With neither hesitation nor warning, the youngest Merc sprang to his feet, tipping over his chair in the process. He seized the drunk man by the lapels of his dinner jacket and lifted him off the ground. On the table, Fairchild’s wineglass tipped, staining the white cloth red.
“How dare you talk to her like that!” Nash roared. “She’s mine! She’sours!”
People were looking. Everyone was looking.
Slaynwas looking.
This was bad. Real bad. Fairchild knew she had to act, and fast. She bolted up, taking care not to tip her chair as Nash had done, and she quickly moved around beside him.
“Darling,” she said, injecting her voice with a sweetness she wasn’t feeling. “You’re causing ascene.”
To make sure she got his attention, she stabbed the end of her high-heeled shoe into the top of Nash’s boot, grateful to have finally found a use for her highly impractical footwear. It seemed to do the trick. A glimmer of realization flickered across his face. He lowered the man back to the floor.
Reece and Dutton had both risen from their seats, and they were watching her intensely. So was Slayn. Fairchild could sense him watching in the corner of her vision. His woman was watching too, and so were his guards.
But it was Slayn she was worried about.
If he thought she was off-limits, it would put the entire mission in jeopardy. Fairchild’s mind raced as she tried to think of something, anything, to fix this mess.
“You’ll have to excuse my partner,” she said, carefully smoothing the rumpled lapels of the drunkard’s jacket. “Sometimes he can be a little, ah…overprotective.”
Apparently, she had the magic touch. All the fear drained out of the little man’s face, and he stared up at her with an expression of abject horniness that was almost pathetic.
“It wasn’t my intention to offend,” he said apologetically. “I merely assumed you and your partners were swingers.”
“We’re mostly exhibitionists. Suite Q312 if you would like to watch.”
She said it loud enough for Slayn to hear.
“I see,” the little man answered, looking slightly dejected. “And you’reonlyexhibitionists? You don’t evershare?”
My, he was really pushing his luck, wasn’t he? Had he already forgotten the way Nash had lifted him off the ground a few seconds ago? But then, booze did that to people. So did an overactive sex drive. Anyway, Fairchild was glad he’d asked. It was the perfect setup for her not-so-perfect plan.
“Oh, we’re not quitethatstrict,” she said, pitching her voice so Slayn would be able to hear her. “Whenever we go on holiday, my partners give me one free pass. They let me go to bed with one man of my choosing.”
The little man smiled, heartened by the prospect that he still had a chance. He didn’t, of course, but Fairchild let him think so out of pity.
He started to leave, then hesitated.
“Oh!” he said. “Since you and your friends are exhibitionists, you must be in the big competition, right?”
“Competition?” Fairchild asked.
“Don’t you know?” the man said. “Tomorrow night, in the Grand Auditorium! It’s a competition to see who can put on the best live performance.”
Fairchild glanced quickly at Reece. He gave a subtle nod.
“Oh that,” she said. “Of course. We wouldn’t miss it for the universe.” And then, as sultry as possible, she added: “I love performing live.”
The little drunk man grinned and nodded, and expressed five or six times how intensely he was looking forward to it. Finally, with a bit of gentle prodding and some verbal jiu-jitsu, Fairchild managed to send him off in the direction he’d come from. She suppressed a sigh of exhaustion and started to sit down again. Her teammates did the same.
As her butt hit the cushion of her chair, she accidentally glanced in the direction of Slayn’s table. He was looking directly at her, and for a moment, their eyes met. He lifted his glass in a silent toast, then drank deeply, eyes smoldering above the brim.
Fairchild couldn’t hide the fire of hatred that suddenly roared inside her. She managed to keep it away from her mouth and her brows, but she knew it was blazing in her eyes.
She hoped Slayn mistook it for a different kind of fire.
His eyes rolled back, the lids fluttering briefly, and he carefully set his glass back onto the table. The blonde was leaning into him now, whispering something into his ear. She had one hand resting on his shoulder. The other was in his lap. Slayn’s mouth twitched, and a slow smile spread across his face. He sighed.
