Chapter 676: Blood Bass and Bad Decisions Ava never released my arm. She dragged me through the parted sea of bodies like Moses with a hard-on, nails sunk so deep into my forearm I felt the blood bead and trickle warm down to my wrist. Every step she took was a declaration: heels cracking marble, hips rolling slow and lethal, hair whipping behind her like a black battle standard soaked in enemy blood. The strobes painted her in freeze-frames: tits straining mesh, nipples cutting diamonds, thighs flexing, ass bouncing just enough to make grown men whimper. Then it hit Aber. "OH MY GOD, YOU’RE HER!" Aber shrieked over the music, eyes wide, already half-drunk on something pink and glowing. She grabbed Ava’s wrist, brave or stupid, I couldn’t tell, and yanked her toward the dance floor. "Girls’ circle. NOW. You’re dancing with us or we’re all dying of jealousy." Melissa, Sina, and the petite Asian girl materialized out of the strobe fog like backup dancers from hell. Four sets of manicured claws latched onto Ava’s arms, waist, hair. Ava shot me one arched brow equal parts amused and murderous, before letting them drag her away. I watched her disappear into the crush of bodies, black dress flashing like a shark fin through neon water, hair whipping as the girls formed a tight, screaming circle around her. Within seconds they had her in the dead center of the dance floor, phones up, bodies grinding, Aber already trying to twerk on Ava’s thigh like a golden retriever in heat. Dex appeared at my elbow, pressing a black Solo cup into my hand. "Welcome to the real party officially, Beach King." The cup was cold, bubbling, smelled like rocket fuel and cherry cough syrup. I downed it in one. Fire raced down my throat and exploded in my chest. The bar had been set up in what used to be a dining room: thirty feet of black marble, LED strips pulsing blood-red, bartenders in nothing but gold body paint and thongs pouring shots straight into open mouths. Colt waved me over, already shirtless and glazed in sweat, lining up tequila suicides on the bar top. "Body shots, motherfucker!" he roared. "You’re the king, you pick the body!" Some random brunette with fake lashes and real tits volunteered instantly, hopping onto the bar and lying back like a sacrifice. Salt on her neck, lime in her mouth, tequila pooled in her navel. The crowd chanted my name as I leaned down, tongue dragging salt from her throat, shot the tequila straight from her skin, sucked the lime from her teeth while she moaned loud enough to cut through the bass. Next round: beer pong on a table made of surfboards. Jaxon versus me. Loser strips. I wiped the floor with him in four turns. He lost his shorts. Crowd lost its mind. Then flip-cup. Then rage cage. Then some game involving ice cubes, blindfolds, and a girl screaming every time someone found her clit with their tongue. I won that one too. Every victory earned another shot, another roar, another phone in my face. The room spun in neon streaks. Girls kept trying to grind on me; I let them for exactly three seconds before moving on. Ava was still in the middle of the dance floor, laughing like a demon queen while Aber and the others worshipped at her feet. I slipped away. Needed air. Needed space. After hours of endless drinking and girls smearing their bodies onto me. The mansion was a labyrinth of sin. I wandered. Pool room: green felt, cigar smoke, some tech bro getting a blowjob under the table while he tried to bank the eight ball. Kitchen: marble island covered in coke lines thick as garden hoses, two girls making out on top of them, white dust on their tongues. Theater room: projector playing porn on loop, moans synced to the bass, three couples fucking on recliners like it was Dolby surround sound. Balcony: ocean wind hitting my face like cold water, couple arguing over whose turn it was to get pegged, girl already wearing the strap. Every room pulsed with the same heartbeat: young, rich, stupid, alive. I kept moving. Upstairs hallway: red lights, locked doors, muffled screams of pleasure and pain. Downstairs again: secret speakeasy behind a bookcase. I leaned against a wall, cup refilled with something clear and lethal, watching the chaos swirl. The party was perfect. And I was already bored. The pool deck was a war zone of wet skin and bad decisions. Someone had cranked the underwater LEDs to ultraviolet; the water glowed radioactive turquoise, turning every naked body into a floating neon sculpture. The pool itself was a riot: at least sixty people crammed in, half of them topless, the other half working on it. A girl in a glowing pink thong stood on the diving board chugging vodka straight from the bottle while two guys beneath her tried to motorboat her shadow. Another dude crowd-surfed across the surface on an inflatable flamingo, dick swinging like a helicopter blade. Every time he passed over a cluster of girls they reached up and slapped it like a piñata. The infinity edge spilled glowing water into the void, falling thirty feet to the rocks below in a constant neon waterfall. Someone had rigged subwoofers under the coping; the bass hit the water so hard it sent ripples that slapped bare asses like wet hands. A game of chicken had turned into full-contact gladiator combat: four girls on four guys’ shoulders, all of them drunk, all of them vicious. One redhead in a diamond-studded bikini top ripped another girl’s top clean off and used it like a whip. The loser got dunked so hard she came up coughing glitter and tequila. The crowd roared. On the shallow end steps, a circle of people played "spin the bottle" with a glowing dildo the size of a forearm. Every spin ended with someone bent over the edge getting railed while the rest counted strokes like a fucked-up jump-rope chant. Someone had wheeled out a foam machine. White suds poured over the edge of the jacuzzi, turning it into a bubbling cauldron of tits and tongues. A guy in a Viking helmet poured champagne straight into the foam; girls dove face-first like it was a slip-n-slide made of money. I stood on the marble lip, barefoot, jeans rolled, shirt long gone, skin lacquered in sweat and spilled liquor. The heat rolled off the water in waves, thick with chlorine, coconut oil, and raw sex. Every breath tasted like someone else’s orgasm. Dex cannonballed past me, completely naked, Rolex still flashing on his wrist. "KING!" he screamed mid-air, then hit the water like a bomb. When he surfaced he was holding a glowing butt plug like Excalibur. "WHO WANTS THE SCEPTER?" The crowd lost its collective mind. I laughed once, sharp, full of pretence that I was actually enjoying, then drained whatever was in my cup. The alcohol had stopped burning hours ago; now it just poured straight into my veins like liquid neon. I watched Ava across the pool: hips rolling slow and lethal while Aber and the girls formed a grinding, screaming orbit around her. Every time Ava moved, the circle tightened, like moths trying to fuck the flame. I was done watching. I turned and walked back through the house. Past the beer-pong massacre in the foyer. Past the kitchen island now slick with spilled coke and pussy juice. Past the theater room where the projector had switched to tentacle hentai and nobody seemed to care. Up the stairs. Second floor: red lights, locked doors, moans muffled behind velvet. I kept climbing. Third floor. The music down below faded to a dull heartbeat. The air up here was cooler, quieter. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝒆𝒘𝙚𝓫𝙣𝙤𝒗𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢 The hallway stretched long and dark, lit only by a single red LIMIT sign bleeding at the far end. Every door was closed. No handles. Just keycard slots glowing faint crimson. Something pulled me forward. Not curiosity. Not boredom. Something older. Like the house had a secret it only told gods who were drunk enough to listen. I walked. Slow. Bare feet silent on the marble. The red light at the end pulsed once. Like it was breathing. I found her!