A/N: A chapter in a little over a week! For once, I haven't procrastinated. Sorry about the time cues; for some reason, my dividers never show up, so to separate the scenes, I have to write in stuff like, "Later that night." Anyone know how to get dividers to show up? Also, I bumped the rating up to M, just to be safe. Thanks to my wonderful reviewers from last chapter, Nellyka, BimboBoop, Princess Persephone, SaturnineSunshine, 3venst4r, tvrox12, Edwardslover09, M, guardian izz, and TriGemini. You guys are the best!

The day before Blair's seventeenth birthday, Eleanor Waldorf paid a visit to her daughter's bedroom with exciting news.

"The Archibalds will be here tonight for dinner. Anne is bringing the ring." The ring. It was practically all that Eleanor ever talked about. From what it looked like, the prized Vanderbilt heirloom would finally sparkle on Blair's hand tonight, and the Waldorfs' prospects had never looked rosier. A diamond ring led to a marriage and a marriage led to the end of their financial woes.

Even though Blair had long dreamed of this moment, she was anything but hopeful. Ever since Blair had learned of Nate's infidelity, their relationship had been on a nosedive. To say it was beyond repair was an understatement.

"Will Nate be here?," she said flatly. She knew Nate had even less to do with this engagement than she did.

"Of course. He is going to look so handsome by your side."

"Mother," Blair spun around on her seat in order to face her. "There's something you need to know before we do this." She took a deep breath. "Nate and I—we haven't been right lately. I'm not sure if we'll even stay together for much longer, since we—"

"But that's impossible. You and Nate were meant to be." Meant to be. They had heard that practically since birth. Blair looked up at her mother with pleading eyes, but Eleanor was resolutely closing her mind to argument. Blair tried again.

"The thing is, I don't know anymore."

"So you've hit a rough patch. You'll work through it. Just come to dinner tonight." There was a tone of finality in the way she voiced the last statement. Blair knew she was going to dinner. There was no question about it.

Later that night.

Despite the promise it heralded, Blair was distinctly dreading this dinner. She had bathed and changed into the mint green dress Eleanor had specially designed for that night. Ironically, Eleanor had insisted that Blair wear her grandmother's pearl necklace, which, unbeknowest to her, had actually been bought by Chuck Bass a little over a year ago.

Blair delicately fingered the smooth pearls, a slow fire burning somewhere deep inside of her as she thought of their heated encounter on the rooftop. If only Kati and Is hadn't interrupted them; what would have happened then? If she closed her eyes, she could almost feel his gentle touch on her cheek. If she tried hard enough, she could almost recall his heady scent and the feeling of his warm breath before her mouth. This is madness, she thought. To think such things about Chuck Bass! She shook her head and began applying an uncharacteristically sultry, dark red shade of lipstick to her pout.

When the Archibalds arrived, Blair descended the staircase regally. Even if her mother was auctioning her off like a prized pig, she was still a Waldorf. Nate looked at her and nodded, but did not smile. He was standing as far apart from the Captain as possible, and Blair immediately knew something was up from the stiff, leaden manner in which both men were standing.

"Howard, Anne, delightful to see you again," Eleanor Waldorf said, as she swept into the room to greet them.

"The pleasure is all mine, Eleanor," the Captain replied, as Eleanor shook hands with all three of her guests.

"Can I interest you in a drink?"

"Certainly. Celebratory drinks for us all." Once they were seated, the adults began to talk business. Blair plastered on a perpetual smile and stared at a spot on Anne Archibald's seat for the next two hours as living arrangements were hashed out, the wedding was discussed, yadda yadda yadda. Nate seemed to have fallen into an open-eyed coma. Then the ring was unveiled in all of its dazzling glory.

"Why don't we let her try it on for size?" suggested the Captain. Before she could protest, her arm had been pulled over and the ring shoved into her hand. Aware that all eyes were now on her, Blair slipped it onto her ring finger and held it out for the room to see.

It was too big. Only Blair knew this, for she held her hand completely still, and for all intents and purposes, it appeared to fit.

"Perfect," Anne Archibald said.

"Like it was made for her finger.

"She feels like an Archibald already."

"She certainly does," crowed Eleanor.

"I just think Blair will be a marvelous addition to our family. She'll uphold the old Archibald name. Shape up our Nate and make him a real man, right, son?" Nate looked up moodily at his dad, who let out a nervous chuckle and clapped him on the back.

"Can I talk to you in private…father?" Nate said, brow furrowed and eyes steely.

"Of course, son." He smiled to the ladies. "We'll be just a second." Blair returned to her staring game with the chair as her mother and Anne Archibald carried on a pleasant conversation about something that was boring her to tears until she heard angry voices coming from the room Nate and his father had just entered.

"You have a problem, Dad!"

"You don't know what you're talking about!"

"Stop lying, Dad!"

"Look, kid, I'm your father. You ought to treat me with more respect than that!" Suddenly the door burst open and both men stalked out.

"Where are you going?" Nate yelled.

