Chapter 1
KADE
My head buzzed and my body felt heavy as I sat staring out over the casino floor.
I was raised there, spent half my time as a kid popping stolen quarters into the machines being chased away by security guards, while my parents rubbed elbows with wealthy guests and celebrities.
It'd become so mundane and boring that even the six busty women draped over me wearing practically nothing didn't amuse me anymore.
"Kade, baby, you're not yourself lately," one of them said—Tina or Tara or Tiffany. I never remembered their names, because there were as many of them as there were slot machines. They wanted sex with a chance to trip me up in a pregnancy scandal, and I wasn’t stupid enough to bite most nights. When I did I used a condom—my own to make sure it wasn’t sabotaged—and made them do the walk of shame.
I was over it; bored of life. I knew there was something better for me out there than wasting my time and money partying my life away.
"I’m fine," I grunted, pushing her back from my chest where she had tattooed herself.
"I just want space." And another drink, but I didn't say that.
Dad would have a fit if he found out I was getting wasted on his dime again.
The Atlas, however, had been my home every day.
Where did he expect me to go? And I'd just be putting it on his credit card anyway.
"Wanna go up to your room and have some fun?" The woman on my right walked her finger up my chest and across my neck, then cupped my jaw and made me look at her.
She was beautiful—they all were—but I wasn’t in the mood tonight. I politely took her paw from my skin and stood up, shaking them loose as I swayed toward the bar. Thankfully the lot of them stayed put, probably expecting me to bring a round of drinks back, which I had no intention of doing.
I parked on the last stool at the far end of the bar, jerked my chin up at Jimmy to let him know I wanted another, and then let my head drop.
I didn't know what my problem was. I could have any woman in the entire city of Las Vegas begging me to wine and dine her; I had money coming out my ears and I had my pick of homes and hotel rooms to entertain and party, but nothing made me feel alive anymore.
It was like I was stuck on repeat, doing the same thing over and over, and it never satisfied me.
"You good, Kade?" Jimmy asked as he slid the glass in front of me. My head perked up, but instead of looking at the bartender who'd been serving me since I was sixteen, I locked eyes on a strange sight.
A woman was straggling in looking a little worse for wear, sporting a full designer wedding gown with a long train and so many gems on it she looked like a disco ball.
Her hair stuck up at odd angles in places, and mascara ringed her eyes in thick black swathes, screaming at anyone who looked at her that she'd been crying.
Jimmy's eyes tracked where I was looking and he whistled between his teeth. "Foxy and broken hearted... just your type." Then he chuckled and tapped on the bar. "Behave yourself or your pop'll come down on me for this one." His wink of encouragement only made me grimace.
Was I so easy to read that a bartender could call my next move before I'd even decided what I'd do?
The woman stomped up to the bar and slouched onto a seat, ordering a margarita, then folded herself in half, draping her upper body over the bar and letting her purse dangle from one arm.
She gave off the impression that she'd either been left standing at the altar or she’d run off in a huff for some unknown reason.
It made my Spidey sense go a little crazy. I wanted to know her story.
I downed the drink and slid off my stool, keeping my eyes fixed on her as I walked around a few other men who were staring at her too, and cautiously sat on the stool next to her. She never looked up once, until Jimmy passed her drink to her saying, "Here ya go, miss."
Her dress was filthy, and up close I got a better look at her face. She really was beautiful despite the mess of her makeup, but she looked like someone had murdered her dog.
Definitely a broken-hearted runaway bride.
She sat up and sucked in a breath of surprise like she wasn’t ready to see me sitting there, then nodded at Jimmy, who darted off to fill another drink order. It took her a minute to register where her drink was before she pulled it closer and gulped it.
"Rough day?" I asked, chuckling, because it was so obvious to anyone who looked at her that she was living a bad dream.
I didn't mean it in a rude way, but she scowled at me and kept gulping her drink, holding it up high in the air when the glass was finished.
Jimmy looked our way with wide eyes and a skeptical expression and I shrugged at him.
"Another," she grunted when Jimmy walked up.
"I've got it," I told him. "Put it on my tab."
