Andros looked down at his wristwatch, his mind racing. He had another meeting directly after this one—hadn’t the email said it was urgent? Was planning to travel up to Leeds tomorrow. Hell, he had plenty to be getting on with. Did he even have time to make a go of seducing the lady in red?
“It says here…” The clerk looked up at him, seeming to shift a little on the spot. Andros recognized uncertainty when he saw it, and gestured for the man to continue.
“Well, it says…”
“What?” Andros asked, scheduling conflicts working through his mind. “Spit it out, man.”
“It says here that you did.”
Chapter Three
Lyra knew the moment he entered the room. It was like an awareness. The very air in the room changed, the skin on the back of her neck prickled, and she felt her heart race.
Andros Casstellini had arrived.
Finally.
A few moments later and muted voices reached her. Club Belmont wasn’t exactly busy. The majority of its patrons sat alone, reading their papers, eating their meals, or simply drinking their wine. One of the low voices she heard had to be his, and Lyra found herself shivering at the thought. After all the months she and her sisters had spent planning, the time had finally come…
She paused for a moment with that thought, wondering exactly where each of her sisters were now. Rachel would have caught the eye of Dominic Rimeria already. She was so sweet, so perfect, and though Lyra had worried about her little sister’s ability to pick the pocket of one of the richest men in the country, Rachel had insisted she was up to the job. Who was Lyra to say otherwise?
And Penny. She’d be getting ready soon to make her way to Sebastian Demetrious’ house. Once there she would use her finely honed skills to get the money they needed to start their project—a project which was of the utmost importance, which would make a difference to so many people who needed help. No, she corrected herself with a slight sigh, not people, girls, teenagers at risk. She and her sisters had been in that position and they’d all agreed, the moment they were old enough to realize how lucky they’d been to escape relatively unscathed, that they had to do whatever they could to ensure others were equally as lucky. And it had all seemed so simple when they’d sat down to plan it out.
No bank would lend them a penny, no private investors, no charities. If they wanted the money to make a difference, they would have to find it themselves. A billionaire for each sister.
Sebastian Demetrious, Dominic Rimeria and Andros Casstellini.
All men with too much money for their own good, money that could make a real difference in the sisters’ hands.
Three marks.
Three plans.
Three deceptions.
Lyra repeated it all in her mind now, both to remind herself, and to stop from looking over to confirm that Andros was actually sat in the dining area. After all, it would do her no good if she sat there gawking at him, like practically every woman no doubt did. No, she had to play it cool. It was essential to her scheme that he came to her. That he was the one to chase.
And her sisters? She thought of Penny, black haired, lithe, so much like the cat they called her. She was going to lift the money to buy The Point—a huge building that they planned to turn into a shelter—straight from Demetrious’ safe. Then she and Rachel were going to get the money needed to convert it into something habitable. Somewhere safe.
Rachel would get her money through her innocent ways. Charming Dominic Rimeria, making him burn until his back was turned, so that she could help herself to the key from his safe.
And she? Lyra knew her sisters assumed that she would follow a similar plan to Rachel, making Andros ache for her until the time came to thieve some of his riches. She had let them assume that—because the truth of the matter was, she knew that Penny and Rachel would never approve of her actual plan, that they might even have gone as far as to stop the whole mission.
Lyra ‘the man eater’ Matthews, she thought with a smile, watching the lights glint off her tumbler. That was what they called her because she had never had any trouble getting men to do what she wanted. One after another, they ran around after her like puppy dogs, desperate to get in her pants. Her sisters never even considered that she’d have any trouble making Andros act the same way.
The trouble was they hadn’t considered other things.
Hadn’t realized that the moment she’d looked down at Andros’ picture her heart had skipped a beat, and her panties had drenched themselves. Fact of the matter was Lyra wanted some excitement, wanted to be chased by a man like Andros. Oh, she knew how important the mission was. She knew she had to get a set amount of money in order for the project to be completed, and she would—that was not in question—but Lyra saw absolutely no reason why she couldn’t have some fun at the same time.