“ARE YOU SURE you want to do this?” Drae wasn’t sure he was okay with the idea of his wife strapped into a harness leaping out of a building eight hundred feet above the Vegas Strip. He didn’t care that the jump was a controlled descent or that someone was waiting on the bull’s-eye below to help her through the deceleration and landing.
“I can’t believe you don’t.” She chuckled.
He wasn’t insane. Having spent a good deal of his adult life in imminent danger of mayhem and destruction, he held a dim view of adrenaline pursuits.
The jump coordinator was running her through what to expect as he adjusted the wrist cam she had on and joked around with a laughing Victoria until Drae was just about to his breaking point. When he suggested they get away and clear the air, Drae envisioned a weekend in Sedona—just the two of them. He’d even decided to take a leap of faith and try to discuss a long-range vision for their family.
What a fucking idiot he was for letting Victoria handle the arrangements. Effectively hustled and outmaneuvered by her and Lacey, they were on a plane headed for Vegas before he had time to catch his breath. It had been downhill since then.
Instead of the logical, serious left brain side of his wife, Drae found the other side of her personality putting him to the test. The one that was wild, spontaneous, and too fucking curious for her own damn good.
Avoiding the weekend private jet clusterfuck, they flew in on Thursday afternoon. She’d been hyper and excited during the flight, something he attributed at least partially to being away from their son for a couple days. Stephanie was good for babysitting the occasional overnight, but this was the first time they’d left Daniel for so long. On the ride to their hotel, her excitability changed to balls-out horny wife. Appearing the perfect lady, she’d worn a modest sleeveless dress and some killer shoes, but quietly announced as the limo pulled from the curb that she forgot to wear panties and would, therefore, be screwing his brains out the second they got to the M.
Somehow, she made it sound perfectly reasonable that having no underwear required sex as the answer. Answer to what, he didn’t know, but that was how their getaway weekend started.
Had she kept her promise? Totally. And just like he had days before, wild man St. John kicked his sensible side to the curb and went for it. There was a long cushioned bench in the vestibule of their suite. One minute after he’d tipped the holy fuck out of their room attendant to get him on his way, she was pushing the bench away from the wall and undoing the decorative belt on her dress. When her cute ass shook as she wiggled the tight sheath up over her hips until it was bunched around her waist, he swore the heavens opened, and the angels were singing. Not only wasn’t she wearing panties, but she’d also gone for a full wax. She looked so goddamn sexy and delectable in those wicked high heels with her pussy bare.
“You. St. John,” she purred with a wicked gleam in her eyes. “Pants off and on the bench, pronto.”
He barely hesitated. The truth was she had no idea how turned on he was by her dominant side. It was cute as shit—his feisty little wife trying to be all big and bad around him. One surefire way to break his control was by giving in to her desires. Victoria St. John didn’t take no for an answer.
So she fucked him into heart-pounding oblivion—there on the velvet bench right inside their hotel room. They were still dressed, only naked from the waist down, which added a certain crudeness to the coupling, and their behaving like sex-starved maniacs.
It was all good, he figured, until a couple of hours later when she announced they had VIP passes to the Britney Spears show at the Hard Rock.
The Britney Spears show.
Jesus Christ.
At one point during the extravaganza, while Victoria bumped, shimmied, and twirled along with the pop star, he’d glanced at the guy next to him. Just like Drae, the dude was holding a purse and standing guard over a woman who looked older than Victoria but was just as animated and clearly into the whole stupid thing. They rolled their eyes, sighed deeply, and in his case, barely managed not to grit his teeth as the stage show wore on.
It was more of the same after they returned to their luxury suite at a hotel off the Strip. Their room had a breathtaking view of the Las Vegas valley and the twinkling lights of the Strip. The perfect backdrop for making stark naked wild man love to his mate with her tits pressed against the window as he took her hard and slow from behind.
Were they talking? Trying to work on their issues? No. They were screwing. That and eating, being pampered, and running around town doing every crazy activity his wife could find.
This was how he found himself at the top of the Stratosphere as his woman prepared to jump off the side of the tower. He’d let himself get talked into her manic need for excitement when she pouted and promised to go zombie hunting with him afterward.
Laser tag zombie hunting. They were working on their issues. Yeah, sure.
Tori couldn’t remember ever being this scared. When she stepped onto the small platform with her jump coordinator right at her back and looked out over the Strip below her, twinkling in the setting sun, a moment of crushing doubt grabbed hold.
What the hell was she doing? Oh, my god. She had a son at home. Jumping off buildings wasn’t something any sane, responsible mother would do, right?
These days, she didn’t always feel like she was rowing with both oars in the water. Maybe that explained why she was hundreds and hundreds of feet above a busy highway dressed in a jumpsuit and trussed into a harness with a Go-Pro on her wrist.
Knowing her husband was growling and chewing on iron nails as he watched her get ready to fall gave her a completely false sense of bravado. Was she trying to prove something or make a point? Tori wasn’t sure anymore.
“You ready?” the jump coordinator shouted close to her ear.
