Page 37 of Vex
"That they do." She sipped her drink, eyes never leaving his face. Something flickered in her expression. "Now that you're away from your lovely companion, I thought we could talk. It's so hard to plan for your future when the past is sitting on your lap." Her smile sharpened.
Alarm bells sounded in his head. "She's in our rooms. My bed. Doing as she's told."
If only any of that were true.
"Is she?" Maera drained her glass and set it down with a soft clink.
Ice flooded Vex's veins. Maera's tone held the satisfied purr of someone who knew where all the pieces were positioned. She wouldn't be here making veiled threats unless she had leverage.
He didn’t have time for her games.
He gathered his chips with practiced efficiency. Nothing else mattered now. Not when his dragon was roaring for him to find her, protect her, regardless of what secrets she'd kept.
He cashed out and stood. "Duty calls, I'm afraid. Perhaps we can continue our conversation another time."
Maera's smile never wavered, but her gaze was hungry. "Of course, my lord. I'm sure we'll have plenty to discuss very soon."
The words followed him toward the elevators, each step controlled despite the urgency clawing at his chest. The casino floor blurred around him. His senses strained for any trace of her, but recycled air and mingled perfumes obscured everything.
Maera might have just been testing him, but Vex didn't care.
The elevator took forever to arrive. Tallyer could have found her. Maera's security could have taken her. She could be bleeding somewhere while he'd been nursing his wounded pride.
If there was even a chance that Luisa was in danger, he was going to protect her.
The elevator doors opened, and he stepped inside. For the first time since he'd stormed out of their suite, his purpose was crystal clear. Whatever had happened between them, none of it mattered as much as keeping her safe.
He couldn't do anything else.
19
It was cold. Freezing. Blistering.
Brisk.
The words cycled through Luisa’s sluggish mind as consciousness crept back in fragments. Her skull throbbed where Zymon's blaster had struck her, a sharp counterpoint to the bone-deep ache radiating from everywhere at once.
Luisa shivered as she sat up, her evening gown and heels useless against the chill. The midnight blue fabric that had made her feel confident in the casino now clung in icy sheets, offering no protection against wind that cut through silk like a blade. Snow accumulated in the folds of her skirt, and her bare arms were mottled red and white. The emerald necklace Vex had given her felt like a glacier around her throat.
She'd been dumped in the cold. Snow fell in thick, lazy flakes that would have been beautiful under other circumstances. Now they felt like frozen daggers against her exposed skin.
The Haddiac Mountains rolled on in every direction. Luisa squinted against the blowing snow but couldn't make out lights from the casino.
This was how they disposed of people. The realization hit her with absolute clarity. No messy murders in pristine corridors, no blood on expensive carpets, no bodies to explain to guests. Just dump the problems outside and let the mountain do the work. Clean. Efficient. Deniable.
The wind howled around the peaks like something alive and hungry, carrying the promise of slow, frozen death. How many others had Maera's people taken there? The mountain would claim her bones like it had claimed so many others, leaving nothing but another mysterious disappearance to file away and forget.
A low growl echoed from the darkness beyond the tree line, followed by the crunch of something large moving through snow. Luisa's blood turned to ice as she realized she wasn't alone on this desolate peak. Whatever lived up here would smell her fear, her blood, her vulnerability.
The cold might kill her slowly, but the local wildlife would be faster.
Panic shot through her, burning away the sluggish haze clouding her thoughts. She refused to be dinner for some beast.
Her legs were numb blocks as she tried to stand, pins and needles shooting through her calves as circulation returned. The heels that had made her feel elegant in the casino were death traps now, their thin soles providing no traction on icy rock. She kicked them off without hesitation, the expensive shoes disappearing into snow.
The cold bit into her bare feet immediately, sharp enough to make her gasp. But she could feel the ground, sense the subtle variations that might mean the difference between solid footing and a fatal fall. She stumbled forward through drifts, her dress tangling around her legs.
Through a gap in swirling snow, she glimpsed lights twinkling in the distance. The casino, still perched on its impossible peak like a glittering jewel against the storm. It looked impossibly far away, but she was definitely on the same mountain. The lights flickered through snow, but they were real.
