Chapter Four - Erika
1224 Words
~Ariel’s POV~
The hallway was crowded, noisy even after I left the classroom. Students spilled into the corridor in groups, laughing, complaining, already comparing schedules like it was some kind of competition.
I hugged my bag to my chest and exhaled slowly. Somehow, I survived his class. No trip to the HOD’s office about my earlier behavior, no academic death sentence for crossing any line. Just a bruise to my pride and a very long list of questions I had no answers for.
His name still lingered in my head, Kaiden Draven, son of Mr. Kael Draven, my soon to be step brother. The one I had unknowingly shared a heated night with.
I rubbed my temple hard enough to feel the tension building up there, building faster than I wanted. I needed to get my mind off of him, at the same time I needed air.
I needed Bella.
I dug out my phone the second I stepped outside the building. Bella picked up on the first ring.
“Girl, where are you?” she asked with that dramatic gasp she always used when she was excited about absolutely nothing.
“Outside the art department,” I said, weaving through a cluster of tall guys blocking the walkway. “I’m not dead, in case you were wondering.”
“Well, that’s great. Guess whose eyes just got blessed this morning? Me. By the hottest man I have seen in months. Ariel, I swear he looked carved.”
I snorted. “You say that every week.”
“This time I mean it.”
“You always mean it.”
“Okay, but this one had, hold on, let me think—broad shoulders, veins running along his hands, and this rich-man-clean-shave thing going on.”
“Congratulations,” I said dryly. “You’ve described eighty percent of the science faculty.”
She groaned, sounding like a little child. “You’re no fun. Anyway, where are you? Have another class coming up?”
“No, just heading to the cafeteria. Can you meet me—” I stopped mid-sentence. “Wait. Bella, hold on.”
Walking toward me in slow and deliberate steps, was Erika.
Perfect. Just what I needed to completely ruin my afternoon.
Bella kept talking but I barely heard her through the phone. Erika’s friends flanked her like backup dancers with inflated egos. The smug expression on Erika’s face already told me what mood she was in.
I sighed softly, speaking into the phone. “I’ll call you back.”
“Why—”
“Just trust me, and get your ass to the cafeteria.” I ended the call before she could whine.
Erika stopped right in front of me, folding her arms under her chest. Her outfit screamed money, her tone screamed boredom with a hint of cruelty.
“Well, this is interesting,” she said. “Who let a rag into such a prestigious school?”
Her friends snickered on cue.
“Oh my God, look at her shoes,” one of them whispered loudly enough for the whole hallway to hear. “Definitely a welfie.”
“A charity case if you ask me.” the other one chipped in.
“A mistake.” Erika added, sounding louder than the rest.
The words rolled off them like they’d rehearsed it. I clenched my jaw and inhaled through my nose, refusing to give them the expression they wanted.
I stepped to the side to walk away, but Erika moved just as fast, shoving me with her shoulder. I stumbled back, the floor tilted beneath me and I braced myself for impact—
—but instead, I fell into something solid. Or rather, someone.
A steady hand caught my arm and I felt my breath hitch.
Kaiden.
He stood behind me, expression unreadable, jaw tight, eyes cold enough to freeze fire itself. Someone just as eye catching was beside him, brows raised in amusement. They both looked like they’d stepped out of a photoshoot instead of a faculty meeting.
Erika and her friends froze instantly, their arrogance evaporating like steam.
“Professor Draven,” Erika said quickly, forcing a smile. “We were just, um—”
“Playing?” Kaiden asked calmly, his tone colder than the building’s AC. “Is that what you call publicly harassing another student?”
“N-no, sir. We—”
“I’m not blind.” His voice cut through her excuses like a blade. “You three should learn the clear difference between maturity and insecurity.”
A flush crept up Erika’s neck. Her friends looked like they wanted the ground to swallow them whole.
Kaiden released my arm, stepping back as if touching me had burned him. He didn’t look at me again. He didn’t have to. The tension dripping from him said enough.
“Let’s go,” he said to the young man beside him.
They turned and walked off together, the crowd parting naturally to let them pass.
“This is a first. Since when do you intervene in a student's affair?”
“Shut it, Damian.”
I could still hear their voices even past the crowd of students flocking around, soft, definitely cold. I didn’t even get a chance to breathe before Bella’s arm hooked around mine out of nowhere.
“Oh my God,” she whispered, eyes glued to Kaiden and the person beside him as they disappeared down the hallway. “Ariel. Ariel. Who were those two hot men? And why does one of them look like he eats souls for breakfast?”
I pressed my palm to her mouth. “Please stop talking.”
She mumbled into my hand, then glared when I released her. “No, seriously. The one with the scar—”
“Bella.”
“The other with the vein—”
“Bella.”
“I’m just saying this school is already paying off.”
I sighed. “Let’s just go before I lose it.”
We walked off together, and although she chatted nonstop beside me, my mind was spinning somewhere completely different. Kaiden’s face replayed in my head every few seconds—his cold stare, the way his jaw flexed, the way he shut down the moment I touched his arm.
He meant what he said earlier in class.
“Forget that night.”
“Pretend it never happened.”
He wanted me to act like nothing existed between us, like we didn’t have the steamiest nights together.
I could almost manage that—if he didn’t look at me like I was both a mistake and a threat.
---
By the time I got home, the sun was already dipping, golden hues stretching across the open sky. The mansion’s windows caught the last bit of it, making everything look too perfect, too staged.
I plugged in one earpiece and kept the other dangling, climbing the steps slowly as my throat tightened the closer I got to the door.
I wasn’t ready for family anything. Not after today.
Not after him.
I tugged my bag higher on my shoulder, walked through the massive doors, and crossed the dining room. I was halfway to the stairs, relief washing through me—when a voice tore the air clean in half.
“Who the f**k let you in?”
- Writer
