Lust (Vegas Nights #2)

by Emma Hart

  “Sorry about her. She’s not exactly the friendliest person in the world. And she’s still pissed I turned her down six months ago.”

  I bit the inside of my cheek to keep myself from laughing. “Humble. An admirable quality in a man.”

  He flashed me a crooked grin over his shoulder. “My office is right here. Chief shouldn’t be too long. We had a homicide in the early hours, so he’s working overtime.”

  “I can come back.”

  “What’s the point in that?” Adrian closed the door behind him and motioned for me to take a seat. “A rushed and under pressure Chief Sandford is the best Chief Sandford. He’ll agree to anything.”

  “If anyone asks, I’ll make sure to tell him you said that.”

  He laughed. “You do that. He’s well aware of that fact. He’s probably gonna agree to whatever you want anyway. He’s getting sick of the boys not being able to hook any hookers.”

  “Sounds like a bachelor party game. Hook the Hooker.”

  “I think that’s the way some of them do it. A game.”

  “That’s probably why you’re not getting serious results.”

  Adrian perched on the edge of his desk. “You’re probably not far wrong. Which is why we need someone who can help us.”

  “I still don’t understand it,” I admitted, folding my hands in my lap. “You’re the ones who are trained. Are you seriously telling me that a bunch of guys who live and work in Las Vegas can’t recognize a hooker when they see one?”

  He paused. “That’s exactly what I’m telling you. You have the bonus they don’t, and that’s the ability to put yourself in their shoes, because you’ve lived it for so long.”

  I didn’t understand how or why these people who were trained officers were doing a job they obviously couldn’t do, but I didn’t get a chance to ask, because at that moment, the shrill ring of Adrian’s phone cut through the air.

  He leaned over the desk. “Detective Potter…. Yes, sir. We’ll be right there.” He put the phone back on the cradle and stood up. “Let’s go. Chief is waiting for us in his office.”

  My stomach flipped. The nerves were doing some kind of tap dance in the pit of my belly. Not that it mattered—I was already here, if there was a trap, I’d fallen for it. Except it didn’t feel like a trap, but still. The skeptic in the back of my mind said it was.

  I beat down the butterflies and followed him through the building, ignoring the curious glances of those who passed us.

  Did these people know who I was?

  Why did I care?

  I really, really needed a nap.

  Adrian knocked on the door and followed it up with a, “Sir?”

  “Come in. Make it quick,” a harsh voice responded.

  “Ladies first.” Adrian swept an arm toward the now open door.

  I swallowed hard and stepped into the office.

  Chief Sandford glanced up. Dark amber eyes peered through thin, rounded glasses, piercing me firmly but not unkindly. “Ms. Fox. Lovely to meet you.”

  “Hi,” I said.

  Could I have been any more awkward?

  Adrian coughed back a chuckle and shut the door. “Ms. Fox, this is Chief Sandford. Chief, Perrie Fox.”

  “We’ve established that, thank you, Detective. Ms. Fox, please take a seat.” He waved his hand toward a chair and obediently, I sat. “I’m afraid I don’t have time for a long conversation, so here is my offer. The department will pay you twenty-five dollars an hour, plus any costs for a uniform, i.e., disguises, wigs and so forth.” He dropped his attention to the file in front of him.

  That was a cut.

  A big cut.

  “When would I be…needed?” I asked hesitantly.

  “Every evening. At least six days a week.”

  “For how long?”

  “Two to five hours each night.”

  “Make it five hours a night, six nights a week, and pay for my babysitter. Then you’ve got a deal.”

  Adrian’s eyebrows shot up.

  “A shrewd negotiator. I’d expect nothing less from a Fox.” He peered over the top rims of his glasses. “That seems fair to me. As long as we get two to three arrests every single night, that deal will be upheld.”

  No pressure, then.

  “Done.” The word slipped out of my mouth before I could stop it.

