BETRAYED, BROKEN... THEN BILLIONAIRE

2: CAMPUS HUMILIATION

The espresso machine hissed and sputtered, filling the air with bitter steam as Steve's hands moved through familiar motions. Pull shot, steam milk, pour, serve. His mind remained locked on Lois's unanswered message, replaying those five words until they lost all meaning except dread.

A girl approached the counter, designer sunglasses perched on her head despite the early hour. Her coat probably cost more than Steve's entire wardrobe. She barely glanced at him as she rattled off her order.

"Iced vanilla latte with oat milk, two pumps sugar-free vanilla, extra ice, light on the oat milk, and can you make sure it's actually stirred this time?"

Steve nodded, fingers already reaching for the cup.

"Please," he added quietly.

She blinked, surprised he'd spoken. "What?"

"You forgot to say please."

Her perfectly shaped eyebrows rose. "Excuse me?"

"Nothing. One iced vanilla latte coming up."

Steve made the drink exactly to specifications, sliding it across the counter. The girl took one sip, her face contorting in exaggerated disgust.

"This is wrong. Completely wrong. Make it again."

Rita appeared from the back. "Is there a problem?"

"This," the girl gestured at the cup like it contained poison, "tastes nothing like what I ordered."

Steve had made it perfectly. He knew he had. But Rita was already nodding, apologizing, instructing him to remake it. The girl smirked, enjoying the small power play.

As Steve remade the identical drink, he heard her whisper to her friend, "Isn't that the poor guy from Business Strategy class?"

Her friend giggled. "Oh my God, yes. I didn't even recognize him behind the counter. So awkward."

The girl took the new drink without thanks, without a tip, and walked away laughing.

Steve's phone burned in his pocket, still silent.

Steve's break came at nine thirty. He collapsed into a corner booth, spreading his Business Strategy notes across the scarred table. The textbook opened to chapter twelve, but the words might as well have been hieroglyphics. His mind kept circling back to Lois, to that message, to the silence.

Three tables away, Tucker Worthington held court with his usual entourage. Tucker, whose family owned half of Connecticut. Spence Hardwick, trust fund baby who drove a different luxury car each week. Whit Prescott, whose great-grandfather had founded some railroad or bank or something equally generational.

"Did you see the thrift store fashion show yesterday?" Tucker's voice carried easily across the coffee shop.

Spence snorted. "That broke boy energy is really something special."

"How does someone like that even afford NYU?" Whit added. "Charity case, probably."

Steve looked up, meeting Tucker's eyes across the room. Tucker wasn't even trying to hide who they were discussing. His smirk widened as he gestured toward Steve with his seven-dollar latte.

"I mean, look at those shoes. I wouldn't donate those to Goodwill."

Laughter erupted from their table. Other students glanced over, some joining the laughter, others looking away uncomfortably. Steve's face burned. His shoes were scuffed, the sole separating slightly on the left one. But they were the only pair he owned that weren't completely falling apart.

"The collar on that shirt," Spence continued, warming to the topic. "Is he trying to start a new fashion trend? Homeless chic?"

More laughter. Steve's hands clenched on his textbook. He could leave. Should leave. But that would give them the satisfaction of knowing they'd gotten to him.

A shadow fell across his table.

Campbell Covington stood there, her brown eyes blazing with quiet fury. Without a word, she turned and walked straight to Tucker's table.

Campbell planted her hands on Tucker's table, leaning forward until her face was inches from his. Her voice came out quiet, but it carried the force of a slap.

"Maybe he affords it by working three jobs while you coast on daddy's money. That takes actual character."

Tucker's smirk faltered. "Excuse me?"

"You're excused. Now let me educate you about something called work ethic. Steve is here at six AM making your overpriced coffee while you're probably still sleeping off whatever party your trust fund bought last night. He's in class with you, pulling better grades despite working seventy-hour weeks. So maybe before you mock someone's shoes, you should consider whether you'd survive one day of his life."

Spence leaned back, chuckling nervously. "Relax, we're just joking around."

