The Playboy’s Dangerous Bet의 모든 챕터: 챕터 11 - 챕터 20

LIV"Hold that thought," Gia yells over the pounding bass, glaring down at her vibrating phone screen.We have barely been standing on the edge of the dance floor for two minutes."It's my psychotic publicist," Gia groans, jamming a finger into her other ear so she can hear. "If I don't take this, she’ll tank my branding campaign. Go buy a drink. I’ll be right back."She levels a warning finger right between my eyes."And I'm dead serious about you getting laid tonight, Liv! Stop saving yourself for a fraud who probably didn't even respect you!"Before I can open my mouth to argue, she spins on her heel and shoves her way toward the back hallway, abandoning me to the wolves.I stand awkwardly near the edge of the bar, clutching the lapels of my wool coat.I need to leave.I don't belong in a place like this.I turn on my heel, fully prepared to march straight out the front doors, hail another cab, and wait until morning so Ben can explain how tonight was all some twisted misunderstand

KLAUSFor three full seconds, nobody moves.The bass of the nightclub hammers through the floor, vibrating against the soles of my shoes, but inside my head, there is only a deafening, ringing silence.Twenty-nine.And untouched.Across from me, Olivia looks like she wants the sticky floor to open up and swallow her whole. The mortified flush on her cheeks spreads all the way down the pale column of her throat, disappearing beneath the collar of that skin-tight black turtleneck."Gia," Olivia chokes out, her voice trembling with humiliation. "Shut up. Shut up right now.""What? I'm just stating facts—"Gia doesn't get to finish the sentence.Because all at once, the color drains out of Olivia’s face.The three glowing blue shots she slammed on finally detonate in her bloodstream.Her eyes lose focus, the dark pupils blowing wide under the strobe lights.She sways sharply to the left, her hand flying out to catch the edge of the sticky bar and missing completely."Whoa, Liv!" Gia lung

LIVMy skull feels like someone filled it with broken glass and kicked it down a flight of stairs.I groan, burying my face deeper into my pillow as a spear of blinding morning sunlight slices through the gap in my bedroom curtains.My mouth tastes like blue food coloring and regret.Slowly, wincing at the volume of my own heartbeat thudding behind my temples, I pry one eye open and look down at myself.I am lying on top of my duvet.I am still wearing my black ribbed turtleneck.My dark jeans are still zipped and buttoned.My socks are still on my feet.Thank God.I push myself upright against the headboard, pressing the heel of my hand against my forehead as I try to stitch the pieces of last night back together.I remember the bathroom at The Static.I remember crying against Gia’s mesh top and trying to convince her that the man in the Velvet Tears booth wasn't Ben.I remember Gia dragging me out to the dance floor.I remember her walking away to answer her publicist’s call... and

KLAUSCrimson silk.It’s wrapped tight around two pale, delicate wrists, pinning them high against the black iron spindles of my headboard.Below me, tangled in black sheets, Olivia arches her bare spine off the mattress.The wool coat is gone.The sensible turtleneck is shredded on the floor. She’s wearing nothing but that scrap of black lace from her phone, her porcelain skin flushed a feverish pink in the dark."You do that to scare people," she whispers, her wide brown eyes dark and bottomless as I drag my scarred thumb across her swollen bottom lip."Are you scared of me now, sweetheart?""Yes."Her breath shatters on a desperate whimper as I force my thigh between her legs.My palm slides up the bare, quivering heat of her inner thigh, right over the red crescent marks her own fingernails left behind."Don't stop," she begs.I dip my head to bite down on her throat, shifting my hips to sink deep into that tight, untouched heat—A shrill, vibrating buzz slices straight through t

LIVGia has been staring at my left hand for forty-five seconds without blinking.If her winged eyeliner could shoot lasers, the antique Edwardian diamond sitting on my ring finger would have melted into a puddle of platinum on the tabletop by now.It’s Sunday afternoon.Outside the front windows, the street is bright and peaceful.Behind the counter, my sister’s twenty-year-old barista who is now miraculously recovered from his twenty-four-hour flu, is steaming oat milk like Friday night never happened.My life is officially back on its tracks.Except across the small café table, my best friend looks like she is two seconds away from flipping the booth over."Let me get this straight," Gia says, her voice dangerously quiet as she leans across the table in a cropped red leather jacket and a lace bustier that belongs nowhere near a Sunday brunch crowd. "You marched into your apartment yesterday morning ready to castrate him... and twenty minutes later, you let him tie a piece of bakery