Free Dark Paradise by Tami Hoag Page A

Rafferty scooped up her serving
    tray, sloshing imported beer and Pellegrino. The bartender shot her a
    look, and tears instantly burned at the backs of her eyes. Not that she
    really gave a damn about the drinks. She had bigger things on her mind.
    This was just a job she was screwing up. How important was that, when
    her whole life was one big, balled-up mess?
     
    If only she'd had the sense to go straight home last night. But no.
    Glutton for punishment that she was, she just had to take a few turns
    past the Hell and Gone, cruising the street in her ancient rusted-out
    Camero until Will stumbled out the door of the saloon with his arm
    around a buxom blonde.
     
    The tears pressed harder, glazing across her vision. She clenched her
    jaw and held her breath as she set the drinks on the long table,
    heedless as to who had ordered what.
     
    What did any of them have to complain about?   They were rich, they were
    movie stars, they didn't have to drive around in a fifteen-year-old car
    in the middle of the night, looking for a cheating husband.
     
    Damn you, Will.
     
    Damn me for loving you.
     
    Her vision blurred to a jumble of watery colors. As she bent to set down
    the last of the drinks, she misjudged the distance to the table and let
    go of a tall mug of beer too soon. The glass hit the table with a thunk
    and beer spewed out of it like water from a floodgate, drenching the
    tabletop. Several women at the table gasped. The man whose drink it was
    bolted backward, shooting up out of his chair as the beer ran off the
    edge of the table.
     
    Samantha gaped in horror at the mess that seemed so symbolic of her
    whole life, and burst into tears.
     
    "No, no, sweetheart, don't cry!" Evan Bryce laid a fatherly hand on
    Samantha's shoulder. "It was an accident. No harm done."
     
    Mortified, Samantha mumbled behind the hands she had pressed over her
    face, "I'm so sorry, Mr. Bryce!   I-I'm s-so sorry!"
     
    He slid his arm around her and gave her a comforting squeeze. "Hey," he
    said with humor in his voice. "I've had beautiful young women do far
    worse things to me!"
     
    The courtiers who sat around his table all laughed indulgently. Samantha
    wished the floor would open and swallow her whole. Evan Bryce was the
    most powerful among New Eden's new power elite. He was some kind of
    celebrity, a producer or something. Samantha had seen him on Lifestyles
    of the Rich and Famous and Entertainment Tonight. He was always on the
    awards shows or the judging panel at the Miss America pageant. The
    people who visited him at his ranch outside of town were like a Who's
    Who of Hollywood and California politics.
     
    And she had managed to dump a pint of beer practically in his lap.
     
    "Come on, now," Bryce said, leading her toward the chair he had so
    hurriedly vacated. "You've obvious been working too hard, Samantha. Sit
    down. There's no hard feelings."
     
    That he knew her name jolted her for an instant, until she remembered it
    was pinned to her chest. Stupid. The word lashed her like a whip. Stupid
    kid. She'd heard it from her father often enough when she'd been growing
    up, so that now, even though she had been living away from her family
    for over a year, it came back to her and crumbled the debris of her
    self-confidence into even smaller pieces.
     
    "No, I couldn't," she mumbled, backing out of his grasp. She could feel
    the eyes of the others on her, and imagined she knew what they thought.
    They thought she was a hick, a stupid, silly half-breed girl who
    couldn't even manage to keep a drink order straight. "I have work to
    do."
     
    Bryce pulled a face, "I don't think Drew would begrudge you five minutes
    as my guest."
     
    "I don't know, Bryce," one of his friends said slyly.
     
    "He may get jealous. I think he's had his eye on you."
     
    The rest of them laughed. Samantha took in their faces in a
    glance - beautiful beyond what was normally human, teeth too white and too
    straight, eyes gleaming with some kind