Fucked Raw By My Enemies

Ivy’s pov

The penthouse mirror reflected a woman I barely recognized. A sleeveless black silk dress clung to every curve of my body like liquid sin, the neckline plunging low enough to bare the swell of my full pale breasts with each breath.

A high slit climbed my left thigh almost to the hip, flashing skin with every sway of my hips. Thin straps crossed my back, leaving most of my spine exposed. I slid on a mink blazer. I wanted to have fun, not freeze my tits off in the cold December air.

My amber eyes burned with tears again, for the umpteenth time, and I could hardly fight them, for every second, the image of those two assholes tangled together flashed back, along with the effrontery they’d had to even mock me for it.

Fuck them. Fuck them both.

I fanned my hands over my face, sniffling, blinking rapidly to push the tears back. My makeup had taken a whole hour to do, so I wasn’t about to ruin it for Angel the Devil.

I took the rollers out of my chestnut hair and let it fall around my shoulders in waves, and my heart-shaped lips were coated red.

I slammed the rollers down on the vanity hard enough that the vibration traveled up my arm. The pink diamond bracelet on my right wrist shook with it, glinting light that the matching earrings and necklace threw back.

Oh, the wedding ring. I yanked it off my finger, the gold band sliding free coolly, and stormed down to the kitchen despite the chaos in my chest, lit the burner, and hurled the ring into the flame before I could think better of it.

Then I opened a jewelry box and dropped it inside instead, because some vindictive, practical part of me still wasn’t ready to lose it.

Tomorrow I could go back to playing perfectHarper Kingsley, but tonight, I was getting my revenge on Angel.

I slipped the black card Pamela had given me into my studded clutch, stepped into black stilettos to match, and strutted out of the penthouse.

In no time, I arrived at the building for Max Club, a tall, obsidian tower rising in the heart of Wisteria, our city. Red carpet unrolled from the curb under golden lights.

A valet in black uniform waited by my Aston Martin, ready to take my keys. The air was cold and crisp, people dressed to the nines strutting toward the huge hall entrance.

The main hall hummed with murmured conversation and the clink of glasses. Crystal chandeliers cast fractured light across sleek marble floors, and at the end of the hall stood a hostess in a fitted red gown, a display of masks beside her, and an elevator just past that.

Ohhh, right, that would lead down to the club.

I strutted toward her, heels clicking against the floor as I wove through the crowd.

The hostess held out a black-gloved hand.

”Ticket, please?”

I handed her the card, and with a hum, she gestured at the masks. One caught my eye immediately.

It was a delicate gold lace, shaped like flames licking upward at the corners, tiny crystals catching the light along the cheekbones, gold threads draping down to cover the rest of my lower face.

”This one,” I whispered, already tying it on, for it was perfect enough to hide my identity so well.

”You can go on, Miss. The club’s at basement level.”

I stepped into the mirrored elevator alone, heart beating wildly, for this was so far outside my comfort zone it wasn’t funny. I’d spent fourteen years working to keep a pristine image, after what happened while hoping it would earn me one more moment of my father’s love.

The doors closed, and my reflection stared back at me.

Loud music bounced off the walls as the display counted down, and right on zero, the doors opened onto a lobby, and at the end of it, a door to another world.

”Well, color me stunned to my boots,” I whispered, stepping inside.

The club was dark, mostly. Strobe lights cut through the haze, catching the tightly packed bodies on the dance floor.

A long bar ran along one wall, lit in blue LED, and beside it a VIP section roped off with a blue sash, a bouncer the size of a small building standing guard.

I headed straight for the bar, the slit in my dress flashing my legs with every step.

Two shots of vodka burned down my throat, spreading warmth through my veins, loosening the knot that had sat in my chest since I’d left the office.

The bass hummed through my body, and my hips started swaying before I’d even decided to move them.

