Chapter One #2
He was gone before she even realized he meant to leave, and her knees buckled the moment the door closed silently behind him.
She slid down the wall, fingers pressed to her swollen mouth. Her breasts still ached, and her belly still felt the imprint of his need.
What had just happened?
The memory burned through her again and again, making Andie press her thighs together harder. The library felt too small now. Too full of his lingering presence. She fled upstairs, locked her door, fell into bed fully dressed.
Day One, and she already wanted to run.
But she couldn’t.
Mustn’t.
She would stay here, take it one day at a time, until she had done what she had come here to do.
One day at a time, Andie. We won’t go until we get what we want.
The words followed her into sleep, and they were the first thing she remembered when morning came.
Good.
The early night had helped. She felt stronger. More herself.
Then she touched her lips.
The kiss blazed through her like lightning finding ground. Her breasts tingled with the memory of being pressed against him.
She showered in water hot enough to hurt. Dressed in jeans and the nicest blouse she owned, which wasn’t saying much. Tried to look like someone who hadn’t been thoroughly claimed by a stranger twelve hours ago.
Failed.
The house was a disaster zone.
Bodies everywhere. Not dead—she checked the first one—just passed out. On the marble floor. Against walls. Draped over furniture like expensive laundry.
The Christmas tree listed sideways, ornaments scattered like casualties.
The smell made her stomach rebel even as it growled for food.
She picked her way through the human debris, hunting for the kitchen. Joyce hadn’t bothered with a tour, just pointed out her room and warned her not to embarrass anyone.
The kitchen, when she found it, looked like a magazine spread. All marble and chrome and machines she didn’t recognize.
Voices drifted from somewhere beyond.
She followed them through a smaller door and found her people.
Linoleum floor. Regular coffee maker. An older woman at a normal stove. Two maids eating breakfast. A driver reading a newspaper.
They all stopped when she appeared, but the moment her stomach growled, everyone burst into laughter, the sound completely breaking the ice and making it clear that they were all of the same world.
“Sit down, honey.” The older woman was already reaching for another plate. “I’m Kate, and you must be Andie, Joyce’s niece.”
“I am,” she answered with a tentative smile.
Kate gave her a plate topped with eggs, bacon, and toast while introducing the others.
The maids were Eunice and Reece. The driver was Butch.
They talked around her, over her, including her without trying, and everything about it felt wonderfully familiar.
They almost made her feel like she was back home.
Almost.
About half an hour later, they all heard a car crunch up the drive, and Andie noticed everyone changing looks.
“Do you guys have something to do?” she asked. “Should I go?”
Katie shook her head. “It’s fine. That’s just Mr. Mitropoulos.”
“Should I know him?”
“It’s only because you’re not from around here that you don’t know who he is,” Eunice told her with a grin. “Mr. Mitropoulos is one of the richest men in San Antonio.”
“America,” Reece corrected. ”He’s one of the richest men in America.”
“But he’s also a practicing lawyer during his free time,” Kate added. “And that’s why Mr. Bernard chose him to be the executor of his will. Mr. Mitropoulos looks up to Mr. Bernard as his mentor.”
So...a billionaire businessman who was also a lawyer but much younger than Joyce’s deceased husband?
Andie only had one conclusion after that.
“He sounds terrifying.”
But somehow, this only made her aunt’s staff laugh.
Huh.
Maybe she should just quit her job back home and find work here as a stand-up comedian, with the way everyone in Texas seemed to find her funny even without Andie meaning to.
“If Joyce has her way,” Eunice said slyly, “he might be your uncle soon.”
“Oh.” Lester Bernard had only been gone for three months. But maybe...that was just how some people moved on?
“I don’t know if Joyce has told you anything about the will,” Kate divulged with a tone of faint concern, “but we already know what’s in it. And we’ve already let your aunt know that we intend to leave once the will has been read.”
Andie found herself blinking back unexpected tears. “I know this will sound silly, but I wish we had more time—”
“Oh, hon, it’s fine.” Kate gave her a warm hug. “We’ll still be in San Antonio.”
“And we can meet up whenever you’re free,” Eunice added.
“I’m actually going to work for Mr. Mitropoulos,” Butch shared, “so maybe we might bump into each other.”
Andie offered to help the staff when she realized they had been tasked to rouse the guests and attend to their needs, but Kate firmly rejected this and urged her to head back to her room. “Your aunt’s friends are never in the best of temper whenever they wake up with a hangover.”
Once back in her room, there wasn’t much to do except to wait...while doing her best not to think of what happend last night. And with who.
At about half past one, the intercom in her room buzzed. It was Joyce, asking for her to come to the library.
“I’ll be right down.”
Her voice was steady as she spoke, but inside, her heart was already back to twisting itself in knots. Why did it have to be the library of all places?
Just keep it together, Andie.
Hang in there.
We need to keep it together until we get what we want.
She knocked on the door when she reached the library, and Joyce asked her to come in, her voice sounding a lot sweeter than she was used to hearing.
How...curious.
Andie opened the door and found herself blinking. The library from last night looked a lot smaller in daylight. But it was no less cozy or elegant. Her aunt was perched on the couch like a magazine photo, and her lips broke into a smile as soon as their gazes met.
“Andie, darling.” Her aunt gestured to the side. “I’d like you to meet Paul Mitropoulos, a dear friend of Lester. Paul, this is my niece Andromeda. But we all call her Andie.”
Andie turned to the man rising from the window chair, and that was when the world completely stopped turning.
Paul.
The stranger from last night.
His name was Paul.
And he was the man everyone said who could be her uncle if Joyce had her way?
A part of her wanted to look away. But a part of her also couldn’t stop staring. He had been very, very beautiful in the dark. But in daylight, he was sinfully breathtaking, with the way his copper hair caught fire in the sun, and how his cheekbones could cut glass, and oh, those lips of his—
Stop it, Andie!
Panic filled her, but this only caused her gaze to collide with his—
Gray.
It had been too dark last night to see the color of his eyes.
But now she knew.
It was gray.
The same shade of storm clouds, winter mornings, and heartless endings.
His eyes were emotions turned into ice, except for that glint—
Was it just her...or was this man, this Paul, looking at her like she was a new toy he meant to hunt and play with?
“Hello, Andie.”
Same voice. Dark silk over broken glass. Same accent. Same sense that he found her...entertaining.
He extended his hand, and conscious of the way her aunt was watching them like a hawk, she immediately extended hers as well...and barely managed to keep herself from gasping as his fingers closed around hers in a grip that had heat blazing through every inch of her body—
Because his touch...
It made her remember—
Do you want to be my friend, koukla mou...
Make sure you’ll not forget me...
If Joyce has her way, he might be your uncle soon...
She might not be close to her aunt at all, but the moment she remembered Eunice’s words, and felt Joyce staring at her still—
“Hello, sir.”
The words had already tumbled out before she even realized what she had said—
And what she had chosen to do—
Oh no.
The glint in his eyes brightened into a dangerous glitter.
With just two words...
Two tiny words...
And with it, she had turned both of them into accomplices.
His thumb brushed her knuckles before releasing her hand, the touch almost unnoticeable in its briefness.
But she felt it all the same, and that touch—
That touch was this man weaving a web of deception around her aunt from the same spool of lies she had used.
That touch was him telling her—
If you want to play it like this...
Then let’s play.