"Love Substitutes: The Twin Game" Chapter 8
Over the next twenty days, he drank heavily into the dead of night, pushed his racing cars to their absolute limits, and threw himself into all kinds of extreme sports.
He squandered his time and energy carelessly, no longer needing to exhaust himself playing someone else, no longer having to deal with the trouble at home. Even breathing felt far more liberated.
Inside the VIP lounge of the high-end nightclub.
The music blasted deafeningly, the neon lights blurred, and champagne flowed freely.
Caspian leaned halfway against the sofa, the collar of his black shirt thrown open carelessly. His eyes were half-closed, his gaze fixed onto the amber liquor swirling inside his glass, lost in unknown thoughts.
A beautifully made-up girl, relying on her attractive looks, boldly wrapped her arms around his, pressing her body close to his side.
The woman reached out to take the glass from his hand, her voice sweet and cloying, "Second Young Master Vanderbilt, drinking alone is so boring. Let me drink with you, alright?"
As she spoke, she leaned down to touch his glass.
In the next instant, the hazy, unfocused look in Caspian's eyes turned violently sharp.
He violently jerked his hand back, throwing both the glass and the woman entirely away from him, "Ugly. Get the hell away from me!"
With a loud crash, the shattering glass mixed with the woman's terrified shriek, instantly plunging the entire lounge into dead silence.
Everyone present was a master at reading the room. Someone immediately signaled the waiter to drag the weeping girl out of the room.
Another person stepped forward eagerly, "What kind of woman do you like to drink with, Young Master? I'll arrange it right away."
Caspian lowered his eyes, murmuring the sentence back to himself before speaking slowly.
"I want someone who looks pure. When she looks at you, her eyes should be damp and soft. Her voice needs to be sweet and gentle, not too loud."
He lifted his hand, gesturing below his chest to specify:
"Her height should be right around here. Her waist needs to be soft, the kind you can completely grasp with a single squeeze... Also, there needs to be a small red mole on the right side of her neck."
Before he could finish, Caspian snapped his mouth shut.
As if suddenly realizing something, his expression turned as dark as ink.
The temperature in the lounge dropped instantly, and everyone could perceive that Caspian was in a terrible mood.
People exchanged silent glances, secretly guessing whether this man was about to unleash his fury again.
Standing nearby, his closest friend, Felix, felt his eyelids twitch violently.
The person Caspian had just described was exactly Seraphina, wasn't it?
He knew a bit about the situation between the Vanderbilt brothers and Seraphina.
He also knew that Seraphina had gone to the UK after the divorce.
Caspian had already had enough of his revenge and had agreed to hand Natalia over to Christian once her surgery was finished, as Christian had requested.
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But now...
Perceiving the heavy hostility spreading around Caspian, Felix quickly changed the subject to discuss recent gossip within their high-society circle.
Yet there was always someone oblivious enough to run straight into the gunfire.
A young playboy holding a glass walked unsteadily over to Caspian, speaking with a voice reeking of alcohol, "Cas, I heard you're already tired of playing with Seraphina. When are you going to let the brothers have a taste of her?"
Failing to catch Felix's warning look, the playboy continued on his own, "To be honest, I've been craving Seraphina for more than just a couple of days. Cas, what does it feel like to sleep with Seraphina?"
The moment the words left his mouth, the entire lounge fell completely silent, everyone holding their breath.
Perhaps in the past, they would have chimed in to ask as well.
But over the last few days, Caspian had been murmuring Seraphina's name from time to time whenever he got drunk.
Anyone with half a brain knew Caspian couldn't let her go.
They were all men, so they naturally understood the ugly possessiveness deep within a man's heart.
It was exactly like a possession you didn't even care for—even if it rotted and broke, it still belonged to your territory.
No one else was allowed to touch it even once.
Caspian narrowed his eyes, a smile touching his lips. "You want to know?"
