Bought By The Man Who Hates Me

When Bethel returned to the table, the dinner plates had been cleared. In their place sat a bottle of tequila and a shot glass. A spinning bottle lay in the center of the table.

"Truth or Dare!" someone shouted. "To liven up this wake!"

Bethel tried to sit, intending to grab her purse and leave, but Preston caught her hand. "Come on, Bethel! Don't be a spoil-sport. Just one round."

She was trapped again.

Baron sat across from her. He had undone the top button of his shirt, exposing the hollow of his throat. He looked relaxed, but his fingers were drumming a rhythmic, agitated beat on the tablecloth.

The bottle spun. It whirred against the wood, blurring.

It slowed down. Tick. Tick. Tick.

It stopped. The neck of the bottle pointed directly at Bethel.

A cheer went up around the table.

"I'll ask," Clarissa said immediately. Her eyes gleamed with malice. "Truth or Dare, Bethel?"

"Truth," Bethel said. She wasn't going to perform like a circus animal for these people.

Clarissa leaned her chin on her hand. "Okay. Truth. Chynna mentioned you have a bit of a history. Is the rumor true? Did you really dump some poor guy five years ago because a better offer came along?"

The room went silent. The air was sucked out of the space.

Bethel's heart hammered against her ribs. Clarissa didn't know the ex was Baron. She thought Baron was just a spectator. But the question was a direct arrow aimed at him.

Baron stopped drumming his fingers. He slowly lifted his eyes. The storm in them was raging now. He was staring at her with an intensity that made her skin burn.

He was waiting. He was waiting for her to say she made a mistake. He was waiting for a crack in the armor.

If she said she regretted it, Baron would ask why. He would dig. And if he dug, he would find the federal indictment against her father. He would find the blackmail. He would find out she did it for him.

And then he would lose his security clearance. He would lose his career. He would lose his family's respect.

Bethel dug her fingernails into her thigh until she felt the skin break through the fabric of her dress. She had to kill the hope in his eyes. She had to finish what she started five years ago.

She lifted her chin and looked Baron dead in the eye.

"No," she said, her voice steady and cold. "No regrets."

Baron flinched. It was small, a micro-spasm in his jaw, but she saw it. It was the look of a man who had just been stabbed in the chest by someone he trusted.

The people around the table murmured, scandalized by her callousness.

Baron let out a short, terrifying laugh. It sounded like glass breaking.

He reached out and grabbed the shot glass of tequila that was meant for the loser of the game. It wasn't his turn. It wasn't his penalty.

He threw his head back and downed the burning liquid in one swallow. His Adam's apple bobbed.

He slammed the heavy glass down on the table. The sound was violent, cracking the delicate stem of a nearby wine glass.

Baron stood up so abruptly his chair screeched backward, toppling over onto the carpet. He didn't pick it up. He didn't look at Clarissa. He didn't look at Preston.

He looked at the wall, his chest heaving.

"I'm done," he growled.

He turned and stormed toward the door. He shoved the heavy mahogany panels open with such force they banged against the wall.

He was gone.

The room was left in a stunned silence. Bethel sat frozen, her heart bleeding out in her chest. She had done it. She had protected him.

And it felt like dying.