Page 4 of Gemini Queen
Until it’s far too late for her to escape.
Chapter Three
Zara
I splay my fingers wide against the glass barricade between me and the two-hundred story drop to dispel the psychic charge that builds in my hands whenever I feel threatened.
Finally, the breeze up here cools down the dangerous tingle in my palms.
I pull in a slow breath of humid ocean air that smells like salt and ozone, then push the air back out to ground myself. Just a little mindfulness to settle my pre-performance jitters. I count my breaths until my heartbeat slows and my pulse steadies. When I finally swing around to rejoin the party, Adam’s nowhere to be found.
Which is a little worrisome. That guy’s up to something.
I mean it. He’s serious trouble.
But it’s time to get my own butt in gear and cause a little trouble myself.
Keeping it casual, I circle the rotating bar and maneuver through the gyrating couples getting down on the deck and sashay into the glass-walled penthouse. All the doors are wide open, to hell with the A/C, and the skunky smell of weed floats out. Inside the smoky rec room, two girls in couture cocktail gowns are getting stoned on the leather couch and two guys are making out in the corner.
I give that guy-on-guy action a double take because, hey, who wouldn’t? The blond surfer type against the wall has his pants open. While the shirtless hunk with a bird of prey inked across his muscled shoulders is sliding to his knees and basically getting ready to suck his friend off right there.
Too bad that security guy who’s built like a goddamn linebacker isn’t joining the fun. The hired muscle’s doing his job guarding the private wing where Wang keeps his office and the safe. I amble past—he’s too alert and way too sober for my comfort—and stroll over to the open wing that leads to the poker den, an impressive array of total immersion video games, and the john.
The bedlam of flashing lights and howling sirens and revving engines pouring from the game room packs enough sensory overload to give anyone a migraine. Except for a girl raised in a Vegas casino like I was. But the acrid smoke coiling from the muted mutter of the poker den’s thick enough to make my eyes water. I duck into a private bathroom—Wang has nine of them according to Cleo’s schematic, which I’ve memorized—and lock the door.
Thank Christ the air’s fresher in here, sweet with floral notes from some chick’s designer perfume. I suck in a grateful sniff and tap out a quick text to Xiao on my burner phone.
Situation normal up here. I’m hot to trot. How’s it looking on the street?
My partner sends back a thumbs-up emoji and that’s it.
Honestly, I’m a little disappointed. I wouldn’t have minded a little sexting to distract me from my jumpy nerves. Usually, Xiao’s more than down for that kind of distraction. Later, after I’ve shimmied out of the Tai-Sun Tower the same way I shimmied in, once we’re on board the getaway boat and motoring for Kuala Lumpur, he’ll have my catsuit unzipped and my legs flung over his shoulders and his talented tongue circling my clit until I beg for mercy.
Because Xiao loves making me beg.
And that’s the only way I’ll do it.
I take care of a little business with the self-cleaning Japanese toilet tucked discreetly behind a screen—even my bladder’s nervous tonight—and check my phone again. I’m hoping for a selfie of Xiao’s impressive cock, which he’s been known to provide in the past, but bummer. Still no joy.
Now it’s only ten ticks to showtime.
I tuck my phone in my clutch and check the stiletto in my boot. If I need to use my blade, it’ll be when the bomb goes off. And by now I realize I’m like ten separate kinds of jittery.
I don’t have precognition. Sure, I’ve got some of the right DNA for that, but the Geminis are genetic mutts with chromosomes from all four arcane races, and we don’t have that kind of gift.
Still, when I get jumpy, it usually means something major’s about to go sideways.
I take a sec to case the joint for anything I might have left behind. In the dim red mood lighting Wang’s got going on in here, the slab of black granite under the mirror’s wide enough to hold the glass bowl sink and a fucking foursome, but I’m all alone. There’s a ventilation shaft above the toilet, and my lipstick tube hides a baby Phillips in case the bomb collapses the stairwell and I need to shimmy out that way.
I’ve always got a Plan B.
There’s no reason this won’t work. There isn’t. And I’m used to performing under pressure. I suck in a bracing breath, grip my clutch, summon my resting bitch face, and unlock the door.
Except when I swing it open to sashay out, someone else sashays in. And suddenly I’m not alone in here anymore. Because my Adam Driver doppelgänger, who’s a good foot-plus taller than I am close up, is plenty big enough to stop me slipping past.
He stalks right into the john like he goddamn owns it, those tiger eyes of his locked onto me like tractor beams.
Up close, he’s just as pretty and twice as savage, lean and feral under silk and leather, black flames in ink wicking up from his open collar, all high cheekbones and miles of blue-black hair and a fuck-me mouth I’m suddenly imagining wrapped around Xiao’s cock while I straddle the new guy’s hips and take him deep inside.
