Chapter 1 #3
I stepped forward to tell her we were closed, but she narrowed her eyes and settled her hands onto her hips, the fire in her gaze stealing my words.
“What the hell is going on?” she spat. She glanced around. “Fuck. Where are all the customers?”
Wild brown curls and ringlets cascaded over her shoulders and down her back like she was some sort of gorgon come to turn me to stone under her gaze—and I had no doubt she could harden at least one part of me to stone very quickly.
Her deep brown eyes were like pools of liquid chocolate. Maybe I’d drown in them.
Her posture emphasized her willowy figure, but she looked strong as she stood before me, like she had a steel inner core and wouldn’t be intimidated by anyone. Maybe that was just a byproduct of living in New Orleans.
Still, something about her made me want to play, to tease, to make her even more fucking angry to see more sparks.
Whatever happened, I had to be careful; this woman could be my end.
My beginning and my end, and I didn’t want it any other way.
I stepped closer to her. I probably couldn’t get close enough.
The desire to hold her to me, to feel her body pressed against mine, crashed over me, and I swallowed.
She was a whirlwind, fierce and dangerous…
So dangerous. Could I control this whirlwind?
Hell, could I control my own damn self around her?
For fuck’s sake, I needed to. It shouldn’t even have been a question.
Except she was determined and thrilling… things I craved as mine.
But I’d been down this dark road before.
“And who…who are you?” Even with halting speech, I sounded imperious and snooty, and the fire in her eyes blazed harder.
“I’m the singer. Booked to sing here today. Who the hell are you?”
Ah, a question I could do something with. I reached into my back pocket and extracted a business card.
“Sebastian Dupont,” I said. “Representative of the new king of New Orleans, and I’m now the owner here.”
Her mouth fell open. “You own The Neutral Zone now?”
I grimaced. “It’s called Allécher now.” I wanted something that both spoke to our French roots and followed Nic’s conventions for naming his businesses. Plus, I wanted to give customers a heads-up about the seduction and enticement they could find within these doors.
Allécher…It meant to tempt or to entice.
The woman in front of me wrinkled her nose. “You gave it some new fancy French name?” She shook her head. “Good luck with that being enough to improve the place.”
I chuckled. “That won’t be the only change now that Francois’s gone.”
“He’s gone?” Her words were a whisper, and she lifted her hand so her fingers clawed briefly at the base of her throat before she seemed to make a conscious effort to lower her hand to her side again. “Francois is dead? What about émile?”
I shook my head. “Francois isn’t dead, but he’s no longer in power. émile, however, is very dead indeed.”
She closed her eyes briefly and blew out a sigh then seemed to recover herself and focused back on me, her gaze steely again.
“Who are you?” I shouldn’t have cared. She was just a club singer—someone Francois paid to entertain his customers.
There was no guarantee she was even any good. But I held my hand out anyway, wanting to feel hers clasped in mine.
She hesitated, but I willed her forward, almost holding my breath as I waited to touch her skin.
“Kayla McKenna,” she murmured as I finally curved my fingers over the back of her hand.
“Kayla.” I smiled. I couldn’t help it. Her name brought me inexplicable joy even as she continued to view me with suspicion and actual animosity.
She still clutched my business card in her other hand, and she turned it over to read the print on the back. Then she grimaced doubtfully, and I wanted to smooth the expression from her face.
“So do I still have a job or what?” She was pretty abrupt, and I almost laughed but part of me didn’t dare to disrespect her indignant anger like that.
“I mean,” she continued. “I only went on…” She paused and squinted, just the smallest twitch around her eyes, really.
“Vacation for a week, and it was all agreed officially that I could take the time.” She lifted her head and looked around, taking in the busy men who were already scattered around the space, measuring things and making notes.
“But now everything’s changed.” Then she returned her attention to me, a hard glint in her eyes.
She clearly wasn’t happy.
“Everything’s changed,” I agreed.
She tugged her hand from mine like she’d only just realized I still had hold of it. “So?” She raised an eyebrow.
I let my hand drop to my side and flexed my fingers briefly, already missing her touch. “So…what?” Holy hell, I really was dumb around this woman.
She blew out a rapid breath. “My job. Do I still have one?” She left the you fucking idiot at the end of her sentence unsaid.
“Oh. I… I…” I didn’t even fully know what Allécher was going to be yet, aside from exclusive and desirable.
Invite-only exclusive, probably. I wanted people to want to be here, to aspire to it.
But I wasn’t sure what that meant for any sort of lounge singing vibe.
That was too much to explain on the fly, though—especially if I kept stuttering out all of my words and I was about to unexpectedly fire someone.
“Well?” She all but started tapping her foot.
I nodded at the business card in her hand and forced myself to be far more flippant than I felt. I had a business to run, after all—and I had a whole host of bad behavior in Baton Rouge to live down. I couldn’t move to New Orleans and start more of the same.
And holy fuck, she looked young. Young but self-assured. Like she’d already lived a life. And what the hell did I know these days? All the women looked young. I was old. Bordering on ancient.
But I knew this. She was something other —human but more. Something I wanted to explore. Something I needed to avoid.
I deliberately averted my gaze, returning my attention to something not all pressing as I sought to dismiss her. “Give me a call in a month when we’re ready to reopen. I’ll know more then.”