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Kira rolled her eyes, even as her heart skipped a beat. She looked down at the array of sparkling cocktail glasses on the counter.
“Good, he’s distracting,” she replied.
“As if you don’t love it,” Lily giggled. “Who wouldn’t?”
“He scares off other potential tipping clients,” said Kira, picking up a fresh tray.
“Yeah, but he tips better than all of them combined,” she pointed out.
“True. I don’t know where he gets all that money from,” said Kira.
“Who cares? As long as it’s going home with you, right?” said Lily. She gave Kira a wink and walked away to serve a packed poker table.
Kira didn’t have much time to think about ‘Mr. Muscles.’ A bachelorette party came ambling into the casino, ribboned in white and ready to waste way too much money on slots. Suddenly, one corner of the casino floor became very busy, and Kira jumped into the fray to serve up pink cocktails and congratulate to the bride-to-be. She saw a lot of bachelors and bachelorettes on her night shifts. Seeing people so excited and nervous for their big day excited the romantic in Kira. It was like watching one of her favorite stories come to life.
Sometimes, she wondered if she would ever experience a romance like that. Kira imagined herself in a white dress. She could visualize everything else, too: the flowers, the music, even the cake. Somehow, it was much harder to picture the man who would stand at the altar waiting to be her groom.
She knew one thing for sure; it wouldn’t be a guy like Mr. Muscles.
CHAPTER3
LUKA
Luka paceda vast figure-eight through the ghost town of Roach. He wove around the buildings with a gun at each hip, squinting out into the dusty horizon. The desert was a constant swirl of red, brown, and gold, the sands shifting so slowly as to not even be noticed. It looked like it had been unchanged for centuries. Luka always loved the sense of calm he felt out in the middle of nowhere, surrounded primarily by the uncaring attitude of nature. The fresh air invigorated him, and the knowledge that his life was in his own hands… well, it only intensified the pleasure he felt in being there. He was accustomed to the thrills and kills of his lifestyle, and it was nice to do some work in a natural environment for once, instead of sneaking around the city streets.
From his stance at the northern edge of the ghost town, Luka could almost see the cracked expanse of the dry lake beds. It was a mostly forgotten part of the state, but there were still those adventurers who wanted a chance to hike somewhere unusual. Luka had even heard anecdotes about people going out to the dried lake beds to hold engagement or family photoshoots. The surreal, nearly alien environment made for a stunning backdrop. Las Vegas locals trekked out in their fancy clothes, carrying heaps of photography equipment just for the striking scenery. It was the first Friday of May, and the weather was beautiful. During the day, the desert heat was rising back to its usual blaze, and the world cooled down by evening. It was the perfect time to venture out into the wilderness, as long as you knew your way back.
Today, though, Luka was happy to have driven down to Roach without seeing more than a couple of other vehicles on the freeway. It was just safer for civilians to stay out of harm’s way, especially with Mikhail’s best and cruelest set up in the ghost town just to the south.
Not that he expected much of anyone to comethisway. Even for the most seasoned backpacker, there weren’t a ton of reasons to draw them to Roach. The ghost town itself was not a lot to look at, at least not anymore. The whole place consisted of just a few falling-down structures; an old farmhouse with a squalid outhouse, general store, and what was left of a train depot. The depot was especially forlorn. The wooden platform was missing several planks, and what remained was badly broken. Years of rot had weakened it to the point of becoming a complete hazard. The glass windows of the depot building had been shot or smashed out, with only the needle-sharp angled edges remaining. The inside of the building was filled with dust and grime. Any historical items that had been left there were long gone by now, plucked up by eager explorers and opportunistic looters.
It was an icon of a brighter, more optimistic moment in Roach’s history. Long ago, for a brief window of time, Roach had been a railway town, a bona fide stop on the cross-state journey. As the railroad projects were abandoned for automobile-friendly roads, the train stops fell into disuse, and then disrepair. Roach was a victim of the sweeping changes of the mid-1900s. Luka was no history buff, having spent his life learning the rules of the streets rather than learning from books, but he thought it was something worth remembering, even if it was outdated and falling to pieces. It was a scrap of the past. Something to be protected for posterity.
For now, though, it would serve just as well as a temporary torture camp.
Luka smirked as a shout of unspeakable misery rose up from the center of the ghost town. The victim’s shrieks and moans split the silence and filled Luka with satisfaction. He stretched his muscular arms up over his head and smiled into the afternoon sun. It beat across his face, highlighting his powerful bone structure. He had high cheekbones, a large, straight nose, and a strong jawline with a rounded chin. His dark brown hair glinted in the orangey glow. He breathed in deeply the fresh scent of the desert, even though the ghost town smelled faintly of gasoline, and soon it would smell like old blood, too. Luka didn’t mind that. He felt right at home breathing in the scent of death.
He recalled so clearly how it had felt to watch his comrade, Andrei, fire that final shot to Dasha Turgenev’s forehead. Luka usually liked to preserve the very worst targets for himself; after all, if he was going through the work of capturing, holding, and torturing someone, it seemed only fair that he got to deliver the killing blow. It was the cherry on top of a violent sundae, and Luka relished every step of the process.
But this time, he understood perfectly why it was necessary for Andrei to make that kill. Dasha Turgenev was a horrible brute of a man. His evil reputation stretched all the way across the Atlantic Ocean, back to his roots in Russia. Dasha had been causing panic and pain all across the rural landscape, as well as running illicit schemes in Moscow. Luka had never been to Russia, having been born in the States. He only heard of Dasha’s reign of terror secondhand. Andrei, however, had grown up in the motherland and witnessed firsthand the horrors of Turgenev and his team of lowlife lackeys. They’d battled for control of the area for years, until finally Andrei had quashed the whole operation with one well-planned sting. Then, when Dasha had appeared again, he’d immediately swooped into Andrei’s inner circle to target the one person he cared about above all others: Inessa.
Luka remembered talking to Andrei about the burgeoning relationship between them. Luka knew why Andrei was worried. It was dangerous to involve an innocent young woman in their risky lifestyle. Especially when you had enemies like Dasha. So when Luka had captured the Russian tyrant in the broken-down general store, he had known how important it was to keep him incapacitated but alive. It was slightly less gratifying than taking his own kill, but it was still wildly enjoyable to watch the life leave Dasha’s body.
But Dasha hadn’t been the only rat bastard running around the ghost town that day. When Luka and the others had arrived, they’d found several men gathered there. Dasha had a team of miscreants working for him here in the States. While their ringleader tried unsuccessfully to hide in the old general store, the others had scattered out into the darkened desert. Mikhail and Vadim had chased after them, but there were too many to round up that day. Besides, with Inessa confirmed safe and Dasha confirmed dead, the crisis was averted.
Now, though, Luka was back in Roach for a follow-up mission. Not all of Dasha’s flunkies had escaped that day. Sure, a few of them had slipped away, but Vadim and Mikhail had managed to catch one of them.
“The big idiot was looking back at us over his shoulder when he tripped over a cactus.” Mikhail laughed as he retold the story. “Fell right into it. The dumbass was covered in spines.”
“Spines for the spineless,” remarked Vadim.
“I think we’ve given him enough of a break, don’t you?” said Luka. He cracked his knuckles. “I have some more questions for our friend.”
“I’m going back to the estate. I try to catch dinner with Annika and the twins when I can. I have to admit, it’s cute as hell to watch them eat,” Mikhail explained.
“You know what they say; they’re only young for a little while, then it’s all over before you know it,” said Vadim.
“We’ve got this under control here,” Luka chimed in.
