RISK(11)

"We'll discuss your qualifications and Crew will let you know either way in a few days."

I pull back. The tug is enough that Nolan releases my hands. I clasp them together in front of me. "I'll look forward to that call."

"We're heading into the club. There's room at our table if you'd like to join us." Crew motions toward the VIP entrance of Shade. Why doesn't that surprise me? When they checked into the hotel, they would have been granted all access to Shade. That's what money buys here in Vegas, among many other things.

"Thank you for the offer, but I can't. I need to give a witness statement to the police regarding Jerry and then I'm going to hang out with my friend at home."

"I'll be in touch." Crew nods as his hands dive into the front pockets of his pants. "Have a good night, Ellie."

"You too," I shoot back quickly.

"We will." Nolan's voice lowers. "Goodbye, Ellie."

I offer a sweet smile that is masking something sinister and then I wait.

They both pivot on their heels and take a step toward the club's entrance.

Then another step.

Crew stops to talk to a brunette with a short bob and an equally short dress.

Nolan continues on.

On Nolan's sixth step I finally unclench my hands. "Hey, Nolan Black. Turn around."

He turns instantly at the sound of my voice.

Nolan's gaze catches mine before it settles on my fingers and the object I'm dangling in the air. His brows arch in surprise. His eyes fall to his now empty wrist before they dart back to the watch in my hand; the exquisite Rolex watch in my hand.

"I believe this belongs to you." I smile, tilting my head as I step toward him.

"How the f*ck?" he mutters with a grin and a shake of his head. "You're hired. Can you start next week?"





Chapter 8


Nolan




"It's not her." Crew drops a piece of paper on my desk. "I'm telling you that Ellie is not the little redhead. She's not."

I look down at the paper. It's a copy of Ellie's transcript from Mercy College. Elinor Beth Madden is her full name. She graduated at the top of her class.

It's just another piece of the puzzle I've been trying to put together for the past week.

After she had stolen my watch right under my nose, I gave her the job. She was so excited she almost hugged me. Almost. I wanted her to. I'm all for celebrating in whatever way a stunning woman desires. A hug is a decent place to start.

There were no hugs that night, though. There was nothing other than an hour inside Shade with Crew. I bailed and went up to my suite. I spent the majority of that night, and every night since, researching Ellie Madden. I even had one of my personal security guys run a background check on her.

Everything she told us checked out including the award the Mayor gave her for taking down an armed robber in a pharmacy in Queens. After the madman had fired a shot into the ceiling when his demands for cash and prescription drugs weren't met, he pointed the gun at a woman holding a crying baby. Ellie stepped in the line of fire, and when he pressed the trigger to silence the infant, it was Ellie who got hit.

Thank Christ he was high and a bad shot because she could have lost her life.

Although the bullet grazed her thigh, she didn't step down. She waited until the * had what he wanted in his pocket and when he tucked the gun into the waistband at the back of his jeans, she pushed him face first into a display shelf. It gave the police, standing at the ready outside the pharmacy, the slim opportunity they needed to rush in. The man was apprehended without anyone else being hurt.

That wasn't the only time she's risked her life helping others. She stepped in the middle of a purse snatching in Central Park more than a year ago. The mugger was threatening his victim with the jagged edges of a broken wine bottle.

According to an archived article from The Post that I found online, Ellie ran at him full force from the side, taking him to the ground. The impact knocked the bottle from his grasp. She declined to give many details when a reporter who happened to be jogging through the park tried to interview her, only stating her name as Ellie. She was quoted as saying, 'she did what anyone in her position would do.'

She's wrong. Many people who stumbled on the mugging would have gotten the hell out of there, afraid to get involved.

In the grainy picture published with the article, Ellie is standing next to a gray-haired woman who has her face buried in her hands. Ellie's arm is draped around her shoulder in comfort, concern blanketing her expression.

The woman is a real life crime fighting crusader who somehow ended up working in a casino in Vegas for minimum wage. It makes no f*cking sense.

"You looked in her eyes, Crew." I toss the paper aside. "You can't tell me that you don't see what I do. The same sadness is there."

"We've all got some sadness inside of us." He takes a seat in one of the two chairs that face my desk. "There's no way in hell that Ellie is the girl we used to know. Kip was quiet as a mouse. She didn't say more than a few words to us in total the entire time we knew her. Ellie is a force of nature. They're polar opposites."

He's right. Kip, a girl we knew for a sum total of two months when we were teenagers, rarely said anything. She wore a patterned scarf around her neck to ward off the winter winds. She'd pull it up and over her lips, holding it there whenever she spoke, muffling the sound of her voice. She was so shy that she kept her eyes cast to the ground most of the time. It's hard to imagine anyone climbing out of a shell that contained to transform into someone like Ellie.