  “Needless to say, Ms. Fox, even with immunity, I expect you to cease your work immediately.”

  I nodded in agreement. It was still a pay cut, but it was enough to live on and this gave me enough time to find a job. Even if I only had two weeks…

  In the short-term, it got me out of the thing I was trying to escape, so there was that.

  “Excellent. Detective Potter, can you arrange everything with Ms. Fox? I have to get back to work.”

  Just like that, we were dismissed.

  Adrian led me out of the room and back through the building to his office. There, he shut the door and locked it behind him. He whipped a form out from one of the drawers on his side and handed it to me.

  “Fill that out,” he said, sitting down. “You’ll be needed tonight, so if you need to, call a sitter.”

  “Tonight?” I blinked. “How quickly do you think I can get a sitter?”

  “Family?” he said. “Her dad? A friend? How you usually do it. Make it regular.” He moved his belt over, clinking the cuffs that were attached to it.

  Deliberate or not, it worked.

  I filled out the form, and with a promise to meet him here at six-thirty, left, armed with a mission to find a sitter.

  Chapter Five

  Perrie

  It didn’t happen often, but life was kind to me. My regular sitter somehow was free, apparently under the assumption she’d be minding Lola as normal tonight anyway.

  I’d obviously forgotten to cancel her after I’d been arrested and ‘quit.’

  I didn’t want to say it was a coincidence, but it was definitely a nice surprise.

  The butterflies that fluttered through my stomach weren’t unlike the ones from earlier. They were rampant and heavy, wild and sickly, making the nerves that came with them feel like they were ten times worse than they were.

  How was I going to get away with this without a disguise? I hadn’t had time to come up with one. I wasn’t exactly unrecognizable. There were places in this city I wasn’t allowed to go, places I was banned from because of what my job was.

  Had been.

  What it had been.

  I wasn’t that person anymore. With any luck, I never would have to be again.

  Those were points I’d have to bring up with Adrian when I saw him. How was I supposed to pretend to be someone I wasn’t? How would he get me into these places I’d been banned from?

  I sighed heavily as I walked into the police station. Luce was gone, and after quickly showing my new ID card to the guy behind the counter, I punched in the code for the door and slipped through.

  I was so out of place here. Everyone around me was wearing suits or uniforms, and here I was, tentatively making my way through the building wearing jeans, a fancy shirt, and heels. All I was told was to show up looking like I was meant to be in a casino.

  Awkward signs directed me to the briefing room I was supposed to be in.

  All right, I asked for help. I had assumed Adrian or somebody would meet me and show me where to go, but I’d been wrong.

  He was, however, waiting outside the briefing room for me.

  “Feeling okay?” he asked, his blue-green eyes searching mine as I stopped in front of him.

  “Uh, not really.”

  “Great—you have to say a few words tonight on how to spot a hooker.”

  “Sounds like a weird, slumber party game,” I muttered.

  He laughed, running his hand through his hair. “You’re not wrong. Do you think you can do that?”

  Not. At. All.

  “If I really have to. Will they know who I am?” I fidgeted on the spot.

  “Well…
” He hesitated. “We used some artistic license. As far as they’re concerned, you’re a former prostitute who has agreed to help us clean up the city’s tourist hotspots.”

  “Technically speaking, that’s correct.”

  “There you go, then. Let’s get started.” He shoved open the door to the briefing room before I had a chance to eke out my disagreement with this entire situation. “Gentlemen, I’d like to introduce you to Perrie. She’s a former sex worker who has graciously dedicated her evenings to us to help us identify our targets.”

  Adrian shot me a look that told me to move my ass, so I shuffled into the room. At least a dozen pairs of eyes pinned themselves on me, and I froze halfway to where Adrian was standing.

  Thankfully, Adrian obviously recognized this, because he walked toward me and touched a hand to my upper back.

  “Perrie will be undercover with me every night. She’ll be working both as an insider and as a potential client for male prostitutes, since we’re short on female associates for this case.”

