ACE: Las Vegas Bad Boys by Frankie Love Page B

it doesn’t sound like it’s good for you. The last thing you need is an enemy who knows your past showing up, dragging you through the mud.”
    “Fuck, I know.” My smile disappears. I know Mark has my back, but right now it sounds like his belief in me has its limits. “I don't want to get dirty. I just want this land. And Grotto knows it.”
    “As your counsel, I think you need to drop this land deal. If Grotto really wants to come after you, it's going to make the Spades Royalle look bad. You can't have that right now. The hotel just got into the black.”
    “I know you've stuck your neck out for me before, but with Grotto, this isn't business. This is getting fucking personal,” I tell him, seething.
    “Personal or not, Grotto's not going anywhere. He's been in Vegas for as long as me. And whether you like it or not, he's not leaving anytime soon. The cops haven't got shit on him.”
    “I'm not letting him push me in a corner.”
    Mark snorts. “Nobody puts baby in a corner, is that right?”
    “Fuck yeah, it is.” I stand, needing a fucking drink. Needing to fucking breathe.
    “Look, Ace, don't get all pissed off.” Mark opens a drawer in his desk and shuffles around papers. He pulls out a business card and hands it to me. “Call Trenton. He's a PI, he'll help you out. If there's dirt to be found on Grotto, he'll find it.”
    “Thanks, man.” I take the card and turn to leave. I pause in the doorway. “Hey, your lady doing better?”
    “Yeah, Judy's doing okay. Out of the hospital and back home. That pneumonia really got to her. But she's hanging in there.”
    I see him swallow, like he has a lump in his throat; this year has been a bitch for him. Judy is the fucking light of his goddamned life, and after three rounds of chemo she's finally on the mend. Except for this latest run in the hospital.
    People like Mark and Judy—good people—don't need that kind of shit, yet they're dealing with it.
    Mark comes around his desk to say good-bye, claps me on the back. “Thanks for asking, Ace. She'll like hearing that you're thinking of her and not just the twenty-somethings you meet at the casino.”
    I smile, wave good-bye.
    Glad to have Grotto off my fucking mind for a moment.
    Instead, I walk away thinking of one twenty-something. Thinking of the ways I'd like to put her in a corner.
    And knowing that tonight, I will.

    * * *
EMMY
    I need to get out of this hotel suite, stat. Meeting with Detective Clark can't wait. He has information about my sister's case, and I need it. Now.
    Otherwise I’m never going to move on with my life.
    I just can't believe my hallway lover is Ace. Ace Royalle. Ace, the fucking owner of this casino.
    I'm still here—naked, wrapped up in the sheets we slept in last night. Though, to be fair, there wasn't much sleeping last night. The only sleep I had came in the early morning hours.
    Because last night all we did was fuck ourselves silly. Hard. Soft. Fast. Slow. We screwed until his cock was as raw as my pussy.
    Which, okay, was amazing. But also—really? I bared myself to the most sexed-up sleaze this end of the strip. And everyone knows that about him. How did I miss what this guy looks like?
    Tess is going to legitimately die when she finds out. Not that I will tell her. Because … I mean, I just spent last night doing the thing I have said was a no-go since getting this job.
    I had sex with the baddest of the bad boys.
    And I liked it.
    However, I do not like the note he left for me. The demands scrawled across it. He wants me to wear a certain dress, to a certain club, with one goal in mind. To have sex.
    And while I know Ace is that guy, the guy who has sex on the dance floor—I am so not that girl.
    Okay. So I have two options. 1) Put on my fishnets and blow off Ace, hotel owner extraordinaire, aka deceiving asshole. Or, 2) put on the amazing clothes provided for me and relish the luxury of being his latest conquest.
    I suppose there is an option three.
    Wear the