"I don’t need charity," she said, pulling a debit card out of her purse. "Start a tab in my name." She slid the card across the bar toward Jimmy, who held his hands up defensively as if this were a fight between the two of us. I got a glimpse at the name.
Laney Rowan. It had a nice ring to it. "I got it, Jim," I said, then I turned to her. "I'm Kade Kingston," I told her, extending my hand. "Nice to meet you."
Lainey's throat worked around a hard swallow, but she ignored my hand as she turned to start unfastening the buttons on her train. The thing looked super heavy and annoying, and with those manicured fingernails it looked difficult.
"I could... I mean..." I reached for a button, which was probably really rude, but I wanted to help. "I could help."
Her hand lashed out and smacked mine. I jerked back, stifling a chuckle. She was a feisty one. "Sorry," I blurted out.
"I don't need help from you or any other man.
Do you understand me?" she said hastily.
Tears welled up in her eyes and poured over her cheeks.
I didn't know whether to back away slowly because she seemed a little crazy, or let my heart break for her because whoever the douche was that broke her heart deserved to be slugged.
So I sat there watching her struggle, until she gave up when Jimmy brought her second drink. "Another," I said, jerking my chin up, and he nodded at me.
I was a little out of sorts, a bit wasted and moody, but I decided to choose the high road.
A woman like Lainey Rowan didn't need Playboy Kade; she needed a shoulder to cry on, and an anchor point to make sure some other douchier man didn't do something dangerous to her.
It was the least I could do after offending her by trying to help.
Lainey cried a bit harder for a moment, gulping her second drink just as fast as the first one, but didn't look over at me again until Jimmy brought both of us another round. Most of her mascara was on her chin at that point, and her slumped posture and bloodshot eyes indicated the drinks were starting to hit her. She probably hadn’t eaten today, either.
I didn't know what to expect when she started talking, but I wasn't surprised by what came out.
"You're really Kade Kingston?" Her sobs turned to sniffles, then stuttered breathing, but she slowed the rate at which she was consuming the liquor at least.
"Yeah... the one and only." I sipped my whiskey, keeping my buzz going, and turned to face her again. "What's your story, pretty girl?"
A brief hint of a smile flashed across her face, but then more tears came pouring out. I was quite certain those were brought on by the buzz she was feeling already.
"He cheated on me…. At his bachelor party, and he didn't even tell me himself. I heard his groomsmen talking about it." The wail that erupted from her chest tore through me, but it also drew a few gawking eyes.
"Hey..." I soothed, glaring at the men behind me. This girl was probably barely legal and now her entire life was turning upside down. She wasn’t exactly the sort of woman I'd find myself attracted to—hello hot mess.
But no matter what sort of playboy people thought I was, I'd never do that to a woman.
Cheating wasn't just wrong, it was despicable… and with a stripper, no less.
"We were high school sweethearts, and yes, I wasn't sure if I was ready for marriage, but he didn't have to go sleeping with another woman two nights before our wedding, did he?
" Lainey's hands flew up to cover her face and Jimmy handed me a clean towel, giving me the side eye and a cringing face.
Clearly he understood how messed up this was too, but I wasn't just going to leave her.
"Here," I coaxed, shoving the towel in her hands. She started wiping her face and sniffling, then blew her nose into it and looked up at me.
With the makeup wiped off and her face cleaned up, the woman sitting next to me was even more ravishing.
She didn't need all that paint to make her gorgeous.
She had incredible bone structure, fully pouty lips, and deep brown eyes I could lose myself in.
It made my heart flutter, especially when she started wrestling with the gown again and looked up at me pouting.
"Help," she whimpered, "I'm trapped in this death suit he made me buy and I want it off."
Jimmy passed by, this time sitting the bottle of rum in front of me with another wink, and I felt conflicted.
"Sure," I mumbled, not knowing where to begin. I stood with fumbling fingers like it was my first time undressing a woman, trying to unhook her bra or something. After ten full minutes I managed to get the skirt and train off, and she managed several large gulps from the bottle of rum.
The entire time, she kept rambling about her high school sweetheart, how she never did a wild thing in her life, how she was the good girl who got good grades and didn't ever do anything wrong.
And every slurred sentence that escaped her lips made Jimmy give me another awkward glance. He knew how very unlike me this was.