  I was?

  “Her expertise will be available to us all, and she’s going to give us all a few insider tips on the things we should be looking out for when identifying our targets.” Adrian tapped a finger against my shoulderblade, and it took all my strength not to turn to him and look at him as if he’d lost his mind.

  What the hell? I didn’t agree to this.

  It was instinctual. I couldn’t have a single person identify a hooker from a goddamn virgin without a gut feeling, and now I had to tell twelve guys how to do just that?

  Fuck. My. Life.

  With a cactus.

  There was no gentle way to handle this.

  “Hi.” The word left me shakily and uncertainly. “So, I guess it might seem obvious, but really pay attention to the way couples interact with each other. If they aren’t a genuine couple, they’ll either have an air of awkwardness about them or they’ll be overly touchy-feely. If you’re looking for someone before she finds a client, keep a special eye out on single women who don’t talk to anyone or seem to have any friends around them. The bar is a good place to start and monitor that. It’s a good spot to keep an eye on other people and pick out potential clients. It’s also a perfect meeting place because you can always find your client there.”

  I glanced over at Adrian.

  He nodded. “Right. Focus on the bar and anyone who doesn’t have interactions with friends or anyone around them. Perrie will be with me at the Roma Hotel. Because of this, we’ll probably make the first arrest, then we’ll make our way around to everyone else. Chief is pissed, so be extra vigilant and let’s get a good result tonight. Let’s go.”

  ***

  “Are you all right?” Adrian looked over the car at me. “You haven’t said a word since we left the station.”

  I sighed, leaning my head right back on the seat. “This feels…wrong, that’s all.”

  “Because you’re effectively giving me a direct line to your friends?”

  “They’re not my friends,” I said, looking out of the window despite his numerous glances my way. “They’re people I understand.”

  “I get that.”

  “No, you don’t. I don’t think you get it at all.”

  “Then help me to.” He shrugged a shoulder.

  “Why? Do you expect me to believe that you’ll suddenly understand and turn this car around? Because you know as well as I do that you won’t.”

  “This is my job.”

  “And you’re stopping people from doing theirs.”

  “Then I’ll correct myself: This is my legal job.”

  Whatever. “If you stopped for a second to think about the fact that probably fifty percent of the women you arrest aren’t doing it because they want to, then you might view what you’re doing a little differently.”

  “All due respect, Perrie, it doesn’t matter to the law if they want to do it or not. They are. They’re making the decision to work illegally against the county laws. It’s not like prostitution isn’t legal in other counties in Nevada.”

  “That might be so, but there isn’t the work there compared to here. If you have a child or a family to support, you’re gonna go where the work is.”

  “I suggest trying Walmart or somewhere like that.”

  I snapped my head around to look at him. “Not everyone in this industry has a choice. If you think they’re all selling themselves for fun on a Saturday night, you’re sorely mistaken.”

  “Then tell me more.” His knuckles whitened as he gripped the steering wheel. “Explain to me why they’re doing it.”

  “So you can arrest them anyway?”

  “No, because maybe there’s another problem in the city we’re not aware of. Are there trafficking rings working under this guise that we don’t know about? Are they secretly porn stars recruiting unwitting men? Is there a problem we can solve? Get to the bottom of it?” He shot me a glance once again. “Are they like you and is there anything we can do, any charities or safe places we can send them instead?”

  “Gee,” I said dryly, “You almost sound as though you’ll let them go if they cry like I did. Which would be ridiculous, because I know you have a quota of whores to collect like little trophies, so don’t pretend like you actually care about it.”

  His jaw twitched, and the skin over his knuckles went completely right. “Don’t assume I don’t care. I asked for this job, not because I’m a spiteful asshole who wants to deny people the opportunity to support their families, but because I want to help them.”

  “Throwing people in jail doesn’t help them. It costs them the money you won’t let them earn.”