"Yeah," the playboy asked excitedly, "is she tight down there, or does her voice—"
Before he could finish, Caspian violently grabbed an empty liquor bottle from the table and smashed it right over his head.
Glass shards flew everywhere as a sharp pain struck the playboy's head, fresh blood instantly gushing from his temple and pouring down his cheek.
The playboy turned deathly pale, instantly sobering up as he stammered in terror.
"Cas... Cas! Didn't you say before... that when you were tired of her, you'd let us..."
Caspian's eyes were bloodshot, completely triggered by something. He grabbed the man's collar, pinned him to the floor, and rained punches down on him, every single blow packed with lethal force.
"My woman... who the hell do you think you are to touch her?!"
The dull thuds of fists hitting flesh, the agonizing screams, and the metallic stench of blood spreading through the air intertwined violently.
The others didn't dare to intervene, quickly slipping out of the room one after another.
Felix tried everything to pull him away but couldn't. Just when he thought someone was going to die—
Caspian stopped his hands.
Beneath the dim lights, his pale face was splattered with blood, his eyes terrifyingly hollow, as if he had just pulled himself out of some uncontrollable frenzy. It left everyone shivering with fear.
His voice was raspy, carrying a trace of drifting slowness, "What... time is it right now?"
Felix froze for a moment, unable to grasp the purpose behind his sudden question, but he still checked his watch.
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"Eleven-thirty at night."
Hearing the time, the dead silence masking Caspian's face vanished instantly, revealing a trace of sharp relief.
He raised his tone slightly, hiding a hint of anxiety, "Then I have to go home first. Seraphina set a curfew for me. I must be back before midnight, or she's going to throw a tantrum with me again."
Chapter 13
In the end, Felix still brought Caspian back to the marital villa he had shared with Seraphina.
He had already heard that Mrs. Higgins, who used to take care of the place, had left.
Caspian had stubbornly insisted that he was used to living here, even going so far as to offer ten times the market price to force Mrs. Higgins to contact Seraphina about selling the property.
Seraphina had agreed readily enough, but she had not spoken a single word to Caspian, merely relaying through the staff that she would accept the money and abandon the house entirely.
Felix helped Caspian onto the sofa, casually pulled a cashmere blanket over him, and prepared to leave.
Caspian violently threw the blanket aside, the usual hostility completely gone from his alcohol-glazed eyes, leaving behind only a dazed, vulnerable softness as he stared toward the staircase, calling out repeatedly.
"Sera, I'm home."
"Sera..."
"Sweetheart, are you asleep?"
"In the future... I won't come back this late again."
There was a trace of anxiety laced within his voice.
In a trance, his mind drifted back to the past, when he had lied to Seraphina about working late at the company when he was actually racing cars at the bay with his friends.
By the time he returned to the villa after having his fun, it was already one in the morning.
The moment he pushed the villa door open, he saw Seraphina sitting quietly on the sofa, dressed in a white lace nightgown.
The gown fell just to her knees, revealing her slender calves.
Her long hair was draped loosely over her shoulders, and the corners of her eyes flushed with a vivid crimson.
She wasn't crying, yet she exuded a sense of fragile, broken grievance, staring directly and unblinkingly at him.
That appearance of hers was as pure as a piece of soft candy, yet so alluring it made a man's heart tremble, a sight no man could possibly resist.
Caspian's throat swallowed hard. Ignoring everything else, he rushed over, pinned her against the sofa, and leaned down to kiss her.
But this time, the usually gentle girl violently pushed him away.
Caught entirely off guard, he stumbled backward, crashing against the edge of the cold coffee table.
A sudden surge of fury rushed up, and he was on the verge of snapping at her.
But he abruptly remembered his current identity, forcing himself to suppress his temper as he coaxed her with forced patience.
"What's wrong, Sera? We were perfectly fine, why won't you let me touch you?"
Seraphina didn't answer, staring straight at him.
"Christian, didn't you say you were working late at the office? Why is your forehead covered in sweat?"
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