“What?”
“They’re criminals, too?” he said, biting the words out.
“Not in the way you mean.”
“Thieves?”
“No! Of course not.” She snorted. “They wouldn’t have the first clue how to break into somewhere. Their skills are, how should I say, a bit more honey coated.”
“Which means what?”
“That they’re doing their part and now I need to do mine. Come on, the auction has started.”
They entered the room, and Sebastian was immediately assailed with a musty smell which reminded him of his great aunt Helena’s living room. Unlike that place, where everything was on the cheerful side, this was very different. He looked around and felt a shudder run up his spine. Men who were quite blatantly skipping on the wrong side of the law stood in clusters and for some reason several children ran back and forth.
“Why are there children here?” he asked.
“This stopped being a paying hotel years ago,” Penny said. “It’s a hostel now for the homeless. The council puts people in here who are on the waiting list for a welfare home. They still rent the rooms out though, for weight watcher groups and AA and stuff.”
Welfare? AA? This was her world, he thought as a beefy man in a far too tight leather jacket took to the makeshift stage. Penny and her criminal sisters. He didn’t understand it, didn’t want to. What the hell had he gotten himself into? How had they come to this so quickly? Had he lost his fucking mind?
He shot Penny a look and felt a thud in his chest. What it meant he didn’t know. But even dressed in his baggy clothes, in the worst of surroundings she was so damn beautiful. He wanted her so much, wanted to fuck her until he lost his mind. You already have.
Madness. Just madness but Sebastian knew he couldn’t give her up. Not yet at least. He knew only that as far as he was concerned this, the area, the criminality, it was a world she would play no part in ever again.
Chapter Nineteen
Even a full day later Penny couldn’t quite believe she had The Point at last. Six months ago when she, Rachel, and Lyra had seen the building they’d known immediately it was right for their plans. The three of them had gone inside, even though there had been ‘keep out’ signs and looked around. A few minutes later, they’d glanced at one another and known. This is it.
From there the plan had formed. They just needed money, and fast, and of course there really was only one way to get it. A project such as theirs needed hundreds of thousands and no bank in the world would lend them that kind of cash. So what were they to do?
Sebastian Demetrious. Penny sighed and pulled her legs under her. Her mark. Back then he’d been one name carefully picked out a pile of several and she’d never imagined….
No doubt he hadn’t either. He’d looked deeply uncomfortable in the auction room. He’d glanced around and she could see the distaste on his face. Not his fault of course. He was a man used to fancy houses and orders given to be obeyed. Which was why again she had trouble understanding his motivation.
Why was she worth all that money? What was he thinking? What did all of this mean? The questions continued to haunt her and try as she might to just accept the situation at face value she could not. Of course it didn’t help that Sebastian seemed to take it all in his stride. He fucked her and then fucked her again all evening and the next day and seemed perfectly content to keep doing so.
“You’re looking thoughtful.” The object of her thoughts emerged from the bathroom, came around the edge of the bed and sat down next to her.
Dressed in her own tight black jeans and a faded red tee, Penny felt almost like herself again, but it only took a moment breathing in his scent and looking into his brandy eyes for the normality to feel like it was unraveling. Sebastian was testing her control to the limits, testing everything if truth be told. “I am thoughtful.”
“Why?”
“When we were at my home yesterday...” She paused. “I was thinking.”
“About.”
“Why?”
“Why what, Penny?”
“Why this is happening,” she said slowly. “I understand that you want to fuck me. You want me to tell you how I got into your home but for two hundred grand? And you actually took me to the auction and are having the deeds sent here. It just feels really odd. ”
“It is odd,” he agreed, running a hand through his damp hair. It was curling and Penny felt her stomach give a little clench. How could one man be so attractive? It didn’t seem fair. “But simple. I want you, badly. To me it seems this is the way to have you and have you I will.”