  “This conversation is going nowhere. You can believe what you want to believe, but us arguing like a pair of teenagers isn’t going to help us do what we’re here to do.”

  “I don’t want to be here. I only am because you blackmailed me.”

  “That wasn’t blackmail.”

  “For an officer of the law, you have a skewed idea of what that is. You told me I had two choices: work with you or be arrested by you. That’s blackmail.”

  “You seem real certain you know the ins and outs of that law.”

  “I’m a Fox,” I said dryly. “I’ve probably seen more blackmail than you have, and I haven’t spoken to my family in seven years.”

  He raised an eyebrow at that. Thankfully, he didn’t push it. “Perrie, us fighting isn’t going to make this work. The quicker we get our quota and we can do this without you, the quicker you can go back to your life and get a proper job.”

  “You assume I haven’t been trying? Like I said, not all of us want to sell our bodies.”

  “But you do.”

  “Doing and wanting are different things. Sometimes I let my kid eat cookies for breakfast. Doesn’t mean I want to let her.”

  His lips twitched as we pulled into the hotel valet area. “If we can’t get along, our cover is blown. To convince people we’re a couple, we have to pretend to like each other at the very least.”

  “But I don’t like you, and I don’t want to like you.”

  “I’m not that bad once you get to know me.”

  I blinked at him. “I would rather get to know a scorpion poised to kill me than get to know you.”

  For some reason, that made him laugh. A deep, husky laugh that sent shivers up my arms, making the hairs stand on end.

  “God. You’re so adorable.” He got out of the car before I could process his words. “Yes, thank you,” I heard him say to the valet as I got out and shut the door.

  Adrian held his arm out for me.

  I stared at it and then him.

  “Take my arm,” he said out of the corner of his mouth.

  The eyes of the valet hovering on us questioningly made me move. I slipped my hand into the crook of his elbow, standing as close to him as I could bear.

  Which wasn’t very close. Anyone watching us would think—

  Never mind.

  Adrian closed th
e few inches between us and leaned his head down as we walked into the air-conditioned lobby of the hotel. “Nobody here knows who we are,” he whispered, his mouth almost touching my ear. “Swallow your annoyance for a damn hour and pretend, would you?”

  “I don’t want to.”

  “Tough shit.” He held his arm closer to his side, trapping my hand against him. “You agreed to this, regardless of how you think I made you do it. The other option is always available to you.”

  “You’re a bastard.”

  “Only when I’m dealing with a stubborn, insufferable woman.”

  “Thank you. I take great pleasure in knowing I’m pissing you off.”

  He laughed again. “Keep that pleasure for the next hour and people might believe that you’re my girlfriend.”

  “Idiots,” I muttered, glancing around as we entered the casino.

  My eyes took a moment to adjust to the smoky, stale air that enveloped us only a few steps inside the vast area. I coughed as the thickness jolted me for a moment. Adrian rested his hand over mine on his arm and guided us away from the worst area, over to where the bar was surrounded by clearer air.

  “Worst part of this job—going home smelling like an ashtray,” he said under his breath.

  I wasn’t going to argue it. But if that was the worst part of his job… “I’d say getting a load full of semen on your face beats that.”

  He froze.

  I froze.

  Whoops.

  I didn’t mean to say that.

  He blinked his bright eyes at me for a moment before he smirked. He let my arm go, only to wrap his around my back and grip the edge of the bar, trapping me right against him. “Think about this on the bright side,” he said into my ear. “The worst part of your job tonight is that you’ll go home smelling like an ashtray.”

  “Stop talking sense.” My face dipped down, my head tilting toward his. “It doesn’t suit you.”

  He laughed, lifting his head and flagging the bartender. “One Budweiser and a virgin strawberry margarita, please.”

  She nodded. “You got it.”

  I leaned back, which unfortunately was onto his arm, and looked at him. “You remembered what I drink.”

  He winked. “Mine is the same.”