Page 98 of Hunted

Before he could, however, I stepped out of reach, overbalancing by mistake. The entire contents of my champagne glass tipped over onto Mr. Sleazeball’s front, ruining what I was sure was a Very Expensive Shirt that probably cost more than I’d ever made waitressing in a month.

“You fucking bitch!” he hollered, leaping to his feet and raising a fist like he intended to land a sloppy right hook.

“Randall!” Lewis snarled, stalling his companion. “Go clean yourself up.”

Wait staff immediately mopped up the champagne like it had never existed in the first place, before Henry Lewis could even deign to acknowledge them. Not that he would. They were invisible to people like him.

“And Miss…?” His cold, dark eyes turned on me, juxtaposed by his polished grin.

“Ward,” I answered stiffly, a muscle flickering in my jaw.

“Miss Ward. Please have a seat. Randall won’t be needing it.”

His other two companions hid their existential dread behind their whisky glasses, leaving me to occupy Lewis’ sole attention.

Fine by me.

“Does Miss Ward have a first name?” he all but purred.

“Katarina,” I answered in a practised sultry tone. A tone, Marie said, was designed expertly to make a man think about what other sounds I could make in the bedroom.

“And is Miss Katarina Ward here for business… or pleasure?”

Okay, he definitely purred that time—and had the balls to try and x-ray vision my kitty.

“Miss Katarina Ward,” I mimicked, perfectly echoing the rolling of the r’s, “is here for a job.”

“Adelaide,” Hunter warned.

“Ah, a job. Hmm.” Lewis took the opportunity to slide his oily gaze down the length of my body and back up again. “I wonder what line of work someone as beautiful as you might be in.”

A snort rolled through the comms and I couldn’t help but wonder which of the three it originated from.

I flashed Lewis a dazzling smile—one I’d much preferred to have given any one of my handlers—and leaned in, just enough to give him a clear line of sight down my propped-up cleavage.

“The kind that leaves men breathless,” I whispered with a wink, letting my real amusement show when a guffaw thundered through my left eardrum.

Whoever was front and centre on the mic got a real kick out of that one.

But Lewis, a man accustomed to people putting on shows for his benefit, assumed my smile was just for him—and as much as it sickened me to do so, I let him. He leaned in as well, finally brave enough to take what he wanted, and slid his palm up my exposed thigh.

Tactition, check. One sense to go.

“You don’t say,” he mused. “And what, exactly, would a night with you cost a man like me?”

I craned my neck, exposing it, and whispered back. “More than you could afford, I’m afraid.” Then I withdrew with his whisky glass in hand, subconsciously prompting his last remaining sense—gustation, or taste—to want more.

It was the only one left, and I knew he was salivating at the thought.

Good.

I finished his drink off, shot him a smirk, and placed the lipstick-stained glass on the mahogany table in the centre. Just where he could see it, study it, wonder what else I could leave lipstick kisses on.

Before he had a chance to stutter any coherent response, I stood up and sauntered over to the bar and signalled to the bartender.

“What are you doing, Deadly?” Dek hummed in my ear, eliciting exactly the type of bodily response Lewis thought he was capable of.

“Wait for it,” I murmured back. “In three, two…”