"I'm going out for a walk. Don't follow me." Ignoring his last command, Nate entered the lift hot on his heels, and it descended, their angry voices disappearing with the car.

"What ever was that about?" Eleanor wondered aloud.

"Let's just leave it to the men." Anne said lightly, though her face belied her calm statement. Five minutes of awkward silence passed before Blair decided to pipe up.

"Should I go check on them?" she offered.

"No need," Anne Archibald said right as Eleanor said, "Good idea." Anne laughed a little.

"That's quite alright, Blair. Go ahead," she finally said.

The sight that Blair met as she stepped out of her building was straight out of a movie. Captain Archibald was leaning forward against the side of a police car, his hands cuffed behind him and his nose bleeding as if someone had smashed it. Nate was glaring at his back, an angry red mark on his face. Had they been fighting? Blair's head was spinning.

"Nate?" she said, laying a timid hand on his arm. He spun around quickly, as if bracing himself for an attack, but stopped as he saw her frightened face. "What happened?" He shook his head.

"You can tell me. I'm your girlfriend."

"No, Blair."

"But I bet you would be happy to tell Serena." His eyes quickly met hers, further proving the point.

"Nate. Do you love me?" she asked. When he merely looked down, she could no longer breathe. So this was it. But before she walked away, she had to be certain.

She stepped closer to him, gently taking his arm and placing his hand on her cheek, in the same position in which Chuck had laid his own hand that night at the masquerade. She closed her eyes, stood on her tiptoes, and dragged his mouth to hers. She waited for the fireworks, for that searing, pleasureful pain that she had long dreamed of, but instead, she only felt his lips mashed against hers. Their lips were touching, but it was not a kiss. They remained pressed together like that for five seconds, before they broke apart and she fell back on her feet.

She looked down, disappointed that her long-planned movie kiss had not turned out to be as life-changing as she had thought it would. Nate just looked confused. They both stood there, unsure of what to do.

"I have to go back inside and get my mother," Nate mumbled.

"Isn't Chuck's speakeasy opening tonight?"

"Yeah, tell him I said hi." Nate slipped back inside the building, hands in the pocket of his coat.

Blair hadn't planned on attending Chuck's opening party, but it was that or heading back to the circus act inside…She suddenly noticed the limo waiting for Nate parked a little down the street, and a jolt of excitement leapt through her. She made up her mind in a flash. Arthur held the door open for her with a smile as she slid in.

Never in her wildest dreams could Blair have imagined that she could go from her mother's posh engagement party to Chuck's sleazy speakeasy in less than an hour. But here she was, sitting next to Chuck on a couch stained with Godknowswhat watching a bevy of scantily-clad women shake their goods onstage.

Despite the forwardness of the women, Chuck was completely focused on Blair. He watched the way she slammed down her drinks, the way she sized up the dancers before her, the way she toyed with the pearl necklace he had bought with her slender white fingers.

When she had entered the speakeasy and told him quite bluntly that she and Nate were over, his mind had lurched to a stop. Sure, Nate and Blair had never been right for each other, but their miserable relationship had been a constant since the third grade. Chuck didn't know what to make of this recent development. Blair turned to him now, pervading his thoughts.

"I remember you mentioning this place a long time ago."

"It was a year ago."

"Victrola," she said, and in her mouth the name sounded sultry and exotic. "But you just bought it."

"Let's just say the owner needed some persuasion. But I got it in the end." Chuck Bass always got what he wanted. They both took a drink as the dancer on stage wrapped a feather boa around her bare top half.

"Look, can I ask what happened with Nate?"

"We were getting engaged," Blair began. "And I realized..." She couldn't say this. If she said it, it would be true. She took a deep breath and plowed on.

"I realized we don't love each other."

"We?"

Blair was silent.

When the last woman had left the stage and the crowd had thinned to nothing, Blair presented her notes to Chuck.

"The blond one can't dance worth a damn."

"But she's really popular with the downtown crowd."

"Then she needs to be taught. And the girl after her needs to hold back. Leave them wanting more."

"Since when are you such an expert on dance?"

"You may not know it, Bass. But I got moves." He turned to her, a smile on his lips.

"You know what?" Blair didn't bother asking "what". She knew where this was headed. "I'd like to see you dancing up there." There was a slight pause, but a pause nonetheless. Chuck raised his eyebrows at her, not fully believing that she could be considering it.

"I bet you would," she said finally, though she made no move to get up. He was caught off guard by the flirtacious nature of her tone. Normally, he would be bracing himself for a good smack by now. Amazingly, the battle was already half-won.

"Come on. No one's even around to see you."

"Except for you."

"I never thought Blair Waldorf would be one to refuse a challenge." She turned to give him a bored look. He knew immediately that he had said the magic words, and now, oh God, was she really going to do it?

"Guard my drink," she said, leaping to her feet and taking the stage. He leaned back, hardly believing his luck. He had expected to maybe take home one of the dancers for a night's fun, but instead, he was enjoying his own private burlesque dance by the Upper East Side's undisputed queen. Even though he wouldn't get any action tonight, this was completely worth it in his book.

