Sweet Sinful Nights Page 3

  On the way upstairs she snagged her mail, slapping it on the kitchen table to look at later. She showered, blow-dried her hair, and applied fresh makeup, twisting her long chestnut hair into a neat updo. She slipped into a sleek black dress that zipped up the side—the whole damn side from hem to sleeve—then into a pair of four-inch red suede shoes that tied up her ankles and to her calves. Vegas nights could be chilly, so she grabbed a shimmery, silver wrap for her shoulders.

  She looked the part. She needed to look the part. She might not be the one on stage, but she still looked like a dancer.

  Hell, she still was a dancer, even if she’d never dance again the way she wanted to.

  But she’d gotten over her injury.

  She’d gotten over her loss.

  She’d gotten over Brent.

  She knew how to get over stuff. She’d done it since she was thirteen.

  CHAPTER THREE

  One thousand feet.

  That was when the plane started getting service again, so Brent tapped the screen on his phone, ready for the barrage of messages to load. Wireless had been down on the return flight from Saint Bart’s, and he was antsy to know what he’d missed. Edge had been expanding rapidly in the last year, so these days his company was like a busy airport with jets lined up, taking off and landing every fifteen minutes.

  As his plane dipped closer to the runway in Vegas, the emails poured onto his phone. He scanned quickly for James’s name, since his right-hand man was tasked with keeping him apprised of the latest deals, problems, and opportunities. Brent was the front man in their 70/30 partnership, but James was vital in helping guide the business and find the right opportunities for Edge.

  Fortunately, the email that awaited him was of the opportunity variety.

  “Meeting tonight with Shay Productions. Should be able to sign that deal.”

  Excellent news.

  That deal had come together in record time—less than one week. Brent had been traveling to Ibiza earlier that month to check out the club scene there, and see what best practices he could adopt for his business. One of the clubs he’d visited had featured background dancers on pedestal stages throughout the club, dancing seductively all through the night. Some had circulated on the dance floor too, and the club owner had dropped the name Shay Productions. Brent had passed it on to James, who’d assembled the pieces quickly while Brent had traveled to Saint Bart’s for the launch of his club there.

  Brent hadn’t slept in his own bed in ten days. He was damn tired, and ready to crash.

  The Saint Bart’s club opening had gone so smoothly that he’d returned one day earlier than planned. Hearing that the next deal was falling into place was music to his ears, especially since Edge’s expansion into New York had been hitting roadblock after roadblock. He had a meeting in Manhattan later that week to deal with the latest challenges in that city.

  He yawned as he began to reply good luck.

  But then he covered his mouth, stifled the yawn and reminded himself that businesses didn’t grow if the CEO made sure he got a good night’s sleep. Edge had thrived when Brent had burned the midnight oil and kept his laser focus on the company. That included meeting all their business partners when he was in town and making sure everyone was on the up and up.

  The second the wheels touched down in the city he called home, he dialed James.

  “Hey, where’s the meeting?” he asked, as they taxied. He’d flown commercial and had enjoyed the first-class seat. His brother Clay had taught him that early days were not the time for frills like a private jet; those would come with growth. Or better yet, make nice with people and they might loan you their jets. That was how his brother had flown the friendly skies in style.

  “Mandarin Bar at the Oriental,” James said. “You gonna join us?”

  Brent nodded. “Yeah. I want to meet them before we sign off.”

  “Excellent. See you at eight then. Oh, and this deal kicks ass. Their dancers are fuck-hot,” he said.

  Brent laughed. “That’s what we want, my man. That’s what we want. I’ll see you in two hours.”

  Soon he made his way off the plane, shouldering his bag from the overhead and heading down the escalator toward the terminal exit, where his regular driver waited for him. The black town car zipped along the highway as the sun fell below the horizon, and twenty minutes later he’d reached his home.

