Claimed by the Sicilian Tycoon (Criminal Seduction #3)(2)

Rachel smiled, albeit a strained kind of one, and pulled the dress back up. “Don’t mess with the disguise!”

Penny rolled her eyes. “Disguise my ass.”

“We’re all going to do this,” Lyra said, standing up and looking back and forth between her sisters. She was doing her oldest sister voice, though Penny had often said that five months barely warranted the title. They were all in their twenty-fifth year, each as old as the other, in years and certainly in life experience. God knew they all had plenty of that.

“And in a few weeks we’ll have exactly what we’ve been planning ever since we escaped that goddamn foster home ten years ago,” Lyra continued, almost daring her sisters to disagree. “We’ll be women of the world. Free to do as we please, and no one will be able to tell us, or force us, to do things we don’t want ever again.”

“The power will be ours,” Penny said.

“Ours,” Rachel agreed.

Lyra nodded. “Ours.”

She held out a hand to either side of her, and the two other women stood up. Penny’s pale hand took her left, Rachel’s lightly bronzed one her right. Clenched tightly together, their arms made a perfect, equilateral triangle, and there in the kitchen standing thus, and as they looked from one to the other, resolve settled across them all.

Because danger or not, jokes or not, the women who were bonded over a decade and a half ago by events that counted for more than a blood connection ever could, each knew that in their world only those with the power could call the shots. After twenty-five years of none, all were determined they would have some. And they were realistic women. They knew that in reality there was only one way for them to get it.

As if on cue, they all looked down at the table, at the pictures of Sebastian Demetrious, Andros Casstellini, and Dominic Rimeria. Three billionaires, three playboys, all disgustingly rich, and ridiculously predictable.

Their marks. Each of them handpicked.

And each sister thought it at the same time, though none said it, because it barely needed saying. These men have no idea what they have coming…





Chapter One



The drink set in front of her could have been many things. A vodka and tonic, a gin and soda, even a white rum with a dash of something fruity. Lyra wasn’t sure which, but suspected vodka purely because of the glass. It was a wide bottomed tumbler with a frosted ring of ice, and when she’d worked bar in a similar up-market club she’d always put vodka in a tumbler with that exact same frost. It looked good, and kept the drink chilled to perfection. Plus if anyone had bothered to look at the glass she was currently drinking from—an identical tumbler—they would have thought vodka and ordered accordingly. They weren’t to know that she was drinking icy water, that no alcohol would be passing her lips in this club.

“From the gentleman over there,” the bartender, a damn good-looking guy in his very early twenties, said.

Lyra raised an eyebrow, and gave the bartender her most sultry smile. “Which one?”

He pointed across the room to one of the dining tables grouped around a number of leather chairs. Old leather, and old money, Lyra thought as she eyed the man who’d sent her the drink. He was dressed in a suit that screamed six months’ rent, his shoes were polished to a shine, and he had the Financial Times laid out in front of him. He was also blond, blue eyed, and almost as good looking as the bartender. For a moment, Lyra considered the situation, but almost immediately shook her head. She wasn’t here for Mr. Rich and blond. He wasn’t her mark.

“Tell him thanks but no thanks.”

The bartender, who Lyra noted—thanks to the little gold tag on his waistcoat—was called Mitch, grinned, and shook his head. “The guy’s a regular here. Hardly ever orders a woman a drink.”

“And?”

“He’s a member of the House of Lords.”


“Is this supposed to impress me?”

Mitch’s smile widened. “Just filling you in on all the facts.”

“I’m not interested, so tell him no.”

Mitch shrugged, removed the glass, and wandered over to the man in question. House of Lords? Lyra smirked as she took a sip of her own water. He’d likely be pissed at her rejection. Moneyed men always expected people to jump the moment they said so. It pleased her in a very small way to leave him hanging.

“I don’t think he was too happy, or particularly undeterred.”

Lyra smiled at Mitch and nodded to her glass. “Just fill that up with more water.”

He did as she asked, before placing the glass back down in front of her, and giving her a long, considering look. “He’s the third guy to offer you a drink. One after the other you tell them no, and that’s just the ones who have dared approach.”

“What’s your point?”

“You’re not married.”

“You know that how?”

“You’re not wearing a ring.”

Lyra shrugged. “Lots of women don’t wear rings anymore. I could have it on a chain around my neck, or I could have left it at home.”

“But all married women wear their ring at some point, and your finger has no indentation.”

“Ah.”

“Plus you’re obviously out to impress someone.”