The Billionaire's Secret Quartet

Lydia, seeing Alaric shake his head, decided not to get up to answer the door.

The doorbell rang for a while and then stopped.

Just as Lydia was about to breathe a sigh of relief, her cell phone buzzed in her pocket.

Checking the caller ID, she saw it was Thalassa calling and quickly answered.

"Lydia, did you swing by Alaric's place to check up on him?" Thalassa's concerned voice came through the phone.

"Yeah, I did. Gave him a shot," Lydia replied.

"Have you left yet?" Thalassa inquired.

"No, still here," Lydia said.

"We're at his doorstep, rang the bell but got no answer," Thalassa explained.

ringing? Hold

up and

earlier by Angelina and Georgia, instinctively fearing it might be them

out, it

and Hertha standing there. She was

Thalassa and Hertha entered, Thalassa asked, "How's Alaric

Not like it's the end of the world," Hertha

a jolt in his heart and excitedly sat up in

barely a whisper, too soft for

but then he remembered the disdainful look Hertha had given him when they fast parted, along

opened his mouth to speak, then swallowed the words back down, a look

only deepen her disdain for him. She had made it clear; she found him repulsive, believing there could never be anything between them. With that thought, Alaric's briefly recovered energy faded,

on him, Alaric quickly lay back down and closed

as he did, footsteps