The $20,000 sat in her account like a ticking bomb.
Ava paced her shoebox apartment, bare feet slapping the worn wooden floors, her phone screen glowing like it was cursed. She kept refreshing her banking app, expecting it to vanish. Glitch. Scam. Mistake. Refund. Anything but real.
But it was real.
Transaction complete.
Amount received: $20,000.00
Note: "Shut up and be mine for a week."
Her pulse thundered in her throat.
This couldn't be happening. She wasn't the girl men wired tens of thousands to overnight. She was broke, anonymous, sarcastic to a fault, and bad at flirting. She was the girl who tweeted memes about dying alone with a house full of cats.
But last night, she'd made a TikTok. A stupid, throwaway TikTok.
Just her in sweats, sipping cheap wine, mouthing off: "At this point, I need a man rich enough to ruin me financially and emotionally except I want the money first."
She didn't even bother with makeup.
Yet somehow, that was the video that hit 3.2 million views in 12 hours.
And then the money came.
No "hi."
No introduction.
Just twenty. Thousand. Dollars.
And a message that felt like a command.
She spent the next hour tearing through the Internet, fingers trembling over her keyboard. Dorian Kane. The name she barely remembered from last semester's Business Law class. Tall, rude, unreadable. He'd transferred mid-semester and vanished like a ghost, leaving behind whispered rumors of being expelled or pulled out by his "rich daddy."
But this, this was beyond college boy nonsense.
He had her bank account. Her address. Her attention.
There were no other suspects. And the name in the transaction? K Industries LLC.
Her stomach twisted as she clicked through anonymous business listings. One link after another led to shell companies, ghost assets, shadowy investments tied to skyscrapers and silent takeovers. This wasn't just a man.
It was the man.
And now, she was the game piece.
Ping.
Her phone vibrated. A new email from her landlord.
Subject: URGENT TENANT NOTICE
Ava clicked with dread coiling through her gut.
Due to a change in ownership of the building, all tenants must vacate within 14 days. Apologies for the inconvenience.
Her breath hitched.
Her eyes scanned again. Change in ownership? Effective today?
Her hand shook as she grabbed her coat and yanked open the front door only to find an envelope slid neatly underneath. Her name in block letters.
Inside? An exact replica of the eviction notice. This wasn't spam.
It was targeted.
Her phone buzzed again.
Unknown Number:
"I said name your price. You didn't. So now I'm pricing you."
Ava sat down hard on the edge of her unmade bed.
This was madness. Criminal. Deranged.
And yet something about the message didn't feel unhinged. It felt calculated. Like a man playing chess with a bored smirk, while everyone else was still unboxing the board.
Her fingers hovered over the screen. She could report him. Block him. Call the bank. But something dark and magnetic inside her whispered wait.
Then another message came in.
"You made the first move. You said you wanted a man who'd pay. Now I'm paying. You asked to be ruined. I'm just answering the call."
Her mouth went dry.
She had said it. Joked. Flirted with the idea.
She never thought the universe or some cold-eyed, secretive billionaire would actually listen.
She stood, walked toward the window, and looked down.
And there it was.
A sleek, black SUV idling across the street. No license plate in sight. Just tinted windows and power humming beneath the hood.
Her phone lit up once more.
"Car's waiting. You have ten minutes."
No threats.
No apologies.
Just a final statement:
"This is your one week, Ava. You belong to me now. The rest depends on how well you behave."
Ava stared at the car. Her heart pounded so hard it hurt. Her breath came in sharp, uneven waves. This was insane.
But she was already packing.