"Vince Evans is back! This is your last chance. You must be chosen, become his wife or lover, and then bear his heir."
These words kept echoing in Lydia's head like a magic spell.
Lydia bit her lip, feeling like a pet waiting to be picked by Vince.
Being chosen meant that she could save her parents' company, become the rich wife everyone envied, have money and status, and become the mother of the next heir to the famous Evans family.
It sounds great, doesn't it?
However, being chosen also means she has to please Vince in bed, suffer the anger of this domineering billionaire, let him dictate terms in her life, and lose the freedom that once belonged to her.
"Don't pretend to be noble. You always refused to please rich men. Now our company is about to go bankrupt, and if you fail again this time, I'm going to sell you to a Mexican drug lord. If you want to live, go and please Vince. It's better for both of us."
Lydia remembered the terrible look on her father's face when he said that.
Her father won't allow her to screw this up, because this time the billionaire is Vince Evans.
Vince Evans is a name that no one can ignore.
The heir of a nationwide luxury hotel group, a famous Wall Street investor, the top three on the list of golden bachelors ...... Also, the CEO with cruel methods, the domineering and cold businessman, the man who will never be gentle with women ......
Wealth, fame, wine, beauty, and flash ...... The rumors about this 26-year-old young man never stop.
Lydia knows that men like him have hearts of stone and that s*x is just a pleasure for them. Even if she mesmerizes him with her body, what's the point?
But she had no choice, she had to go to this ridiculous wife-chosen party.
……
At this moment, in a pink princess' room, servants are putting on Lydia's girdle.
Lydia's mother, Megan, is picking out her dress for the party. "Honey, what do you think of this black velvet gown? It looks elegant and modest but shows off your breasts perfectly. I guarantee all the men are going to look back at you, including Vince."
The servant was cinching the girdle on Lydia's body hard, making her already slim waist even tighter, and the S-shaped curves on her body were even more obvious.
"Very good, very good." Megan nodded her head in satisfaction while admiring Lydia's figure. "A truly sexy woman must have a perfect waist-to-hip ratio. And a man who knows women must go hard for the curves of a woman from her back to her waist and her hips. Oh, my dear daughter, I can already imagine the lust in Vince's eyes when he sees you."
Lydia lowered her eyes, her long lashes covering the loss in her eyes.
Noticing Lydia's low mood, Megan put away her happy expression, took Lydia's hand, and said with concern, "I know it's not what you want to do, but we can't help it. Your father's health is getting worse every day, and the company's debt is like a bottomless pit. You know, if we can't get Vince's investment this year, we'll go bankrupt next year, and then we'll have to move out of this villa and go to the slums to squeeze into a small, run-down rental house."
Lydia tried to say something, but her breath reached her throat and turned into a sigh.
Megan persuaded again. "I know you've always wanted to be a jewelry designer. If our company goes bankrupt, there's no way for your dream to come true, is there? So now we have to keep our company. That's your dream too, isn't it?"
It was Lydia's dream to become a jewelry designer, but she wanted to be a woman who sat in her office and put her heart and soul into making designs, not a woman who went to great lengths to dress herself to please men.
"Do I have to go to that party? It wasn't even a welcome party for Vince, it was a disgusting party for him to pick women. All the women treating themselves as commodities to cater to that abominable bad guy ......"
"Shhh!" Megan interrupted Lydia. You must be careful what you say when you go to a party at night. Don't make Vince hate you."
"Isn't he a jerk? He stopped every investor on Wall Street from working with us to annex our family's company. He just wants to watch us go off the deep end and wait for us to get on our knees and beg him. There is no way to satisfy the appetite of such a bastard!"
"And how do you plan to save the company? With your designs that nobody buys?"
"Mom!" Lydia's eyes widened, tears welling up in her eyes. "The reason why my designs didn't sell was because of that bad guy!"
Lydia sat down on the floor in defeat.
Her mother was right, Vince had destroyed all their hopes, and they really had no way out.
Megan sat next to Lydia and rubbed her back. "My good girl. Don't always think badly of things. At least, Vince is a young, handsome billionaire."
