Page 8 of Accidental Vegas Vows

I stumbled out of the car, watching in silence as the taxi driver retrieved my small suitcase from the trunk, and flattened down any hint of a wrinkle on my dress. At least in something that almost reached my knees and covered the entirety of my chest—sans buttons—he couldn’t say I was dressing provocatively.

The black fabric was fairly tight, though.

Cursing myself for not picking slacks and a shirt with some kind of blazer, I took my bag from the taxi driver and passed him a ten-dollar bill as a tip before making my way inside.

The interior of the private charter service was ornate and gorgeous, but since I was already late, I didn’t have a second to appreciate it. My bag was whisked away by workers who took it straight out onto the tarmac, and once I’d given my name and checked in, I too was led out into the abrasive sun.

The jet sat undisturbed around a corner, engine idling, with two pilots milling about by the bottom of the stairs. It looked large enough to seat at least twenty, and from the looks of the people in the windows, most of the twenty people were men.

“You must be Ms. Martin,” one of the pilots said, his lips taut as he looked at me. “We’ve been waiting for you.”

“Traffic,” I offered as a half-hearted apology.

“It’s fine. We’re only twenty minutes behind schedule,” the other said, passing a slight smile in my direction before gesturing for the stairs. “We should get going.”

I climbed the steps to the aircraft, fully expecting some kind of flight attendant to demand to see my ticket at the top and direct me to my seat, but as I rounded the corner, it didn’t look like assigned seats were even a thing. There were a handful still available, most taken up by men and a couple of women I’d never met but seen in passing around Blackwood. In the center at a table for five, Damien lounged, hunched over the polished wood table with a glass of amber liquid clutched in his palm.

The second he clocked me, his grin turned wicked.

“Ms. Martin,” he said, his voice booming above the others. “Sit wherever you’d like.”

————

I’d never been to Vegas.

The flight had been stressful — I wasn’t sure what I’d expected, but Damien spent the entirety of it talking business with the close handful of men that sat at his table, leaving me toward the back alone. I’d spent most of it anxiously going over my notes and trying not to be tempted by the occasional glass of alcohol being passed around the plane.

When we touched down, we headed directly to the conference center in the Luxor. Thrust into negotiations without a single clue what was happening, I found myself huddling toward the back again, listening but not engaging. Damien watched me from a distance, his eyes always lingering, tearing me apart — and when it had been time for me to present to those who had come with us, the internal higher-ups and the handful of board members, he introduced me personally.

Our brightest intern. That’s what he called me.

All in all, the presentation went down well. Damien stayed next to me as our group huddled around me, flipping the page for me when I needed it. And afterward, when he presented in front of the other companies, he name dropped me when he mentioned the new and exciting changes that would be coming to Blackwood in the near future. He hovered as I spoke idly to a handful of business owners and local green initiative planners. He stayed close enough that I knew he could hear, but far enough that it left me alone and vulnerable.

I wasn’t entirely sure how I felt about that.

But after, as the night progressed and we left the confines of the Luxor and padded down the strip, Damien announced to the twenty-or-so of us that he was treating us to dinner and drinks in celebration of landing the contracts.

That’s how I found myself almost at the head of the long table beside Damien in a luxurious cirque-themed restaurant I hadn’t caught the name of somewhere inside the Bellagio.

I was two drinks and a main course deep, with a ring and antique wristwatch laden hand far too close to mine on the table. His knee brushed against mine, and my stomach twisted with a hint of butterflies and mostly anxiety. Was that on purpose?

My pulse hammered in my ears. He hadn’t even said a word to me.

His mouth moved silently as he spoke to the man on his left, his fingers drifting ever so slightly closer to mine on the table. I tried to work out what he was saying, if it had anything to do with me, if the shape of my name crossed his lips — but I couldn’t pick apart any of it, not until he turned his attention to me instead.

“They’re all impressed with you, you know,” he said, his voice low enough that only I could hear it. He sipped at his glass of whiskey, a wry little smile creeping across his lips and puckering the wrinkles beside his eyes.

I needed more alcohol if I was going to survive this. I knocked back the last of my drink before reaching for my third.

Damien's gaze was too much, too lingering, too daring for me to handle without it, and I kept finding myself getting far too lost in the sea of blue and the temptations it held. “Does that include you?”

He chuckled, his eyes locking with mine as his hand crept just an inch closer. He doesn’t want you. That would be insane. He’s the CEO, HR would go crazy if they found out. “Especially me, Olivia. You’re already proving my choice to hire you was an excellent one.”

Heat flooded my cheeks and the space between my thighs.

This hadn’t been what I’d expected when I sent my resume to Blackwood for the internship. I couldn’t deny that I was absurdly attracted to him, couldn’t deny that I liked the way he talked to me or said my name, and more than anything, couldn’t deny that a part of me that I didn’t let see the light of day might let him fuck me if he asked. “You can’t just say things like that,” I breathed. Oh, shit. The alcohol was making it too easy to speak to him.

“Like what? I was paying you a compliment,” he chuckled.

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