At this rate, he'd be lucky to trap himself a date to the senior prom.
Still feeling frustrated—and, of course, irritable—he wasn't paying attention to who was manning the bar. Or, rather, womanning the bar, as was the case at Drake's. So he didn't much care who was the recipient of his lousy mood when he dumped himself onto the leather stool he generally occupied and snarled, "Gimme a Tanqueray and tonic. And make it snappy."
When his drink didn't magically and immediately materialize before him on the bar—an extremely odd development at Drake's—Lucas glanced up to find that the woman to whom he had just barked out his order was none other than Drake's illustrious and infamous owner, Lindy Aubrey. And he understood right away what he'd just done: namely, put his life—and more important than that, his manhood—in very grave peril.
Lucas had nothing but respect for Lindy Aubrey. Like every other member of Drake's, he was too terrified of her not to have respect for her. Although he didn't know her well—or at all, for that matter—she was something of a celebrity in Chicago . Since opening Drake's, she had received extensive and not just local press; Adam himself had often commented to Lucas that he'd considered doing a story about Lindy for Man's Life. She'd grown up in one of the city's most notorious neighborhoods, was a survivor of the streets, and had been on her own since she was fourteen years old.
In spite of her mean and meager beginnings, however, she had, through mysterious ways she'd never revealed, raised the money to open Drake's a few years ago. Since then, she had turned the club into one of the country's premier establishments. She was completely unapologetic about its masculine exclusivity and employed some of the best attorneys in the nation to fight and win numerous court battles to maintain the club's purely male membership.
She was a man's man in many ways, yet her femininity was inescapable. In her mid-forties, she was a striking-looking woman. Lush, dark hair tumbled past her shoulders, and clear gray eyes reflected both intelligence and wry wit. Tonight, she wore a screaming-red suit, the short skirt showcasing what Lucas, even terrified, had noted long ago were spectacular legs. Bright gemstones sparkled on nearly every finger, around both wrists, around her neck, in her earlobes. It was rumored that she carried a revolver in her purse everywhere she went, and that it had been fired on more than one occasion.
Lucas believed the rumor quite readily.
She had been sifting through some papers when he had growled his command, but she had halted, mid-sift, to smile at him in a deceptively benign way. Now that she had his attention, she pursed her lips in a manner that another man—one who wasn't terrified of her, say—might find sexy. Lucas, on the other hand, just about wet himself.
"Well, aren't you cute," she cooed softly. "And whose little boy are you?"
"Oh, uh … hi, Lindy … um, Ms. Aubrey … uh, ma'am," Lucas stammered. "I didn't realize it was you standing there."
She continued to gaze at him in that unnervingly bland I'll-huff-and-I'll-puff-and-I'll-have-you-shorts-for-dinner manner. "Obviously," she murmured in response.
Lucas shifted a bit nervously—okay, a bit terrifiedly—on his stool. "I'll just, um … I'll just go, uh…" Go wet myself, he finished lamely. "Uh … I'll just wait for one of the bartenders to get my drink for me."
Lindy's smile turned knowing. "Yes. You will."
Unable to help himself, Lucas noted again the proliferation of jewelry adorning Lindy's not at all unattractive person, and unbidden, an idea popped into his head. Though, he had to admit right away, it wasn't a very good one. Because the idea that braved entry into his brain just then was that maybe he could target Lindy Aubrey as his tycoon to trap. She was rich, obviously, and a good-looking woman. Intelligent, wry sense of humor, sexy in her own man-eater kind of way. Hmmm…
Of course, there was that small matter of him wanting to wet himself whenever she came within a hundred feet of him, he reminded himself. That could potentially put a damper on things, so to speak. Probably it would be best if he found someone else.
Lindy continued to gaze at him in that bored, I'm-done-with-you-now way of hers, then, "Edie," she tossed over her shoulder at the bartender who stood nearby. Then she went back to sifting through her papers, and—just like that—dismissed Lucas with all the concern of a jackal that had finished bloating itself on a piece of ripe carrion.
The good news, as far as Lucas was concerned, was that he no longer had Lindy Aubrey's attention. The bad news, however, was that he did have Edie Mulholland's.
Oh, great , he thought. Little Edie Sunshine. Just what he needed to make a lousy night lousier. Little Edie Two Shoes. Mulholland of Sunnybrook Farm. A woman who was so nice and so kind and so sweet and so polite and so … so … God, so blond, she could make the Olsen Twins vomit.
"Hi, Mr. Conaway," she greeted him pertly with a cheerful little smile.
Pertly. Cheerful. Ew. Lucas tried not to lose his dinner all over the bar. And the "Mr. Conaway" thing was just too nauseating for words. He knew that referring to him as "Mr." was required by her job, and really, coming from another woman, he might find the address kind of … well, kind of arousing, actually, now that he thought more about it. But the fact that it was Little Edie Sunshine saying it revolted him for some reason. She was probably the same age he was, give