  After a quick shower that both perked him up and washed off the remnants of cross-country travel, he pulled on jeans and a button-down. He tucked it in and considered a tie. There were plenty of times when he needed to go full suit, and that had been one of the biggest transitions for him in his new job. How the hell his brother wore a suit every day and liked it, he had no clue. Give him jeans and a T-shirt any day of the week. But this gig required a classier touch, so he added a tie, leaving the jacket behind.

  He grabbed his helmet, locked the door, and hopped on his Indian Dark Horse, the new bike he’d bought last year to celebrate Edge’s growing success. As the engine purred to life, he fast-forwarded to the meeting tonight with the entertainment services firm that choreographed dance shows around the world. Naturally he thought of Shannon, and couldn’t help but wonder what she was up to these days. Was she still in choreography? Had she moved beyond West Side Story? Had she found a boyfriend? A husband? The thought curdled his stomach and made him gun the engine and ride faster, the cool evening air whipping past him as he drove to the hotel.

  He’d tried to keep her in the past, where she belonged, because there was no room for her in the present. Especially since she didn’t seem to exist anymore. He hadn’t gone to the extreme and called a private detective to dig up a phone number. But he’d done enough when he’d Facebook stalked her nearly a year ago.

  He’d learned nothing. Zilch. Nada.

  Shannon was one of the rare breeds who’d managed to live most of her life off the Internet. That wasn’t surprising. Given what had happened to her family when she was younger, it was no surprise that she’d learned to navigate the world under the radar.

  He’d tried valiantly to move on from the biggest mistake of his life. Because she’d been right—she’d been absolutely right with her last words. Hardly a day went by when he didn’t regret having walked away from being with her. As he covered the final mile to the meeting, he replayed some of the moments from their time together.

  Like their first kiss outside a record store in Boston when he’d been riffing on how only old, angry record dudes listened to vinyl anymore, and she had laughed so hard she’d clutched her belly. He’d wanted to pump his fist from having made her crack up, but there was no time for that because she’d placed her hands on his cheeks and made the first move.

  In seconds, he’d spun her around, backed her up to the brick wall, and kissed her as if his life depended on it.

  The first time they’d slept together was only a few nights later. Neither one could hold back. The chemistry between them was too electric, too intense. They went to dinner at a Thai restaurant near campus, and the second he’d paid the bill he’d grabbed her hand, walked her out, and taken her back to his place. As soon as the door had fallen open, they were both nearly naked.

  Then there was the evening he’d run out of gas in his motorcycle when they were on a date. They’d been one mile from his apartment. Still, he’d told her he’d carry her the whole way home. He’d hoisted her up and draped her over his shoulder as she’d swatted his back and shouted playfully, Put me down.

  There were so many memories from their two years together. Smaller ones, slices of moments, but ones that he remembered just as fiercely. The way she looked as snow fell around her face when they walked through the city. The sweet, sexy smell of her neck when she fell asleep in his arms. How she went to nearly all his shows, and threw her arms around him and kissed him hard after each performance, even the night she gave up her tickets for them to see her favorite dance company, Alvin Ailey. She’d saved up for them, but he’d told he
r he landed a gig that night and needed her desperately at his show, so she came to see him instead.

  Then the fighting—they fought over everything and nothing. They fought over their schedules, whose apartment they’d sleep at, and what they were going to do on a Friday night. They argued about petty jealousies and fears. Every now and then they argued over money—she’d gone to school on a full scholarship, so he never wanted her to pay when they went out, but she didn’t like to feel “indebted,” she’d said. They fought over secrets held too close. He was an open book; she was hidden. But some things she’d shared freely. Like the letters. With crystal clarity, as if it were happening that moment, he could recall kissing away her tears every time she got one of those letters in the mail. The letters tore her apart, and soon he started opening them for her because she couldn’t bear to read them, but she couldn’t bear to throw them away either.

  He wondered if she still got them. If they still ripped her in two.

  And who kissed her tears away.

  The notion that someone else was there to do that was like a fist in his gut.

