You've Got Fail(5)
“Yes.” He turned to look over his shoulder, his face only inches from mine. When his gaze flickered to my lips, unexpected heat twirled inside me. I didn’t get attracted to my marks. It wasn’t in my best interest. But this guy—Willis—hmmmm.
“Consider it done.” I dropped back down onto my heels and pirouetted away from him.
3
Willis
Why did she have to be hot? And what kind of woman went around smelling like vanilla? Like a fucking cake waiting to be tasted. I watched as Fake Scarlet swayed her hips through the crowd and stopped next to a man studying one of the paintings.
“Did she agree to knock it off?” Elias walked up to my elbow, a drink in each hand.
“Yeah.”
“What was her excuse?”
“She didn’t have one.” I followed the curves of her legs up to where they disappeared under her tight red skirt, then the flare of her hips, the dip of her waist, and the ample breasts on display from her low-cut top. I’d always had a thing for redheads, and this girl was firing on all cylinders.
Fingers snapped in front of my face. “Are you listening, man?”
“Yeah. Sorry. What was that?”
“Did you at least get her real name so we can keep her honest?”
“No.”
He shook his head and tsked. “Did you do anything useful besides drool all over her fine, fine ass?”
“She kept distracting me with the”—I waved my hand in a general arc—“porn.”
“It is pretty damn distracting.” He stared at the clowns doing a circle jerk on the wall to our left. “I can’t stay long. Claudia bought our tickets for this event, so she’ll be expecting me to put out tonight.”
“Thank you for your sacrifice.” I couldn’t take my eyes of Fake Scarlet who was still talking to the same guy.
She moved in closer to the man. Besides the fact that she was clearly out of his league, I didn’t like her getting close to him. Not one bit. Then I saw her pale, delicate hand slide under his suit coat. No more than a second later, she’d slipped his wallet into her clutch.
“Holy fucking shit.”
“Huh?” Elias downed one drink, then started on the second as his on-again, off-again, apparently on-again girlfriend walked up to us.
“She’s a thief.”
Elias shrugged. “Look man, I know she’s using your name, but I don’t know if that qualifies as actual theft. Especially since you aren’t really Scarlet Rocket, either.”
“No, I mean.” I narrowly resisted the urge to point. “She took that guy’s wallet.”
“We should tell the gallery owner.” Claudia craned her head back and forth, her model height giving her an advantage over the crowd.
“Hell no!” I quieted when several people turned their heads at my exclamation. “We can’t have it getting around that Scarlet Rocket is a petty criminal.”
Claudia threw her long blonde hair over one shoulder. “Fine. Have it your way.” She grabbed Elias’s hand. “Let’s get dinner and then fuck.”
“I told you.” Elias put on a browbeaten look. “Voracious.”
“Poor you.” I saluted Claudia. “Have fun tonight.”
“You coming?” Elias asked as Claudia pulled him away.
“No, I think I’ll stay a little longer. See what else Fake Scarlet gets up to.”
“Well, good work tonight, I guess? Not really. Maybe a little?”
“Yeah.” I was too focused on Fake Scarlet to give them a proper goodbye. She’d moved away from the man who was light one wallet and started chit-chatting with a woman in front of a sculpture that, for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out. It wasn’t body parts, or was it? Maybe. Nothing was obvious in the mush of flesh-colored sculpture. But somehow it seemed sexual in the way the possible-dong-looking pieces sort of lay along the flappy-looking pieces.
I edged closer, pretending to study a cock collage that took up a large chunk of wall space. Obviously, that piece was done by a man.
“—loved every bit of his jewelry from last season.” Fake Scarlet smiled big and admired the woman’s necklace.
“Well, thank you. I like to tell my husband I have wonderful taste. And you’ve just proven my point.”
Scarlet took the woman’s hand and patted the back of it. “You tell him it’s Scarlet Rocket approved.”
Goddamnit. And worse, when Fake Scarlet drew her hands away, she’d removed the woman’s bracelet and dropped it into her bag.
I stepped up. “Scarlet, another word?”
She gave me a dead-eyed stare, but jerked her chin toward a spot where fewer people congregated. “Fine. Wonderful meeting you, Minnie.”
“Same to you, Scarlet.” The woman beamed.
“Was her name really Minnie?”
“Yes.” Scarlet whirled and crossed her arms over her stomach. “What do you want now?”
“You’re still pretending to be me!”
She smirked. “So?”
I could have strangled her. Maybe made it look like a BDSM art installation, just so it would seem legit. “Didn’t we just discuss this not ten minutes ago?”