Three Fates

fascinating.
    “If we get into the bloody place, why don’t we just look for the bloody statue?” Frustration honed Rebecca’s voice to an edge.
    “We won’t get that far. Not without a lot more time and preparation. We can take the time and the prep,” he added. “But if we do a simple B and E, snag the statue, we won’t be hanging anything on her.”
    “Rephrase.” Cleo spoke coolly. “Hanging her.”
    “If we work it right,” Jack agreed, “the house is doable on short notice. Morningside isn’t. Not with amateurs.”
    “Oh, now we’re amateurs.”
    “Well, Bec.” Gideon put his hands on her shoulders, gave her a little shake. “We are that.”
    “Why don’t you speak for yourself—”
    “I could use some tea.” Tia spoke up, got to her feet. “Is it all right if I use the kitchen?”
    “Help yourself,” Jack told her. “Wouldn’t mind some coffee while you’re at it.”
    “There are better facilities upstairs,” Rebecca suggested after catching Tia’s annoyed expression. “Why don’t we go up and put something together?”
    “Cleo?”
    Even as Cleo started to protest, she caught Tia jerking her head toward the door. “All right, but we take shifts on the domestic duties.”
    When they were safely in the elevator heading up, Rebecca turned to Tia. “You wanted to get away from that lot?”
    “For a few minutes. It occurs to me that this is new territory for all of us. We hardly know each other.”
    “I just don’t like their superior attitude.”
    “You mean Jack’s superior attitude,” Cleo said as Rebecca jabbed in the code and strode out of the elevator into the apartment.
    “In particular. He didn’t even tell me he had that place down there.”
    “Before we talk about them, let’s talk about us.” Cleo dropped into a chair, swung her legs over the arm and settled in. “Any wine around here?” she added.
    “There is,” Rebecca answered. “But put a hold on that tea and coffee. Let’s have a drink and see what the three of us think of each other before we go on with this business.”
     
     
    “WE REALLY SHOULD go back down.” Tia bit her lip as Rebecca topped off all three glasses. Again.
    “They don’t need us at the moment.” Rebecca bit into a pretzel, studied it consideringly. “Let them huddle over their blueprints and diagrams for a bit. I can take a look at them later. Those deal with technicalities and are easily refined.”
    “That’s if you know one end of a blueprint from another.” Tia sipped. “I don’t.”
    “You won’t have to. It’ll be put into words for you, and those you understand very well. Malachi thinks you’re brilliant.”
    “Oh well, he’s . . .”
    “Toast,” Cleo said and scooped up dip with a ridged potato chip. “Guy’s nuts about you, but he’s not a moron. You are brilliant. I never got along with brains before. Your kind of brains,” she explained. “The academic sort. I spent most of my school time figuring out what kind of trouble I could get into next, and disliking girls just like the two of you.” She grinned as she popped another chip in her mouth. “Funny how things work out.”
    “Gideon wouldn’t be wasting time with you if you didn’t have a brain. He’d have gone for the package,” Rebecca added. “But once he’d unwrapped it, he’d have lost interest quickly enough if all you had to offer were nice breasts and long legs.”
    “Gee thanks, Sis.”
    “Well, after all, he saw you unwrapped—so to speak—straight off, didn’t he? And while we’re on that subject, what’s it like?”
    Cleo only picked up her wineglass, sipped.
    “Oh, be a sport,” Rebecca complained. “It’s a natural curiosity, isn’t it? Tia, aren’t you wondering what it’s like to strip down bare-assed in front of a roomful of men?”
    “I never thought about . . .” She trailed off, pinned by a smirking look from Rebecca. “Maybe,” she admitted. “But I don’t mean to offend you, Cleo.”
    “You don’t. She’s a lot nicer than you are,” Cleo said to Rebecca.
    “She is that. But I wasn’t after offending you either. Don’t you think that at some point in her life, a woman fantasizes about being built and beautiful and tormenting a lot of men by sliding out of her clothes in public? Knowing they want her but can’t have her. It’s powerful.”
    “It can be. It can be powerful, or demeaning and exploitive. It can be fun, or it can be humiliating. Depends on how you look at