Chapter 4

There was a probing edge to her voice. "Do you want a part-time job?"

I was caught off guard.

Selina came from a tight household, so she took part-time work all the time.

I just never imagined she'd be willing to share one of her money-making channels with me, of all times.

I gave a small laugh and asked, "What kind of job? What's the hourly pay?"

The moment I finished asking, she started a video call.

She turned the camera toward the hiring notice by the door of a karaoke lounge.

It read: "Now hiring private-room hostesses. Eight hundred cash, paid daily."

I fought down the churn in my stomach and demanded, "What's that supposed to mean?"

Selina's tone carried a certain matter-of-factness. "Isn't your family bankrupt now? What are you still putting on airs for? I'm doing this for your own good. Eight hundred a day, just sing a little, drink a little with some people, and you've earned it."

Blood rushed straight to my head, and my scalp prickled with fury.

I was so angry I laughed. "If it's that good, why don't you do it?"

She shrugged. "I've got my own part-time gig. Besides, you've got experience..."

She drew out that last word, then said, with heavy meaning, "Aren't you always out eating and drinking with those older men?"

I couldn't hold back a dry heave.

The business dinners I'd once attended with my elders, and she twisted them into something that filthy in her mind.

"Get lost."

I was about to hang up when Daniela, half-drunk, grabbed the phone. Her words slurred. "Can pride fill your stomach? Your family's bankrupt. Drop the rich-girl act and go make some real money."

Then she called the others over. "Come look. Take a good look. This is our dorm's very own Miss Walker. From now on you'll have to give her plenty of business."

Laughter erupted around her, a dense buzz of talk that stabbed into my ears like needles.

"So this is Lauren Walker, the one whose family went bankrupt? She's pretty. Nice figure too. But she's in college and she still has to do this?"

"What do you know? She used to be a proper little heiress. She's used to throwing money around. Apart from quick cash, why would she ever swallow her pride and take a real job?"

"True enough. A private-room hostess is still a hostess."

My grip tightened on the phone until my fingertips went white.

I glanced at the recording reminder still blinking in the top-left corner and forced myself not to hang up.

I wanted them publicly destroyed in front of the whole school one day, wanted everyone to see just how dirty the hearts under these pretty faces really were.

One guy pulled three hundreds straight out of his pocket, belching from the drink. "Come on, little sister, come drink with me. I'll give you three hundred."

Everyone dissolved into laughter. I didn't break down sobbing the way they'd expected.

Instead, I looked back at them through the screen, cold and detached.

That look, high and untouchable, set Daniela off again. She screamed at the phone. "You know what? What I hate most is that stuck-up, holier-than-thou face of yours. So you had a little money. What's with all the airs?"

I felt nothing at all facing Daniela now, only the way you'd watch a child throwing a tantrum. "What exactly is it you're so unhappy about?"

That one line seemed to enrage Daniela.

Her face went cold as she roared, "Handing us the things you couldn't use up, that was all just to watch us fawn over you with gratitude, wasn't it?"

It had never once crossed my mind. This whole year, I'd given them everything, poured my heart out to them.

And this was how they'd seen me all along.

"Daniela, Selina, if you didn't want my things, you could've just said so. I'd have smashed them before I let you have them. To spare your pathetic pride, every single time I said I couldn't use them up and handed you brand-new ones."

"Too bad you never valued any of it. Now that I'm down on my luck, suddenly you two feel wronged? When you were taking it all, why didn't you say a word then?"

Daniela's features twisted nearly together. She was just opening her mouth to speak.

Someone let out a sharp, shrill shriek.

The guy who'd offered three hundred to make me come drink pointed at his phone screen. "Look, quick. It's Lauren Walker's family's company."

Everyone yanked out their phones to check the trending list for the day, and then every pair of eyes went wide.