The Velvet Bet (The Velvet Trap Billionaires #2)

Prologue – Liam Hunt

Eight years ago

She’s already inside.

Silver Rose moves fast below me, her mask flashing beneath chandeliers dimmed to a smoky glow. From the gallery, I watch her navigate the maze. She’s too deep, too close to the end. The Velvet Game doesn’t wait for you to be ready, and tonight it’s ending faster than I’d like.

I push off the gilded rail and move on. Heat gathers beneath my mask, leather pressed tight against my skin.

The Beaumont Royale is ours tonight. Not officially. Renovations emptied the hotel of guests and staff, and the Game saw the guards gone before dusk. What remains is scaffolding, draped statues, and a maze that didn’t exist yesterday.

I descend two flights and find a wall where a corridor should be.

“The fuck…” The curse comes out as a disbelieving laugh.

I drag my fingers along carved pilasters, searching for the release. There’s always a release. That’s the rule. But this one is refusing to show itself.

“Damn it!”

“Panther?” The voice comes through the brick.

“Joker? That you?”

“Yeah.”

“I think Silver Rose is within one turn of the final trap.”

“Ah, fuck! I don’t like this,” Joker says. “She’ll hit the safe word the second it goes.”

Joker’s wrong about a lot of things. Not this. Safe word means the illusion breaks, and the Game delivers nothing.

“You’ve got eyes on Lynx?” I ask.

“Your Lynx Queen is on this side,” he replies. “She’s not far behind.”

I’d watched her before tonight’s game began.

The black-and-tan feline mask did its job well, turning her into part temptation, part mystery.

But it couldn’t hide her incredible figure, her very kissable mouth, or the way anticipation burned through her.

Silver Rose is a worthy hunt, but Lynx is the one I want underneath me tonight.

“We switch,” I say. “Now.”

I keep searching for the release until my fingers close around a decorative rosette half-concealed by a canvas tarp. It shifts under pressure. A mechanism grinds inside the wall, and several bricks retract to form a narrow aperture.

Joker’s hand appears first. He squeezes through the breach toward me. I wait until he’s clear. We clasp forearms in passing. “Try not to die in there,” he says.

The moment I reach the other side, concealed panels along the corridor slide back into the walls, revealing what moments ago appeared to be unfinished construction.

I’ve seen enough of this maze to understand its intent. From the upstairs gallery, I studied the turns, the false openings, the dead ends masked by scaffolding. What none of us knows is where the final trap lies, or how it will strike.

I take the stairs two at a time. At the bottom, I catch sight of her. Lynx moves fast through the lower passage with athletic certainty—

Until her heel hits a panel.

She yelps as the floor tilts. The wood gives way and her balance goes with it. The railing shudders loose as a section next to her drops into darkness.

She twists mid-fall, catching the railing. Her body does what it knows: trying to generate movement. She swings herself up, but every shift of her weight tilts the broken edge further. The Game knows her weakness—a runner is not built to hang.

Her fingers tremble. Her face is flushed from fighting herself.

For half a second, I think she’s going to say the word.

I leap toward her. “Hold on!”

My hand catches her wrist hard enough to bruise. The remaining boards groan under my weight. I adjust my grip, bracing my stance as another strip of timber cracks loose beneath us.

“I’ve got you,” I say as I drag her in. The ledge gives way where she’d been hanging a heartbeat ago, the drop swallowing the last of it. She slams against me, the skirt of her gown torn where it caught the edge. Her mask brushes my jaw, breath hot.

She chokes, adrenaline still sparking through her. “What the hell was that?”

“Your final trap.”

She laughs, breathless but exhilarated. “I suppose I signed up for that kind of drama.”

I keep a hand at her waist to make sure her footing holds. “Maybe.” I gather her hair at the nape. “But I’m here. The Game doesn’t get to break you.”

She straightens, pressing closer. Heat radiates through the fabric between us. “So I’m your claim tonight?”

“The Panther takes what’s his.”

“I was hoping it would be you,” she murmurs, satisfied. “Not really a fan of the Joker.”

I guide her through a door marked with an X. Inside waits a suite steeped in old-world opulence—high ceilings edged with gold leaf, velvet drapery against tall windows, a carved four-poster bed in the center of the room.

My hands travel along her sweat-covered skin, peeling satin from her shoulders. Her pulse flutters at her throat as I take in the lines of a body shaped by years of long-distance training. She answers touch for touch.

Her hand goes under my shirt. She’s not gentle about it. Her fingers find my chest and press in. “Now that,” she says, “is built to endure.”

A crooked little smile curves at her mouth before she reaches for my tie. One tug loosens it. My jacket hits the floor a second later.

The masks stay on. That is part of the ritual. We are hunger without names.

We meet hard. My arms aligned with hers, I lift her wrists above her head, securing them to the carved posts with silk that matches the sheets. Her breath deepens as I step back and let her see me reach for protection.

When I return to her, I take my time. My mouth drags over her breasts, back up along her throat until her head tips and the first sound escapes her. She strains against the silk binding, liking the resistance. I spread her wide beneath me, fitting myself against her core.

Then I give her what she came for.

The bed gives a muted creak. Her composure breaks into something raw and electric. My hands plant at her hips as I drive into her. When she comes, it’s with a sharp intake of breath. I follow seconds later, finishing deep with her.

Afterward, after I set her wrists free, she lies wrapped in the satin sheets, her chest rising as the storm recedes.

“Wow,” she murmurs. “I see why the waiting list is so long.”

“Would you reapply?” I ask, fastening my cufflinks.

She laughs under her breath. “Immediately.” Her palm glides over the sheets, settling between her thighs. “This almost beats winning the Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc.”

“Almost?” I arch a brow beneath the mask.

“You’d have to make me work a little harder to take first place.”

I smirk as I put on my jacket. She reaches for me, her fingertips grazing my wrist. I lift her hand and set it gently back against her belly.

“So you do enforce the rules.” The line comes out half challenge, half temptation.

“Always.” I adjust my tie. “A car will take you home.”

“Great game, Panther.”

“Likewise.”

She came for the edge. I came for the chase. The Game works because nobody comes here looking for forever, and I’ve never wished otherwise. I don’t deal in aftermath.

My radio crackles. Marcus Lockwood comes over the line. “Thought you wouldn’t make it.”

“You made it too easy,” I reply, which earns a quiet chuckle from the Game Master.

The Beaumont Royale stands silent around us, marble pillars bearing witness, statues half veiled in renovation cloth as though even stone has chosen discretion.

“How’s Joker?” I ask.

“He secured his win. He moved faster than usual tonight.”

“He hates losing more than most.”

“Lucky you two weren’t on the same hunt,” he quips.

Perhaps.

Although men like Joker are easier to admire when they’re running the same direction.