Free The Alchemical Detective (Riga Hayworth) by Kirsten Weiss

handed it to her; his green eyes darkened.  “Was it about the murdered girl?”
    “I’m not sure,” she hedged, fiddling with a pencil.  A feeling in her bones wasn’t good enough, not anymore. 
    “What else is bothering you?  There’s more.”
    “Besides the murdered girl, and being under suspicion for murder, and Pen rejecting her ability to see ghosts?”
    He smiled crookedly.  “Come on.  That’s all in a day’s work for you.”
    “My magic isn’t getting better.  It’s growing more uncontrollable.  The irony is when I had it, I tried not to use it too much.  I thought relying on magic was weak.  I never realized…”  
    “How much a part of you it was?” he finished for her.  He pulled up a chair and sat down beside her, his legs in a sprawl, his robe gaping enticingly. 
    She raked her hands through her hair.  “Yeah.”  Her magic had been a sixth sense, and now she was down to five and a quarter.
    He glanced around the room.  “That’s how I feel about this place.  I couldn’t imagine not being a part of it.”
    She gave him a long look and suddenly wondered what he was doing awake at this hour.  “How’s the turnaround going?”
    “Ah.  That.”  He tilted the wine glass, observing the play of lamp light through the garnet-colored wine.  “I know what needs to change.  Gambling at Tahoe once had glamour, elegance.  Sinatra and other movie stars used to come here.  I want to bring that back.  This place will never be Vegas and it shouldn’t be.  Tahoe is different and that’s a strength.
    “I plan to renovate the building in American craftsman style.  I want people to come here and feel like they’ve arrived somewhere special.”  His expression turned wistful.  “This was my parent’s first casino, you know.”
    She didn’t say anything, knew Donovan’s parents had died when he was young.  By the time he was old enough to take control of their casino, it was flagging.  But he’d turned it around, and added to the family empire with casinos in Las Vegas.  The casinos were more than just businesses to him, Riga knew.  They were his heritage and mythology wrapped together.
    His jaw tightened.  “I won’t lose this place.”
    “Is there really a chance that might happen?”
    “I’ve been complacent and I trusted…”  He stopped himself with a quick shake of his head.  “I turned this place around once.  I’ll do it again.”
    “A full renovation…  Sounds like big changes in the works,” she said, thinking of Reuben, who’d been in charge here for so long. 
    “If that’s your subtle way of asking if Reuben is on board, the answer is, no.  Reuben thinks I should play up the celebrity card, brand myself, to bring people in.”  He set the wine upon the desk and took her hand, traced the lines of her palm.  They tingled from the contact.  “Don’t worry, I won’t do it.”
    Riga felt a surge of relief.  She didn’t like the idea of a more public Donovan, didn’t want to share him.  Was she being selfish?  Was the celebrity angle such a bad idea?  Donovan already got his share of press, he was rich, sexy.   But celebrity was fleeting, the public fickle.  It might provide a boost to the casino for a few years, but what then? 
    “Though if your show on Tessie takes off,” he continued, “I might just have to.  I can’t have you walking the red carpet with an empty-headed actor on your arm.”
    “I wouldn’t worry about that.”  She smiled.  “It’s just the Supernatural Channel.  I didn’t even know there was a Supernatural Channel until this week.  How many viewers can it have?”
    He stretched his legs out, and crossed them at the ankles.  The robe slipped further, exposing his powerful muscles.  “The paranormal is hot right now.”
    Riga placed her hand on his knee, slid it up his thigh.  The paranormal might be hot, but Donovan was on fire.
     

Chapter 10: Action
    “I don’t believe in Tessie,”