One Night Stand, Eight Surprises: Pampered by My CEO Husband --- - Chapter 3: Chapter 3

The neon lights of Las Vegas blurred past the taxi window as Arielle pressed her forehead to the cool glass. It wasn’t the Vegas she’d always imagined—bright, glittering, full of laughter and wild dreams. This version felt loud, too fast, too loud, too empty.
Her heart pounded like a second pulse behind her ribs.
She hadn’t meant to come here. It had been impulsive, the kind of reckless decision she never made. Her best friend had canceled last minute, and the hotel room was already paid for. After a year filled with loss—her mother’s death, a broken engagement, and a job that drained her soul—she’d needed a break. Just forty-eight hours to forget she existed.
But now, alone in a city that smelled like desperation and expensive perfume, she wasn’t sure what she was doing here at all.
The driver dropped her off at the entrance of a high-rise hotel whose name she barely remembered booking. She tipped too much, because she didn’t want him to see how her hands were trembling. She took the elevator to the twenty-third floor and entered the suite.
It was far nicer than she expected—soft sheets, a skyline view, gold-rimmed bar glasses. She dropped her purse on the dresser, kicked off her heels, and stood by the window. Her reflection stared back at her—twenty-three, tired, trying so hard not to fall apart.
She was lonely.
Utterly and achingly lonely.
And that’s when she made the second reckless decision of the night.
Downstairs, the hotel lounge glowed dim and golden, alive with the hum of low conversation and soft jazz. Men in tailored suits laughed into their whiskey glasses. Women with legs like sin perched on bar stools. Arielle walked in slowly, feeling like she didn’t belong.
She wore a black dress she hadn’t touched since college, lips painted red like armor. She didn’t know what she was looking for—just that she didn’t want to feel invisible for one more night.
She ordered a drink.
Then she saw him.
He was at the far end of the bar, a dark suit stretched over broad shoulders, white shirt undone at the collar. He looked expensive. Dangerous. Alone. The air around him shimmered with power, the kind that didn’t need to be announced.
Their eyes met.
It was electric.
She looked away first, heat rising in her neck. But a moment later, he was beside her. Close enough to smell the faint trace of expensive cologne, clean skin, and something darker underneath.
“Is this seat taken?” he asked.
His voice was smooth, deep, and casually commanding. The kind of voice you didn’t forget.
“It is now,” she said before she could stop herself.
He smiled. And then they talked.
About nothing and everything—what brought her to Vegas (“Just needed to disappear”), what he did for a living (“I fix things,” he said vaguely), where he was from (he didn’t say). No names. No pasts.
It felt like a dream.
By the time they finished their third drink, the air between them was charged. Every glance was a question. Every touch of fingers against a glass was a promise.
He leaned in. “Let’s get out of here.”
Arielle’s breath caught. She hesitated for one heartbeat.
Then nodded.
The hotel suite he took her to wasn’t his. It was too sterile, too anonymous. It felt perfect.
He kissed her like he was starving. His hands were large, warm, skilled—mapping her body as if he needed to memorize every inch.
She responded in kind, her fears unraveling with every button he unfastened. She clung to him like salvation, because for one night, she didn’t want to be strong. She didn’t want to carry the weight of her own life.
She wanted to be wanted.
Clothes fell like whispers.
The air turned thick with heat.
There were no words left between them—just gasps, moans, the rustle of sheets and the slap of skin. She cried out as he moved within her, her body arching with need. He held her like he was afraid she’d disappear. They moved like two pieces that finally fit.
It was urgent. It was raw. It was beautiful.
It was everything.
Later, when the night cooled and he slept beside her, his back to the city lights, Arielle watched him. Memorizing his face. The line of his jaw. The softness he wore only in sleep.
She wanted to ask his name. She wanted to tell him hers.
But she didn’t.
Because she knew this was just one night.
No regrets.
No strings.
When she woke up, the other side of the bed was cold.
He was gone.
All that was left was a folded note on the nightstand: “Thanks for the escape.”
No name. No number.
And that was the night she conceived the greatest surprise of her life—eight lives, born of passion, born of silence.
Now, years later, that same man
had walked into her life again. And he still didn’t know.
But he would.
The clock was ticking.