My Online Boyfriend Lives In The Next Room Chapter 02

My Online Boyfriend Lives In The Next Room Chapter 02

I almost didn’t believe it.

It didn’t match anything I knew about him.

Alistair was cold and distant—the kind of person you didn’t even try to get close to. We’d lived together for a year, and on a good day, we maybe said three words to each other.

In real life, I was the definition of a good girl.

I’d gone straight from college into a bank job. I wore thin-framed glasses and looked exactly as boring as my job description.

And that wasn’t an act. That was really me.

The only reason the online relationship existed was because I was ghostwriting messages for my branch manager’s daughter.

Her name was Sloane Carrington, and her family had the kind of money that made a bank salary look like pocket change. The bank job was just her playing at being a normal person.

Her desk was right next to mine.

Six months ago, she decided I was going to do her flirting for her. “Laurel, I need you to seduce a guy for me.”

“What? No. I’m literally the worst person for that.”

Sloane was the kind of person who hit the clubs every night after work and treated life like one long weekend.

“This guy’s impossible. I sent him two messages and he blocked me.”

“I don’t have the patience for this slow-burn online thing.”

“I’m out every single night. When am I supposed to be texting some guy?”

“I’ll set up a new account and you talk to him for me. Once he’s hooked, hand it back.”

“Obviously, I’m not asking you to do this for free.”

“You need cash, right? Five grand up front.”

“Another five when it’s done.”

I needed the money. Badly.

So I said yes.

Sloane set up the account under her own name. The profile photo was a shot of her at a club, angled so you only saw her from the side.

Spaghetti-strap top, denim shorts cut so short they barely qualified as clothing. She was leaning against the bar in a baseball cap, gaze dropped to the drink in her hand like she didn’t know anyone was looking.

You couldn’t see her face, but the feather tattoo on the back of her shoulder was right there.

Her username: [A Single Feather].

I logged in and added her target. His username was [Crystal Clear].

Sloane made one thing very clear: I had to flirt like her, not like me. Otherwise, the whole thing would fall apart the second I handed the account back.

So I buried every good-girl instinct I had. I played it bold. Flirty. Fearless.

Three months of that before we finally made it official.

That was three months ago, and I’d been ready to hand Sloane her account back. But she said she was too busy and asked me to keep it going for three more months.

Those three months came and went.

Somewhere along the way, my once-distant online boyfriend turned clingy. Then possessive.

Once he figured out I had a thing for voices, he sent me a voice message late one night.

[Baby, do you like my voice?]

Low and husky with a cold detachment underneath—the combination was dangerous.

I dove under my covers and called him.

At first, it was just talking. But talking stopped being enough.

He gave me whatever I asked for.

If the comments hadn’t spelled it out, I never would have connected them.

Alistair’s voice in real life was cold, like he couldn’t be bothered to care. My online boyfriend was the opposite. Intense. Needy. All-consuming.

I couldn’t make the two of them fit inside the same person.