3. Max
MAX
Moreno has been watching the same server long enough that I am starting to feel obligated to apologize on behalf of our family.
I follow his line of sight across the ballroom and find the woman from orientation carrying champagne between two tables.
Black uniform, gold-trimmed mask, dark hair pinned up badly enough that several strands have already escaped.
She is listening to a guest with the expression of a woman calculating whether homicide would damage her tips.
His interest makes sense immediately.
Calder sees both of us looking and sets down his glass. “Behave.”
“I am sitting perfectly still.”
“That has never been evidence of good behavior.”
Moreno’s gaze stays on her. “She isn’t scared.”
“You say that as if frightening her from thirty feet away was an option you considered.” I lean back. “Normal men introduce themselves before the silent intimidation.”
“You should try normal first.”
Calder’s mouth shifts at one corner. He has spent the last hour pretending this ballroom interests him only professionally, which would be more convincing if I had not known him long enough to recognize the difference between observation and effort.
The estate invited exactly the sort of people we came to meet: wealthy operators, lawyers comfortable with porous borders, private-security owners, fixers, smugglers, casino money, politicians who never ask where a donation begins.
The masks make networking feel illicit without changing much about what these people already do for a living.
We are not here searching for missing women.
Nothing about the invitation suggested that kind of business, and the Coyotes are still young enough that a room full of difficult contacts is opportunity all by itself.
Calder has already identified a California shipping broker, a casino investor with private-air interests, and a lawyer who has spent an hour pretending not to recognize him while checking our table every ten minutes.
I have three phone numbers, two invitations I will never use, and a very good rumor about a customs official who likes debt more than discretion.
Moreno has collected almost nothing because strangers tend to decide he should approach first. He is comfortable with that arrangement.
Rooms like this compress months of careful introductions into one evening.
Calder watches who gets deferred to. Moreno watches security.
I listen to who laughs too hard after certain names and which stories change depending on the audience.
Between us, we usually know who deserves a second conversation.
The server crosses our section again, and I become willing to lower the professional standard.
Her attention follows a pattern. Nearest exit. Service traffic. Security. Guests. When she turns toward us, Moreno gets a fraction longer than the room deserves before her eyes reach me. I smile. She looks away without a hint of embarrassment.
“She was watching us.”
“She watches everyone,” Calder says.
“Everyone else got security-level interest. Moreno got curiosity. I got appreciation.”
Moreno finally looks at me. “You got tolerated.”
“Envy makes you cruel.”
Calder’s attention follows her again. “She is working.”
“You keep saying that while watching her work.”
“I can observe without interfering.”
“That’s because you can make interfering sound like a legal category.”
Before he can answer, she approaches with a fresh bottle even though the table still has full glasses. The small amusement visible around her eyes makes the detour deliberate enough for me.
“You’ve been watching us,” I say.
Her hand stays steady over Calder’s glass. “You say that like three men attending a party only to sit with each other aren’t worth studying.”
I put a hand to my chest. “We just met and you’re already judging our social skills.”
“I work for tips. Judgment is complimentary.”
Calder tips his glass away before she pours. “He has enough.”
“He has half a glass.”
“He considers that an emergency.”
“I do. Finally, somebody understands me.”
She moves to my side and pours. Up close, dark eyes show above sharp cheekbones. Her mask cannot soften the intelligence in the way she looks at people.
“What’s your name?”
“Do you ask every server that?”
“Only the ones spying on me.”
“Valentina.”
The name lands and stays,
“Max.” I gesture across the table. “The rude one is Moreno.”
“You have been talking the entire time,” Moreno says.
“Exactly. I am charming. You are rude.”
Her attention goes to him. “Moreno.”
“Valentina.”
He says it without performance, which somehow makes it more intimate than anything I have done in the last five minutes.
“And our exhausted chaperone is Calder,” I add.
“I regret every choice that led here,” Calder says.
“Family?” she asks.
Moreno and I are easy enough to place if somebody studies us. We share pieces of our father in different proportions. Calder looks nothing like us and still occupies the table as if nobody would think to separate him from the decision.
“Moreno is my younger brother,” I say. “Calder came later and had the bad judgment to stay.”
Calder looks at me. “You make that sound charitable.”
“It was. We were difficult.”
“You remain difficult.”
Moreno says, “He means Max.”
Valentina laughs, short and genuine. A guest two tables away snaps his fingers for service, and the laugh disappears before she turns.
“I hate that,” she says under her breath.
“Then don’t go,” I tell her.
“That is not how employment works.”
“It should be.”
“Tell that to whoever is paying me eight thousand dollars.”
Calder’s focus sharpens. “For two days?”
“Guaranteed, plus tips. I intend to become unbearable about it.”
“Eight thousand is enough to tolerate finger snapping?” I ask.
“No. It is enough to tolerate wanting to break the finger.”
She leaves us and crosses to the demanding guest. Her smile is all teeth while she replaces his glass and takes another order without giving him anything useful to complain about.
On the way back, she catches me tracking the exchange and raises one eyebrow. I lift my drink in salute.
