Maya materialized at his elbow, chuckling at the reluctance written all over his face.
Maya Scarlett: the rambling, disaster-magnet whoâd helped him to escape out of a construction-site kidnapping, the only person outside his harem he trusted with the jagged truth of his life, the one whoâd spent weeks watching him disappear into empty classrooms or bathrooms with Sierra and Maddie wearing that patient,
starving-wolf
expression she thought was subtle.
"Come on, pretty boy," she said, hooking her arm through his with shameless confidence. "Canât hide forever."
"Watch me."
"Nope. In we go."
She tugged.
He let her.
Every step toward those doors felt like walking onto a stage lit by a thousand
judgmental suns.
The doors swung open.
And oh boy.
The entire cafeteria went dead quiet.
Five hundred heads swiveled in perfect, eerie synchronization. Conversations died mid-sentence. Forks hovered halfway to mouths. Someoneâs phone clattered to the table.
Every pair of eyes locked onto him
And Paradiseâpoor, unsuspecting Paradiseâwould never be the same.
Not a slow freeze, not a ripple of attention spreading outward like polite gossip. No. It was instantaneous.
Brutal.
As if some cosmic remote had slammed the pause button on three hundred privileged teenagers mid-bite.
Every head snapped toward him in perfect, horrifying unison.
Every conversation died with a strangled gasp.
Every pair of eyesâthree hundred pairs, give or take, in Ashford Eliteâs vaulted, cathedral-ceilinged feeding templeâlocked onto Phei Maxton like heâd just descended from Olympus wearing nothing but charisma and mild irritation.
Some wereâpredatory, awestruck, envious, hungry, terrified, worshipful.
Prey and predator and main event, all rolled into one unfairly beautiful package.
The Dragon had entered the building.
The silence stretched exactly two heartbeats.
Then reality shattered.
"Oh my godâ"
"Itâs him, itâsâ"
"PHEI!"
A girl at the nearest table launched upright so violently her chair toppled backward, clattering into the shin of the boy behind her. She didnât notice. Didnât care. Just stood there clutching her chest like sheâd been shot by Cupidâs entire arsenal, eyes shining with the manic gleam of someone teetering on the edge of religious conversion.
"Heâs here," she whispered, voice cracking.
"Heâs actually here."
The dam broke.
Whispers detonated into a roaring tidal wave of hysteria.
"I thought he was absent todayâ"
"Someone swore he had monoâ"
"Do I look okay? Shit, is there kale in my teethâ"
"Move, youâre blocking the shotâ"
Phones materialized like conjuring tricks. Dozens. Hundreds. The cafeteria strobed with camera flashes, turning the marble floors into a paparazzi red carpet from hell.
A sophomore girl vaulted onto her table for elevation. Her tray went flyingâsoup arced beautifully through the air like modern art. Her friends didnât scold her. They climbed up too, forming a human pyramid of desperation.
"Smile! Please smile for us!"
"Over here! Phei, look over here!"
"PHEI! PHEI, I LOVE YOU!"
They were screaming his name.
Screaming it like he was the main dancer of a world-tour K-pop group whoâd just landed at Incheon. Like he was BTS surrounded by an ARMY of fans at the airport. Like he was Jesus Christ returnedâif Jesus had cheekbones sharp enough to cut glass and a rumored body count that included two Legacy princesses.
Pheiâs left eye twitched.
"Maya."
"Yeah?"
"What the actual, entire fuck is this."
Mayaâtraitorous, delighted Mayaâwas biting her lip so hard it was a miracle she hadnât drawn blood. Her shoulders shook with barely contained laughter. That patient, wolfish hunger she usually wore around him had been temporarily evicted by pure, unadulterated glee at his expense.
"Welcome to idol life, superstar," she managed, voice wobbling. "Shouldâve stayed in your cave, dragon boy."
"I was perfectly happy in my cave. You kidnapped me."
"And I regret absolutely nothing."
A cluster of junior girls had formed an impromptu barricade near the salad bar. Not hostileâjust... stationary. A wall of glossy hair and designer perfume, all staring at him with tear-streaked devotion. Several were openly crying.
Actual saltwater tears.
Over a boy walking to get lunch.
"Excuse me,"
Phei said, attempting a polite sidestep.
One of them let out a sound like a kettle realizing it had been left on the stove too long. Another seized her friendâs arm in a death grip that would leave fingerprints for days.
"He spoke to me,"
the first one hissed, reverent.
"He said âexcuse me.â To me. Did you hear his voice? Did youâ"
"I WAS STANDING RIGHT HERE, I HEARD EVERY SYLLABLEâ"
"Itâs even better up close, Iâm not okay, Iâm never going to be okay againâ"
"I think Iâm going to faint. Someone catch me if Iâ"
She did not faint, but she did
sway dramatically
, and her friends propped her up like sheâd been wounded in battle.
"Someone should remind if Iâm in a wrong country...
this is not America."
Phei navigated the gauntlet with the grim focus of a man defusing bombs, hyperaware that one sudden movement might trigger a full-scale riot.
He made it ten whole feet before the next ambush.
A girl stepped directly into his pathâpretty, brown hair, green eyes, the kind of symmetrical face that wouldâve ruled the school if Phei hadnât accidentally rewritten the hierarchy. Now she looked like a pilgrim presenting an offering, hands trembling as she held out a box.
Pink. Heart-shaped. Extravagant ribbon curled with surgical precision. A tag in elegant calligraphy:
For Phei âĄ
"Phei,"
she breathed, like his name was sacred scripture.
"...Yes?"
"IâI made you something."
She thrust the box forward as if it might explode if held too long.
"Chocolates,"
she rushed on, cheeks crimson. "Handmade. Wellâmy familyâs pastry chef supervised, but I chose every flavor myself. Dark chocolate with sea salt, milk with raspberry infusion, white with matcha andâ"
"Thank you,"
Phei said, because murder was still frowned upon in Paradise, and what else was there?
Her face ignited like a sunrise.
"Youâre welcome! I meanâthank you for accepting them! I meanâ" She made a small, mortified squeak. "I rehearsed this for three hours in the mirror and now your eyes are looking into mine and theyâre unfairly blue and IâI have to goâ"
She
bolted.
Full sprint, nearly bulldozing a freshman carrying a tray of sushi in her panic to flee the consequences of her own courage.
So... cute, theyâre all so
cute.
He thought a slime dancing on his lips watching her leave.