Spin the Bottle
/1/129726/coverbig.jpg?v=d952b45e9b05aae9f5803a8b2c8d4fc6)
The Hockey Prince's Secret Ice Queen
All I wanted was to find a computer genius to process the non-linear dynamic equations for my ecological model. Instead, I found myself cornered by Julian Andrews, the university's hockey prince, trading a public, staged kiss for his academic support. To finalize our "deal," I was dragged to the campus ice rink. The cheerleaders and puck bunnies immediately swarmed him, mocking my plain clothes and treating me like a pathetic joke. Brooke, the head cheerleader, even set up a figure skating competition with a date with Julian as the grand prize. She performed a basic spin, blew him a kiss, and smugly waited for me to fall flat on my face and humiliate myself. His hockey teammates laughed from the sidelines, watching me try to support Julian as he stumbled around the ice like a newborn giraffe. But as I held his warm hand to keep him from falling, I couldn't help but feel something was terribly wrong. Why was a top-tier athlete faking such awful balance? And why did his ice-blue eyes stare at me with such knowing anticipation, as if he already knew about the professional figure skating past I had spent years trying to bury? "Just let go and skate." He whispered, slowly releasing my hand. I took a deep breath, glided to the center of the rink, and landed a flawless double Axel. As the entire rink fell into a dead, shocked silence, I realized I had just exposed not only my own hidden past, but also the biggest secret of the campus god.
Chapter 1 No.1
Sage POV:
"Let me kiss you."
The request was a low, hurried murmur—warm, quiet, and laced with the faintest edge of mortification.
Stunned, I snapped my head up toward the sound.
Julian Andrews filled my vision. He easily towered a head over me, his lean, athletic frame silhouetted against the bright morning glare, casting a long shadow across the cobblestones. Briar University's star forward. Team captain. The athletic department's untouchable golden boy.
Campus rumor had it that Julian was notoriously indifferent, never sparing anyone a second glance.
Behind him, a solid wall of navy-and-gold varsity jackets blocked the brick path. His teammates were whistling, shoving each other, and effectively cutting off my only exit.
The sudden commotion immediately bottlenecked the morning foot traffic. Whispers rippled through the crowd, and within seconds, a dozen students reached into their pockets out of sheer muscle memory, black camera lenses catching the light as they aimed squarely at us.
Julian's sharp eyes tracked the movement, his jaw tightening into a hard, irritated line.
Before I could take a single defensive step back, he closed the distance between us. Leaning down into my space, his broad shoulders shifted in a subtle, fluid maneuver—throwing up an impenetrable physical wall that completely shielded my face from the intrusive glare of the cameras.
His sharp, striking face hovered breathtakingly close. His deep baritone brushed against my ear, lost to the autumn wind, meant for me alone:
"Sorry to drop this on you," he whispered, his pale blue eyes disarmingly earnest, holding a quiet heat that sent a tremor straight down my spine. "The guys backed me into a locker-room dare... but I'm not here to use you as a joke. We can fake it. Angle it so it looks real—whatever you're comfortable with. Just help me get them off my back, and I owe you one."
It was only then that my brain finally rebooted.
What on earth? He's actually trying to kiss me?
A sharp flare of pure absurdity hit me, and my gaze dropped to my reflection in the dark glass door of the adjacent building: an oversized, faded gray hoodie that swallowed my frame whole, soft, thin jeans worn at the knees, bare-faced dark circles carved beneath my eyes from forty-eight hours of non-stop coding, my dark hair hastily twisted into a cheap plastic claw clip, and a pair of oversized, thick black-rimmed glasses sitting heavy on the bridge of my nose, completely hiding my face.
I looked like a refugee from an all-night disaster. How had Briar's golden prince ended up in front of me?
When I looked back up, my breath trapped in my throat anyway. He was too close, his clean scent of winter mint and cedar wrapping around my senses. Having those pale blue eyes staring straight down at me made my chest tighten in a way I really didn't want to acknowledge.
"Clock's ticking, Cap!" Landon howled from the sidelines, hands cupped around his mouth as the rest of the players lost their minds laughing. "Plant one on her, or enjoy the five-AM bag skate!"
A raucous chorus of barks and chest-thumping went up from the team.
A few yards away, two girls heading toward the dining hall froze in their tracks, pointing their phones.
"Wait, who the hell is that?" one of them laughed loudly, zooming her camera in on my face. "She looks like she just crawled out of a dumpster. There's no way Julian's actually kissing her. Post it on Sidechat right now—this is going straight to number one."
