Page 27

She reared back a little at the visual onslaught. The place was a gyrating wall of people, the strobes making them look like a solid mass of human JELL-O, jiggling and moving to the heart-pumping bassbeat.
They were constantly jostled as they attempted to move forward. To ensure they weren’t separated, Ethan slipped his arm around Alexa’s waist. Tried to ignore the zing of electricity that touching her elicited. She turned her head at that moment, her hair brushing his jaw. “And people come here forfun?”
A hard smile of agreement settled on his lips. It wouldn’t be his idea of entertainment either, although there’d been a time years earlier when he’d tried the club scene. Paying for overpriced liquor and leaving stained with others’ drinks and vomit had lost its allure in ahurry.
A loose-hipped young man who’d obviously been over-served danced up to them, his hand on Alexa’s arm. “Dance with me, gorgeous.” He exerted enough force to pull her forward a fewsteps.
Ethan’s brows lowered. “Back. Off.” He doubted the man could hear him, but something in his stance had the other guy glancing in his direction. What he saw in Ethan’s expression made him release Alexa and retreating quickly into the mob behindhim.
As Ethan forced their way forward, it soon became apparent that the crowd parted naturally for the woman at his side. Not so much for the two of them. He turned a shoulder into the mass of people and wedged a hole for them to pass through. In the ten minutes it took them to make their way to the vicinity of the bar, no fewer than three guys tried to halt Alexa’sprogress.
Which was exactly the reason he’d insisted the two of them pair up for the search for Lawler. Alexa had made no secret of her annoyance. They could cover twice as much area if they split up, she’d insisted. An assurance that now proved false. Alone, she would have been accostedcontinually.
The people were lined up three and four deep waiting for service. Ethan was about to flash his credentials again when Alexa slipped away from him and headed to a group of raucous young men draped over the bar a few feet away. He watched as they turned as one at her presence and parted like the Red Sea forMoses.
Ethan shook his head, unwillingly amused. Maybe he’d underestimated her after all. He took a moment to scan the room behind him. More crowded than the other establishments they’d been to, but the places seemed to get more jammed with the passing hours. It was going to be impossible to pick a lone woman out of the masses at tables, booths and the dance floor. It was going to take forever to search the wholearea.
He faced the bar again and saw a bartender leaning attentively toward Alexa as she showed him what was likely a copy of Jeanette Lawler’s professional photo. The man with the bar rag leaned forward to take a long look before nodding. He later shrugged at something Alexa said and waved an arm at the mob that had to be a violation of the fire code. As she fought her way back to him, Ethan stepped in front of a harried-looking waitress balancing a tray ofdrinks.
“Have you seen this womantonight?”
She barely gave the picture a glance. “Not that I recall, but look around. She could beanywhere.”
Alexa reached Ethan’s side then. “According to the bartender, she was here earlier. But he hasn’t seen herrecently.”
Which meant she may have left, or she was among the sea of occupants. With a mental sigh, he nodded. “We’ll look herefirst.”
“We splitup.”
He opened his mouth to argue, then shut it again and nodded. She could go where he couldn’t. And she’d already proven that she was more than adept than he at garnering the attention needed to show people the picture. Men would be far more likely to notice the woman in the image than another female would. And Alexa had already proven that she had no trouble eliciting malecooperation.
For some reason, that thought wasn’tcomforting.
* * *
The bartender was right.The place drew a decent crowd and there were more than enough young men here to take advantage of the Hump Day specials. Jeanette was glad she hadn’t left earlier. Now it was time to narrow her focus because she had to be up early for the interview tomorrow, which meant a short night in bed with her favoredselection.
She was squeezed into a booth with five prospects, and she needed to choose while she could still focus. One of the enterprising souls had hooked his finger in the narrow strap of her dress and lowered it to write his number on the back of her shoulder with a Sharpie. She didn’t bother telling him that whoever she took home tonight wasn’t going to get acallback.
As if they recognized that she was on the prowl, all of the young men were plying her with drinks and what they probably thought passed for witty conversation. The conversation was part sophomoric laughter and part one-upmanship, with lines thrown in from the latest juvenile movie that guys always thought washilarious.
It was one of the downfalls of selecting outside her age group, but as long as she made her choice early enough in the night, she could overlook a few faults. She studied each of them in turn and decided that when it came time to make her exit, she’d just grab the one that seemed soberest. Because she definitelywasn’t.
He was going to have to do all the work. Laughter spilled from her lips, and she clapped a hand over her mouth, shocked. The guys seemed to take her amusement as encouragement. Their voices rose and their gestures grew wild. A drink was knocked over, which of course landed straight in her lap to pool in her bare thighs. She’d forgotten her vow earlier not to sit in the dress. Right now, it resembled a short glitteringshirt.
“Shit, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” One of the young men reached over to sop up the liquid with a damp napkin. His hand lingered where it met bare skin, then skated upward. She batted it away. He was out of the running, she decided, disgruntled. Not only a slob but one who’d take every advantage aswell.
“I’m going to the restroom.” She grabbed the small purse she’dbrought.
“We’ll save your place,” oneproclaimed.
“On my lap,” anothersaid.
“On my face,” one of the others put in and then of course they all laughed like the young fools theywere.
Morons. Jeanette weaved through the wall of bodies, barely managing to avoid a flailing arm from one of the dancers. “Here, don’t forget your drink,” someone said. She didn’t even turn around. If she ever did get to the ladies’ room, she wouldn’t be returning to that table ofdickheads.
But suddenly the drink was in her hand, and she looked down at it, before scanning the moving crowd behind her. Her benefactor was lost in the ocean of people, but he was right about one thing. There was no reason to leave a half-full Crown and coke behind. Especially when it’d beenfree.