Claimed by the Sicilian Tycoon (Criminal Seduction #3)(37)

“A beautiful girl.”

He growled and turned to look into a pair of eyes he had always considered to be distinctly reptilian. “Mainwright.”

The elderly Peer nodded. “Seems you’re punching above your weight with that one. A bit too feisty for the likes of you.”

“If I require your thoughts on my personal life I will ask for them.”

Mainwright grinned. “I’m sure you will, but humor an old man.”

“I would hardly call you that.”

“Perhaps not, so let us say instead that I make it my business to know about my competitors.”

“Is that what I am?” Andros asked, frowning hard as Lyra halted at the bar. What was she doing?

“It seems so,” Mainwright agreed. “You moved in on Ainsley’s deal.”

“He invited me in,” Andros grated. Lyra was talking to someone. Who the hell was it? “And I have no interest in discussing my business dealings with you.”

“Then let us discuss something else,” Mainwright said, his tone taking on a whole new meaning, that even in his distracted state Andros picked up on. “Have you met that young lady’s sisters yet?”

Shock hit, enough so that Andros tore his gaze away from Lyra. Lyra who was talking to the f*cking bar man it seemed! “Her sisters?”

“Equally as beautiful,” Mainwright said, the gloating in his voice obvious. “It seems they too like their…companions…foreign and rich.”

So Mainwright had investigated Lyra, knew what her sisters were doing, and by the sounds of it whatever it was it wasn’t far from what Lyra was up to. Only Mainwright had no way to know that Lyra had already told him about her circumstances. Had no way to know about the deal they had agreed.


“We have an advantage over the homegrown wealth,” Andros snapped. “As you have no doubt become aware.”

“And yet…” Mainwright nodded in Lyra’s direction. “They always turn closer to home in the end. Take care, Casstellini, you may be in deeper than you know.”

Andros did not pause to answer the other man, but strode over to the bar where Lyra was laughing at something the f*cking bartender was saying. He couldn’t be any older than twenty-five. Lyra’s age. Fuck. If the anger he’d felt as she laughed at Ainsley’s jokes had been bad, this was way beyond it.

Andros paused just by them, and watched with mounting rage, as the bartender leaned forward and said something that made Lyra laugh again, her hair flicking behind her shoulders as she did so.

Closer to home. Any man’s mistress. Just happened to be you.

The thoughts tumbled through his mind one after the other, and Andros clenched his jaw tight. Was it because they were back at the scene of their very first meeting? That here he could not forget how it had all started, that Lyra had tied him in knots so f*cking hard for a very specific purpose.

She was his and yet…

“Lyra,” he growled, stepping forward. “We’re leaving.”

She turned with a start. “Of course.”

He practically dragged her from the room. Andros knew it, knew that people were probably staring, wondering why he was making such a hasty departure, but at that moment he did not give a f*ck.

He was angry. The possessiveness, the weird nature of his relationship with Lyra, not to mention her flirting with a f*cking member of staff, all combining to make him at last—after so many weeks—question what the hell he was doing.

In too deep?

For once an Englishman might actually have alerted him, a Sicilian, to something that had passed him by, something he’d known but refused to accept, and Andros had no idea what to do about any of it.





Chapter Nineteen



Andros slammed the door behind them, pulling his tie free as he entered the living area. His eyes were blazing, his mouth set into a hard line, and Lyra shifted from one foot to the other, her heart thudding uncomfortably. The exit from the club had been hurried, the drive home hideous, and she had no damn idea why!

Once, no twice, Lyra had opened her mouth to say something, but then shut it a moment later. She wasn’t really sure what to say. Wasn’t sure how to approach the Andros now prowling in front of her.

He was angry.

He was formidable.

And he was making her nervous.

Obviously she had done something wrong, for what else could have made him so mad? Only she wasn’t sure what. She evaluated her behavior at the club as he shrugged off his suit jacket, wondering what might have set him off, but could find nothing. Maybe she’d spent too long talking to the stiffs? Flirted too much with one of the other guys? She wasn’t sure.

Or maybe she’d gotten it all wrong and he’d had one of his business deals hit the skids, or even met up with an old enemy…that Mainwright guy, perhaps. Again, she wasn’t sure. The only thing she was sure of was that they needed to talk it through. The drive home had not been the best place obviously, but now they were home…

“Andros,” she began, her tongue tripping over the best way to approach him. “Is everything okay—”

“Do you seek to anger me?” he demanded.

His voice was clipped, the anger clearly seething beneath it, and Lyra’s eyes widened. “You know I don’t.”