She looked down. Oh, my god. Then she looked up at the darkening sky, saw the moon in all its shimmery silvery glory, nodded, yelled, “Let’s do it,” and stepped off the edge of the platform.
Instead of screaming like a lunatic, after the first shocking rush when her brain realized she was falling, Tori started to laugh.
“Hell yeah!” she hollered into the sky as the bull’s-eye platform became bigger and bigger the closer she got.
The moment when the zip line began to decelerate her jump, she screamed, “Woot! Woot!” and gloried in the sensation of being slowly lowered onto her feet.
“That was fantastic,” she gushed enthusiastically to the attendant who caught her. Emotions rushing out of control from the adrenaline rush, she was babbling like an idiot as he unhooked the apparatus.
High as a kite, she rushed into the building to get the video of her jump and the picture they took right before she went over the edge. Another couple was laughing and checking out the cell phone pics of their jumps, and she heard the guy, a tatted up hipster with a very impressive beard say, “Hehe, wouldn’t have had a single regret if I went splat at the bottom.”
Whoosh! The pendulum of her emotions swung from sky-high excitement and laughter to a precipitous plunge into guilt, regret, and a disbelieving conscience lambasting her with a brutal scolding.
Probably the exact wrong time for Draegyn to appear with that unhappy frown he seemed to wear twenty-four-seven.
She wished he’d get mad at her for being so stupid. Wanted him to go alpha on her ass and put her in her place. But he wouldn’t. She already knew that. Aside from the times when he took her like a madman, he came off like a robot programmed to be polite, civil, and freakishly in control.
Tori snapped.
“Why the hell didn’t you stop me?” she angrily accused as he came to her side. He pulled up short at her fiery outburst.
Shoving the flash drive with the jump video into her purse, she snatched the bag from his hand, fixed him with an accusatory glare, and marched off as he stood there shaking his head in disbelief.
With every step she took, Tori felt an explosion building inside. Behind her, she heard Draegyn plead, “Victoria, come on. Slow down.”
Slow down? Ugh, lord. She was so sick of him and his slow down, chill out, be cool façade. Nothing rattled him. Ever. The more unglued she got, the more self-controlled he became. She was starting to feel … managed. Played.
The only time she had so much as a glimpse of the powerful, arrogant man she fell in love with and married was when she put her bitch cap on and played bedroom slut.
Draegyn caught up with her and took hold of Tori’s arm. Jerking away, she stomped ahead, oblivious to the activity around her. He had stopped her right before she crashed headlong into a trio of mimes entertaining the tourists. Despite him saving her from an embarrassing situation, she stiffened and haughtily tossed her head so her hair tumbled down her back.
“You’re killing me, woman. I’m serious,” he ground out in an exasperated voice. “What the hell, Victoria. Nothing I do makes you happy. I suffered through Britney fucking Spears for you! But then you get mad at me for not dancing. Do I look like someone who secretly prances about with pigtails in a schoolgirl’s uniform?”
“You look like someone with a cactus up his butt who doesn’t know how to let loose and have fun.”
Oh, why did she say that? Why? His eyes flashed with anger, and she suddenly felt vulnerable and unsteady in the face of his reaction to her hasty words.
Pausing to catch her breath, Tori’s composure was little more than a fragile shell, offering scant protection from the onslaught of messy emotions crowding in on them.
He muttered something that she didn’t catch. Surrounded by a crowd of people, the noise and constant movement made having a conversation difficult.
A girl dressed in a glittery gown with an enormous wig and a ton of stage makeup handed them a flyer as she passed by. At first, Tori gripped it in her hand, then used it to fan herself, and finally, when a sliver of calm and sense took over, she looked at her husband and offered a shaky smile.
“I’m sorry.” Searching for a cutesy way to cut the tension, she tried smirking, “PMS?”
“Sure. Why the hell not?”
His voice had softened somewhat, but his expression remained turbulent. He was driving her crazy. Or maybe it was her driving him insane. A rush of self-doubt crashed into her system. Were they turning into that couple who were always on different wavelengths?
No, no, no. She loved this complicated man. Loved him with her whole heart. They’d always been off-kilter from the moment they met, but the strength of their love had been the bridge between two very different people. Were they losing that? Was the reality of being husband and wife too much for their unusual relationship?
The flyer she held caught Tori’s attention. It was an advertisement for a flash contest at someplace called Triple Threat. They were giving away a two-thousand-dollar grand prize in an impromptu karaoke competition.
She sighed and looked around at the teeming crowd. Wait. What did the flyer say? A karaoke contest? Where?
Shoving her purse back into Draegyn’s hands, she slid the flyer into the inside pocket of his sports coat, grabbed his arm, and said, “Come on.”
“Where’re we going?”
“I know just what we need.” She chuckled. A couple of minutes later, they were waiting on an Über car as a parade of Michael Jackson impersonators strolled by. Well, actually strolled wasn’t quite right. A couple of them strolled, but an equal number were moonwalking and “Thriller” dancing along the sidewalk.
Out of nowhere, double-oh-trouble at her side broke into a sidesplitting approximation of what he imagined passed as moonwalking. She almost burst apart with delight. One or two bystanders laughed, and the next thing she knew, two or three other guys joined in. They all looked like her husband. A bit exasperated, weighed down like a packhorse, and accompanied by a laughing female who applauded their antics.
