Priceless Revenge Bought by My Billionaire Ex

Right when our high school reunion hit its peak, Carter Hayes—our former golden boy, now a ruthless billionaire—slammed his crystal wine glass onto the floor right at my feet. Red wine and shattered glass splattered across the hem of my white dress, looking just like fresh blood. "Vivian Hall," he sneered, loosening his silk tie with a cruel, mocking smirk. "I heard you specialize in entertaining wealthy old men these days." He leaned in. "How much for a night? For old time's sake, I'll book you for the whole month." The private suite fell dead silent. Every pair of eyes pierced through me like needles. I slowly knelt down, picking up the jagged shards piece by piece, ignoring the sharp edges slicing deep into my palm. Then, I looked up at him with a flawless, radiant smile. "Sure, Mr. Hayes. But my rates have gone up. I charge by the minute now. Are you sure you can afford me?" His smug expression instantly froze. Wiping the blood from my hand, I added calmly, "After all, your fiancée offered me half a million dollars last month just to carry your baby. And I turned her down." At eleven that night, I pushed open the double doors of VIP Suite 8. Thick cigar smoke mingled with heavy designer perfume, making the air stiflingly sweet. "Here she comes! The club's star has finally arrived!" Someone let out a low whistle. I wore the club's mandatory black slip dress. The silk barely covered enough skin to be considered legal. My manager had specifically ordered me to wear it, claiming tonight's guests were the highest tier of VIPs. "Vivian? Is that really you?!" A woman with curled hair gasped dramatically. "We haven't seen you since graduation! How on earth did you end up in a place like this?" I recognized her immediately. Chloe Davis. The girl who used to trail behind me in high school, kissing the ground I walked on. Now, the diamond ring glistening on her finger was massive enough to blind someone. "It pays the bills," I replied with my perfectly practiced customer service smile—eight teeth showing, pleasant and detached. "You need to pay bills in a place like this?" Carter's voice cut through the noise from the darkest corner of the room. He sat at the head of the table, his long legs crossed, a cigarette glowing between his fingers. Seven long years. He was still devastatingly handsome. Except the warmth in his eyes—the eyes that once looked at me as if I hung the stars—was completely gone. Only Arctic ice remained. "You're flattering me, Mr. Hayes," I said, offering a slight, professional bow. "I'm the VIP guest relations manager here tonight. I'm at your service." "VIP manager?" Carter let out a sharp, mocking chuckle. "Dressed like that?" Subtle snickers rippled through the room. Chloe leaned in close, her heavy floral perfume stinging my nose. "Oh, Vivian, don't be shy! We're all old friends here. We all know what happened. Word on the street is that after your dad went bankrupt, you..." She paused deliberately, letting everyone's dirty imaginations fill in the blanks. I kept my composure. "What can I get you to drink, Ms. Davis? We just received a rare vintage Burgundy." "Stop acting so classy!" Brad, a man in gold-rimmed glasses, chimed in with a leer. "Vivian, remember how untouchable you used to be? Prom queen, straight-A student, guys lined up around the block just to buy you coffee. And look at you now." His gaze crawled over my bare shoulders. "Guess at the end of the day, a woman always ends up relying on a man's wallet." Carter hadn't said a word. He just watched me. His gaze felt like a cold scalpel, peeling back my skin layer by layer. My mind involuntarily flashed back to that rainy night seven years ago. Carter had stood outside my family's gated mansion, soaked to the bone, clutching a cashier's check in his trembling hands. "Vivi, I managed to borrow some money! Thirty thousand dollars! Take it, please, just to get through this week..." I had stood behind the second-floor window, watching his stubborn silhouette in the downpour. My father's harsh roar echoed behind me: "Don't you dare go down there! What is Carter Hayes? A broke college kid! What can thirty grand do against twelve million dollars of debt? Chad Miller has agreed to bail us out—the only condition is that you marry him!" "Dad, please... I love Carter!" "Love?! Does love pay off ruthless creditors? The firm is ruined! The Millers have political power and infinite capital! What can Carter Hayes offer you? Love? How much does a pound of love cost on the market?!" That night, I never walked down the stairs. The next day, I met Carter on the rooftop of our campus library. "We're done," I said. He went pale. "What did you say?" "I'm breaking up with you." I forced my voice to stay cold, forcing myself to look straight into his crushed eyes. "My dad arranged my engagement to Chad Miller. We're from different worlds, Carter." "Different worlds?!" Carter grabbed my wrists desperately. "Vivian, you told me you'd wait for me! Wait until I graduate, wait until my startup takes