-circle around the front door, keeping anyone from getting in unless the bouncer let them through.
He was a mountain of a man, all muscle and no neck. The black t-shirt he was wearing must’ve been his kid brother’s because Katie could actually see the outline of the veins in his biceps through the fabric. From behind sunglasses, he scanned the crowd and picked out couples who he thought met the Spiral Club’s rigorous standards of young, hot, and sexy.
Katie bit her lip. If this was a popularity contest then she figured she might as well go right now. Katie was never the popular girl in school. She’d lived her life quietly. Her body was nice, but not Victoria’s Secret perfect. Her boyfriend Riley had never had any complaints. No, the way she looked wasn’t the reason why they were in trouble just now.
That was something else entirely.
Not that it mattered right now. Katie had been expecting to come to a club where you paid a cover charge, and that was it. She hadn’t been expecting a selection process. She didn’t want to wait out here in the crowd for an hour--or longer--before even getting noticed by the bouncer. She was here to have fun. Not stand in line.
“Are you here to get in?”
A girl half Katie’s age was standing next to her, asking that question with a smirk. One perfectly sculpted eyebrow was cocked up in disbelief. Her fingers played with several colored bead necklaces around her pretty, perfect neck.
Katie met the girl’s vacuous stare. “That’s generally what you do at a nightclub, isn’t it?”
The girl and her boyfriend both snorted in laughter. “It’s what me and my friends do at a nightclub, sure. No idea what somebody your age does at a place like this, though.”
Then she twirled on her high heels and led her guy friend away to another group of kids just as young, and two seconds later all of them were laughing uproariously.
Katie rolled her eyes, crossing her arms under her breasts and staring off in the other direction. She wanted to go slap some manners into the whole group of them but she knew it wouldn’t do any good. Wisdom didn’t always come with age, but there were always people out there who wanted to use their youth as an excuse to stay ignorant.
Her good mood from earlier was evaporating quickly. She adjusted the strap of her clutch purse over her one shoulder, and debated with herself whether she should stay, or go.
Go, she decided. There were dozens of clubs all around New Orleans that she could get into. She didn’t need to get into this one specifically.
Feeling good about her decision, Katie found her smile again, and turned to go.
“Hey, pretty woman,” a voice called to her through the crowd. “You come inside now, yeah?”
Katie looked back over her shoulder to see the mountain guarding the door pointing at her, waving her over to the ropes. For just a moment she thought about leaving anyway but then she saw the look on that teenager’s face with her perfectly sculpted eyebrows. She wasn’t even trying to hide the sheer surprise that Katie would be picked first over her.
It gave Katie a perverse kind of pleasure to stalk back through the crowd, right past Miss Perfect Eyebrows, and step through the velvet rope when the bouncer moved it.
Ha. Take that.
“Thank you,” she said to the bouncer, craning her neck to look up and see his face.
“Welcome, Miss,” the man replied, his voice raised over the thumping music and the noise of the crowd. “Mister Hastings asked for you special.”
Then he winked, and held the door open for her.
“Wait,” she started to ask. “What...?”
Hastings? Could it be?
The door to the club closed again, and for a moment her eyes were blinded by the darker lighting inside. When her vision recovered, a man in a red silk shirt was taking her into his arms.
“There you are, ma chere,” Carlson Hastings said to her. “Thought you’d never get here.”
Chapter 3
“You,” Katie said, completely at a loss for words. “How did you get here?”
His smile was bright in the shadowy light. He had to lean in close to her so he could speak into her ear and be heard over the music in the background. “I know all the shortcuts. Nothing happens in New Orleans, Carlson Hastings doesn’t know about it.”
“No, I mean...” Katie’s head was spinning. The music was loud. Her pulse was starting to thrum in time to the flashing of the multicolored lights cutting through the darkness all around them. There were people everywhere, dancing or standing around and all of them talking, talking, talking. His scent was a mix of earthy spices and hot flesh. It was making it hard for her to concentrate. “I mean, how come the big guy at the door listened to you and let me in?”
“Oh, that.” He laughed in a carefree way, and twirled her until they were both out on the dancefloor, pressed on all sides by gyrating bodies. “It just so happens that I own this club. Besides, my people have their instructions to bring in only the most beautiful of people.”
He twirled her around again, skillfully bringing her back into his arms without ever once hitting anyone else.
Then he leaned into her ear again, and said, “The most beautiful people is, of course, what you are.”
Katie could feel herself blushing, and was glad for the dim lighting inside the Spiral Club. Riley flashed through her mind, but only for a second, and then she was forgetting all about him in the arms of this man here. After all, he’d forgotten all about her.
