“You can’t not believe,” she whispered. “You can’t work in Vegas for any length of time without coming to believe, at some point, that luck, fortune, fetish, fate play a role in all of our lives. No matter how you try to control your destiny, Lexington, you can’t not believe in magic. Not in Vegas.”
Oh, yeah, he could not believe if he wanted to.
But his blood still ran cold as he stalked toward the store exit, needing to get the hell out of here, and fast. But he did a sharp double take when he saw Jenna standing wide-eyed near the door.
He grabbed her arm. “Geez, Jenna, how long have you been standing there listening?” he snapped.
“Did you hear what she said? About The Tears of the Quetzal?”
“Keep your voice down,” he growled as he ushered her out into the pelting sheet of rain. They ducked their heads against the deluge, ran hand in hand to the car, got in breathless and wet. Both sat in silence for a moment.
Jenna turned to him. “Lex, she had to be talking about The Tears of the Quetzal.”
“It was nonsense,” he said brusquely. “And even if she was referring to the ring, it was probably because she read about Candace’s murder and the diamond in the papers. Damn it—” he ran his hand over his rain-soaked hair “—she probably recognized me from the newspapers the minute I walked in there, played me all along. And then you go and walk in.” Anger stirred, and he swore again. “If she goes to the press with this now, if she tells the media that you and I were together in that place, after they splashed me kissing you on that front cover—” Lex slapped the steering wheel.
“Lex—”
He turned the ignition. “You should have stayed in the damn SUV.”
He pulled into the street, incensed. It was dark now, wipers smearing rain across the windshield. He’d be a fool to believe a word of what the Lucky Lady had said about his mother. The woman was a charlatan, a fake, like the rest of this place and everyone else in it.
Hands tight on the wheel, Lex replayed the scene in his mind, thinking of when exactly he’d heard the chink of bells and sensed another presence in the store. “You heard everything, didn’t you? You heard me talk about my mother.” His words came out bitter. He didn’t want Jenna to know.
It was personal. Maybe a part of him felt humiliated by his past, the fact his mother had once been a hooker before she’d cleaned up her act and gone to dealers’ school. Maybe a part of him really wanted all the ugliness of Sara’s murder to stay buried, not associated with him. Hell knew. He’d never analyzed it.
“I already knew about your mother, Lex,” Jenna said softly as she opened the glove compartment. “I saw these.”
“Oh, you went snooping around my—”
“I didn’t want to get mugged wearing my emerald bracelet and diamond pendant, okay? So I took them off to stash in here.” She removed her bracelet from the glove compartment, clasping it back on while she spoke. “And I couldn’t help seeing these newspaper cuttings.”
“So you just read them.”
“Wouldn’t you?” she snapped.
He shot her a hard look. “Put them back.”
She stared at him in silence for a moment, then shoved the articles back into the glove compartment, slapped it closed. Lex noticed her hands were trembling.
They drove in tense silence, entering thickening traffic, water writhing little snakes over the windshield, refracting the brake lights ahead.
Then suddenly, in the dark, he felt her hand move onto his knee. Just a gentle touch. No pressure. Reassuring. Compassionate. As if to let him know she was there for him, that she understood.
Moisture burned suddenly into his eyes. His jaw tightened. He clenched his fists around the wheel. He needed to get her home, dump her outside her fancy mansion and get her the hell out of his life.
Because he was scared. He was starting to feel like leaning on her, sharing.
His deep down private stuff.
He didn’t want another relationship, marriage. He didn’t want to start falling for a woman—not in that way. Especially not Jenna Rothchild.
He remained silent as he drove sharply into her driveway. Waved on by the security guard, he drove right up to the portico, stopped, but did not kill the engine.
“I can let myself out.”
He nodded.
She reached for the door handle, hesitated. “That’s why you really came back to Vegas, isn’t it, Lex?” she said. “That’s why you put in for the transfer. You came to find your father. To learn who killed your mother.” Her voice was thick, full of emotion and compassion. Lex just wanted to stay on safe, uncommitted territory. He wanted to cruise in his emotionally neutral zone. He wanted her to get out. Leave him alone.