“Yeah, I’ve got your money. I’ve got my hands on every last dime in your casino, Slater. And unless you let Penny go in the next two seconds, I’m going to drain every slot machine and roulette wheel in the place.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
“This.” She held the phone out for a moment and let him hear the feeding frenzy under way on his casino floor. “Let Penny go, or this is only the beginning.”
“I’ll kill the bitch first,” he hissed. “Then I’ll come for you.”
“Wrong answer.” Naomi’s voice was steady, cool control.
Asher smiled as he watched his incredible woman stroll along another row of machines in the pit, touching each one, setting off jackpot chimes and sirens while Slater listened. The crowd of people scrambling to get to the money closed in like a hive full of bees, swarming the machines and shrieking with greedy excitement.
Naomi glanced at Asher, nothing but steel in her gaze. “I want Penny,” she demanded of Slater. “Send her down. Right now.”
“You’re gonna pay for this, you fucking little cunt.”
“You first,” she said, emptying the half-dozen machines beside her as she spoke. “Let Penny go.”
“Somebody, go get that damn kid!” he shouted, his voice shrill over the receiver. When Slater came back to talk to Naomi, he was panting with rage. “Nobody threatens me. Nobody steals from me. You understand? You’re dead, bitch. You’re fucking dead!”
Naomi barely blinked at the threat. She hung up on him and turned to Asher. “Do you think this is going to work?”
He reached out and palmed her cheek. “You just did the hardest part. You’re fucking amazing, you know that?”
She gave him an anxious look, the first he’d seen her falter tonight. “I just want Penny safe.”
“We’re not leaving without her.” He glanced up, his head and shoulders towering over most of the buzzing crowd. “We’ve got company on the way.”
The group of pit bosses finally clued in on the source of the disruption. A couple of them touched their wireless earpieces and blanched, no doubt on the receiving end of Slater’s tirade. All five men started jogging toward them.
“Go,” he told Naomi. “Stay low. I’ll handle these dumbfucks.”
The men split up, three sprinting toward Asher while two others fanned out to cover the perimeter of the clot of shouting, screaming, shoving casino patrons. Naomi disappeared into the throng, her petite size and sleek agility aiding her in hiding in plain sight.
Asher swiveled his head in the direction of the oncoming casino managers. A simple flash of his fangs convinced one of the men to turn tail and run in the opposite direction, but the other pair kept barreling toward him.
He charged at them too, grabbing their lowered heads in his hands and skull-smashing them unconscious. He had more trouble on the way. Slater’s security detail had decided to join the party now.
Half a dozen men moved in from other parts of the casino to look for him. One cowboy already had his service pistol in hand, brandishing it as he charged for Asher. Bad move. Asher was in motion before the human even knew what hit him, tossing the guard halfway across the floor.
Another trigger-happy rent-a-cop fired his weapon over the teeming swarm of casino patrons and suddenly the excited squeals and cheers turned into a panicked stampede.
As the crowd screamed and dove for cover, the other security men opened fire. Shots rang out from multiple directions, a few of them hitting their mark. Asher didn’t feel the bite of the multiple rounds that slammed into him. His attention was focused completely on something else.
Across the large casino, the glass elevator descended to the lobby. Inside stood Slater, short and stocky, with graying dark hair and a jowly face currently pinched with anger. His hands gripped Penny’s thin shoulders in front of him, as if he were prepared to use the lanky girl as a shield. Surrounding the pair were Slater’s team of heavily armed bodyguards.
Fuck. Where was Naomi?
Asher scanned the area for her as the floor security closing in on him tightened ranks with guns blazing. He dodged the fire and the relentless stream of terrified civilians bolting from all directions for the exits.
“Naomi!”
Another shot hit him, square in the chest. Asher’s fury was on full boil now. Bellowing, he mowed down the team of humans, his hands a blur as he crushed bones and twisted spinal columns, working to clear a path toward Slater and the child.
As the elevator doors opened, the new team of armed men spilled out.
And then he saw Naomi.
Slater took his hands off Penny as he stepped out of the car and gaped at the chaos going on inside his prized casino. The momentary inattention was apparently all the opportunity Naomi needed. She raced forward, making a desperate lunge for the elevator.
