All Chapters of Two Can Play: Chapter 41 - Chapter 50

DOMINIC I sat in my office at Veil Holdings, staring at the same file on my computer for what felt like the tenth time without absorbing a single word. My hands rested on the desk in front of me and I looked down at them, at the veins running across the backs, at the gold band on my finger that I still wore out of habit. I had come to the company for a meeting earlier that morning. That was the plan. Show up, handle what needed to be handled, and leave before anyone could corner me with more questions I did not want to answer. But after the call from Celeste, after I heard her voice telling me that the time had come for the culmination of our plan, something had shifted in my chest. A tightness I could not name had wrapped itself around my ribs and squeezed. The desire to leave, to retreat to whatever corner of the city I wanted, had evaporated. So I buried myself in work instead, clicking through spreadsheets and reports, trying not to think about what those words meant. Tryi

CELESTE I had to hand it to Seraphine. Watching her unravel after that phone call, the way her voice had climbed and cracked and gone almost hysterical in the background, anyone who did not know better would have thought she was genuinely, desperately in love with her husband. The kind of woman who had been wronged and was fighting to hold her marriage together. It was impressive, really. The performance of it. But if Seraphine was operating under the impression that a man denying you publicly, and before people considered your friends, meant anything other than he was completely done with you, then she was living in a fool's paradise that I did not have the heart to dismantle for her. Not yet, anyway. I could not keep the straight face for much longer. The moment Seraphine walked out, the awkward silence she left behind pressing against the room, I let out a slow breath and turned toward the window. Pat, predictably, started immediately. "Celeste." She came to stand

CELESTE The balcony was cool against my skin but Dominic's mouth was fire, his tongue pushing past my lips, his hands pulling me into him like he wanted to absorb me through his clothes. I had already gotten carried away, already lost myself in the taste of him, the feel of him, the way he kissed me like he was starving and I was the only meal in sight. "Celeste!" I heard Julian's voice again, sharp and desperate, but I still did not react. I let Dominic's tongue slide against mine a little longer, let his fingers dig into my waist a little deeper, let myself have those extra seconds of him before the world came crashing in. When our lips finally parted, I turned my head. From the corner of my eye I saw Julian standing by the gate, his face twisted, his hands balled into fists at his sides. But he was not alone. Seraphine stood right beside him, her eyes wide, her mouth hanging open like she had just walked into a room and found a ghost. She looked frozen, too shocked to ev

JULIAN I paced up and down, my eyes fixed on the countdown timer on my phone. Nine minutes left. Then eight. Then seven. Sweat dripped down my temples and I wiped it away with the back of my hand, my breath coming in short, ragged bursts. One hundred million dollars. That was not pocket change. That was money I had worked for, bled for, built my empire on. And these little bastards thought they could just take it from me like I was some common fool they could intimidate into submission. But what choice did I have? If that video went viral, Celeste would see me with that redhead's mouth wrapped around my cock, her ass bouncing on my lap, my cum painting her face, and there would be no explanation that could fix it. No amount of apologizing that could undo the image of me fucking another woman while my wife was at home waiting for me to come back. And my company. My reputation. Everything I had spent years building. Gone. In the time it took for a video to load and buffer.

JULIAN I drove to the bungalow, my foot pressing the accelerator all the way to the floor. The streets blurred past me, the city lights smearing into ribbons of color, and before I knew it, I was pulling up to the gate. The guards recognized my car and opened the gate immediately. I parked and walked inside, my strides long and determined, my jaw set so tight I thought my teeth might crack. The guard stationed at the door to the room where the girls were being kept nodded at me as I approached. I nodded back and pushed the door open. The room was a decent size, a bedroom with two queen-sized beds pushed against opposite walls, a bathroom attached, and a window that had been barred from the outside. The girls were sprawled across the beds, some asleep, some staring at the ceiling, all of them looking like they had been through hell and back. But they had showered. Their hair was clean, their faces washed, the tears and grime from the docks completely gone. They had changed i