The cruel words hit like a splash of ice water, snapping me out of my daze and instantly killing the stupid flutter in my chest.
I hated the attention.
Four years ago, after my family and my former training partner framed me and destroyed my competitive skating career, I swore I would never be public entertainment again. I buried my name, switched majors, and hid behind oversized fleece and thick glasses just to live an invisible life. If I ended up on the campus forums with Julian Andrews, the internet vultures would dox me before noon—and drag up the toxic scandal I had bled to walk away from.
My research was already on the verge of falling apart. I didn't have time for this circus.
I locked my grip around my heavy binders, my knuckles straining white.
"Find someone else for your dare, Andrews," I said coldly, taking a step back to put distance between us, my voice tight with adrenaline. "I'm not interested in being part of your game. Move."
I kept my head down, attempting to brush past him.
"You're Sage Kelley, right?"
The sound of my name brought my boots to an immediate halt.
I blinked up at him, caught completely off guard.
"Professor Beaumont's senior research student," Julian straightened up slightly, his cadence measured and even, carrying an intellectual sharpness that seemed impossible beneath a varsity jacket. "I saw your Havenwood Creek senior capstone proposal sitting on his desk over Sunday dinner."
My heart gave a hard, hollow thud. Professor Beaumont was my academic advisor—and the guardian of the final research endowment my late father had left behind.
Julian leaned in slightly, his voice dropping to a near-whisper against the whistle of the wind. "I spent an hour going over your codebase."
My lips parted. "You... read my proposal?"
"Your simulation keeps crashing because your core fluid algorithm strategy is flawed," Julian murmured, his pale blue eyes deadly sharp. "And Uncle Des mentioned that if you don't deliver a working version by this Friday, the department is pulling your grant—which means you don't clear your senior thesis, and you don't graduate in May."
The hair on the back of my neck stood on end.
Friday was the deadline. If the funding was pulled, the project died, my senior capstone failed, and I would be forced to stay another semester without my degree. Worse, my father's final ecological legacy would be reduced to scrap paper.
I had been panicking over that exact deadline for two days straight, and Julian had just laid it out like it was nothing.
Worse, I couldn't even brush him off. I had heard the rumors about Beaumont's nephew—the CS prodigy everyone in the department talked about. I just had never realized it was him.
"I know how to fix your algorithm," Julian stated plainly, laying his cards on the table, his gaze locking onto mine with an unshakeable, quiet certainty. "Help me get through this bet. In return, I'll rewrite your boundary calculations tonight. Deal?"
/0/23056/coverbig.jpg?v=ca1982578059e4dc1ae1cfdc7f33fda3)
Spin the Bottle
It all started with a kiss during the game of spin the bottle. * When Stephanie Valentine - a wallflower who only focuses on getting good grades for college - goes to her first high school party in senior year, she hopes nothing crazy happens. But then she somehow ends up in the same room with Ch
/0/5443/coverbig.jpg?v=8d3af310aa9fbc2bcb3a7933f4cdc619)
/0/11740/coverbig.jpg?v=c1477cbcf9aeee33e2b7c18c2f8ca033)
/0/24275/coverbig.jpg?v=6aa70c46155bf7501066c5d3f427f89e)
Cruden Tale (Awakening Spin Off)
Leyanne Cruden is a very old yet powerful witch in present day who is dissatisfied with the world as we know it. An immortal who stopped ageing in her late twenties. She has lived through so much and lost so many that it has jaded her personality and she no longer knows if she is good or bad. A vis
/0/9595/coverbig.jpg?v=0db1b8c07cbb8a137709bfaf66dd5738)
The Brass Bottle: A Farcical Fantastic Play in Four Acts
This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preservin
/0/18231/coverbig.jpg?v=baf7388257bd58889dba5a3037b6fb03)
I Rule the Underworld
Once a mediocre man, and now a powerful Yama. His name is Evan Ye, the overlord of the underworld. He commands deceased historical figures and countless heroes from movies and cartoons. The sole purpose of his minions, whether it be the fearsome characters of computer games or the beautiful, sexy fe
/0/18482/coverbig.jpg?v=cab7f99796a207c586db0721bfc523b3)
Genius Twins And Their Mother
Lancy, a daughter of a wealthy family, is sold to an agent organization. During a mission, she is seriously injured and lost her consciousness. Years later she wakes up, unexpectedly finding that she has boy/girl twins. Her six-year-old boy is smart, with excellent business thinking; the girl is goo
/0/18510/coverbig.jpg?v=5e2bd42482281165f5c3d0f39d9ef28d)
Forever And Always
Twenty year old Viola's life seems to have bloomed into happiness as she proposes to her fiance at her birthday party. However, the man she thinks is in love with her turns out to be an extremely cruel husband, who takes control of her life after tying the knot. Expelled from the school, and humilia
/0/18080/coverbig.jpg?v=92077f1de15d5cf7aa84d8377d333bc1)
Trapped with the Lawyer
Trapped series - Episode II: Trapped with the Lawyer. It all starts on that fateful night, when Ella, who is the dear sister of Samuel’s best buddy, sneaks into the hotel where the drunken Samuel resides and gets pregnant… “I don’t want a divorce! I don’t want a divorce! I did no such thing!”