  When he reached the Mandarin Oriental, he kicked her out of his head once more, said hello to one of the valet guys he knew, and headed to the elevator, ready to turn his focus back to business and away from the past. The Mandarin Oriental was one of the few hotels in Vegas without a casino. While Brent enjoyed a game of slots or a round of cards, he also savored the calmer, classier atmosphere of this hotel—that was what made it a great spot for meetings with other locals. When you lived in town—and he’d grown up in Vegas and spent most of his adult life there—you had to find the hidden oases that let you conduct business away from the jingle of clanging slot machines, the slap of cards from the table games, and the eye-numbing parade of bare flesh in sequined tops serving drinks to tourists. God bless the visitors; they made this town run, and they powered his clubs with their energy and night-owlish ways. But sometimes, you just needed to be part of the engine and operate under the hood rather than as the ornament.

  This hotel was one of those spots that let him do that.

  The sleek metal elevator shot him up to the twenty-third floor, and as he checked his phone, he saw he was early for the meeting. When he reached the Mandarin Bar, the hostess greeted him, and said that James Foster was already there. Exactly as Brent had suspected. James was beyond punctual, and Brent was grateful every day to have such a steady guy as his lead investor.

  The hostess escorted him to James, who was seated in a oversized red leather chair by the floor-to-ceiling windows that overlooked the city. He rose when Brent walked over, and reached out a hand to welcome him back.

  “Good trip?” James asked as he sat down again, gesturing to the booth on the other side of the table. James was older than Brent by a few years, and had a long pedigree in business. While Brent had the vision and the guts to build Edge, James was the solid, reliable rudder who made sure they stayed the course.

  “The best,” he said, and recounted a few key details. When he was through, he glanced around, scanning the room for the waitress.

  “The waitress should be right back. She’d just stopped by before you arrived,” James offered.

  Brent tipped his forehead to the square bar in the middle of the space. “I’ll just grab a drink myself. You want something?”

  “Vodka tonic.”

  Brent threaded his way around the leather chairs and chrome tables to the towering shelf of liquor that framed the bar. A guy he knew, Miles, was working behind the counter, and nodded a hello. “Hey, Brent. What’s the latest with you?”

  “Not much, just working on my tan,” he joked, holding out his forearm to show the color he’d nabbed while in the Caribbean.

  “Haven’t I told you to quit the tanning bed juice?”

  “This is all natural, man. Saint Bart’s color.”

  “I’m working on my blue-light tan,” Miles said with a laugh, as he glanced up at the tinted lights in the bar. “Anyway, what can I get for you?”

  “Scotch on the rocks, and a vodka tonic.”

  “Coming right up.”

  Brent drummed his fingertips against the steel countertop as Miles headed to the other end to pour. Turning around, he leaned against the bar and stared out the window, where the entire city stretched far beyond the glass. City of sin. City of secrets. City of endless opportunities. Whatever bout of exhaustion had threatened him when he’d landed had vacated the premises. He was wide-awake and energized, ready to sign deals, to grow Edge, to keep on building the business.

  Glass clinked against metal, and he turned to grab the drinks and start a tab. A minute later, he had a glass in each hand and was making his way back to their table when he stopped short.

  His pulse pounded.

  His throat went dry.

  The floor tilted and loomed closer. The glass walls zoomed in. He blinked.

  He was seeing a mirage. Either that or he’d slipped back in time, because there was no other explanation.

  After all those years, there she was, in the flesh. A vision in black and red, and a brunette now. He stared from across the room, trying to process what he was seeing.

  Shannon Paige-Prince.

  The biggest regret of his life, more stunning than she’d ever been, and she wasn’t alone. She was with one of her brothers, and they were both focused on James. Heading for his table. As she turned in his direction, she looked up and they locked eyes.

  His drinks slipped from his hands, crashing onto the dark wood floor and shattering.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  “That answers my question. Those glasses are indeed breakable,” Brent said, tapping on his glass as he sat back down with a new drink and raised it in a toast. The waitress had just given it to him after quickly handling the spill.