Their Über pulled up and Draegyn St. John, Mister Cool-Under-Pressure, I will break your face if you touch my woman, goofed for the crowd and Billy Jean’d her into the waiting car.
At the karaoke club, she went into hyper drive with excitement. Signing in and paying a twenty-dollar performance fee, she scrolled through a thousand songs, found the perfect one, and went to confer with the two guys running the show.
Confident in her choice, she cracked a couple of jokes and then went to find her husband. As usual, he’d managed a table near the front, probably just by glaring at the previous occupants.
“What do you want to drink?” he asked when she sat down. “I’m feeling like a martini. Will go good with these lovely pretzels.” He chuckled.
“Those aren’t just pretzels,” she teased. “That’s Chex Mix.” She grabbed a handful a tossed it into her mouth. “Um. Yum.”
“Can I ask you a question without you jumping down my throat?”
She stopped and looked into his face. Extraordinary eyes colored blue and gray with shards of silver gazed at her. Rebellious emotions, the ones tearing her apart, reared up with alarm. Was that what she did? Jumped down his throat?
Oh, Victoria, her conscience groaned. What are you doing?
The crunchy munchie stuffed in her mouth tasted like cardboard as a ball of thick emotion lodged in her throat. She knew with certainty at that moment that what Lacey tried to point out was all too true. She was a mess. Worse than a hormonal mess. In the span of thirty seconds, she swung from happy to horrified. And not just once. This kind of crap happened all day, every day. Over and over.
Melancholy took hold. She was pushing and pulling at the same time. No wonder she was exhausted and on edge.
“Is that what I do?” she asked. “Jump down your throat?” Tori watched him warily, afraid of his response.
He hesitated for a moment, like he was measuring her up, and despair tore her in half. This wasn’t right.
The old Draegyn—the one who sought her out at every opportunity, the one who followed her every move and word with adoring eyes, put an arm on the back of her seat and caressed her shoulder with the lightest of touches.
“Wrong word choice, baby. Said it but didn’t mean it the way you took it.” He leaned in and brushed his nose in her hair. “Sometimes I like when you act like a stern brat.”
Tori didn’t move. His breath so close to her ear gave her a thrill. So did the scent of his cologne and the way it blended effortlessly with his masculine vibe. Go ahead, she thought. I’m listening.
Placing her hand on his thigh, she gave him a tactile signal and held her breath.
“Is there a message in the song you chose?”
She gasped slightly. He knew her so well. Without thinking about it, she had indeed chosen something very much associated with their current predicament.
Feeling trapped by her stubborn foolishness, she squeezed his thigh and laid her forehead against his chin.
“Are you tired of me, Draegyn? Is my craziness driving you away?”
“Honey,” he ground out. She looked up at him through her lashes. “You are not crazy, and I will never be tired of you. I don’t know what the fuck is going on, and we really need to get this shit sorted out, but I swear to you, I’m not going anywhere. We made a promise to each other. Remember?”
She nodded and chewed on her bottom lip.
“We’re in this together. For the long haul. You can trust me, Victoria. Don’t ever doubt for a second that everything I do, I do with you and Daniel in mind.”
“Please don’t give up on me.”
She didn’t know where those words came from, and hearing them—the way her voice faded at the end to a hushed stillness—shook Tori up. She was speaking one of her greatest fears.
“Tell you what,” he murmured with a husky growl. “You get up on that stage and show ‘em how it’s done. Want me to record it so Boots and Ass can critique Sass when she’s solo?”
Boots, Ass, and Sass. Oh, my god.
She giggled quietly. “Don’t forget Desert Angel. She’s a tyrant, that one. Oh! And my mom. Nothing like a pageant coordinator judging the talent competition. And Heather! Her too. Holy cow. Now, I’m nervous.”
The next couple of amateurs took the stage and performed with groan-worthy horror. Some people should never attempt karaoke. She and Draegyn laughed, rocked along, and plowed through a couple of drinks and a huge platter of loaded baked potato skins before a Beyoncé clone took the spotlight.
Forty seconds into a tone-deaf rendition of “Single Ladies,” complete with some truly awful dance moves, her husband turned to her and said, “Please tell me you’ve got this.”
Oh, she had it all right. “Don’t worry, shugah,” she drawled. Fluffing her hair and applying some lip-gloss she pulled from her purse, Tori snickered and arched an eyebrow. “I’m bringing it Justice Style.”
When it was her turn and she stood up, her husband in all his alpha glory patted her on the behind and said, “You have a very talented mouth, Mrs. St. John. Go show these good people what’s what.”
Overcome with glee, she marched confidently into the spotlight, cracked a few jokes with the emcee, and got the crowd laughing. After a quick check with the sound guy, she glanced at the karaoke screen for her cue, got into position, and found her husband’s pointed gaze. He was looking at her with unabashed pride and joy.
When the song started, she took a deep breath and spent the next four or five minutes doing a better Madonna than half the drag queens in Vegas.