”Ladies and gentlemen of Max Club,” the MC’s voice boomed, ”here’s a fun game. Think you’ve got what it takes to be a drop-dead gorgeous pole dancer? Step up, show us what you’ve got. Winner takes home ten grand and a VIP booth for the rest of the night!”

Cheers erupted while people pressed toward the raised platform where the poles stood. Two girls climbed up first, one hand each finding a pole as the music shifted into something heavier.

The third pole winked at me, and right then the image of Angel balls-deep in Jake seared back into my brain.

My hand shot up. ”I volunteer!”

The crowd parted as I climbed the steps. The pole gleamed gold under the spotlight, and on cue, the music changed.

I let the blazer slide off my shoulders and pool at my feet, and cheers rose as my dress hiked with the movement.

One slow spin, then another, arching my back, rolling my hips. The slit parted further with every turn, baring more thigh, my chest rising and falling with each breath.

Loud whistles pitched higher around me. ”Fuck yes, baby!”

”Work that pole!” ”Get it, gorgeous!”

I lost myself in the rhythm. Hair whipped across my face, sweat beading along my collarbone. I hooked a leg high, spun upside down, slid back to the floor in a slow, deliberate drop.

A grin tugged at my lips as the crowd roared, and then a golden stripe of light swept the VIP section, and my eyes locked on the most gorgeous man I’d ever seen.

I lost my breath completely.

His eyes were on me. I couldn’t make out the color, but I could feel them, and while everyone else hollered toward the stage, he sat motionless, head cocked to the side, watching only me.

His golden curls caught the sweeping lights like molten thread, a bandana tied around them that felt almost criminal, and I wanted to reach across the room and free them from it.

His mask was black, unlike the gold and silver everyone else wore, silver veins streaking across it like cracks of lightning, covering the upper half of his face. His black shirt hung open at the throat, a slice of golden skin visible beneath it.

Our gazes held, and the rest of the room fell away. I danced harder, rolling my hips, sliding down the pole like I was performing only for him.

Heat pooled low in my belly, my lips parting as my breath came shorter, harsher. I licked my lips, gripped the pole, sank to my knees, and threw my ass back slow.

The light swept his face again, and I could have sworn I saw a smirk. He lifted a glass of whiskey, the liquid swirling amber in the light, and brought it to his mouth.

My heart did a triple backflip. Okay, not hallucinating, he’s really looking at me—

A hand shot out and grabbed my ankle from the edge of the platform, yanking me toward the crowd.

That snapped me out of it instantly. My free leg kicked hard, heel connecting with something solid when someone grunted below.

”What the hell?!” I wrenched my leg free, chest heaving, eyes blazing behind the lace mask.

The crowd roared louder, but all I felt was the jolt back to reality.

The MC’s voice cut through the speakers with a nervous laugh. ”Okay, okay, folks, that’s enough! We obviously have our winner tonight. Let’s give it up for our second performer!”

I barely heard the rest of it. I snatched up my blazer and scrambled off the platform, legs shaking, cheeks burning behind the lace.

What the hell was I thinking? Coming here to prove a point, to hurt Angel, and risking this? What if it had been worse than a grab? What kind of asshole grabbed at a woman dancing on a platform?

Had bandana guy seen that?

I couldn’t find him through the swarm of men suddenly trying to talk to me. I had to get out of here. The company would be mine soon, I’d worked hard for Kingsley & Co. since I was eighteen. I couldn’t afford a scandal, even though Jake would love nothing more than to watch me burn.

I clutched the blazer around me, fingers digging into the wool as I pushed through the crowd, heart racing.

The MC kept rambling. ”Ten minutes to midnight, everyone! What are your resolutions for 2026? Drink up, party hard because we’re stepping into a new year!”

Yeah, here’s to a wonderful start, cheated on and grabbed at a club, all in one New Year’s Eve.

Was this really how I wanted to start the year, half-dressed in a basement club, strangers thinking they had a right to my body? Angel was a bastard, but that didn’t mean I had to risk everything over him. I needed to get home.

