“High-maintenance may be pretty on the outside, Jenna,” he whispered, voice hoarse, his sudden erection straining against his pants. All he wanted to do was take her right here, right now, on this table. “Been there, done that. And I’ll tell you something, Ms. Rothchild. It’s not worth it.”
She swore softly at him again. But it didn’t hide the raw hurt glimmering in her eyes.
Then she swiveled and stormed out.
Lex slumped back in his chair. Beaten, hot and throbbing like he’d never been in his life. Angry as all hell at what he’d allowed to come out of his mouth. He’d been lashing out at himself for even being tempted. She was right. What he said was way below the belt. He didn’t mean it. He watched her disappear into the restaurant elevator, silk pants swishing in smooth flow around her ankles. Dark hair swinging across her back. Head held proud.
The elevator doors slid shut, and the gentleman in him kicked back in.
Who the hell did he think he was?
He got up, ran after her, jabbed repeatedly at the elevator button, cursing the car to rise faster.
Jenna was shaking, hurt, aroused. Her eyes filled with tears. Never had she been through such a maelstrom, or been so humiliated. She was like a frustrated firecracker ready to detonate by the time she stormed through and out the lobby into the steaming Vegas night.
No one—no one—hurt her pride and dignity like that! But what really burned was the fact he didn’t want her. That he’d been able to rein himself in. The coldhearted jerk was actually immune to her tried-and-true seductive ploys. To her wealth, to her looks.
She’d always gotten everything this way.
What cut even deeper were his comments about her lifestyle, her family. About who she was inside.
It made her want to prove him wrong. It made her want him even more, damn it. And that made her scared. Because she was beginning to see that if she really wanted to win Agent Lexington Duncan, she was going to have to try something completely foreign. She was going to have to be herself. That old self she’d buried at school so very many years ago.
So long ago that Jenna didn’t know if that person even existed anymore.
What if there was nothing under her facade?
What if this was who she’d truly become?
She slumped back into the limo seat as her driver pulled into the street. Wouldn’t that be ironic, she thought, if the one man in her life that she might actually end up wanting—really wanting—would be the one she couldn’t have.
Lex rushed out under the myriad of gold bulbs just as Jenna’s limo pulled out of the valet area and into the palm-lined boulevard of the sweltering Las Vegas night. He stared at the red brake lights flaring, then fading down the road. He swore, kicked a tire.
The valet came at him instantly. “Sir? Please—”
He raised his hands, backing off. “Sorry, sorry, no worries. I’m outta here,” he muttered as he made his way to the line of waiting cabs. But as he stole another glance at the vanishing white limo, a dark sedan, plates obscured, pulled out fast, tucked in behind it.
Lex stilled, a sixth sense whispering inside him. The limo turned left off the boulevard. The dark sedan followed.
He shook off the sensation. It was Jenna’s affect on his body—and it was the ring in his pocket messing with his head, making him paranoid. He climbed into a taxi, almost telling the driver to take him straight to the Vegas FBI field office before his brain kicked back into gear. He should go home first, get his own vehicle, then return the legendary ring ASAP. He’d be a fool to make the cabbie an outside witness to the fact he’d even been to the FBI offices this time of night.
But as Lex sank back into the car seat, hand in his pocket, fingering Harold Rothchild’s diamond, he realized he’d crossed the line. Big time.
What in heaven had he gone and gotten himself into?
The Avenger.
That was his tag tonight, how he was going to think of himself for this leg of his mission. He tucked in behind the white limo, slowing as it turned into the driveway of the Rothchild mansion. The security guard Harold Rothchild had hired since the murder of his daughter waved the limo in through the gates.
The Avenger cut his engine and lights, watched from darkness across the street.
He now knew the FBI agent heading up the Candace Rothchild homicide investigation was seeing the youngest Rothchild heiress. This could get interesting. It held real potential—in any number of ways. Hot deliciousness snaked through him, making him hard. Death, he’d discovered, excited him. Ever since he’d taken the life of that Candace slut.
Killing her had made him powerful. Invincible. Determined to systematically wipe out the rest of the Rothchild scum from the earth, to get his hands on The Tears of the Quetzal. He wanted that ring, needed it.