Page 7 of Knight Life In Vegas

“Shut up.”

“Grumpy today?”

Fuck. What if I had missed out on the scent match for my whole pack? We had almost given up hope of finding a compatible omega. None of them ever seemed to click withallof us, plenty more thinking Dylan and Eduardo’s jobs were too childish, and even more than that put off by the financial issues we had been facing of late. My packlovedtheir jobs, and I did too. It wasn’t my fault I’d inherited a failing business I couldn’t even sell because it was my grandfather’s legacy. A scent matchwouldn’t fix all the issues, but she should at least like every member of the pack.

“Rough morning,” I replied slowly. “I thought I would have a guest for breakfast, but apparently she didn’t have the same idea.”

“That’s rough, buddy.” He held a box aloft. “More donuts for us, then.”

I didn’t want donuts. I wanted the blonde goddess who rocked my world and cried all over me because she had chosen me as her first step in her sex life after a divorce. I wished I had known I had that honor in advance, but that didn’t change that she had chosen me. Fate had walked her right into that club and I’d been too stupid to ask the right questions to keep her.

I would keep that knowledge to myself for now. No sense in disappointing the others when I had no information to track her down. It was possible she didn’t evenwantto be found. Maybe she had tried to take that step too early and regretted everything. The thought of that made me queasy.

I forced myself into the shower, loath to scrub the scent of her from my skin, but I couldn’t give my pack false hope right now.

Both Eduardo and Dylan were in the kitchen when I emerged, Eduardo pouring all of us coffee, and Dylan already halfway through a Boston cream. He nudged the box toward me and I plucked out a lemon curd–filled powdered donut. It didn’t come close to the sweetness of my lemon meringue duchess, but it was better than nothing.

“How was your luck last night?” I asked.

“We hooked up with a pair of roommates,” said Eduardo. “Flexible sweethearts. They do aerial arts. You?”

“I took absolute perfection to bed,” I told them.

“What made her so perfect?”

“You’d have to meet her to know.”

“Seeing her again?” Dylan asked.

“I fucking wish. Didn’t get her name or her number.”

“Dumbass.” Dylan chuckled. “You gotta let thebighead lead in these situations. The little one doesn’t get info like that.”

“I wasn’t expecting her to disappear into the night,” I defended.

“Better luck next time.” Eduardo sipped his coffee that was so strong he could probably stand a spoon up in it. “If it’s meant to be, you’ll see her again. And if not, there’s plenty of fish in the Vegas sea.”

It was this fish or nothing. I would have to keep my eye out and hope that fate was feeling merciful. If I was pathetic enough, perhaps it would take pity on me and have us cross paths at the grocery store or something equally mundane one day.

“Have you heard anything about the investor funding?” Eduardo asked.

“Nothing yet. It’s been so long that I’m pretty sure they’re just brushing us off.”

“Assholes.” Dylan snorted. “They’ve got more money than sense and won’t use a single dollar to save a city staple. It’s not our fault we got fucked over.”

No, it wasn’tours. The legion of people who had sensed blood in the water were the ones to blame. They’d swooped in when my grandfather’s dementia had started to show enough to make him vulnerable, but not enough that anyone knew to intervene. I could only hope the guilt ate them alive.

My grandfather had moved into a care facility and handed the reins over to me since I already worked for his company. Night of Knights was built into all my happy memories with its jousting, dancing, and revelry that nothing else has ever been able to match for me. I had practically grown up in the arena. My first job was there, and I had learned everything about business, horse care, and theatricality from my days working alongside mygrandfather. Now I was shackled behind a desk most of the time, trying desperately to salvage all the damage that had been done.

“We could look for investors elsewhere,” suggested Eduardo. “Surely some rich bitches in the big cities dream of being a knight? Financing one could be the next best thing.”

“I don’t doubt they exist, but finding them isn’t that simple.” Investors sensed blood in the water with me too, feeling my desperation to save this business, and rooting out all of the gaps in my knowledge I hadn’t learned because I hadn’t expected to take over yet.

“That’s what the Internet is for, my friend,” Dylan said with an easy smile.

“You do it, then, if you’re so confident.”

“Okay, I will.” He polished off a honey glazed, his mouth sticky with sugar. “So tell me about Miss Perfect. I need to visualize.”

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