Page 8 of Just My Luck

Jax stood by the velvet sectional, his hands shoved deep into his pockets, his eyes tracking me in the dim light of the suite. “Yeah. It was pretty fun.” He paused, his lopsided dimple making a faint, tired appearance. “Get some sleep. Tomorrow we show Mr. Sterling what GSM can do.”

“Goodnight, Jax.”

“Goodnight, Nova.”

I walked into my bedroom and closed the door, leaning my back against the dark wood. My heart was still hammering a furious rhythm against my ribs. I had survived the first night in Vegas and the heartbreak of knowing Jax wasn’t ever going to make a move. I had to come up with a different plan before I did something stupid.

Chapter 4

Jax

I couldn’t tell if the pounding in my head was from the scotch or from the fact that Nova had spent the last eight hours sleeping a few feet away from me.

By eight in the morning, the shared sitting room of our penthouse suite was flooded with blinding desert sunlight. A massive room-service cart sat between us, loaded with silver domes, fresh fruit, and a much-needed carafe of black coffee. Nova was already fully dressed in her corporate outfit—a crisp, perfectly tailored blazer and pencil skirt—and her dark hair was pinned up in a way that left the elegant line of her neck completely exposed.

“Okay, look at page four of the addendum,” Nova said, tapping her tablet with the back of her pen while she navigated a forkful of eggs. “I dug into Gold Standard’s historical retention data for major hospitality brands. If we highlight our long-term ROI instead of just front-loading the creative assets, hopefully we’ll appeal directly to his background.”

I took a slow sip of my coffee, trying to match her level of professionalism. “His background in international hospitality asset management?”

“Exactly. Before he launched the Apex and broke ground on Onyx, Christian Sterling spent three years restructuring luxury boutique hotels across Europe with his father. He’s an operations guy at his core. He doesn’t just want a pretty campaign; he wants to see the structural metrics of how GSM is going to scale his brand globally.” She swiped to a new screen, bringing up a high-res corporate headshot from a recent financial journal. “Here. I managed to pull a clean bio photo from the Financial Times piece that ran yesterday so you can memorize the face.”

I leaned forward, setting my coffee cup down onto the glass table, and squinted at the screen.

The man in the photo was wearing a flawless navy suit. His dark hair was sharply styled, his jawline precise, and he had a distinct, unshakeable glint of supreme confidence in his silver eyes.

A sudden, freezing jolt of recognition slammed straight into my chest. The coffee in my stomach turned to pure lead.

“Nova,” I said, my voice dropping an octave as I stared at the tablet. “Look at the photo.”

She blinked, leaning in closer to the screen. “I am looking at it. That’s Christian Sterling.”

“No, Nova. Look at his face. The hair. The eyes.” I looked up, meeting her gaze dead-on. “Think back to a few hours ago. The rooftop club.”

Nova’s eyes widened and the color drained from her cheeks. Her mouth dropped open in a perfect, stunned circle.

She gasped, her hands flying to her mouth. “Oh my god. He was the one hitting on me. I turned him down.”

“Yeah, the very same man,” I muttered, my jaw tightening as the memory of the guy’s smug, competitive smile flashed through my mind.

“It makes sense,” she whispered, her brain rapidly connecting the dots as she stared at the screen. “Of course he’d be hanging out in his own VIP lounge. The Apex is his flagship property. He was scouting his own floor.”

A sudden, wicked little grin tugged at the corner of her lips, her eyes flashing with that familiar teasing I knew all too well.

“Man,” she said. “If I’d known that was the multi-billion-dollar client, I totally would have flirted back. Think of the leverage we’d have for the GSM contract right now.”

“Don’t even joke about that,” I growled, the words slipping out a little too fast, a little too protective. I cleared my throat quickly, forcing my professional tone back into place. “We don’t mix business with… whatever that was. Come on. Grab your binder. We have a meeting to win, regardless of his nightlife antics.”

I hated that I was going to go into the meeting trying to sell my family’s business to a man I wanted to punch in the face for flirting with the woman of my dreams.

Ten minutes later, we stepped out of the executive elevators onto the restricted lower level of the Apex. The chaotic chiming of the casino floor vanished, replaced by the hushed, intimidating quiet of corporate wealth. The hallways were lined with frosted glass, minimalist art, and security guards who looked like they checked bank statements at the door.

We were escorted into a massive, state-of-the-art boardroom. The center of the room was dominated by a monolithic black marble table, and my stomach did a tight flip when I realized we were heavily outnumbered.

Like Nova had suggested, Christian Sterling hadn’t come alone.

Arrayed down the right side of the table were at least seven other executives—sharp-faced men and women in dark gray suits, holding tablets and looking at us like we were a minor annoyance on their morning schedule.

At the head of the table sat the man of the hour. Up close, in the stark overhead lighting of the boardroom, Christian Sterling looked even more formidable than he had under the neon lights of the club.