Free Ready for Him by Tanith Davenport

Chapter One
     
     
     
    Looking at each of her friends in turn, Jade Bleecker raised her glass of champagne and smiled. “A toast, everyone. Piper, you first.”
    Piper tucked her brown hair behind her ear and thought for a moment. “To marriage.”
    Beside her, Shaundra giggled. “Oh God, I can’t think of one. You guys go ahead of me, I’ll get one in a minute.”
    “To Vegas, baby,” Leonie announced, pressing a red-lipped kiss to her glass before raising it, capping the gesture with an exaggerated wink.
    “To us,” Jade added, lifting her glass higher with mock solemnity.
    “Ooh, ooh, ooh, I got one!” Shaundra cried. “To fucking! ”
    Their glasses clinked together and all four let out a cheer.
    Ten p.m., and the bar at the Bellagio was buzzing with life. Jade sat back in her chair and observed her friends as they drank, all three in their own way thrumming with excitement. All three ready to get married in four days’ time, with her as their joint maid of honour.
    Three times a bridesmaid, never the bride…
    It had already been quite the upheaval. Jade had moved out of the New York apartment she had shared with Piper a month earlier. Joey had moved himself in immediately, ready for married life. Leonie would be uprooting herself completely to live in her fiancé Darren’s home state of Iowa. As for Shaundra, no one knew what she would end up doing. She and Andrew were already sharing a studio apartment, spending money on the funkiest fashions and eating beans on toast for dinner.
    Jade took a mouthful of champagne and scanned the bar, careful not to let her eyes linger on anybody for too long. The slightest hint that she might be man-hunting and she’d never hear the end of it.
    “See anyone you like?” Piper murmured in her ear.
    “Nope,” Jade murmured back, restraining an eye roll. “These aren’t my kind of men, you know?”
    Piper shrugged airily. “You never know.”
    Well, maybe. Maybe opposites did attract. But Jade knew her appearance set a lot of these men—rich men, businessmen, professional gamblers—on edge. With a modern mohawk in black and green, her tattooed arms and her nose and brow piercings, she made most men quail at the sight. They looked at her as though she was going to either punch them or stab them.
    Even the men at her dojo were scared of her—although at least they had a reason. They knew what she could do to them.
    Shaundra’s voice broke into her thoughts. “I don’t know about you guys, but I’m going shopping tomorrow. I saw a great little vintage place when we were in the cab.”
    “I’ll go with you,” Leonie immediately chimed in. “I’m sure I saw an artwork store a few blocks away.”
    Oh God. Jade raised an eyebrow at Piper, who mirrored the gesture with a knowing look.
    “I’ll pass. I feel like hitting the casinos tomorrow. What do you think, Jade? You in?”
    “I’m in.” Jade threw her a look of gratitude. She loved Shaundra and Leonie, but God, could they shop.
    As she glanced across the bar again, her eye rested on a young man at the far end of the room. Where had she seen him before? He was tall, his blond hair messy and streaked with green, matching piercing green eyes which seemed to be taking in everything around him. Although he was dressed very casually, Jade recognised his T-shirt and jeans to be designer label. A big spender who wanted to look like a nobody.
    She definitely knew his face. Maybe he was an actor. Probably not much of a name, though. He was standing alone, glass of red wine in hand, with space around him as though he was radiating a force-field. Nobody seemed to recognise him.
    Cute, though.
    Piper nudged her, and Jade reluctantly dragged her eyes back to the table. Shaundra was pulling on her jacket, adjusting the jagged collar, which stood up in spikes and was catching on her chandelier earrings.
    “I’m going to head upstairs. Andy wanted an early night tonight—you know how it is.”
    “Mwah!” Leonie