They danced for what seemed like an eternity. It was slow and sensual even though the beat of the music was driving through her veins. She was mesmerized by the way he put his entire body into his movements. Not just his arms, and his legs, but his hands on her hips, and his torso, and his eyes. She tried to match what he did and found herself swaying her hips back and forth, like a hypnotist’s lure.
She forgot herself in the music, throwing back her head, tossing her hair, laughing at everything and nothing and realizing that this was exactly what s
he had wanted to find in New Orleans. Total abandon. Here she could completely forget herself and be whoever she wanted.
Right now, she wanted to be Carlson’s dance partner.
Perspiration was beading at the nape of her neck, trickling down the line of her spine, when Carlson took her by the hand and pulled her away from the dance floor. Katie found herself whisked into a private room off to the side of everything. There were red leather couches and an oval table in the middle and deep, shag carpeting. The lighting here was soft and brighter than the club. Gratefully, she flung herself down on one of the couches and kicked off her heels. Her feet were going to feel this in the morning.
“Oh, I don’t know if I could stand for another minute!” she laughed, draping an arm over her face. “I can’t remember when the last time was that I had that kind of fun.”
“Then it has been far too long,” Carlson said to her.
He was over by the door, and when he closed it, the noise from the Spiral Club became a muted hum. Whatever he was using for soundproofing here in this private space, it was working really well.
Suddenly there was a tall, thin glass of something being pressed into her hand. She opened her eyes again, finding bubbly champagne with cut up strawberries swimming in the bottom.
“Ooh,” she sighed. “That’s nice. One of the perks of being the owner?”
“Not even the greatest one, ma chere.” He raised a glass of his own to her, and sat down on the other couch across the table from her. “There will be more dancing, I promise. For now we sit, and we talk, no?”
Katie realized she was in a room alone with a man she had only just met, the door was probably locked, and no one at all knew she was here.
Not that she was worried. What she could be feeling could best be described as fascination. Something not unlike attraction. Her body and her mind were all worked up from the events of the evening. She looked at this dark stranger, into his eerie, attractive eyes.
And she found that she was seriously turned on.
Sitting up straighter, hoping he wouldn’t notice her keen interest in what he would look like without that red silk shirt. The heat in her core was just a smoldering distraction right now. She had to wonder, if he took her in his arms like he had out on the dance floor, would the sparks fly?
“So,” he said to her. “You must tell me about yourself.”
She smiled a little smile. “Oh? I have to tell you?”
“You simply must. I insist. It is the cost of giving you such royal treatment in my club.”
Katie raised her glass, and then sipped some of the fruity, dry liquid. It was so good. She would never drink champagne the same way again.
“There’s not much to tell,” she said, licking the taste on her lips.
His eyes followed the tip of her tongue. “Now, I know that is not true. I have an eye for special people. You, Katie Pearson, are special. Tell me where you are from. Tell me what you do to make money, that most evil of all necessities.”
“Ha. Well, it is the root of all evil, isn’t it?”
“Yes, but we still need it.”
“That is true, for sure. Well. I actually own my own business.”
“Ah, you are talented as well as lovely then.”
Her cheeks were probably just as red as they felt, but she could always blame it on her drink. “I don’t know about talented.” Although, that was exactly what she was. She was trying to be humble, but she had a real flair for what she did. In fact, she was better at it than most. “Actually, I flip houses for a living.”
He blinked at her, obviously confused by the way she had explained it. “You turn houses upside down? This is a new thing?”
She giggled, and when she tried to stop herself she snorted. “No, no. I don’t mean I literally ‘flip’ the house. What I do is I find old houses that are in decent shape but have maybe been neglected for a few years. I purchase the house, and then I fix it up and bring it back to life, and then sell it for a profit.”
Carlson leaned forward in his seat, putting his drink down on the table, completely forgetting about it. “You renovate the houses.”
“Well, yes. I need to have a good sense of what a house will look like when it’s done, before I ever buy it. Some places look like they’re in good shape when they’re really just a few termites away from falling apart altogether. Some other houses look like they’re ready for the scrap heap when they’ve got the most to give. It’s an art, really, knowing which houses to buy and which to pass over.”
Carlson was fascinated, hanging off her every word. “How do you know? I mean, how do you know which place is good and which place is...tres mal, as they say. Which ones are bad?”
Katie shrugged, and the strap of her dress slid down her left shoulder. “I just know. Like you said, it’s a talent. A gift, I guess.”
