The Girl He Loved to Tease
The slap echoed across the courtyard.
Every conversation came to an abrupt halt.
Dozens of students turned together, their mouths dropping open as Maya Brooks slowly took her shaking hand away from Aiden Sterling’s face.
A bright red handprint covered his cheek.
No one moved.
No one breathed.
“You… slapped Aiden Sterling?” someone whispered.
Maya’s chest moved up and down as she tried to catch her breath. Her fingers were still numb from the hit, but she wouldn’t take her eyes off of it.
“I warned you,” she said, her voice calm even though there was a storm of emotions inside her. “Don’t ever touch my things again.”
The cheap leather notebook that Aiden had taken from her a little while ago was now on the ground between them, with its pages flapping in the wind.
Aiden looked at it then turned his eyes back to Maya. For the first time since he arrived at Sterling University, someone had dared to stand up to him in front of a group of people.
His friends were waiting for him to get angry.
Instead…He laughed.
The sound surprised everyone.
“You’ve got guts, Brooks.”
Maya crouched down, grabbed her notebook, and wiped the dust off the cover.
“No,” she said in a cold tone. “I just have self-respect.”
A group of people let out surprised sounds all at once.
Liam Carter ran his hand across his face.
“She’s definitely getting expelled.”
Aiden ignored him.
As Maya turned to leave, he called out to her.
“So that’s how you show gratitude for someone paying attention to you?”
She stopped without looking back.
“If your idea of attention is to embarrass people because they weren’t born wealthy, you can keep that.”
His smile faded slightly.
She kept walking toward the Business Administration building, leaving behind a courtyard where the students were shocked and speechless.
Liam walked over and folded his arms.
“You know,” he said, “most people would have been really angry after that.”
“I’m not most people.”
“No kidding.”
Aiden kept looking at Maya until she went inside the building.
He said with a soft laugh, “I’ll admit, she’s interesting.”
“You’ve been flirting with her since your first year,” Liam said. “Why?”
Aiden shrugged.
“I don’t know.”
“Do you not know, or are you just not willing to accept it?”
Aiden didn’t answer.
The truth was, Maya Brooks fascinated him.
She wasn’t impressed by his money.
She didn’t care about his family name.
She stared at him like he was just a regular student.
For some reason…
He couldn’t stop thinking about her.
⸻
Maya rested against the wall inside the Business Administration building and shut her eyes.
“What were you thinking?” Chloe Bennett whispered as she rushed toward her. “You slapped the richest student in the university!”
“He deserved it.”
“I know he did.”Chloe lowered her voice.
“But he’s Aiden Sterling.”
“I don’t care who he is.” Maya replied
She moved the silver necklace that was tucked under her shirt, a gift from her late father who had told her never to take it off.
The metal was oddly warm when she touched it.A faint pulse ran through it.
Maya frowned.
It had never done that before.
Far above the campus, Professor Evelyn Hayes stood by the window of her office. Her sharp gaze remained fixed on Maya.
“The seal…” she whispered.
“It’s weakening.”
She put her hand in her pocket and took out a tiny crystal that started shining with a gentle golden light.
Her expression turned grim.
“It can’t be…”
⸻
Far away, under an old cathedral that’s been left empty and tucked deep inside the woods near New York, torches suddenly lit up with bright blue flames, one by one.
A tall man wearing black robes opened his eyes slowly.
His lips formed a cold smile as a magical map floated in front of him, showing a single bright spot of golden light.
“So…” Damien Sterling murmured.
“The final daughter of the Luminara Bloodline has finally come forward.”
He made a fist with his hand, which put out the map.
“Prepare the hunters.”
“Bring me the girl.”
Maya stepped into her first lecture without knowing that an old war was starting around her, and her only thought was about that one thing.
Surviving another day at Sterling University.
She didn’t know that the slap everyone was discussing had stirred up powers that had been looking for her for more than twenty years.
