From the floor, a weak, pitiful groan emerged. "S-Sugar… my future children…"
"Future children, my ass!" Ava groaned, jabbing a furious finger at Zeke, who was flailing like a fish out of water. "WHAT DID YOU DO TO ME?!"
"I-I did nothing!" Zeke wheezed, hunched over and clutching his crotch like it had personally betrayed him. "I-I don't even know why I'm here… with you, at least! I went to the bar after our dinner, got drunk, made out with someone, checked into a hotel, and—why the hell did that woman turn out to be you?!"
Ava let out a high-pitched shriek of horror and yeeted a pillow straight at his face. "OH, YOU FILTHY, FESTERING MAGGOT!"
Zeke stumbled back, groaning. "Did you just call me festering—?"
"DID WE—?!" Ava clutched the sheets like they were her last lifeline. "D-Did we… you know?! F-Fuck! I can't just lose my virginity to a walking scandal!"
Zeke, still holding his very wounded dignity, peeled the pillow off his face and gawked at her.
"Wait—you're a virgin?!"
"THAT'S NOT THE POINT, YOU IMBECILE!" Ava screeched, now frantically patting herself as if she could dust off the sins of the unknown.
"Oh, no. Oh, no, no, no—" She spun around in circles, clutching her head. "I need a doctor. I need a lawyer. I need bleach."
Meanwhile, Zeke, despite his very real pain, had the audacity to smirk.
"Wow, sugar. Never took you for the sentimental type." He winced, still hunched over but wiggled his brows. "So… does that mean I was your first?"
Ava froze. The absolute filth of his tone. The smugness in his stupid face.
"DIE!" She lunged.
Zeke, learning from experience, threw himself over the bed to escape her wrath.
"Wait, wait, wait—think logically!" Zeke dodged another flying pillow, now using the blanket as a makeshift shield.
"THINK LOGICALLY?!" Ava grabbed a glass of water from the nightstand on the bedside table and hurled it at him.
"ACK—SUGAR, WAIT—" Zeke yelped as the water soaked his face and hair, now looking like a drenched rat—handsome filthy rat.
Ava huffed, panting, then froze. Her eyes narrowed. "Wait a damn minute," she squinted at him. "If we really did something… why are you still wearing pants to think that you're drunk?!"
Zeke blinked and looked down. Sure enough—his pants were still on.
"OH THANK THE HEAVENS!" Ava collapsed onto the bed, throwing her arms over her face.
Zeke, still dripping wet, scowled. "Wow. That hurts."
After a long, dramatic sigh, Ava's eyes suddenly snapped open as last night's memories came rushing back—specifically, those two cackling women.
"Eva, that bitch!" Ava groaned, dramatically shooting up from the bed like a possessed doll. She frantically searched for her purse, sighing in relief when she spotted it lying on the floor like roadkill.
She scrambled down, snatched it up, and pulled out her phone—only to find it had been violently bombarded with hundreds of messages and missed calls from Adelle.
Without hesitation, she called back.
"MY LADYYYYYY!!" Adelle's shriek nearly shattered Ava's eardrums, forcing her to hold the phone at arm's length.
"MY LADY, WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN—"
"Oh, shut your hole, Adelle, and fetch me from—" Ava stopped mid-sentence and turned to Zeke, who was still sitting blankly on the bed, looking like an existential crisis personified. "Hey, Casanova, which hotel is this?"
Zeke blinked a few times, still rubbing his broken shlong. Then, as if finally registering Ava's words, his lips curled into a slow, lazy grin.
"Oh, sugar, don't tell me you forgot our magical night at…" He dramatically spread his arms, as if unveiling a masterpiece. "The Grand Luscious Love Nest Hotel."
Ava froze.
"…My lady," Adelle finally whispered, her voice trembling. "C-Casanova? H-Hotel—"
"Shut up, Adelle." Ava massaged her temple, feeling an incoming aneurysm. "Zeke, I swear on everything holy, if you do not give me the actual name of this place—"
"I did!" Zeke grinned, gesturing to the tacky pink wallpaper and the enormous, heart-shaped mirror on the ceiling. "Welcome to The Grand Luscious Love Nest Hotel! Five stars on discretion, four stars on cleanliness, negative five stars on personal dignity."
Ava's left eye twitched.
"My lady… did you check in to a love hotel?!" Adelle's voice cracked.
"I WAS KIDNAPPED, DAMN IT!" Ava screeched, barely resisting the urge to throw her phone across the room.
"Oh, sugar," Zeke cooed, flopping onto the bed like he had all the time in the world. "Kidnapped or not, we had a wonderful time here." He sighed dramatically. "So many memories…"
Ava grabbed one of her stiletto on the floor and chucked it straight at his smug, beautifully punchable face.
Like a woman on a mission, Ava stormed out of the room, leaving Zeke rubbing his face like he was trying to erase his own existence.
She had to rip off a piece of fabric from the hotel bedsheet, because dignity must be preserved, and wrap it around her face like some post-breakdown vigilante. One hand clutched her purse and stilettos, the other held her phone as she stomped through the hallway.
"You heard him. Be here in five minutes. This place ain't far," Ava barked into the phone before cutting the call and planting herself in the lobby like a ticking time bomb.
When the van screeched to a stop, Ava launched herself inside without a word. Adelle didn't probe either. She knew damn well that Ava in this state was primed for murder.
Ava should be drafting an attempted assault case against Zeke, but she had bigger, stupider, fish to catch and roast at 300°C.
The second the van stopped in front of the Summers estate, Ava sprinted inside barefoot, charging straight for the pool—because of course that's where Eva would be, probably sipping on Ava's patience like a cocktail.