To say Kade Kingston thought about someone other than himself would be laughable.
I was the butt of someone's joke right now, but I honestly didn’t care.
And I wasn’t helping her just to get laid either, which I was certain was another thing people were saying about me.
Even I knew how off the wall it was for me to listen to her sob story and help her out of this gaudy gown.
But the instant that skirt hit the ground and her curves popped out, I was rock hard.
It hit me like a ton of bricks, so heavy I had to sit down to avoid blowing right there in my pants.
Lainey's body was on fire, and the white satin cocktail dress that hideous thing had been masking fit her like a glove.
She poured more rum into her glass, then into mine, and turned to face me. Her knee brushed mine, but she didn't pull away.
"The sad part is," she said, continuing her sob story, "that I was ready to walk down the aisle to that cheating jerk when I hadn't even lived my life.
I've never done a crazy thing in my life.
Not once. When girls in high school wanted to go swim in their bra and panties, I sat on the shore and hid myself.
When my college volleyball team went to a rave I stayed home. When—"
"What sort of crazy things do you want to do, Lainey?" I asked her, interrupting her rant. She paused long enough to take another long pull from her drink and then set the glass down.
"I don't know. I'm so stupid I don't even know what crazy is.
I think turning my econ paper in a day late is crazy.
" She laughed at herself. It brought the most radiant smile to her face, which only made my problem worse.
I wasn't a total sleaze, though. No way I was going to take this woman up to my room unless she initiated it right here in plain sight in front of all these witnesses—and the dozen cameras pointed at me right now.
"Come on, you have to want something ridiculous. Sky diving, bungee jumping, swimming with sharks. What's crazy to you?"
She turned, slurping more rum, and sighed. "What's the craziest thing you've ever done?"
I actually had to think hard about what to say. I didn’t want to make her feel bad, because I'd done some pretty ridiculous things. But I also didn’t want to lie to her. My name was in every tabloid and gossip blog out there. I knew she’d probably heard some of my antics.
For the past twenty years I'd been making waves. Only now, at thirty-six, had I finally decided being the wild child wasn't cool anymore.
"Well, I surfed the Banzai Pipeline in Hawaii, and I've swam with sharks in the Great Barrier Reef—"
"Swum," she said curtly. "Have swum... it's grammar."
I laughed so hard I snorted. Not only was she obnoxiously moral, but she was a grammar nerd too. It really got me going. "You're not kidding. You really are a goody-two-shoes.”
"God, stop judging me," she said in a tone that betrayed how mortified she was.
She covered her face. "I told you. I should've just married him in a boring ceremony and had two kids and a dog and lived in a clean neighborhood with a three-bedroom house and a white picket fence. My mom would’ve loved that. "
I felt bad for her, genuinely bad. It was probably the first time anyone had gotten real with me like this. Most people placated. They wanted my money or my fame or my sperm. They never wanted real, honest conversation. This was refreshing.
"Okay, okay..." I sighed, then I took a sip of my own drink. "Take crazy off the table. What sort of thing would push your boundaries, but not be too crazy for you?"
Lainey lowered her hands and looked up at me with skepticism. Her shoulders still sagged and she looked like she couldn't think of a single thing to say. So I prompted her.
"What about kissing a complete stranger... like Jimmy," I said, gesturing at the bartender. "Or Gavin.” I pointed at my friend who was playing security guy tonight, standing across the room. "Would that count as non-goody sort of crazy?"
Lainey's eyebrows rose as she turned toward me, sliding off the stool and swaying. "Or you?" she said, leaning in.
Her hands splayed on my chest, and she leaned right between my knees as her mouth connected with mine in a scorching kiss that shot heat right to my groin.
My eyes stayed wide open as our tongues tangled and hers shut tight.
She clutched my shirt in both fists, and I looked helplessly at Jimmy who stood slapping his leg and laughing at me, but God was this hot.
My heart hammered and my cock jumped, and I let myself go, holding her hips, pulling her closer, and grinding her on my dick until she bit my lip and whispered, "Yes... like kissing a stranger," before she dived back in.
Lainey Rowan wasn't Miss Goody Two Shoes. She was a fireball ready to explode in the night sky, and I was on standby to watch it happen.