Page 118 of The Bittersweet Bond

It wasn’t just her body, it was the way she moved, the way she laughed—It was the way she looked at him, like she could see straight through him.

It was the way she had always known him—before he even understood himself.

The way she never backed down, never softened her edges, never hesitated to tell him the truth, no matter how much it cut.

It was the way she had already wrecked him before he ever had the chance to stop it.

And that… That was what he had been running from all along.

__________

Evin

And then, she felt him.

Bas’s gaze burned into her.

Relaxed. Casual. That knowing smirk playing at the edges of his lips—like he could see right through her.

And she hated that it still got to her.

But tonight, she didn’t mind.

Tonight, she liked it.

Let him look. Let him win.

Just like always.

__________

The girls had barely made it inside when the music pulled them in, an invisible force tugging at their limbs. They weren’t even at the bar yet, but the moment felt too good to resist. The crowd swallowed them whole, bodies moving in sync with the heavy beat, the kind of rhythm that made it easy to forget everything else.

For the first time in what felt like forever, Evin let go. The heat, the music, the neon strobes slicing through the darkness—she melted into it all. She wasn’t thinking about tomorrow, or the past, or anything outside of this moment.

Until she turned to say something to Milka and—

A sharp jolt.

Her shoulder clipped someone’s, her balance tipping just slightly as she stumbled toward the bar.

"Whoa there," a voice murmured.

She looked up.

A stranger.

He smirked, his grip lingering just a second too long on her shoulder. "You okay, sweetheart?" His eyes gleamed, toeing that thin line between charming and sleazy.

Evin barely had time to react before a familiar figure caught her eye.

There was Dominic.

Ofcourse.

That smug grin on his face told her everything she needed to know. He was eating this up.

"Well, well, look at that," he drawled, his voice coated in something close to amusement. "This all feels a little familiar, doesn’t it?"

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