Although that same gift came with a price. Sometimes she found houses that were full of more than just memories--no, more than sometimes. A lot of times, the houses Katie chose were haunted. It was like the ghosts were attracted to her.
Or she was attracted to them.
Either way, she decided not to tell Carlson about that part. There was no need to ruin the moment, after all. There was still a smoldering attraction between the two of them, and so far the night had been too much fun for her to ruin it with the truth about her and ghosts.
She took another long sip of the champagne. A strawberry touched up against her lips as she did, and she sucked it in, chewing it slowly between her teeth. That was where all the alcohol settled. The fruit just soaked it up.
Her head was still spinning from the dance floor, and this whirlwind, whatever it was, that was happening between her and Carlson. She felt lightheaded, all of a sudden, and she had to put her drink down before she dropped it.
Somehow she misjudged where the edge of the table was, and she realized a moment too late that the glass was falling through midair. Carlson leapt and saved it, placing it gracefully up where she had intended it to go. As he did, he placed a hand on her knee, and the warmth from his touch spread through her until it mixed with the heat of her arousal and she gasped.
Katie leaned in close to Carlson. His image was beginning to blur. How much of that champagne had she drank? Her mouth parted, and she whispered something into his ear, and then he was holding her very, very close.
“Shh,” he whispered to her. “No worries, ma chere. We will talk tomorrow. We have much to discuss. Oui. Much to discuss.”
Then the darkness of the club was back, and she closed her eyes against it.
Chapter 4
The next thing she knew, she was opening her eyes again.
She was laying down, but not on the hot leather couch. Beneath her, and all around her, she was enveloped in soft, cool sheets.
She was also in her underwear.
And, she was not in her own bed.
Confused, Katie sat up straight and pulled the sheet higher to cover the cups of her lacy bra. She tried to remember how she’d gotten here. She remembered coming to New Orleans on vacation, and then the club, and being with Carlson in that room with the leather couches, and drinking with him.
Then, nothing.
The alcohol! Carlson must have put something in it other than strawberries. Panic began to set in because as attractive as she found him she didn’t like to think of what might have happened in the time between when she had her dress on, and now.
Hesitantly, she swung her feet over the side of the bed, reaching down to find the floor.
At the same time, the lights in the room came on.
Dropping into a plush chair in the opposite corner, Carlson crossed his legs, and smiled broadly at her. “I was wondering when you were going to awake, ma chere.”
“What time is it?” she asked, suddenly realizing she didn’t even know.
“After dawn. A little after eight. New Orleans is asleep now. It will wake again when the sun goes down.”
“I thought there
were things to do in this city during the day?”
“Mais oui. Of course there is, but nothing interesting. The fun things happen at night. I will show you, if you like.”
“Show me? What did you do to me, Carlson?”
He somehow managed to look surprised at her suggestion. “I did nothing, to be sure. Except give you my bed when you passed out. We’re in my apartment above the Spiral Club. You blacked out in the middle of a sentence. Kind of ruined the moment. You’re not used to how we party in the Big Easy, no?”
“You put something in my drink!”
“No, of course not...well, a bit, perhaps. It is just a bit of a kick. Nothing bad, but then I forget people who are not yats may not be used to it. I should have thought and given you something milder. That is my fault, yes.”
Katie was following most of what he said, even with the smooth accent, but a few words were still hard for her fuzzy brain to get around. “Yat? What’s a yat?”
“Heh. It is what we call each other. A ‘yat’ is a local. I’m a yat. You’re not, and I need to take it slower for you.”
Caught under the sheet, one leg hanging out, Katie glared at him. “Take it slower? Who took off my clothes? That’s not slow!”
“But, of course I did. You could not sleep in that dress you were wearing. I’m a bit surprised you could breathe in it.”
“I was just fine in my dress, thank you. Um. Where is my dress?”
“In the closet.” He pointed off to her left. “You might want to wear what I laid out for you on the dresser, instead.”
Katie squinted, and focused on the dresser next to the bed. There was a pair of jeans folded on top, and a comfortable looking shirt, and even a pair of sneakers--all of it very suspiciously in her size.
A frown spread over her face, and this time when she looked at Carlson, she was hardly able to meet his eyes. “Did we... Tell me the truth. Did you and me...?”
His laughter was abrupt and honest, and it put her more at ease than his words did. “No, we did not. Not that I would kick you out of bed, as they say, but I would not take advantage of a woman. If you can not ask, I can not give. If you can not ask, it would be wrong to take. You see?”
Sight Unseen Complete Series Box Set Page 84
