hello. "You will get ready for me now. You will wear what I bought for you. Your hair will be bound and off your neck."
He waited to hear the only three words he cared about and they came right away, the female voice saying,
"Yes, my lheage."
V hung up and dematerialized.
Chapter Three
ZeroSum was doing excellent business lately, Rehvenge thought as he looked at the tallies. Cash flow was strong. There was growth in the sports booking receipts. Attendance was up. God, he'd owned the club for how long now? Five? Six years? And it was finally cranking enough income that he could take a deep breath.
It was a despicable way of making money, of course, what with the sex and the drugs and the booze and the betting. But he needed to support his mahmen and, up until recently, his sister, Bella. Then there was the blackmail overhead he had to cover.
Secrets could be so expensive to keep.
Rehv looked up as the door to his office opened. As his chief security officer came in, he could smell the lingering scent of O'Neal on her and he smiled a little. He liked being right. "Thanks for taking care of Butch."
Xhex's gray eyes were direct as always. "I wouldn't have if I hadn't wanted him."
"And I wouldn't have asked if I hadn't known that. Now, where are we?"
She sat down opposite his desk, her powerful body as hard as the marble he was resting his elbows on.
"Nonconsensual sex in the mezzanine men's room. I took care of it. The woman is pressing charges."
"Was the guy walking after you were through with him?"
"Yeah, but he was wearing a new pair of earrings, if you know what I mean. I also found two minors on the premises and kicked them out. And one of the bouncers was taking kickbacks from the line, so I fired him."
"Anything else?"
"We had another OD."
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"Shit. Not our product, though, right?"
"Nope. Outside junk." She pulled a small cellophane bag out of the back pocket of her leathers and tossed it on his desk. "I managed to snag this before the EMTs arrived. I'm hiring some extra staff to deal with the situation."
"Good. You find that freelancer, you bring his ass to me. I want to take care of him personally."
"Will do."
"You got anything more for me?"
In the silence that followed, Xhex leaned forward and linked her hands together. Her body was all tight muscle, nothing but hard angles except for her high, small breasts. She was deliriously hermaphroditic, although fully a female so far as he'd heard.
The cop should feel lucky, he thought. Xhex didn't have sex that often, and then only when she found the male worthy.
She also didn't waste time. Usually. "Xhex, talk."
"I want to know something."
Rehv eased back in his chair. "Is this going to piss me off?"
"Yup. Are you looking for a mate?"
As his eyes started to glow purple, he tilted his chin down and stared at her from under his brows. "Who said I was? And I want the name."
"Deduction, not gossip. According to GPS records, your Bentley's been by Havers's a lot lately. I happen to know Marissa is unattached. She's beautiful. Complicated. But you've never cared about the glymera. You thinking about mating her?"
"Not at all," he lied.
"Good." As Xhex's eyes nailed into him, it was obvious she knew the truth. "Because it would be crazy for you to give it a shot. She'd find out about you-and I'm not talking about what goes down here. She's a member of the Princeps Council, for chrissakes. If she knew you were a symphath, that would compromise both of us."
Rehv rose to his feet and palmed his cane. "The Brotherhood already knows about me."
"How?" Xhex breathed.
He thought about the little lip/fang thing he and the Brother, Phury, had shared and decided to keep that on the down-low. "They just do. And now that my sister's mated to a Brother, I'm a member of the frickin' family. So even if the Princeps Council found out, those warriors would keep them at bay."
Too bad his blackmailer was unaffected by the ways of the Normals. Symphaths, he was learning, made very bad enemies. No wonder his kind were hated.
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"You sure about that?" Xhex said.
"It would kill Bella if I were sent to one of those colonies. You think that hellren of hers would stand for her being upset like that, especially as she's pregnant? Z's one mean-ass motherfucker and