Sure enough, there she was. Eva. The bane of Ava's existence.
Lounging on a pool bed like a villain on vacation, Eva sipped her cucumber lemon juice with an air of tragic superiority. Beside her stood Helen—Eva's personal demon in human disguise.
Ava saw red. "EVA!"
Eva didn't even flinch. Instead, she gave a slow, lazy turn and beamed. "Ahh, twin sister! So good to finally see you—AH!"
She barely managed to throw up a hand before Ava could pounce on her.
Ava halted inches away, practically vibrating with rage. "You BITCH!! How could you set me up like that?! AND WITH YOUR FIANCÉ?! REALLY?! YOU'D GO THAT LOW?!"
Eva blinked. "Fiancé? What fiancé?" Then, as if she just remembered, she waved a dismissive hand. "Oh, never mind that. More importantly—"
"I'M GONNA SUE YOU FOR KIDNAPPING!" Ava groaned.
Eva arched a brow. "Uh? Do you have any evidence?"
Ava gritted her teeth. "I'll find evidence, Eva. I always do—"
"Oh, I know, sister." Eva smirked, raising her phone mid-air like a villain revealing their trump card. "That's why I made sure to have this."
The screen lit up.
Ava's jaw dropped.
Because there, as Eva's LOCK SCREEN PHOTO, was a picture of Ava and Zeke sleeping in bed together.
Ava could practically hear the distant explosion of her social status imploding.
Eva grinned. "I wonder what people will say when they find out the perfect Ava Summers spent the night with her twin sister's fiancé?"
She clasped her hands dramatically. "Oh, poor, poor Eva Summers. The innocent victim."
Ava gasped, covering her mouth in pure scandalized disbelief. Beside her, Adelle froze, her eyes wide.
"W-When did you become smarter, you little bitch—"
Adelle whispered like she'd uncovered a government conspiracy. "It's that evil Helen, my lady! That evil witch!"
Eva giggled like a possessed rat. "Now... now... don't worry, my beloved sister. I'm not going to post this or whatever, unless you comply with what I want to happen in this family."
Ava grimaced, pinching the bridge of her nose. "Do you really want to burn this manor down so badly?"
Eva let out a dramatic sigh, placing a delicate hand over her chest as if deeply wounded by the accusation. "How insolent of you to say that," she huffed, rolling her eyes so hard they nearly left her skull.
She rose from her lounge chair with the grace of a villain monologuing at the climax of a soap opera. "All I want is to escape that damned wedding, my dear sister. And, well, the only way to do that… is for you to marry Zeke Ford in my place."
For a full five seconds, Ava's brain simply refused to process that information. She blinked. Once. Twice. Then she let out a hollow laugh, one that quickly escalated into actual, borderline hysterical cackling. She even slapped Adelle's arm, nearly knocking the poor girl off balance.
"Did you hear that, Adelle?! ME! MARRY THAT DAMNED MAN—"
Eva didn't even flinch. "Yes. That's exactly what I said."
Ava continued laughing, pointing at Eva like she had just told the most ridiculous joke known to mankind. "That's hilarious! Absolutely unhinged! Do you know what else would be funny? If I climbed onto a rocket and launched myself straight into the sun!"
Eva sighed, dusting off her dress as if she was the one dealing with nonsense. "Well, unless you want me to legally own everything—your birthright, your businesses, all your hard work—then you will do what I say."
Ava's laughter screeched to a halt. "...I'm sorry?"
She turned to face Eva fully, squinting. "Who do you think you're talking to, exactly? Do you think—hold on, what's that?"
Her eyes flicked to Helen, who had, out of nowhere, pulled out a white document from her apron like some kind of cursed magician.
Ava gawked. "How the hell did that even happen? Where were you keeping that?! Does your apron have a secret storage dimension?!"
"Black magic, Lady Ava," Helen said smoothly, tucking the mysterious apron back in place like she hadn't just pulled a cursed contract out of thin air.
Eva, ever the showman, dramatically flipped the document open and held it up like a prize-winning painting. "Here. You signed this yourself, stating you will legally transfer all your assets to me if you refuse to marry Mr. Zeke Sinner Ford."
Ava's entire body locked up. Her pupils shrank to pinpricks as she took a cautious step forward, eyeing the document like it was a freshly lit bomb.
"I—What?! That's ridiculous! I would never sign—"
Her eyes scanned the damned, cursed, satanic fine print, her breath hitching the moment she saw it.
Her signature.
Right there. At the bottom. In her own handwriting.
"And of course, I have proof," Eva said sweetly, and before Ava could even react, Helen—the demon enabler—lifted her phone and turned the screen to her.
A photo of Ava, grinning like a fool, signing the contract.
"Just three shots of Margaritas—spiked to be sure of course, and you immediately signed this last night," Eva cooed, giggling like an actual witch. "Oh, such a good girl!"
Ava slapped a hand over her own mouth as flashes of the previous night exploded in her head like war flashbacks.
The moment she woke up from being drugged, her head was already spinning from the suffocating aroma of alcohol. Then, like the absolute dumbass she apparently was, she had downed both shots in front of her without question… and then signed the paper like a trained circus animal.
She could hear Eva cackling in the background. Helen probably standing there like a Bond villain's assistant.
And then—AND THEN—She remembered making out with—" FUCK!! FUCKING FLYING FUCK!!" Ava screeched, her voice echoing through the entire estate as she took off running like a deranged banshee.
Destination? The nearest bathroom.
Mission? Rinse her mouth with muriatic acid.
Because dear heavens, dear universe, dear every holy deity in existence—
SHE HAD, INDEED, MADE OUT WITH ZEKE FUCKING FORD.