/0/22021/coverbig.jpg?v=4cb57f9f1a67930f06ff97b3761b0f0c)
The Vampire's Omega
Tearing her clothes into two halves he asked, "Who did these to you, who hurt you" His voice rang through her ears, filling the room with anger, which emitted with the desire to kill, and truly, he was going to rip who so ever that had caused these injury on her. "Bella speak" His voice calm but t
/0/32272/coverbig.jpg?v=8b9197dd01d9380fd681906941a89488)
Wolves And Vampires
The story of a Lycan and his Mate, and the devil who threatened to tear them apart. And the story of Three powerful vampire Kings and their fragile mate. Mysteries, the darkness of the past, and storms ahead, Can any of them make it to their final destination? Or they will get lost in the waves of t
/0/35991/coverbig.jpg?v=c9a2a14badac786d0b209334060f4bd5)
Mighty Super-rich Heir
Ever since I was a child, I had always been poor. Every time I came home from school, I would be met with the sight of my father busying himself in the kitchen. From my earliest recollection, I would always remember my father wearing his old factory uniforms in the house. His hair was snow-white an
/0/32517/coverbig.jpg?v=0af252b4cabc74c5b67dfcf70f02e4de)
Billionaire's Abandoned Love Slave
"You look so fucking sexy with your mouth wrapped around my cock," Ryan groaned, increasing the speed of his thrusts into my mouth. I moaned at his praise as I widened my mouth. And a split second later, he filled my mouth with his warm release. I smirked as I gazed up seductively at him and licke
/1/107558/coverbig.jpg?v=40b564db5c700ee3c142abc4e9281e67)
The Mute Bride's Secret Billionaire Contract
I woke up with a throbbing pressure behind my eyes and the taste of metallic champagne in my throat. Instead of my cramped apartment, I was draped in expensive silk under a ceiling the color of a storm cloud. A pear-shaped black diamond sat heavy on my finger, and a document on the nightstand confi
/0/75843/coverbig.jpg?v=d4a95b2505f79b6620d063905b7fb5a9)
HIS MALE SLAVE IS A WOMAN
To the ruthless Alpha Ashen Vladimir III, loyalty is everything,and disobedience is death. So when a sharp-tongued male slave named Nicholas is sent to serve in his brutal court as a server boy Ashen doesn't expect defiance... or attraction. But "Nicholas" is no ordinary slave. She is Nicolette Si
/0/25097/coverbig.jpg?v=37577a1327a2fba54e85087d0e53448f)
Survive among the Vikings
Can true love overcome all the pitfalls of destiny? The Vikings invaded the village where Rosalie lived. They murdered children and the elderly and abducted young women and strong men to their country to sell them into slavery. At the slave market, Rosalie is bought by a spirited young jarl. What wi
/0/33016/coverbig.jpg?v=8ab436c74892e222dfe90a543af34310)
Loved By A Star
A boy falls in love with a girl he once hated because of her pomposity...he then faces the test of letting her know his feelings
/0/16069/coverbig.jpg?v=c53f77ac19b010d7131ee1a4c70731db)
/0/84441/coverbig.jpg?v=c689b5b3cabee2b2484b7d8396a4b936)
Too Late For Their Love: The North Star Shines Bright
My biological parents were tech billionaires, yet for me, Sarah Miller, every penny was a battleground. They preached "character" and "tough love," while lavishing everything on Ashley, their "perfect" adopted daughter, who got whatever she wanted. On SAT day, a torrential storm hit. I desperat
