Tex (Burnout) (47 page)

Tex sipped his beer and watched Candy and Mandy wrestle in a sea of whipped cream, but all he could really think about was a sassy little redhead who needed one hell of a reward.

CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE

In the morning, the group headed downstairs to the buffet. Easy came to their large table with plate stacked as high as he could get it without spilling.

“You know you can go back up,” Hawk told him, shaking his head.

Easy flipped him the bird and shoveled in a mouthful of Belgian waffles. “Last night,” he declared, “was amazing, Vegas.” Abby grinned at him. “Out of curiosity, do you own any other towns? Berlin? Helsinki? Tokyo?”

Abby laughed. “Nope. Just Sin City.”

“I never met someone who owned a whole town before,” Hawk declared. “You think-”

“Abby?”

Abby felt her stomach tighten at the sound of her own name. She didn’t even need to turn her head to know who it belonged to. But she did anyway.

The woman standing at the table was tall, especially since she had on high heels. A decent pair, Abby thought to herself, as she looked the woman over. But then Nicolette had always done better for herself than anyone would have expected from Louisiana sharecroppers.

She had on a crisp linen dress. Her hair was flaming red, much more so than Abby’s. Abby knew it was a dye job just by looking, but a pricey one at any rate.

“What are you doing here?” Abby blurted out, getting out of her chair.

“I heard you were in town and I thought I’d come say hello.”

Abby skirted around the table, took Nicolette by the elbow, and started pushing her toward the door. “Be right back,” she called to the table of her friends.

As both women walked through the lobby, Nicolette protested. “Abby, really, I-”

“
Not. here
,” Abby snapped, jamming the button for the elevator. When the doors opened, she ushered the other woman in and pressed the button for her own floor.

In the relative safety of the suite, Abby slammed the door. “What are you doing here?” she demanded again.

“I came to see you,” Nicolette replied. “You practically ran out of Vegas when you graduated and I never had a chance-”

“You had years, Nicolette,” Abby snapped. “It’s not as though you didn’t know where to find me.”

Nicolette scowled. “Well, things were complicated.”

“I bet,” Abby replied, crossing her arms in front of her chest.

Ignoring Abby’s seething anger, Nicolette instead glanced around the suite. “You know,” she said conversationally, “when Mick built this place, he promised me an apartment on one of the upper floors.” She ran her hand over the back of the sofa. “When he died that bitch-”

“Enough!”

Nicolette at least had the good sense to look chagrined.

“It doesn’t matter,” Abby informed her.

“It’s always mattered,” Nicolette argued. “But now you’re back and-”

Abby shook her head. “I’m not back. I’m just spending the weekend with some friends.”

Ignoring that as well, Nicolette took an envelope out of her purse and tried to hand it to Abby.

“I don’t want that,” Abby declared.

“Abby. Be reasonable.”

“I am being reasonable. This is your thing. Not mine. It has nothing do with me.”

“It has everything to do with you!” Nicolette snapped.

“Why can’t you just be happy?” Abby demanded. “I mean, you look like you’re doing well for yourself, Nicolette. You look like you’ve got a good thing going.”

Always temporarily sidetracked by a compliment, the older woman smoothed her dress and smiled. “I am. He’s a doctor. But this has nothing to do with him,” she said, getting back on track.

Abby sighed inwardly, having forgotten how focused Nicolette could be when money was at stake, or when she was feeling panicked. Nicolette looked good for her age, no one could deny it. But she was an aging ex-showgirl in a town full of younger talent and she obviously felt like she lacked the type of stability that comes from having a lot zeroes in your bank account.

Maybe the doctor was getting tired of her. God knew Abby certainly was.

“Nicolette,” Abby said sternly. “This is a game you don’t know how to play.”

And it was true. Nicolette Boudreaux Raines always wanted more than she had and she always played high stakes. The trouble was, she never understood that the House always wins.

“Abby, we could try again,” Nicolette pleaded. “I know...I know I wasn’t always the best mother.”

“Or ever.”

Undeterred, Nicolette put on her best matronly face. “You could stay,” she said. “We could spend some time together. We could....reconnect.”

“I have a life. And it’s not here.”

Nicolette scoffed. “Nebraska is hardly-”

“South Dakota.”

Nicolette laughed, sharp and brittle. “Is there a difference? Abby, this is Las Vegas. This is home. This is-”

“I have someone,” Abby confided.

Nicolette actually looked surprised.

“I have someone and he’s all I want.”

Nicolette was silent for a moment. Doubtless trying to figure out why anyone would choose love over money. “Abby,” she said in a voice verging on condescension. “You haven’t even known him that long.”

“I’ve known him long enough.”

Nicolette sighed, irritated. “Abby, you can’t possibly care that much for him. And if he cared about you at all, really cared, he would want you to have-”

Abby snatched the envelope from Nicolette and started to crumple it. Nicolette grabbed her wrist. “Do not throw away your future,” she hissed.

“My relationship isn’t for sale, Nicolette.”

Behind them, someone cleared their throat and both women turned to notice that the rest of the group had finished breakfast and had come back to the suite.

Nicolette rearranged her features into a beatific smile and patted Abby’s hand that was holding the envelope. “We’ll talk more before you leave,” she told Abby and breezed out the room.

