Chapter 3

I'd barely made it to the end of class, dragging my exhausted body toward the door, when someone cut me off.

May Lawrence planted herself in front of me, malice open on her face.

"Everyone else can go. Stella Mason stays."

"You're going to run fifty laps around the field. You don't leave until you finish."

My patience with her had run out. My eyes went cold as ice. "Get out of my way. Block me again, and I'll make you regret today."

For a second, the look on my face stopped her.

Then she registered what I'd said and doubled over, clutching her stomach, laughing.

"You're killing me. A driver's daughter, threatening me? Let's see what you can actually do."

She jabbed a finger at the field, then slammed her palm hard into my back. "Run. You don't finish, you don't get out of here today."

The blow sent me stumbling, and the motion pulled at my stomach until that suffocating pain surged up again.

Fifty laps? In the shape I was in, I couldn't have made it half a lap.

I checked my watch again. Twenty minutes since I'd called Oliver Finch.

By my count, he should be here.

Seeing I wouldn't move, she glanced at my bloodless face and gave a nasty little smile. "Fine. You won't run? Then we'll just wait it out. Let's see who breaks first."

So there we stayed, one sitting, one standing, neither of us giving an inch.

The afternoon sun was hot enough to cook a person, and I stood under it, breaking into a clammy sweat.

Just before I went down, a familiar voice came from behind me.

"Miss Mason, what's happened to you?"

"Is it the old trouble acting up again?"

I knew Oliver's voice. I grabbed at him, barely able to breathe. "The... the hospital."

The moment he heard, he moved to get me out of there.

May still wouldn't let it go, throwing her arms wide to block our way.

"Stop right there! I said you don't finish those fifty laps, you don't leave."

In his younger days, Oliver had spent twenty years as my father's bodyguard, and when he got older he was assigned to drive for me.

Next to him, May was a chick against a grown man. He shoved her aside without a second glance.

He drove flat out and got me to the hospital.

Oliver called my father right away and brought in a specialist to operate.

When I woke, it was already the next morning.

The surgery had gone well. That same night I was able to get up and walk a little.

I had Oliver buy me a new phone.

The moment it powered on, two messages popped up.

【Stella, come back quick.】

【May reported you to the department head. Cutting class on your own, breaking school rules. They're going to put a formal report on your record and issue a public reprimand.】

I laughed, furious.

She put me in surgery, in a hospital bed, and I hadn't even settled up with her yet.

And she still dared to come at me.

My face blank, I picked up the phone and made a call.

This account, I was going to settle with her properly.