"Jokes are funny. This is just cruel." Campbell straightened, her Auburn hair catching the morning light. "And you know what's really pathetic? You need to tear someone else down to feel big. That's not wealth. That's poverty of character."

Tucker's face flushed red. "Whatever. Come on, guys."

They gathered their designer bags and expensive coats, leaving behind half-full drinks that cost more than Steve's breakfast. As they passed Steve's table, Tucker muttered something under his breath, but Campbell's defense had neutered his cruelty.

Campbell slid into the booth across from Steve, her anger dissolving into concern.

"You okay?"

Steve managed a nod, throat tight. "You didn't have to do that."

"Yes, I did." She studied his face, and Steve saw the moment she registered his exhaustion, his hunger, his desperation. Her warm brown eyes softened with something that looked dangerously like pity.

That look made him feel smaller than Tucker's mockery had.

Campbell pulled a sandwich from her bag, carefully cutting it in half. She slid one portion across the table to Steve with studied casualness.

"I ordered too much. Help me out?"

Steve's pride warred with the hunger cramping his stomach. He knew she was lying. Campbell never ordered too much. She was a nursing student working her way through school, budgeting every dollar just like him. But his stomach betrayed him with an audible growl.

"Thanks," he muttered, accepting the sandwich.

They ate in comfortable silence. Campbell had this gift of making charity feel like friendship. She didn't watch him eat with that calculating concern some people had, the kind that made you feel like a specimen under glass. She just ate her half and occasionally glanced at her nursing notes.

"How's clinical rotation going?" Steve asked around a mouthful of turkey and swiss.

"Exhausting. Had a twelve-hour shift yesterday. This patient coded twice, and I swear I've never moved so fast in my life." She smiled, but it didn't quite reach her eyes. "How's Lois?"

The question landed like a stone in still water. Steve's hand froze halfway to his mouth.

"She's good. Busy with her thesis."

"Mm." Campbell took a sip of her coffee, not quite meeting his eyes. "That's good."

Something in her tone made Steve's skin prickle. That careful neutrality people used when they knew something you didn't.

"Why do you ask?"

Campbell set down her coffee, finally meeting his gaze. Her brown eyes held something complicated. Concern. Sadness. And underneath, something that might have been anger on his behalf.

"Just wondering. You guys still solid?"

"Of course. Why wouldn't we be?"

She opened her mouth, closed it, then sighed softly.

"No reason."

But Steve knew Campbell well enough to recognize a lie.

Steve returned to the counter for his afternoon shift, tying his apron with mechanical precision. His conversation with Campbell had left him unsettled. That look in her eyes. That careful question about Lois. It meant something, and the not knowing gnawed at him.

The afternoon crowd filtered in. Students between classes, professors needing caffeine, the usual parade of people who looked through him rather than at him. Steve made drinks, took orders, cleaned the espresso machine, existed in the background of other people's lives.

Behind him, two voices rose above the general café noise. Saylor Rutledge and Ellery Hollis, both in his Comparative Literature seminar. They stood at the pickup counter, waiting for their drinks, completely unaware that Steve could hear every word.

"Did you see Lois Frazer at Meridian last night?" Saylor's voice dripped with gossip-fueled excitement.

Steve's hands stilled on the espresso portafilter.

"No! Tell me everything," Ellery leaned in.

"She was with Hayes Beauregard. And I mean with him. Very cozy. Very intimate."

The portafilter slipped from Steve's grip, clattering against the counter. He fumbled to catch it, nearly dropping the entire apparatus.

"Hayes Beauregard?" Ellery's voice pitched higher. "The hotel empire heir?"

"The very same. They were at this candlelit table, holding hands, looking completely in love. He's gorgeous, by the way. Like movie star gorgeous."

Steve's vision tunneled. Hayes Beauregard. Old money. New money. Every kind of money. Everything Steve wasn't and could never be.

"Does Steve know?" Ellery asked.

"Poor Steve probably has no idea he's about to get dumped."

The espresso machine hissed, drowning out whatever Saylor said next. Steve's hands shook as he finished making their drinks. When he called their names, they collected their cups without even glancing at him.

Poor Steve.

Poor, clueless, pathetic Steve.