Mark crossed the sitting room toward Abby. “Everything okay?” he asked.

Abby nodded. “Fine. Honestly.”

“Who was that?” Hawk asked.

“No one,” Abby insisted. To Sarah she said, “Ready to go shopping?”

****

Abby sipped her Bahama Mama and giggled at Shooter trying valiantly to hide his wife’s ass from the general public. Abby had convinced Sarah that she could still look sexy in a bathing suit, despite her scars. They just had to find the right one. Claudia, the boutique owner, had come through with a hot little Brazilian suit that had side cutouts and a nearly thong back, but covered Sarah’s chest and stomach.

Beyond Shooter’s shoulder Abby saw two large men wearing suits and ties, at odds with the pools casual dress code, coming toward the table. Mark, ever attuned to her moods, swiveled his gaze to the approaching men. He tensed, but Abby leaned back in her chair.

“Ms. Raines,” the older one said.

“Jack,” she drawled. Jack Tallant was completely loyal to the Dugan family, but Abby wasn’t about to let him get away with acting as though they barely knew each other.

Jack’s only visible reaction to the familiarity was a slight twitch in his jaw.

“The Dugans would like to see you,” Jack announced.

Abby smiled. “I’m assuming I have time to change.”

Jack grunted something that might have been a yes and Abby stood up. Mark began to get up, as well, but Abby put her hand on his shoulder. “Stay,” she told him. “They’ll just make you sit in a waiting room. You won’t see anything exciting.” She gave Mark a kiss on the cheek and picked up her towel that she’d draped over the chair. Tightening it around her, she was escorted back into the hotel and toward the elevators.

At the suite, she quickly changed into a pair of linen trousers, black high heels, and a cream colored silk button down blouse. She grabbed her purse, double checked to make sure Nicolette’s half-crumpled envelope was still tucked safely inside, and made her way back to the sitting room where Jack and Jack’s Shadow were patiently waiting for her. She didn’t bother to remind them that she knew perfectly well where the hotel’s administration offices were located.

They took her to the ground floor, past the check-in desk, and down the long hall to an area of the hotel that guests never saw. She was ushered into the conference room where it seemed the entire Dugan clan was assembled to greet her. Or do battle. Which for them was the same thing.

Abby spotted Lucian Hilliard, who was head of legal for the Canyon as well as the Dugan family’s private attorney. He smiled warmly at her, in direct opposition to the chilly reception the others were giving her. But then Lucian Hilliard had been overseeing legal operations for the Coral Canyon before any of these people had been associated with the resort. Before Mick Dugan’s widow had gotten her claws into him and certainly before the Dugan heirs, Kyle and Gillian, had been born.

She took a vacant seat next to Hilliard and set her purse down on the floor.

“Abby,” Kyle said by way of greeting, and also as a cue to start the meeting.

“Is this a short trip, Abby?” Claire Dugan interrupted, her sharp gaze boring into Abby from across the table.

Abby smiled, unruffled. “Just a weekend getaway. For my friends.”

Claire’s face remained passive. “Yes, we’d heard you’d taken a job up north.”

Abby didn’t bother to reply. The Dugan family surely knew everything about her from where she lived to what toothpaste she bought and where she bought it.

“Well,” Claire announced, usurping the central role from her son. “I, for one, would like to congratulate you on your new job. Mick was always very supportive of his employees and their families. Since you’re here for a visit, we’d like to offer you-”

“Ten million dollars,” Abby finished for her.

There was no sense in dragging this out any longer than was necessary, was Abby’s way of thinking. Plus, while the Dugans might appear to be a comical mix of a trophy wife past her prime, a grasping, laughably inept son, and an air-headed daughter, Abby knew looks were deceiving. Claire Dugan had as much to do with the operation of the Coral Canyon as her son and her daughter, while not the brightest of progeny, certainly could hire an army of lawyers who were.

Claire gaped.

“Abby-” Kyle scoffed as though she were being childish.

Abby picked up her purse. “We’re in Vegas,” she declared. “Let’s gamble.”

She pulled Nicolette’s envelope out of her purse and set it face up on the table, close enough that Hilliard could see the letterhead. She tapped it casually.

“For 10 million dollars, I will sell you this envelope. But if you’re feeling lucky, let’s open it and let the chips fall where they may, so to speak.”

Claire snorted, which was highly unladylike, but Abby was wise enough not to comment. “It’s surely not the only copy.”

Abby shook her head. “No. I’m certain Nicolette has her own copy. But she can do nothing with it. Not without me. And I’m also certain Mr. Hilliard here has brought along a waiver that I’m supposed to sign relinquishing any claim I might make for a sum of....” Here she looked at Hilliard, who cleared his throat. He was clearly embarrassed by the Dugan’s paltry offer.

“One hundred thousand dollars,” he told her.

Now it was Abby’s turn to scoff. “We all know I’m worth much more than that.”

“Bitch,” Gillian seethed.

Claire held up a hand to silence her daughter.

“Ten million,” Abby repeated. “Or we open this envelope. And I book myself for an extended stay.”

Gillian stormed out and Kyle looked like he might kill Abby rather than agree to that amount. Claire finally sighed and nodded to the lawyer. None of the Dugans stayed in the room, as though they couldn’t be bothered to be associated with Abby for longer than absolutely necessary.