Falling for My Elite Rival

CHAPTER THREE; The Betrayal

I can't breathe.

The room spins around me as the words on his phone screen burn into my mind, etched into my retina in brilliant, glaring white against the dark glass.

Her USB is destroyed. The scholarship is yours, Enzo.

Enzo snatches the phone off the desk, his knuckles turning stark white as he shoves it deep into his pocket, but it’s too late. He sees the horror and realization dawning on my face.

"Mara—" he starts, standing up so fast his heavy chair screeches violently against the hardwood floor.

"You knew," I whisper, backing away from him until my spine hits the cold edge of the white board, holding my hands up as if he just struck me. "You... you knew someone took it."

"It’s not what you think," Enzo says, reaching out toward me, his voice laced with a rare, raw, and desperate panic I have never heard in him before. "Listen to me—"

"Don't touch me!" I yell, slapping his hand away with every ounce of strength I have left. Tears of sheer humiliation and fury overflow, hot and bitter down my burning cheeks. "You set this up! You had someone steal my drive so you could play the hero, keep me distracted with fake slides, and—"

"Are you insane?!" Enzo roars, taking a sudden step toward me, his chest heaving, his face flushed with genuine, explosive anger. "I just spent twenty minutes rebuilding your entire deck line by line! Why the hell would I sabotage you just to fix it?!"

"Because your family runs this school!" I scream back, my voice shaking uncontrollably in the quiet lab. "Because you couldn't handle the thought of a scholarship girl beating you on merit! Who sent that text, Enzo?! Who was it?!"

Enzo shuts his mouth instantly. His jaw sets into a hard, rigid line, and his sudden, agonizing silence is more deafening than any confession could ever be.

"I can't tell you," he says quietly, his eyes darkening.

A harsh, broken laugh escapes my lips. "You can't tell me."

"Mara, please," he steps closer, his hazel eyes pleading, filled with a desperate, dark pain. "Present your work. Go down to the auditorium and win this thing. We will deal with the rest later. I swear to you on my life, I did not ask for that drive to be taken."

"I don't need your help," I say, my voice turning dead, quiet, and cold as stone. "And I don't need your pity."

I snatch the flash drive containing the newly formatted slides off his laptop, grab my bag, and sprint out of the computer lab before he can stop me.

TEN MINUTES LATER

"And now, our final contestant for the Trustee Scholarship: Mara Ribeiro."

The auditorium applause erupts, but to me, it sounds like I’m underwater.

I stand behind the polished wooden podium, the bright stage lights blinding my vision and washing out the dark audience. In the front row sit the board members, including Vicente Tavares—Enzo’s father—a billionaire developer whose cold, calculating eyes are locked straight on me like a predator observing a trap.

My hands shake as I tap the microphone, adjusting the stand.

I look up into the dark abyss of the upper balcony. Sitting right in the center of the back row, standing out against the shadows, is Enzo.

He didn't go backstage to prepare for his own turn. He's standing there, watching me, his arms crossed over his chest, his expression torn between fear, guilt, and an intense, burning admiration.

I take a deep, trembling breath, forcing the ice into my veins. I think of my mother working twelve-hour filing shifts. I think of my uncle who got crushed by a broken municipal system. I think of every person in this zip code who ever told me I didn't belong at Westbridge.

I am not letting the Tavares family destroy me.

"When I was twelve years old," I begin, my voice cutting clear, strong, and unyielding through the auditorium speakers, "my uncle was arrested for a broken taillight he couldn't afford to fix..."

For fifteen minutes, I burn the room down.

I don't just deliver data; I deliver fire. I command the stage, tearing through the policy arguments, using the very slides Enzo helped me build to dismantle every structural objection the trustees could throw at me. By the time I hit my conclusion, the room is dead silent, hanging on every syllable.

"Thank you," I say softly into the mic.

The entire auditorium erupts into a thunderous standing ovation. Even the faculty admissions committee stands up, clapping enthusiastically.

I step off the stage, my knees trembling with residual adrenaline. I did it. I actually did it.

I head toward the secluded backstage exit, wanting nothing more than to break down in private tears away from the crowd, but a heavy hand suddenly grabs my elbow from behind, spinning me sharply into a side hallway.

I brace myself to fight Enzo, but when I look up, it’s not him.

It’s Vicente Tavares.

Enzo’s father looks down at me with an icy, menacing smile, his hands folded immaculate over his custom umbrella.

"An impressive performance, Miss Ribeiro," Vicente says, his tone smooth, cold, and dripping with high-class condescension. "Very dramatic. But I suggest you don't get too attached to that scholarship."

My breath hitches in my throat. "What are you talking about?"

Vicente leans in slightly, whispering so only I can hear above the distant applause. "Westbridge doesn't give full rides to thieves. And in about five minutes, the dean is going to find your original stolen presentation inside Enzo's locker—where you framed him for taking it."

I stare at him in sheer terror, my blood running cold. "What... what did you do?"

"I am protecting my son's future," Vicente says calmly, adjusting his cufflinks. "And removing trash from his path."

Before I can scream for the guards, a loud, thunderous voice echoes from the far end of the hallway:

"Get your hands off her, Dad."

We both turn. Enzo is standing at the mouth of the corridor, his eyes blazing with absolute, murderous fury, holding a small black object in his right hand.

It's my missing USB drive.

"You're too late, Enzo," Vicente says smoothly, without losing his composure. "It’s already done."

Enzo walks straight toward us, stepping directly between me and his father, his broad shoulders cutting off Vicente's line of sight to me. He looks back at me, his hazel eyes fierce, protective, and completely unyielding.

"It's not done," Enzo says, staring his father down with a deadly calm that shakes the very corridor. "Because if she goes down... I'm bringing the entire family down with her."