Instead, Natalie ran from me again.
This avoidance was a direct challenge to my authority.
I called David.
"Get me a plane to Vegas. Now."
Did Natalie think Vegas was safe? That I couldn't find her there?
She was dead wrong.
When the privatejet took off, Los Angeles's lights shrank into a glittering sea below.
I sat in the cabin, whiskey in hand, untouched, mind full of Natalie.
Her masked face at the gala. Her trembling breath in that bathroom, trapped between me and the counter. Her rigid posture in my backseat, like a cat ready to jump through the window.
And earlier. Two years ago, that charity gala where we first met. When she'd grabbed my tie and pulled me into the backseat, eyes burning with raw, untamed desire. That Natalie and the docile Mrs. Winston who came later might as well have been different people.
I'd thought I'd tamed her. Now that seemed like the real joke.
The plane touched down in Vegas around one a.m. A car waited on the tarmac, driver silently handing over keys. I slid into the driver's seat, entered the address David had sent—Canvas Apartments.
The building stood downtown. Not tall, maybe fifteen stories, exterior bland beige brick. Nothing like Blackwood Manor.
I got out. Night wind carried Vegas's particular restless heat, mixed with distant casino noise and music. Fireworks burst somewhere west, bloomed, faded.
I straightened my shirt, buttoned my jacket, and headed for the entrance.
Natalie lived on the fifteenth floor. I stepped off the elevator into a hallway with worn but clean carpet, dim lighting. Found the unit number David sent. Stopped.
Light seeped under the door. Natalie was home. Good. At least this trip wouldn't be wasted.
I raised my hand and knocked.
Natalie, we're meeting again.
Chapter Fifteen
Natalie
I was sprawled on the couch like a fish washed ashore.
The nausea had just passed, leaving my mouth sour and my body drenched in cold sweat. Morning sickness, or in this case, night sickness, felt like God's cruel joke, specially designed to punish women who dared to reproduce. I curled up in the corner of the couch, clutching a cushion, silently begging the tiny person inside me to give me a break for the hundredth time.
That's when the doorbell rang.
Emma said she might drop by tonight with the contract for next week's performance.
So I dragged myself off the couch and shuffled toward the door in my slippers. "Coming, coming. Emma, could you be a little gentler? I'm not feeling great tonight—" I was muttering as I pulled the door open. The second I saw who was standing there, every word died in my throat.
Richard stood there in a dark overcoat, perfectly tailored to his frame. The Vegas night wind had messed up a few strands of his hair, leaving them scattered across his forehead, but he hadn't bothered to fix them. He just stood there, shoulderssharp, his silhouette like a moving Greek statue in the dim hallway light.
God, it wasn't fair. Even now, I had to admit it. Richard's handsomeness had an edge to it, that ease bred by power and wealth. No one could resist him.
But what the hell was he doing here?
I grabbed the door instinctively and pushed hard.
