Friends With Benefits

She hadn’t been interested in the pudgy nerd he’d been back then so he’d gotten a gym membership and started his company in the crappy studio apartment he’d rented on the Strip, and the rest was history. He’d moved the fuck on and any boyhood fantasies he’d had about Alexa had gone in the trash along with the majority of his oversize hoodies. His reputation with women was legendary, which was saying a shit-ton for a town with the highest population density of fuckboys in the country.

He and Alexa both were two of Vegas’s notorious players, but over the past few months he’d been considering showing his hand. He’d accomplished his goals and now he was ready for something else, a new challenge before things got stale. He didn’t want to be that creepy old guy out on the prowl.

And if there was ever a challenge to be had, it was Alexa Lawson, who was currently living up to his boyhood fantasies in a painted-on black pencil skirt and silky red camisole.

“Let me take care of that other little problem and we’ll get going,” she informed him, rising from the couch and shrugging back into her suit jacket. Her demeanor already signaled that she had returned to business mode, which was equally as sexy as her relaxed mode. As far as his dick was concerned, she actually didn’t have a non-sexy mode.

Carter installed some updates on her assistant’s computer while Alexa dealt with Jason and Chris. Both men were shouting angrily and he suppressed the urge to rush in there and protect her, but she didn’t need him. Before too long the room got quiet and she must have shown them the evidence. His software had uncovered Chris’s friendship with the customer who kept winning and video evidence of them talking and splitting the take. It was a cut-and-dried situation.

He was impressed that Alexa never had to raise her voice, she just got shit done. However, when the cops showed up, he realized just how serious the matter was. Software company CEOs like himself generally didn’t deal with the police even though, ironically, his software literally caught thieves. Watching the men in blue cart Chris and Jason away in handcuffs was awkward to say the least, especially considering the way Chris sneered at him. Everyone knew what his software did, so while Alexa did the firing he was technically the one who put Chris in jail.

When they were gone, Carter returned to her office as she was pouring herself another drink.

“You didn’t tell me about the police,” Carter said, scratching the back of his head.

“They’re thieves,” she said simply, joining him on the sofa. “Thieves go to jail.”

Her phone rang and her uncle’s face appeared on the screen.

She put him on speakerphone, and John Lawson’s perpetually jovial voice crackled through the international phone lines loud and clear as a bell.

“Well, Alexa my love, thank you for taking care of another snake in the grass.”

She grinned at Carter and he returned it. Alexa’s uncle was a big personality but also a man of integrity, which was hard to find in Vegas. Like Alexa, he’d admired him all his life.

“I know you’re going to be upset, dear, but like we talked about, I’m ready to retire. I think we should put the casinos up for sale,” John said, shocking both him and Alexa.

“What?” Alexa burst out, her eyes wide and stunned. “Uncle John, I thought you were joking about that. You just went to France to scout out new casino locations.”

Alexa jumped off the couch and started pacing, clearly about to lose her shit as she turned the speaker off and held the phone to her ear. He ignored the urge to comfort her because he knew she wouldn’t let him.

“Yes, of course, Uncle John. The next news article you read about me will be about my heroic dog rescue or helping an elderly widow find love again.”

She sank back down onto the edge of the sofa next to him and tapped the phone to end the call.

“What the hell was that?” Carter asked, resisting brushing away the piece of hair stuck in her red lipstick.

Alexa shook her head, mystified. “Like you heard, he wants to retire and sell the casinos, but my reputation is causing a problem with potential buyers. If I clean it up and he can sell the Wild Nights and Hard Eight casinos, he’ll give me Halcyon outright.”

Carter refilled her glass with the last of the martini from the shaker. Even though it was a good deal for her as far as Halcyon was concerned, he knew she’d rather die than lose the other casinos, too. Alexa was Las Vegas and those casinos; she’d lived and breathed them her entire life. As kids, they’d run the floors of Wild Nights and Hard Eight instead of their backyards, as teenagers they’d worked whatever odd jobs they could, and as adults they’d enjoyed the casinos as they were meant to. But she’d also do whatever her uncle needed no matter how it might hurt her.

