Carrie had been an undercover journalist long enough to know exactly what she was looking at but it still took a few moments before it really sank in.
The tiny round object was a camera. And it was filming her.
CHAPTER FIVE
ANDREAS SIPPED HIS Scotch as he watched Carrie on his phone.
He’d seen the suspicion in her eyes in the moments before she’d gone back inside to cater to his latest whim. Instinct had made him switch his phone over to the live feed coming from his bedroom.
Judging by the stillness in her frame as she stared around his bedroom, he suspected her own instincts had kicked in too.
After a couple of minutes of nothing, her expression suddenly changed, sharpening, her head tilting, brow furrowing as she walked trance-like towards the French door.
And then she was looking right at him…
Her pretty lips formed a perfect O as he watched realisation hit her.
Suddenly she was on the move, her face set, lips now pressed tightly together. She dragged a chair to the curtains and climbed onto it and yanked the camera out. The picture disappeared and he had to wait a few seconds for one of the others to kick in in its place. By then she’d found another, hidden in plain sight on the television. Her face now twisted with rage, she mouthed a curse at him before yanking that one out too.
She made her way systematically around the room until she’d removed all four hidden cameras and there were no more feeds left.
Andreas sipped more Scotch and prepared himself for the storm that was surely going to follow, breathing deeply to abate the weighty beats of his heart.
This was it, a few hours sooner than anticipated. Time for the truth to be revealed.
He didn’t have to wait long.
The patio doors slammed open and Carrie appeared, marching straight towards him. When she reached the table, she snatched the glass from his hands and dropped the four tiny cameras into the Scotch.
He looked her up and down as she faced him, hands clenched in fists at her sides, chest heaving, her furious face pinched, looking ready to punch his lights out.
‘Why don’t you sit down?’ he suggested coolly.
In many respects, it was better for the truth to come out now, when it was just the two of them and no witnesses.
Her lips parted and her jaw moved, clearly struggling to get any words out. When they finally came they were barely audible. ‘You know, don’t you?’
‘That you’re the undercover journalist Carrie Rivers?’ He hooked an ankle on his thigh. ‘Yes, matia mou, I know exactly who you are. I’ve always known.’
‘So…this has all been a game?’
He allowed himself a smile. ‘And what a game it has been. You have played it exquisitely. You make an excellent skivvy.’
She moved so quickly she was a blur, grabbing her glass and throwing the lemonade in his face.
Carrie, her heart a heavy burr, her stomach a mass of knots, fought for breath, feeling not the slightest bit of satisfaction to see the cold liquid soaking his face and hair.
He hadn’t even flinched.
Of all the things she hated about him, at that moment the greatest thing to loathe was that he was sitting there, as cool as a cucumber with lemonade dripping off him while she couldn’t even control her own breathing.
But then his eyes clashed with hers and she realised he wasn’t as cool as he appeared. His jaw was taut and his eyes as dark as she’d ever seen them, filled to the brim with the danger she had always sensed but had stupidly chosen to ignore.
He’d known who she was all along. Right from the beginning.
Her brain burned just to recall it all. She’d known there was something wrong with the way he’d got her waiting on him hand and foot, had been too focussed on the prize at the end to allow herself to think about it. She’d also, she had to admit with painful humiliation, been too busy fighting her reactions to him to pay attention to all the dangers and warnings.
She’d ignored everything her instincts had been telling her.
It had all been a game and she had fallen for it.
She had infiltrated his life to bring him down but he had turned the tables on her and played her like a toy.
Slowly and deliberately, he wiped his sodden face with his hands and shook the liquid away, his piercing eyes never leaving her face.
‘I believe it is time for you to tell me why you are really here, Carrie Rivers.’
His tone cut through her along with the words he used.
‘But before you start, tell me your real name. Are you Carrie or Caroline? Or would you prefer I address you as Lying Snake?’
‘I’m not the snake here.’ Why did her voice have to tremble so much? ‘How many cameras have you had spying on me?’
‘Enough to have monitored your every move if the need had arisen.’