Page 71 of The Cruel Heir

@PityPartyPrincess:Forever looking like life owes her something and then she gets a hunky man? It’s not fair.

My blood went cold.They were talking about me. My fingers hovered over the report button. Then dropped.

What was the point?

Something inside me dropped.

I wasn’t even angry. Not at first. Just… numb. Hollowed out, like someone had scooped out my insides with an ice cream scoop.

The words weren’t just cruel. They were familiar.

I’d seen them before; at Clear View, in the bathroom stalls, scribbled across my locker in Sharpie. On anonymous apps in the middle of the night.

Slut.

Try hard.

Fat girl with a fantasy.

Knew she was easy when she played the violin like that.

It wasn’tabout the truth. It never had been. It was about the way people love watching a girl fall. And how much they enjoy pretending they didn’t push.

I shoved my phone into my bag, heart thudding.

This wasn’t high school.

But it still felt like a locker had just slammed shut behind me. I left the premises after that, getting straight into the car without catching anyone’s eyes.

Back at the mansion, I walked straight past Sterling.

Sterling didn’t say a word when I walked past him.

But his gaze dropped to my neck.

His entire body went still.

A shadow passed over his face, something deeper than rage, colder than vengeance.

I didn’t have to look in a mirror to know what he saw. The bruises were already forming, low and dark, along the curve of my throat.

People like to pretend black girls don’t bruise. That our skin hides the damage. That we’re too strong to break. But Sterling saw it. All of it. And the way his hands curled into fists said he wouldn’t let anyone unsee it again.

Five minutes later, Frankie’s voice cut through the hallway behind me, like a warning shot.

“You want me to kill Chadwick, or just make it look like he snapped?”

Sterling didn’t respond, not with words.

His hand twitched toward the inside of his jacket.

Frankie stepped in, firm and low. “Sterling. No.”

Sterling’s jaw clenched tighter.

His eyes flicked past Frankie, somewhere far away for half a breath, and when they landed back on me, the fire in them had shifted. “I’ve known him too long to let it end in a hallway with cameras watching,” he muttered, low enough that only I could hear. “But don’t mistake that for mercy.”

“I know what you saw. I know what he did. But you pull that trigger now, and you won’t make it past the precinct doors. Billionaire or not, they won’t see a Kingsley. They’ll see a black man with a body count.”