"So you're not new to this," the man flirts, "I wonder who's the lucky guy."

He is impressed by her good looks, but he's surprised to find that she has a bright mind too.

"You really wanna hear me?" he asks in a low, seductive voice.

There is a mole at the corner of his eye. Avery can't help but stare at it—-it gives him a rakish air.

He suddenly lifts his head and a sexy sound comes from his throat as if he can't control himself any longer. The licentious sound makes Avery's ears go hot instantly.

"Are you blushing?" the man asks, "Not so experienced then, are you?"

He lowers his head and regards her with intrigued eyes.

"Stop talking nonsense," Avery hisses.

She pushes the gun into his chest with greater force. He raises both hands above his head in surrender but continues to moan.

"That's enough," she hisses.

She doesn't want to hear this man make sex noises anymore.

"But I haven't orgasmed yet," the man protests, with a naughty look in his eyes.

Loud footsteps fill the restroom.

"Check them one by one," orders a rough male voice.

Immediately, Avery hears the sound of a stall door being kicked in. The partitions seem to shake with the force of the kick. Then the men move to the next stall. They move down the line until they're next to the stall Avery is in.

"Ohh," Avery says with a breathy moan, "Don't do that, you naughty man."

The men searching the bathroom suddenly freeze.

"Uhh, boss, sounds like someone is getting busy in there," says one man, "Do you want us to kick it in or not?"

"Ah," Avery moans again, "Evan!"

"Evan as in Evan Howel?" asks one of the men in a nervous voice.

Avery can hear them grinding their teeth with indecision, but before she can make another sound, the leader makes up his mind.

"Let's get out of here," he commands.

The man in the stall still holds his hands above his head in surrender and Avery keeps the gun leveled at his chest. They hold this position until the men's footsteps get further and further away. Avery takes a deep breath and the tension seems to drain from her body.

"Evan Howel?" the man asks with a low whistle.

He looks at Avery with vague admiration and then he slowly begins to smirk.

"I never would have thought of his name as a sexy noise, but it seems to have worked," he says.

Avery examines the gun and realizes it's empty—there aren't any bullets at all. "No wonder this man managed to keep his cool when I pointed it at him," she thinks.

"I'm Andrew Clifford," the man says.

Avery looks up confusedly and sees that Andrew has lowered his arms and casually put his hands in his pocket.

"Maybe next time you can scream my name if you're in trouble," he says with a mischievous look.

"I doubt a man like you will be much help," Avery retorts, "You seem to have a lot of enemies but little sense—your gun isn't even loaded."

Avery presses the gun to his chest, intentionally putting pressure on the wound near his heart. He winces slightly and a gasp of breath escapes his lips. Still, he reaches out to take the gun.

"Weren't you afraid of me?" he asks her.

An ordinary woman would be scared of a man who pulled her into a bathroom stall; especially a man with a gun suffering from a knife wound.

"Well sure," Avery answers, "But what choice did I have?"

She steps away from him and turns to open the stall door but blocks her.

"I'm one of the good guys," he says with a grin.

"What kind of a man says that while blocking a woman's exit?" she thinks.

Avery frowns and rolls her eyes at him. Suddenly Andrew seems to realize the discrepancy between his words and his actions and he steps away from the door.

"Do you remember my name?" he asks.

"I'm no good with names," Avery retorts.

"Well then, what's yours?"

"Felicity Winter," Avery says.

She doesn't want him to know her real name—she hopes to never see him again as soon as she leaves the bathroom.

"Felicity Winter? I like that," he says with a smile.

He reaches into his pocket and removes a bullet etched with the letters AC.

"I owe you," he says, raising his hand to silence Avery's denial, "And I can make it up to you…with sex."

Avery recalls his tempting but licentious sound. She regards him coolly as he tilts his head to give her a seductive look. He's used to getting any woman he wants. Men like him disgust her.

"I used Evan Howel's name to save your life just now, so you owe him—not me," she says, "I'll be sure to let him know that you'd like to pay him back with sex."

He's almost as attractive as Evan and she has to admit that the image of the two of them together is something. Andrew presses his lips together and slowly drags the bullet across her collarbone. With an almost careless gesture, he releases it, and Avery feels something chilly slipping between her breasts.

"You!" Avery hisses with outrage.

"Remember me now, okay?" Andrew laughs perfunctorily and opens the door, "I hope we can meet soon so I can pay back what I owe you."

"Fuck off!" Avery shouts.

Avery slams the door behind him in a rage. She removes the bullet from her cleavage and examines it carefully.

"So he's the famous Andrew Clifford," she thinks, "How arrogant to put his initials on a bullet? More than arrogant it's just plain stupid. If he shoots anyone, the bullet can easily be traced back to him. Doesn't he realize how easy that makes it for someone to frame him?"

Avery fumes, disgusted by his arrogance and his overtures. She feels frazzled. She doesn't want to go back to the private room to deal with insinuations and satire all night, but she doesn't want to risk running into Andrew again either. She gathers her dress and prepares to walk back to her dormitory room.

…

The atmosphere is still strange in Evan's private room. After a long, tense silence, a murmur suddenly rises from the audience, drawing the attention of everyone in the room. The private room has three normal walls and one wall made of a special glass that allows those inside the room to see the stage without allowing anyone on the stage or outside of the room to see inside.

The stripper on the stage takes off her bra, inducing whistles and cheers from the other private rooms.

"How about some company?" Lisa asks approaching Evan.

Evan has been gulping whiskey since Avery left for the toilet. He knows that Avery isn't the woman she used to be, the woman who loved him. The thought sends physical pain radiating from his heart.

"Damn it!" he thinks, "How can she just leave me to these other women so casually? She treats me like I'm a dress she's taken off and discarded. Unworthy of even a second glance."

The feeling of being despised and abandoned gives him unbearable pain. He finds that the whiskey helps to numb it. Lisa approaches Evan again encouraged by the lively atmosphere and the cheering outside the room.

"Leave me alone!" Evan orders coldly.

Lisa's perfume is revolting and he can't help wondering where Avery is.

Suddenly the door opens and Robert enters with a worried expression, "Sir, Mrs. Howel isn't in the restroom."

"Staff dormitory?" Evan asks.

"She's not there either," Robert replies.

The glass in Evan's hand shatters. Blood mixes with the whiskey and drips to the floor.

"Go find her!" he shouts.

Almost as soon as Robert leaves the room a hush falls over the stage. Dozens of strip dancers take off their bras in a grand finale, and then a black curtain falls over the stage. The crowd goes silent, but then the curtain rises again revealing a beast in a giant iron cage. The animal raises its head and roars toward the sky, shocking the guests with its ferocity. It is a live lion.

The cage is as tall as the first floor of a building and wide as well. The lion has plenty of space to move about. The guests seem to slowly awaken from the intoxicating temptation of the strippers, and gasped with surprise. One of the strippers throws a living white rabbit into the cage and the guests watch in horror and fascination as the lion pounces and kills it.

Some fragile women in private rooms start screaming. Some men begin to shout for more, almost as if they can already guess what will happen next.

"A goddess!" shouts one excited voice from the crowd.

A woman in a white gauze dress gradually descends from the top of the high ceiling. She is wearing a mask that covers half her face and her long hair cascades down her back. The mask is decorated with tiny diamonds that twinkle in the light. She has wires around her waist and her fair skin shines like a beacon. She looks like an angel.

Though she is beautiful, she is limp. She looks almost boneless and her eyes are closed.