It didn't take him long to realize that she wasn't lying. The sensual way she swayed her hips seemed so natural to her that Chuck wondered how he had never noticed it before. She knew exactly where to put her hands, to tease his eyes, his imagination, testing his patience with a tiny smile on her lips. She seemed to be one with the music, every pounding beat accompanied by a simultaneous roll of her hips. With her back to him and her arms lifted gracefully in the air, she was a vision.

Her eyes still fixed on his, she removed the scarf tied around her head and threw it at him. He caught it, rubbing the silky material between his fingers and imagining her flawless skin beneath his fingertips instead. Her deft fingers gently grasped the tiny zipper on the side of her dress, inching it down, down, so tantalizingly slow. Then her dress was in a pool at her feet, and with one swift kick of her heels, she had brushed it aside.

She was now standing before him in nothing but a slip and his pearls, her skin bared to his sight. Sometime during her routine, he had gotten up from his seat and moved towards the stage, entranced. He had to admit it, the sight of Blair casting her clothes off before him was…arousing. What a night! Not only had The Couple broke up, but now the virgin of his adolescent dreams had blossomed into a sensuous, powerful woman before him.

She turned her head, her eyes scorching his with a fire and vivacity he had never seen in her before. She smiled and and beckoned him with her finger. Chuck didn't have to think twice. In one movement, he was on the stage, she sighing in his arms, their bodies pressed together as if all of the space between them was irrelevant. Their faces were dizzingly close, and then…then he quenched the distance between their lips and they were both blinded by the explosions bursting behind their eyelids. For a second, he was frozen in the moment, lost in the feeling of her lips desperately moving under his. This was a kiss both would never forget. As their lips began a passionate tug-of-war, he carried her in his arms back to the plush sofa they had previously vacated. He laid her tenderly along the velvet, their bodies still fused together by the mouth.

When she began unbuttoning his shirt with frantic fingers, his eyes widened. Could she really want to…with him? He broke apart, searching her face in confusion. However, he could find no trace of hesitation in her gaze, only two eyes black with lust.

"Are you sure?" he whispered.

She gave him a coquettish grin and reached up for another lip-bruising kiss. This time, however, he had no qualms, and met her lips with unparalleled ferocity. The now-empty room was soon filled with their tender words and soft moans.

She was everything he had expected and more. When he planted soft, wet kisses along her neck, inhaling the mere scent of her, she let out a wonderful sigh of pleasure, murmuring his name. When his tongue reached the tips of her breasts, she let out a long moan, burying her hands in his dark hair and pressing his head down for more. And when he entered her, the sound of her cries, his name screamed out, her ecstatic noises reaching the ceiling thrilled every nerve in his body, and Chuck knew then that she had made the most beautiful sound in the world.

The experience wore both of them out; even Chuck who was known throughout the city for his boundless energy in bed. They lay there in the dim light together, their bodies lush with sweat and the juices of their pleasure. Sleep was claiming them; Blair watched as Chuck's eyes slowly drifted shut. Blair resisted her body's determination to rest, for her mind was spinning with thought.

She had done it. After years of chasing Nate around and planning her special night with all of her meticulousness and rigor, she had just lost it to Chuck Bass. She smiled in spite of herself; she would be lying if she had said it wasn't good. It had been, in fact, nothing short of amazing. The side of her that had awakened tonight was sorely tempted to rouse the boy beside her and partake in it again and again.

Speaking of Chuck…she looked at him nervously. He looked so peaceful now, but when he woke up, she knew what he would say. He would never let her live this down. Chuck Bass, who had stripped hundreds of girls of their virginities. Chuck Bass, who constantly bragged of his conquests, of the girls he had slept with, then ditched. That Chuck Bass. She would be one of those girls now.

Blair buried her face in her hands. Oh, God. What have I done? I've thrown it all away. The sound of him softly snoring beside her made her focus on the task at hand. Tonight never happened. If Blair pretended nothing had changed between them, well then, the sex had never occurred. She was still technically a virgin, right? Wrong.

She carefully removed Chuck's hand from her waist and slipped off of the sofa silently. There was nothing left to do but run. She had to do it, before he ran out on her first.

Thankfully the door was well-oiled, and her escape was undetected. The air outside was chilly, and she rubbed her hands over her bare arms. She thought of what she looked like with a whimper of embarrassment—disheveled curls, smeared makeup, a thin slip the only scrap of clothing on her. All Chuck's doing.

A few tears slipped from her eyes, as she rode home alone in a cab.

Chuck slept soundly that night in Victrola, dreaming of the girl he had finally made his, never realizing that his arms were wrapped around air.

A/N: I am definitely not good at writing smut. Just reading this knowing that I wrote it makes me blush. Hopefully, I'll get better at it. Unfortunately, I will be out of state for an internship for the next three weeks, so I don't know how often I'll be able to update. I'll try to do it at least once during that time, but I don't know yet how busy my days will be. Thanks for hanging in there through seven chapters! Every one of your reviews makes me smile.