This might not be so bad, Selma kept telling herself. She could probably get a new car and a condo out of this. Some jewelry she could pawn later. But this wasn’t how she’d planned to use her last charm. The last one was supposed to be used to finally get everything she wanted.

She walked up to the reception desk. The clerk was a young man, but his eyes did what all male eyes did when she wore this particular dress: They dropped to her outrageously exposed cleavage and lingered helplessly.

“Would you please ring Mr. Lazlo Patterson and tell him his four-o’clock appointment is here,” Selma said, giving him a slow smile.

“Certainly, ma’am,” the boy said, tearing his eyes away from her. She was old enough to be his grandmother. She wondered if he realized that. Probably not. No one sees your age if you’re bold enough. He murmured a few words into the phone, then paused and said to Selma, “Ma’am, he says he doesn’t have a four-o’clock appointment.”

“How silly of him to forget,” Selma said. “Tell him it’s Selma, from Lost Lake.”

The boy relayed her message, then hung up the phone. “He said he’ll be right down.”

Selma turned and walked across the lobby to the bar, giving the boy a show. She took a seat and ordered a Scotch, neat.

She sighed and shook her head in disbelief that she was actually doing this. She’d seduced a lot of men in her life, but never one that she actively disliked.

She reached into her small red purse. She found the charm inside by its warmth. Her fingers closed around it gently, and she felt it tremble like a caught butterfly. For a moment she felt sadness. She didn’t want to let it go. This was the last of who she was, of what she’d spent a lifetime being.

“You could have gotten me into a lot of trouble. I was with my wife,” Lazlo said, appearing by her side. He was as distasteful as she remembered—hair dyed that ridiculous black, a bad face-lift that raised his brows to an unnatural angle. His eyes went right to her cleavage. He didn’t even look away to order his drink “That was a nice touch, saying we have an appointment.”

“You sound surprised,” Selma said seductively. “I’m very good at what I do.”

“Of that I have no doubt. But we have to be discreet. My wife…”

Selma leaned in and whispered, “You don’t need her. You have me.”