Jailbait
By: Jessa Kane
Prologue
Wanted:
Magician’s Assistant
Must be female and prepared to travel. Immediately.
Assistant will provide own wardrobe, so make it goddamn flashy.
No whiners or crybabies, no cheapskates, no teetotalers.
Liars welcome, however.
Lack of conscience encouraged.
If interested, show yourself at noon tomorrow in the lobby of the Canyon Inn.
If you haven’t been approached by five minutes past noon, you’re free to go.
Chapter One
DASH
Pickins are slim in the Canyon Inn lobby. That’s for damn sure.
I blow a long line of smoke up at the ceiling, before stubbing out my cigarette in the dented tin ashtray. This is where I’m at, huh? Placing advertisements in the local newspaper for an assistant. Watching the bottom of the barrel show up in response. I figure things have been worse. But they’ve also been a hell of a lot better.
Four women mill around near the Inn’s entrance in sequined crop tops, newspapers folded under their arms, looking like a gaggle of depressed strippers. My last assistant made off in the middle of the night with a purse full of my hard-earned cash, putting me in this clusterfuck. Doesn’t seem like I’ll be getting out of it any time soon, either. Is there a single woman alive that can be trusted?
The answer to that is a resounding hell no.
I check my watch for the time, reckoning I’ll give it another two minutes before bailing out the back entrance. A couple of the crop tops are getting wise, starting to glance in my direction and putting two and two together. Yes, yes, ladies. I placed the ad. Does anyone else in this pile of dust and mortar look like a magician to you? Hell, I stand out on the Vegas strip, let alone in this one-stoplight town. If I don’t get out of here soon, one of them will get brave and approach me. I don’t have time to explain that I’m not interested in their services.
Or that I’m not really a magician.
I look down at my watch again, sucking my teeth as the little hand ticks up to the twelve. That’s it, then. Adios, crop tops. I’ve got places to go and money to steal. Hopefully somewhere between this town and my next gig, I’ll run into a woman who can perform under pressure. Someone with sticky fingers and a distracting smile. Is that really so much to ask?
With one final glance at the door, I stand from the sagging sofa and—
There’s a moment in every man’s life when he senses his downfall. Sees it hurtling straight at him like a goddamn torpedo. Maybe it’s a bad poker bet, a wrong turn in a terrible neighborhood, or one line of coke too many.
Mine is a redhead.
I know the second she breezes in, not sparing the crop tops a single glance, that I am royally screwed. She’s electric. The air near my fingers, around my ears, starts to buzz like I’m being swarmed by bees. Am I having a stroke? Jesus, that’s what it feels like. As if some voodoo curse has taken over my body, rendering my feet useless where they remain stuck to the brown, carpeted floor.
Don’t even get me started on my cock.
The redhead has only taken two steps into the motel and it’s already at half-mast. Four steps and I’m primed for fucking. Her. Just like that. Like turning on a radio when the dial is turned to full blast.
She’s wearing green satin in the form of a dress. If you can call the thin, fragile ribbon of fabric a dress. It starts just above her nipples and ends an inch below her cunt. If we were alone in the lobby, I think I might pin her down on the couch and rut her without exchanging a damn word. Hell, I’m thinking about doing it right now with everyone watching. Just snarling at everyone who comes close to my conquest while I wet hump her into a coma.
Get your shit together, Dash.
Now.
I’m known for keeping an almost eerie cool in any situation. Guns pointed at my head, fleeing an angry mob, you name it. I do it all with a smile on my face. So I have no idea what comes over me when the redhead flips her hair and saunters in my direction, those slight hips swaying right and left. From across the room, I can see that her eyes are a startling mint green. And they’re full of determination.
I love a determined woman. God knows I do.
But with a punch in the gut, I realize the redhead ain’t no woman.
Not yet, anyway.