I made it out of the club and headed for the elevator, heels clicking fast across the hall floor. Footsteps sounded behind me.

”Hey, wait up, baby!”

I whipped around. It was the same asshole who’d grabbed me, a bruise already forming on the side of his face, courtesy of my heel.

”Not interested!” I snapped, quickening my pace toward the elevator. He didn’t seem to hear me, because he broke into a sprint. I screamed and ran, but he caught my wrist before I reached the button panel.

”You want this,” he leered, yanking me closer. ”Teasing the whole club like that. Don’t play hard to get now.”

Panic clawed up my throat. Oh my god, oh my god, I was no match for him but I sure as hell wasn’t going down without a fight. I twisted in his arm, my knee flying up between his legs.

He doubled over, cursing, and I kicked him again, and again. ”Get the fuck off me!”

”You bitch.” He let go, snarling, and lunged.

My heart slammed hard enough to hurt. I raised my foot to slam my heel into his gut when a towering figure appeared behind him.

It was Bandanna guy. Up close he was even more intimidating, his huge, broad shoulders filling the hallway.

In one fluid motion, he grabbed the man by the collar and slammed him into the wall. The man crumpled with a squeak and went still, and the stranger tossed him aside like a piece of dirty rag, then turned his hazel eyes on me.

I could see them clearly now, up close.

I wiped angrily at the tears stinging my eyes. First it was Angel, now this?

I was done, completely, utterly done, with men tonight.

The stranger reached out, fingers brushing my cheek to wipe a tear, and without thinking, I slapped his hand away. ”Don’t touch me.”

He didn’t flinch, and his voice came low, velvety. ”I was only trying to help. Most women would feel a bit grateful.”

I scoffed, turning to jab the elevator button, for if this one turned out to be an asshole too, I wasn’t sticking around to find out.

I stepped inside but he followed. His intoxicating scent of dark coffee, vanilla bourbon and oud wafted into my nostrils, but I’d had enough of men for one lifetime, let alone one night.

”Didn’t you get the memo? I want to be alone.”

I could feel him arching a brow at me without even looking, the glint of it evident in his voice.

”Really? So you can get grabbed again?”

The doors closed, and the numbers ticked down.

Zero... one...

My hands were still shaking, adrenaline and fury both refusing to settle. ”I’d say I have better odds of being grabbed with you in here.”

His mouth curled into a smirk, and he reached for my arm. Heat shot through me at the contact, sharp enough to steal my breath.

”Trust me. If I touched you, it’d be because you wanted it.”

”That’s the thing with all you sons of Adam,” I breathed, glaring up at him through the mask, ”you’re all are entitled pricks who think you can take whatever you want and never answer for it.”

His fingers tightened on my arm, hauling me flush against him until my heaving breasts crushed against his open black shirt, his bronze chest gleaming under the elevator lights.

Three... four...

”Mhmm. Are we?” His voice was dark honey sliding down my spine. ”Not a very nice thing to say to someone who just did you a favor.”

He rocked his hips into my belly, and I felt exactly how hard he was through the thin silk of my dress, and a low moan slipped out of me before I could stop it. ”Especially when I’m feeling very entitled right now, to take what I want.”

Coffee, bourbon, and smoke clung to him, thick enough to drug my senses. A thick lump formed in my throat, and underneath the fear-adrenaline still coursing through me, something hotter, more reckless, was rising to take its place.

”Ooh, big words,” I spat. ”Big words for someone who might be hiding a deflatedballoon down there.”

He did not, in fact, like that. His hand shot up, fisting in my hair, yanking my head back roughly, and the pull sent fire racing through me. My body burned, equal parts fury and desperate, maddening desire.

”Say that again, kitten,” he hissed, teeth grazing my earlobe, ”and I’ll spank you. Someone needs to teach that smart mouth a lesson.”

”Do it,” I met his eyes through the mask. ”I dare you.”

In a flash, he slammed the hold button on the elevator and whipped me around, yanking my arms behind my back.