Lex swallowed against the dryness in his throat. And before reengaging his brain, the words came out of his mouth. “One date. That’s it. The money goes to my kids. Then this is done. Over. Capiche?”
“What ever made you think I wanted—” her eyes teased slowly over his bare chest “—anything more?” she whispered. “I did this purely for charity, Lex.”
He muttered something unholy under his breath. Then spun, and stalked off toward the hotel lobby.
Jenna watched him go, admiring the view. His dark-blond hair glinted under the pinprick lights, and his neck was taut. The power in his shoulders transferred with each stride down the corded muscles of his broad back into the waistband of his tailored pants—pants that had been expertly cut to accommodate the rock-hard thighs she’d felt against her body while dancing. And suddenly, this really wasn’t about Daddy and the diamond at all. Not even remotely. This was about Jenna. What she wanted…and she wanted him.
Except he appeared immune to her charms. And her money.
Lex Duncan had just tossed down the gauntlet, because Jenna never failed, especially when it came to men. She always got what she wanted from a guy, and this one was making her determined to prove her skill.
And Jenna had learned from early childhood how to manipulate the males in her life, starting with her dad.
Her mother, June Smith Rothchild, had died while giving birth to Jenna, and she’d always felt that others in her family, including her father, saw her as somehow responsible for June’s death. And when Jenna and her older twin sisters—Candace and Natalie—had fought, Candace would get nasty and “remind” Jenna she “killed their mom.” These attacks had made Jenna feel like an outsider in her own family. Not to mention guilty. She’d become a sensitive and lonely child with a driving need to be loved, to please and to be liked.
And as she got older, Jenna sometimes caught her dad watching her in a certain way. It was at those times that Jenna knew she was reminding him of the wife he truly loved and missed. And although Jenna knew her father totally adored her, his feelings about his youngest daughter were complex. On occasion, especially after a few nighttime single malts, Harold would lash out irrationally at Jenna because she reminded him so painfully of June.
Those moments caused Jenna extreme hurt, and it became her goal to do anything she could to keep in her daddy’s good graces. To be liked by him, to be his favorite daughter. He was her rock. Her defense against the twins, against the nasty friends at school, and she’d found that flattery worked. It was the beginning of where Jenna learned to charm males, with very real results. She’d come to realize she could get whatever she needed this way.
It was the same in high school. Because of her seductive beauty Jenna was automatically labeled as promiscuous. So, to stay “cool” and “liked” she pretended to be “bad,” wore the sexy clothes, hung out with the in crowd. And she always managed to hide her giving heart, her sharp intelligence and her genuine sensitivity. No one had ever really gotten to know the real Jenna Rothchild.
And Jenna started to become the person she had so carefully fashioned. Because of this, she continued to attract the wrong sort of men post school, and she continued to escape with parties. Throwing fabulous events became her forte, her way to escape uncomfortable reality, to be the center of attraction—to be liked. And she was so good at the parties it grew into a business, her dad eventually hiring her as a key event planner for his major Strip casino—the Grand Hotel and Casino.
But deep down, something was missing. A pit was forming in Jenna’s gut—a longing for a sense of worth, something real. Some value and relevance in the scope of the world. And she’d begun to harbor secret fears that maybe she really had no personality after all. Then with Candace’s murder, the inner Jenna really began stirring, asking questions about what life and money were really all about when it couldn’t buy the kind of happiness her poor beleaguered sister seemed to have been yearning for.
Her dad approaching her for help in Candace’s case was a way to wrest some control of it all. To do something.
And now there was this bonus—Special Agent Lexington Duncan.
He was pure eye candy. She wanted him and was stunned he’d been able to resist her, especially after she’d coughed up a cool quarter million for his pet charity.
Damn cool solid hunk of granite.
It made her all the more determined and just a little bit vulnerable.
She pushed a wave of hair back from her face, watching him exit the hotel, shirtless. And she allowed amusement to whisper over her lips. Poor devil. He’d thrown his shirt to the crowd of bidding women, and now he was apparently too proud to go back inside to look for something to wear. The FBI agent was left with no choice but to go home half-naked.
Her smile deepened into a grin.
She’d get him.
She’d seal the seduction tomorrow, on their date.
This was just phase one, she told herself. She’d done her reconnaissance, and gotten him here—playing it smart, staging the event away from the Grand Hotel and Casino and keeping her own name off the event ticket.
Enlisting Cassie to approach Lex’s partner, Rita Perez, at the gym where Rita gave martial arts classes two evenings a week had been the coup de grâce.
Yeah, the date itself would be phase two. And once she was done there, he’d be pure, warm putty in her hands. And that thought sent a hot little tingling zing of anticipation through her belly. She exhaled, pressing her hand against her stomach as she watched the glass revolving door spew him out into the hot desert night. The valet rushed over to him, called for his car.
As Lex passed by on the other side of the big glass windows making his way toward his black SUV he glanced up, caught her watching and scowled.
She smiled sweetly and gave a little wave.
Then she spun on her four-inch heels and sashayed back toward the pulsing Ruby Room. But as she pulled open the doors, she bumped into Cassie coming out.
“Uh-oh,” Cassie said the minute she saw her friend. “You have that look.”
“What look?”
Cassie glanced over Jenna’s shoulder, saw the shirtless cop through the windows getting into his SUV. “Oh, come on, Jenna. Why do you want him so bad, when you could have any one of the guys back there?”
Jenna didn’t answer for a minute.
“Ah, wait, I get it.” Cassie’s disarming chuckle bubbled up from her chest. “It’s because he’s immune to the infamous Jenna Rothchild charm, is that it? He doesn’t want you. Because he can see right through you, girlfriend.”
Jenna laughed, making light of it while she said goodbye to her friend. But Cassie’s words left a niggling coolness inside her. Maybe Cass was right.
Maybe Lex did see right through her. And he saw there was nothing inside. Nothing under the money and superficial glitz.
Jenna wasn’t sure how to handle this idea. It made her feel more than just a little bit vulnerable—it made her feel worthless. Maybe she was wrong. Maybe Lex Duncan had nailed the game advantage and she hadn’t won after all.
Lex was greeted by a chorus of adult males making the yipping sounds of a small dog as he walked into the bullpen at the FBI’s Las Vegas field office Friday, the next morning.
He glanced at Rita Perez. “What the hell is going on here?”
“She has one of those little purse pooches,” Perez said as Lex removed his jacket.
“What are you talking about?”
Perez slapped a copy of the Las Vegas Sun on Lex’s desk. “You and it-girl.” She folded her arms across her chest, looking too damn smug for her own Latina good. Lex glanced