Chill Factor by Rachel Caine

Author:Rachel Caine [Caine, Rachel]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, pdf
Tags: Urban Fantasy
ISBN: 9780451460103
Publisher: Roc
Published: 2005-01-03T23:00:00+00:00

There are two things you need to be successful as a hard-core Vegas ü ber-slut: couture and attitude. I had the second. A trip downstairs to the Luxor bazaar would ensure that I had the first.I toured the options and decided on a discreet place that reeked of high price tags—not that it was an indicator of class, but discount stores definitely were out. I needed the best, and I needed it now.

I came in, all wrinkled and lived-in, and showed the clerk the color of my Luxor card. She was a beautiful little thing, Cleopatra-cut honey-blond hair, gray-green eyes, skin like pale spring roses. Wearing Donna Karan, which went perfectly with her body type. Good shoes, too, something from the Valentino family. I was still partial to Manolos, but I wasn't monogamous.

"Day or evening, miss?" she asked, raising perfectly shaped eyebrows. She had a perfect, cultured, West-End-London accent.

"Evening."

"Casual or—"

"Tell you what, gorgeous, just show me what you think will make me absolutely irresistible."

She grinned, and mischief danced in those gray-green eyes. "That won't be difficult," she said, which made her my best friend ever. "Have a seat. We'll sort something for you."

Forty-five minutes later, I was standing in front of a trio of mirrors, wearing a knee-length midnight-blue raw-silk sheath dress. That wasn't anything so special, until you considered the parts that were missing. I turned slowly, gauging the effect. Transparent blue mesh from a high neck to a band of raw silk over my breasts—the parts that get you arrested, anyway—that faded into transparency again over my waist, dipping into beaded splendor low around my hips. Gorgeous. Striking. Utterly impossible to wear without supreme self-confidence.

Twenty-four hundred dollars, plus change. I did a slow turn again. The salesclerk draped a sapphire pendant around my neck, something large and real enough to make my heart skip a beat.

"Well," I said. "They say accessories are everything."

She gave me a knowing, conspiratorial smile and held up a pair of matching Manolo Blahnik pumps, midnight-blue raw silk, with pinpoint heels that raised me a good three and a half inches.

We high-fived. She gave me eight hundred in change from the chip card, bagged my old outfit, and promised to send it up to my room after cleaning. I tipped her generously, squared my shoulders, and called up my A-game.

Time to get to work.

I cut a swath through the bazaar, drawing stares from men and whispers from women; there were few who didn't look, even if they frowned. The Manolos felt perfect on my feet, completely natural; the dress clung like an expertly tailored second skin. Security watched me just like the rest of the gawkers, with a touch of assessment. They knew who I was, of course, but still, the dress had its effect.

I headed for the highest-stakes tables and came up with a likely candidate. I didn't recognize him, but he had designer clothes and two big, burly guys who were obviously bodyguards, and he had a stack of chips that could build a model of the Titanic without losing too much in scale.

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