"I know my mission is to marry a rich man. When you guys took me home by force at my graduation ceremony at Oxford, I couldn't even say goodbye to my friends. For all these years, you forced me to meet with Richard, the drug dealer. Now that Richard has left America, you are forcing me to seduce Vince. You just want me to marry a rich man, whether the other man is young or old. You don't care about my feelings as long as you can get enough money! You guys are no different from those selfish people."
Pa! The sound of a slap rang out and Lydia felt a burning pain in her cheek.
"How can you say that! We're doing this for your own good! When other ladies in Los Angeles become rich wives carrying Hermes bags for afternoon tea every day, and you're stuck being a designer who stays up late for a paycheck, you'll know how important it is to marry a rich man!"
Megan said to the servant, "Go get that ice to take down her swelling."
Lydia's one hand covered her punched cheek. Her tears did not fall, but the pain came through her skin all the way to her heart.
She closed her eyes in despair. She had no choice.
It was a circle decorated with vanity and money. A woman needs Hermes and jewelry to decorate her smile, and then waits late at night in loneliness for her womanizing husband.
Lydia didn't want to be this pathetic woman. She wanted to leave her family after graduation, find a job as a designer and live with Vic, her boyfriend from college. She didn't tell Vic who she was because she wanted a life of freedom from the chains.
However, her parents deleted all contact information about Vic and made her a tool to please men again, linking her to rich men.
Lydia feels sorry for Vic. She never had the courage to contact him again.
Vic is a fresh graduate with boundless hope, while Lydia is just a bird in a cage.
She doesn't want to burden Vic's life.
The only thing she can do is to disappear from his world and set him free.
………………………………………………………………………………
An upscale private bar where three aristocrats are lazily and elegantly lounging on a couch.
"Vince, I guess all the ladies in California are pulling out all the stops to get into your bed right now." Cecil teased Vince as he shook the wine in his hand, "Gee, I wonder who's going to take the top spot tonight?"
Vince grunted, annoyed, and took a drink from the red wine in front of him.
A drop of red wine trickled down his graceful jawline and flowed with the movement of his mouth to his sexy Adam's apple.
Cecil prodded. "I bet there are countless women who would love to get on their knees and lick this drop of red wine. I've come up with a great idea, and tomorrow I'm going to launch a wine in my bar called "Vince's Adam's apple ". Women could drink it while fantasizing about kissing your throat knot. Oh my God, this scene is so sexy and erotic. I'm such a business genius, I must have made a fortune from it."
"Don't make such boring jokes." Vince casually threw the expensive wine glass on the carpet, wiped the red wine off his throat with a handkerchief, and annoyingly ripped the collar of his shirt, exposing a large portion of his pecs.
The ivory button on the shirt was ripped off, and the button bounced on the floor several times and rolled into some corner.
No one cared about this little button. Only the housekeeping staff will find this surprise "tip" tomorrow.
Ulric, Vince's friend and business partner, said, "Drink less, Vince, you have a welcome dinner to attend tonight. As the star of the show, you can't get drunk. Besides, you have to complete the task your mother gave you tonight."
Ulric, the most stable of the three and the oldest, was the one who calmly grasped the situation every time and reminded his brothers not to forget the business.
"What kind of mission?" Cecil was most interested in this kind of news.
Vince frowned.
Ulric saw a look of frustration on Vince's face. He snapped his fingers and began to gossip. "Vince's mother demanded that he should find a woman to have a child. It's his final requirement to become the heir."
Cecil rolled his eyes. "And I thought it was such a hard requirement. Every woman in the country would marry Vince if he wanted to. But I've always been curious. Vince, why haven't you had a girlfriend all these years?"
Vince gave a cold snort. When he was a student at Oxford, he had a girlfriend. They spent the most romantic time together on campus.
At that time, Vince didn't want to live under his father's reputation, so he hid his identity for a while. He planned to tell her the truth and start a family with her after graduation. But the woman left him forever without saying goodbye at the graduation ceremony.
Women are cruel things! She didn't even leave him a single word.
There is nothing crueler in the world than abandoning a man at a time when he believes in love the most.
Vince gradually mended the cracks in his heart on Wall Street. Amidst the pressure, deception, and scheming, he became a ruthless businessman.
D.amn it!
Vince vowed that he would never fall in love with any woman again! If he ever meets that cruel woman again, he will make her feel 10 times the pain and beg for him on her knees!