off! I promised I'd give you the world!" "I don't have time to wait!" I yanked my hands back. "My father is sick, our company is dead, and I need money. Serious money. Something you'll never be able to provide." I pulled out the diamond tennis necklace Chad had bought me and dangled it in front of his face. "See this? This single necklace costs seventy-five thousand dollars. Carter, you couldn't earn this in a lifetime." His expression shifted from utter shock to agonizing despair, and finally, to complete, dead numbness. "So... you chose the money." "Yes. I chose the money." I turned around, every step feeling like walking on shattered glass. "Don't ever look for me again." That was the last time I saw him. Later, I heard he dropped out of university and vanished. Years later, news headlines broke out: Carter Hayes had built a tech and logistics empire from the ground up, took his conglomerate public, and became one of the youngest multi-billionaires in the country. And my family? My father couldn't survive the shame. The day before federal marshals seized our mansion, he jumped from the eighteenth floor. My mother suffered a mental breakdown from the trauma and has been confined to a psychiatric facility ever since, costing fifteen thousand dollars a month. And Chad Miller? Once he got bored of me, he tossed a divorce agreement in my face along with a miserable hundred-thousand-dollar settlement—barely enough to cover a fraction of the interest on my father's old debts. I fell from high-society heiress to a broke, disgraced divorcee drowning in hospital bills. That was the reality of my life."Vivian, spacing out?" Carter's deep voice dragged me back to the present. He had stood up and was now looming right in front of me. Seven years had sharpened him into a lethal, commanding force. A custom Tom Ford suit, a Patek Philippe watch worth a penthouse, and an aura of absolute dominance that money alone couldn't buy. "I heard you specialize in entertaining wealthy old men these days," he said aloud. His tone wasn't loud, but it was clear enough for every person in the room to hear. Silence fell over the suite. I lifted my chin and met his burning gaze. "Where did you hear that ridiculous rumor, Mr. Hayes?" "Does someone need to tell me?" Carter yanked his tie loose, his lips twisting into a vicious smirk. "Working in a club like this, dressed like this... aren't you displaying your price tag to the highest bidder?" Chloe giggled behind her hand. "Carter, don't be so harsh. Vivian is just doing what she has to do to survive..." "To survive?" Carter stepped closer, his chest nearly brushing against mine. "Tell me, Vivian. How much for a night? For old time's sake, I'll put you on a monthly retainer." His breath ghosted over my lips, smelling faintly of expensive scotch. The humiliating stares of my former classmates dug into my skin. I didn't flinch. Instead, I slowly bent my knees and crouched down. His wine glass had shattered completely. The dark red liquid was pooled around sharp shards, staining the hem of my club-issued white trench coat like bloodstains. I picked up the pieces of glass one by one. A jagged edge sliced right across my palm. Scarlet blood welled up, dripping down into the spilled wine. I didn't stop. The VIP room was eerily quiet, filled only with the faint clinking of glass shards in my hand. Finally, having gathered every major fragment, I squeezed them tightly in my bleeding palm. I stood back up, looking straight into Carter's furious eyes, and smiled brightly. "Sure thing, Mr. Hayes." His jaw tightened. I tilted my head, keeping my voice sweet and steady. "However, my rates have recently spiked. I charge by the minute now. One thousand dollars a minute. Are you sure your black card can handle that?" Someone gasped audibly. Carter narrowed his eyes dangerously. I pulled a cocktail napkin from the tray, casually wiped the blood from my hand, and dropped the ultimate bomb: "After all, your fiancée, Evelyn Vance, offered me half a million dollars last month just to be your surrogate. And I turned her down." Boom. The room exploded into stunned chaos. "Fiancée?! Carter is engaged?!" "Wait, Evelyn Vance from the Vance Conglomerate?!" "Surrogacy?! Are you kidding me?!" Carter's face darkened like a thundercloud. His fiancée, Evelyn Vance, indeed came to see me in secret last month. In an upscale private café, wearing oversized dark sunglasses, she had pushed a blank check toward me. "Ms. Hall, I know you're drowning in debt," she had said coolly. "Five hundred thousand dollars. Carry Carter's baby for me. He has never truly moved on from you. If our child carries half of your genetics, he'll actually love it." I had thrown an entire cup of iced Americano straight into her face. "Ms. Vance, karma always collects its debts." Turns out, karma was remarkably punctual. Suddenly, Carter lunged forward, grabbing my wrist in a grip tight enough to snap my bones. "Repeat that." Pain flared through my arm, but my smile remained razor-sharp. "I said: your fiancée, Evelyn Vance, offered me