Over the next half hour, Valentina returns often enough that none of us can pretend we are only her table assignment. She serves the guests around us, clears glasses, rescues a dropped napkin, and keeps finding reasons to pass within speaking distance. I help where I can.
“Vegas?” I ask when she sets down water.
“Yes.”
“Born here?”
“No.”
I wait. She waits longer.
“That answer has almost no information in it.”
“It contains exactly the information you asked for.”
“You charge for follow-up questions?”
“Depends on the tip.”
Calder gives me the look he reserves for questions he considers unnecessary. Valentina catches it.
“Does he always communicate through disappointed eye contact?”
“Yes,” I say.
“No,” Calder says at the same time.
Her smile returns. “Interesting.”
Moreno has barely spoken, but she keeps coming back to him. Most people either avoid my brother or become louder around him to prove they are not intimidated. Valentina treats his size and stillness as background information. She watches what he actually does.
A guest at the next table reaches backward without looking and nearly catches her tray with his elbow. Moreno sees the collision first and catches the tray edge before a glass tips.
“Thanks,” she says.
“You would’ve caught it.”
“Probably.”
“Definitely,” I say. “But now you owe him a favor.”
Her gaze slides to me. “I absolutely do not.”
“He’s old-fashioned.”
Moreno’s tone stays even. “I am going to throw you in the pool.”
“See? Courtship ritual.”
Valentina laughs and moves away. The next time she returns, a small plate is tucked beneath her tray with three miniature pastries arranged along the edge.
“Contraband?” I ask.
“Emergency supplies.”
“For us?”
“For my sister. She has been working the garden section and forgets food exists when she is busy.” She removes one pastry and puts it on my plate. “You may have the damaged one.”
I inspect the flawless little tart. “Devastating.”
Calder asks, “Your sister is working here too?”
“Nora. She is the responsible one.”
“You say that as if you’ve been assigned another role.”
“I’m delightful.”
Moreno says, “You count exits.”
Her attention cuts to him. “So do you.”
That is the first moment the flirting changes shape. Her smile does not disappear, but some of the lightness does. Moreno does not explain how he noticed or ask why she does it. He only shifts his glass so her tray has more room when she reaches across the table.
She looks at me next. “What do you three do when you’re not sitting at parties judging the staff?”
“Import-export.”
Calder gives me the look again.
“What?” I say. “There is importing. There is exporting.”
Valentina studies the tattoos disappearing beneath my cuffs. “That sounded very legal.”
“It is legal enough that Calder can still sleep.”
“I sleep regardless of your phrasing,” Calder says.
I relent by one degree. “Freight, transport, security, private problem-solving. Some work is legitimate. Some clients prefer not to discuss invoices.”
She doesn’t startle or lean closer because danger has suddenly made us interesting. She simply nods, as if she suspected the answer before she asked.
“What about you?” I ask.
“Bars. Catering. Private events. Whatever pays.”
“And before Vegas?”
Her eyes stay on mine while she gathers empty glasses. “More things that paid.”
Calder does not press. I almost do, then notice the slight set of her shoulders and choose not to turn curiosity into entitlement.
When she lifts another bottle, the movement pulls at the same shoulder she has been rolling for the last ten minutes. I take the bottle from her hand before she has to reach across the table.
“I can pour my own.”
“I know.”
“You are annoyingly observant.”
“Occupational hazard.”
“Import-export requires shoulder analysis?”
“Advanced certification.”
Her mouth curves, but she takes the bottle back only after the table is finished.
Moreno’s attention moves past her. An older guest in a silver-leaf mask has been tracking her every time she crosses the section, gaze following her body with the confidence of a man accustomed to buying access.
Moreno changes chairs without comment. The new angle puts himself between the man and Valentina’s route.
She notices within seconds.
“Did you just rearrange furniture?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Better view.”
Valentina checks what he blocked, then returns her gaze to him. She understands exactly what happened and does not thank him for it.
“You three practice moving like that?”
“Moreno and I have been doing it since we were kids,” I say. “Calder acquired the habit after prolonged exposure.”
“I acquired the habit because you both ignored basic planning,” Calder says.
Moreno looks at him. “He’s lying.”
Valentina laughs again, and this time the sound reaches all three of us.
Colette appears at the far edge of the section and calls her name. Valentina turns, then looks back as though deciding whether to leave one more piece of trouble behind.
“When does your shift end?” I ask.
“You haven’t earned that information.”
“I bought champagne.”
“The champagne came with your room.”
“I appreciated your criminal dessert enterprise.”
“Closer.”
Moreno leans back in his chair. “I will.”
Her attention snaps to him. “You will what?”
“Earn it.”
Colette calls again. Valentina starts walking backward toward the next section. “Try harder.”
The crowd closes around her.
I tap the rim of Moreno’s glass with mine. “When her shift ends, we’re finding her.”
“Yes,” he says.
I look at Calder. “All three of us.”
Calder reaches for his drink and does not argue.
For the first time tonight, I stop trying to decide which of us Valentina wants most. If she gives us another opening, I intend to be beside both my brothers when we take it.