A couple of the women squeezed his popped muscles, oohing and aahing, but Angel simply hoisted her glass at him. “Impressive,” she said, her eyebrow arched.

“Oh, Duke, you must be so excited. It’s almost time for you to start playing again, isn’t it?” one of the younger women asked—the girlfriend of a rookie who was already at spring training.

He turned up the charm. “I’m a playa all the time, am I right?”

She giggled. “I guess. For an old guy.”

“Ooh, ouch. Kicked me right in the nuts with that one.”

“Well, a hot old guy … Does that make you feel better?”

“Almost as good as if you had that hot little ass pressed against me.”

It was like out of a cartoon, the silence that followed. He could swear a needle screeched across a vinyl record and a circle of faces whipped from Duke to Angel and back.

He shook his head, trying to clear the tequila mist. What? Just tryin’ to be funny …

Angel. He’d just shamed her. His ma would spit on him if she could.

“Bartender!” he barked.

Angel shook the door handle in frustration. It was locked. The bathroom in the entry hall was occupied. She almost hitched up the red dress and kicked the intricately carved door with her expensively clad foot, but she controlled herself at the last second. She also stopped herself from launching a flurry of punches at the wall or, better yet, at Duke. She wasn’t going to hurt her hands or toes over a douche bag.

Angel went into the massive kitchen, an orderly beehive of activity by black-vested workers filling trays and washing glasses. A staff member, after removing withered mushrooms from the oven, pointed to a hallway off to the side when she asked him about a restroom. The corridor was wider than her living room and opened onto a laundry room, pantry, and what she guessed was a suite of rooms for servants. Pushing open the door to what she assumed was the bathroom, she immediately regretted it.

Regina sat on the edge of a bathtub, leaning back, her dress up around her waist, pencil-thin legs spread wide. “Mmm-mmmm.” Her eyes were shut, lips puckered.

Clutching Roland Smith’s short, tight curls, she was holding his head down. The married ballplayer was on his knees, his tongue lapping noisily between Regina’s thighs.

“Oh, yesss. Fuck me with your tongue. Fuck me.”

Before Angel could unfreeze herself, she saw Roland bob his head, up down, up down, jamming his tongue into Regina.

I’m being punished. I don’t get to have sex, but I have to see it wherever I go. She started to back out. And how come people can’t lock the fucking door?

Regina’s eyes popped open and landed on her.

“Get out!” the model shrieked.

Chapter Fifteen

Angel slammed the bathroom door.

My God, I hate these people.