half a million dollars to carry your child." His pupils dilated in sheer shock. I took advantage of his stunned state to twist my arm out of his grasp and stepped back. "It seems you were left in the dark, Mr. Hayes. Not surprising—Ms. Vance made it very clear this was her own little project. She wanted to surprise you once the pregnancy test came back positive." I cast a sweeping glance across the room, taking in all the pale, scandalized faces of my former classmates. "So, ladies and gentlemen, do we need more wine? If not, my shift is over. After all..." I glanced at my watch, then back at Carter. "At one thousand a minute, you just wasted three minutes of my time. Shall I put three thousand dollars on your tab, Mr. Hayes?" Without waiting for an answer, I turned on my heels, pulled open the heavy suite doors, and walked out. The icy draft of the corridor slapped my face like a lifeline.I leaned against the marble wall, my palm burning with excruciating pain. Looking down, tiny glass shards were still embedded in my flesh. "Vivian." Carter's heavy footsteps echoed behind me. I didn't turn around. "Something else, Mr. Hayes? If you're looking for that monthly package, please take it up with the front desk." He stepped in front of me, blocking my path, his gaze an unreadable storm. "Was what you said in there true?" "I have the voice memo saved on my phone. Want to hear it?" I unlocked my screen. "Though, listening to it will cost you another three grand. Strictly business, no credit." Carter stared at me for a long time. Suddenly, a dry, humorless chuckle escaped his lips. "You've changed, Vivian." "People change," I said, putting my phone away. "Haven't you changed, too? Back then, you hesitated to buy a two-dollar bottle of water. Now, you smash thousand-dollar bottles of wine on the floor just to humiliate people. Having money is great, isn't it?" He went dead silent. I stepped around him, heading for the staff elevator. "I heard about your father," his voice came from behind me, tight and strained. "Back then, if only..." "There are no 'what ifs'," I cut him off, not bothering to look back. "Carter, let the past stay dead. You're the billionaire CEO of Hayes Enterprises, and I'm a club hostess. We're even." "Even?!" His voice dropped to a dangerous rasp. "How could we ever be even for what you did to me?!" I stopped, turned around, and looked right into his eyes. "What do I owe you, Carter? Youth? Love? Don't be so childish. I dumped you seven years ago, and I own that. But today, I don't owe you a single damn thing." "Then why are you working in a dump like this?!" he demanded, his voice cracking with frustration. "With your education and talent, you could easily—" "Easily what?" I laughed bitterly. "Apply for a desk job at your company? Don't make me laugh, Mr. Hayes. We don't walk the same path. We didn't back then, and we sure as hell don't now." I tugged at the thin strap of my revealing dress. "See this? This is the path I chose. I made bad choices, and I'm paying for them. But you have no right to look down on me. Because..." I stepped right into his space, dropping my voice to a sharp whisper: "When your lovely fiancée begged me to carry your baby, she looked a thousand times more pathetic than I ever will. At least I've never dropped to my knees to beg." Carter's face turned completely gray. Satisfied, I turned and walked away. This time, he didn't follow. The next morning, gossip about the incident had already spread like wildfire through the club. My general manager called me into his office, looking grim. "Vivian, do you have any idea who Carter Hayes is?" "I do," I replied flatly. "CEO of Hayes Enterprises, net worth in the billions, our biggest potential corporate client." "And you still dared to humiliate him in front of his peers?!" "He humiliated me first." The manager let out a long sigh. "I know you've got pride, Vivian, but pride doesn't pay the medical bills. Mr. Hayes called this morning. He specifically requested your exclusive presence in his private suite tonight." I raised my head. "I'm not going." "Not going?" The manager slid an envelope across the mahogany desk. "This is a fifteen-thousand-dollar cash advance from Mr. Hayes. Just show up tonight, and it's yours. What's more, he said if you serve him tonight, he'll sign our three-million-dollar annual corporate membership." I stared at the thick envelope. Fifteen thousand dollars. My mother's psychiatric care fees for next month were due in three days. Exactly fifteen thousand. "Vivian, I know about your mother's condition," the manager's tone softened. "In this city, you have to learn when to swallow your pride." I stared at the envelope for what felt like an eternity. Finally, my trembling fingers reached out and picked it up. "What time?" "Eight tonight. The usual suite." At eight o'clock sharp, I pushed open the heavy doors of VIP Suite 8 once more. This time, Carter was the only person inside. He sat casually on the leather couch, an uncorked bottle of Domaine de la Romanée-Conti sitting on the marble table.