“So what’s the play?” he asked, handing her a glass. He often felt like he lived to serve Alexa. Whatever she needed, he did. It was a mutual codependence, as long as he never tried to press her to talk about feelings. Ever since her parents died she’d cut herself off from anything too serious.

“I don’t know,” she said, sounding a little lost. “I have to clean up my image, I guess.”

“So how do you want to do that? I can take over the media aspect of it, make sure content of you doing wholesome stuff gets shared in cyberspace.”

She nodded. “That’s good, but I need to do more. Like practice abstinence and wear a chastity belt, apparently.”

He laughed at the impossibility and she smacked his arm, unamused.

She slumped down into the back of the couch and he put his arm around her shoulders, breathing in the light apple scent of her hair. She’d used the same shampoo and conditioner since high school and it tugged at his gut like it always did.

“I’m sure you’ll figure something out,” Carter told her, letting go of her to take a fortifying drink of his martini.

She stilled then, looking over at him speculatively.

“I don’t like that look,” he drawled.

“I need a fake fiancé,” she announced, clapping her hands together. “That would solve everything!”

“And exactly how would that solve everything?” he pressed. Perfect, he thought. He was about to leave for a year just as she decided to get fake-engaged to some random Vegas loser.

“Think about it,” she insisted, kneeling on the couch and facing him. Her hair fell over her shoulders in thick chestnut waves as she moved. “For example, if you and I got fake engaged, it would solve all my problems. We don’t have to invent a backstory because everyone in town already knows we’re close, and spending more time together wouldn’t be terrible because we actually like each other. It would be the quickest way to get everyone to believe that I’ve settled down.”

“Wait, you want me to be your fake fiancé? Uh, no way in hell.”

“Why not?” she asked, her head doing that cute little tilt it always did when she was curious about something. “If you’re worried about San Francisco, I think a month is more than enough time to convince people I’m a changed woman.”

Why wasn’t it a good idea for them to pretend to be engaged? he mused. Maybe because their friendship had become a game to see how long he could be in her presence without throwing her down on the nearest surface and fucking her until they both couldn’t remember their own names? Yeah, maybe that was why.

“I just don’t think I’ll have time. There’s a lot to do before the move.”

She looked slightly crestfallen, but a fake engagement was just too much to ask of him.

“You could stop dating for a while,” he suggested. “You’d get the same result.”

“Maybe,” she agreed. “But it will take longer.”

“Yeah, but that’s a good thing, right?” he reasoned. “You don’t want your uncle to sell the casinos right away. In the meantime, maybe you’ll think of a way to change his mind.”

The possibility seemed to at least distract her. “I’m too wired to talk about this now. Let’s get out of here.”

He nodded and followed her out of the office, relieved that he’d put an end to the fake fiancé thing.

They stepped out of the elevator onto the ground floor and the crush of the Friday night crowd was instant sensory overload. The electronic whirring of machines, the tinny clink of coins and the underlying bass beat of rumbling conversation was enough to drive a decent person to recklessness. The anonymity was liberating.

When they finally stepped outside into the bright lights of Vegas, he could tell that Alexa needed to blow off some steam and wasn’t surprised when she grabbed his arm.

“Come on,” she urged, pulling him across the street to Elysium. “Let’s gamble and make bad decisions.”

“So much for reinventing yourself,” he pointed out.

“Tomorrow,” she promised with a wink, shoving open the front doors to the towering casino.

CHAPTER THREE (#u858095a9-30e7-57c1-8bd3-0d4fe0c73b74)

AS SHE’D KNOWN he would, Carter waited for her while she played several hands of blackjack even though he hated gambling. She won her last hand with twenty-one and turned around to celebrate with Carter, but he wasn’t there.