The Mafia Boy In My Class

CHAPTER 5 , YOUNG MASTER

The next afternoon, Ariana walked with Damon toward the school gates after last period, still arguing about their English project.

"I'm just saying, your thesis paragraph reads like a legal document," she said.

"It's clear."

"It's cold."

"Clear and cold aren't the same thing."

"They are when you write like that."

He almost smiled , and then stopped walking entirely, because the black car was already at the curb, and Elias was out of it before they'd even reached the gate.

"Young Master," Elias said, stepping forward. "Your father called. Twice."

Ariana stopped beside him.

Damon's whole body went still for half a second, like he'd been caught doing something he shouldn't have. "Elias."

"Sir." Elias's eyes flicked to Ariana, then back, a silent question passing between them.

"Young Master?" Ariana repeated slowly.

"It's a work thing," Damon said quickly. "Elias works for my father's company. It's just formal. He calls everyone that."

Elias's face didn't change, but there was the smallest hesitation before he nodded along. "Right. Company policy."

Ariana looked between the two of them, unconvinced but not sure exactly what she wasn't convinced by. "Okay," she said slowly. "Well , I should go. Lily's waiting."

"I'll see you tomorrow," Damon said.

She gave him one last look before turning and walking off toward the front gates. Damon didn't move until she was out of earshot.

"That was close," Elias said quietly.

"She doesn't know anything."

"She heard me call you Young Master. In front of her. That's not nothing, Damon."

"I handled it."

"You improvised. There's a difference." Elias opened the car door, waiting until Damon was inside before continuing, voice lower now. "Your father is not going to be happy about this."

"About what, exactly? I talked to a girl."

"You've been talking to this girl for two weeks. You've been distracted. And now she's asking questions she shouldn't be asking." Elias slid into the driver's seat, glancing at him in the mirror. "He knows, Damon. Someone already told him."

Damon's jaw tightened. "Who."

"Does it matter? Nothing you do stays quiet for long. You know how this works."

The drive to the estate was mostly silent after that. Damon stared out the window, replaying the last thirty seconds , the shift in Ariana's expression, careful instead of curious, like she was starting to piece something together she couldn't name yet.

The gates opened as they approached, the driveway curving toward the main house , pale stone, tall windows, more fortress than home. Damon had grown up here. He'd never once thought of it as beautiful.

Marcus Blackwood was waiting in his study, standing at the window with a glass in one hand.

"Sit down," Marcus said, without turning around.

"I'd rather stand."

Marcus turned. His expression was calm in the way it always was , the kind of calm that made grown men straighten their posture without meaning to. Damon had learned not to be intimidated by it. Most days.

"I hear you've made a friend," Marcus said.

"It's not a big deal."

"Elias tells me otherwise. Two weeks distracted by a girl at that school. A girl who now knows enough to start asking questions."

"She doesn't know anything."

"She knows enough." Marcus set his glass down with a quiet, deliberate click. "You went to that school to stay invisible, Damon. Not to make yourself memorable to some girl who has no idea what world she's standing next to."

"I'm allowed to have a life."

"You're allowed to have the life I permit you." His voice didn't rise, but it sharpened. "This family doesn't survive on sentiment. It survives on control. The moment you let something , someone , become important enough to compromise that control, you become a liability. Not just to yourself. To everyone connected to you."

Damon said nothing, jaw tight, hands loose fists at his sides.

"I'm not telling you to end whatever this is," Marcus went on, more measured now. "I'm telling you to be careful. People are watching this family closely right now. If they find a weakness, they'll use it. Do you understand me?"

"I understand."

"Good." Marcus turned back to the window, the conversation apparently finished. "Stay away from the Bennett girl. Or at the very least, be smart about it."

Damon's head came up. "How do you know her last name?"

Marcus didn't answer right away. Something crossed his face , brief, controlled, gone before Damon could read it.

"I make it my business to know things," Marcus said finally. "That's all you need to understand today."

"That's not an answer."

"It's the only one you're getting."

Damon stood there a moment longer, waiting for something else that didn't come. Marcus picked his glass back up, and that was the end of it.

Damon left without another argument, though the question sat heavy the whole walk down the hallway. His father didn't know things by accident. If Marcus knew Ariana Bennett's name before Damon had ever said it out loud, that meant something , something older than the past two weeks, something Damon didn't have the pieces to understand yet.

Behind him, alone in the study, Marcus stood by the window without really looking at anything outside it. After a long moment, he opened the top drawer of his desk and pulled out an old photograph, worn soft at the edges.

Two young men stood si

de by side in the image, both smiling, neither one aware of what was coming.

Marcus didn't put it away.