  James laughed and clinked their glasses. “Good thing you tested it. I was so damn worried,” he said, and Shannon faked a smile, still shaking in her skin. Blood pounded in her head, and the entire bar seemed to sway and bob, like a boat on the seas. She dug her fingernails into the leather of the armchair she’d claimed—a necessary stake in the ground because it gave her distance from that man. That man she wasn’t supposed to see tonight. Who wasn’t supposed to be there. Who had been just as surprised to see her. And who was doing a much better job at covering it up than she was, with his little jokes, and his self-deprecating humor.

  Fucking bastard.

  Everything was so easy for him.

  The man was a master at ad-libbing, at covering up the hole in the routine.

  She hated that he had the ability to patch a gaffe so quickly. But a small part of her was pleased that he’d been so shocked he’d dropped his glasses.

  “In any case, now that my CEO has finished his quality control inspection of the Mandarin’s glassware, I’d like to introduce everyone,” James began, gesturing to Shannon and her brother. “This is Shay Sloan, the founder and head choreographer for Shay Productions. And her brother, Colin Sloan, a financier who advises Shay Productions. Shay and Colin, allow me to introduce Brent Nichols, who runs Edge.”

  Colin rose first. “Good to meet you. I’ve heard a lot about you,” he said, and extended a hand to the man he’d met at Christmas the year Brent had proposed. But Colin knew how to cover up the past, and knew intuitively that she’d want him to.

  “All good, I hope,” Brent said, with a quirk to his lips, though he had to know it couldn’t be good. Colin, Ryan and Michael knew exactly how Brent had dumped her.

  “And this is—” James began, gesturing to her, but Brent jumped in.

  “Shan—”

  “Shay Sloan,” she said quickly, correcting him before he said too much. “I wasn’t expecting you to be here tonight.”

  “I wasn’t expecting you to be here either,” he said, and James shot Brent a strange look as if to say ‘of course you were’ but he said nothing aloud.

  Brent shook her hand next, and instantly a million things zipped through her
body. Memories, feelings, promises. He never once took his deep brown eyes off hers as their fingers laced together. She drew a breath and wished that she didn’t feel a slight charge in her body from the way his gaze held hers. But she did. The fluttery sensation spread through her with every breath. For a second, maybe more, they were the only ones there. The handshake went on longer than it should have.

  James tilted his head to the side and gestured from Shannon to Brent. “You two know each other?”

  Worry gripped her instantly, breaking the moment. She had no clue if Brent felt tricked or hoodwinked that she was behind Shay Productions. She dropped his hand, gulped, and parted her lips to answer.

  Brent jumped in. “We both went to school in Boston, I believe. Isn’t that right, Shay?”

  She squeaked out a yes, breathing easier. He seemed to be guiding the awkwardness out of the way so neither one had to admit how they had known each other, or how well.

  “Yes. I went to the Boston Conservatory,” she said, as she shrugged off her silvery wrap.

  “And I was at Boston College. We had friends in common, didn’t we, Shay?” he asked with a slight smile, keeping it casual, making it easy for her.

  She nodded and wished she knew why he was knitting a fable, but she was glad he was. Their past was theirs. It didn’t need to be part of their business partnership. Clearly, he was a pro at keeping entanglements off the table.

  “We did. It’s good to see you again,” she said, plastering on her best seemingly natural smile.

  His eyes never strayed from her, and he lowered his voice, speaking in the barest whisper, the words hardly audible, but his lips readable. “Is it?”

  Her chest rose and fell, and she didn’t know how to answer. Her skin was white hot all over. Seeing him again stirred up so many memories, not only of the cruel, callous way he’d ended their love, but also of the way she’d leaned on him so much, and how he’d been there for her every time she’d needed him. He’d been her rock.

  Too bad he was as handsome as ever, and still stitched with the same mix of intensity and charm that he’d possessed more than ten years ago. She glanced down, adjusted her skirt, and reached for a glass of ice water, the cubes hitting her teeth as she knocked back half the liquid.