Page 76 of The Bet
THE DIRTY VIDEO COMES BACK TO HAUNT ME
Andie
The elevator doors sigh open onto Thomas’s magnificent penthouse, and I step into the hush, my shoes sinking deep into the runner, the air already thick with whatever perfume they mist through the HVAC. It’s too early for true darkness, but the city is already a collage of neon and blue. In the windows, Minneapolis looks like it’s been dipped in wine and wrung out to dry—streetlights leaking through a high shelf of cloud, the river all purple and bruised beneath. The kind of night that wants to be dramatic but ends up just tired.
I step into the massive apartment and don’t bother calling his name. For three weeks now, the ritual is always the same: I let myself in, toss my bag on the bench in the vestibule, and immediately hear his voice from somewhere deeper inside. Usually the library. Sometimes the den, if he’s working late. Once, he was singing—real, actual singing, off-key and under his breath, crooning an eighties song while he puttered around. I still think about it when I can’t sleep.
Tonight, there’s nothing. No football on mute, no clink of a glass, not even the low tick of jazz from his playlist. The only sound is my own heartbeat, and the faint hum of city energy coming up through the floor.
It’s only as I round the corner into the living room that I see him. Thomas. Standing dead center in the rug’s pattern, as if he’s been pinned there by some forensic team, arms at his sides, feet planted perfectly parallel. He’s in jeans—dark, straight fit—and a storm-grey cashmere sweater that’s so luxurious that the rib at the collar is still sharp. He could be a billionaire or a hitman or a statue commemorating a famous, beloved traitor. The effect is ruined only by the phone in his right hand, held low, screen lit, thumb braced over the back.
I stop. My voice, when I try it, comes out too small. “Hey.”
He doesn’t answer. He just stares at me, jaw locked, eyes a blue so pale they could cut glass. The silence between us is so pure that I can hear the pop of electricity in the light fixtures overhead.
“Thomas?” I take another step, then freeze. I’m maybe five feet from him, but it might as well be the far side of the city. “You okay?”
He lifts the phone, as if testing its weight, then flips the screen so it faces me. The gesture is slow and almost elegant, like a magician unveiling a card. There’s no warning—no hint of what’s coming—until the first second of audio blares into the quiet.
It’s my voice. On the phone, I’m panting, voice high and almost deranged, breath hitching between words. I hear the slap of skin, the wetness of it, the urgent, half-choked little “fuck” I never admit to using in real life. Then, Thomas’s voice: low, feral, notat all the voice I know from waking hours. “You’re so fucking tight, baby. Thank you for gifting me your pussy cherry.”
On the screen, the image jerks, refocuses. My body, lush and wild, legs open obscenely wide, Thomas’s dick sinking slowly into my tight pussy, stretching me, his hips flush against my thighs. The angle is from the side, yet everything is revealed. As he pulls back, the camera picks up a glistening smear of red, streaking his cock and then vanishing as he sinks deep into me again. We both cry out, me a breathless scream of joy, him the deep groan of satisfaction.
I see my own face, twisted and lost, eyes rolled so far up with pleasure you can almost see the whites.
“Yes, claim my pussy,” the woman on the screen pants. “It’s yours.”
“You know what this means,” Thomas growls between deep thrusts. “I’m your first, baby, so your cunt’s now molded to the shape of my cock. You’ll never be satisfied with another man.”
She whines a little, arching her back, unable to reply because of the pleasure the man gives her.
I can’t look away. Not at the video, not at Thomas.
My bag slips from my shoulder, thumping softly to the carpet. I snatch at the strap by reflex, the jolt so violent it nearly snaps my wrist. My throat is sandpaper. I try to swallow, but nothing moves.
“I—” The word breaks in half. “Where did you—how did you?—”
He doesn’t blink. “I was updating your laptop. You asked for help remember? This was in your cloud, Andie. It was labeled with the date of our first encounter here.”
I clutch the bag to my chest, suddenly cold all over. “I thought I deleted it,” I say, stupidly. “I deleted that months ago.”
He sets the phone down on the coffee table, screen still facing up, the video still running. The sound keeps going: my own voice, begging for more, the obscene slap of our bodies together, a whimper I don’t even recognize as me.
The penthouse is exactly as it should be—marble counters catching the last blue smears of daylight, a row of empty glasses on the bar, a bottle of whiskey on the side table, two tumblers set out, one still full and untouched. The TV is off, the room too clean, too orderly. Even the city lights seem to have dimmed, the world outside watching us through a lens of indifference.
I look at Thomas. I mean, really look. He isn’t just angry. He’s gone somewhere else, somewhere far away and windless, where nothing moves or matters. His hands are in fists now, the knuckles white. His shoulders are hunched, the set of his jaw tight.
I want to say something, but all I can manage is, “Thomas, I swear?—”
He shakes his head, slow and final. “Why didn’t you tell me that you filmed us that first night?” His voice is flat, barely even there.
“I forgot about it. I didn’t—” The tears start without warning, brimming in my eyes, blurring the room so that all the sharp corners go soft and nothing is real except the heat in my face and the taste of salt in my mouth. “I never even showed it to anyone. I just— I don’t know. I deleted it right after?—”
His eyes flick down to the phone, then back up. He doesn’t buy it. “You made a promise,” he says, and now the cold isgone, replaced by something that burns, slow and deep. “No more secrets, Andie. We agreed on that. In the fucking diner, remember?”
I nod, even though I can’t really remember anything anymore except the feeling of my own shame.
He gestures at the phone, not even touching it. “Was this for the bet, too? Or just for your collection?”
