"Who gave you the courage? Your therapist?"

Leo’s face went the color of a cooked tomato.

He had walked in here a few hours ago genuinely believing that two million dollars and a smug smile would be enough to put a bicycle-riding nobody in his place. Two million dollars.

Stan Harrison had over two hundred million dollars in his account. He could have buried Leo in cash, lit the cash on fire, and walked away barely noticing the smoke.

"You’re absolutely right," Leo heard himself say, the words tumbling out faster than his pride could catch them. "I was, I was completely out of line. You’re the real one. The real boss. I should have known."

"I’ve made a fool of myself in front of you. I’ll see myself out."

He bowed slightly, turned on his heel, and walked toward the doors of the sales office with all the dignity of a man trying not to break into a run.

By the time he reached the marble steps outside, he was no longer making eye contact with anyone.

Stan watched the doors swing shut behind him and let out a quiet, satisfied breath.

His mood was, by any reasonable measure, excellent.

Six hundred and fifty million in fresh capital. An entire luxury building soon to be in his name, ready to be gifted. A bound target with a wide-open avenue for further spending. Everything was clicking together in a perfectly oiled rhythm.

If this pace held, and there was no reason to believe it wouldn’t, breaking ten billion wasn’t a fantasy. It was just a matter of timing. A hundred billion wasn’t even out of the question. The math said what the math said, and the math was generous.

For now, all he had to do was wait twenty-four hours for the paperwork. Once the title deed was in his hand, he’d find a way to put it in front of Sophie Youngs, and he had a quiet feeling that that particular delivery was going to move her favorability needle in some genuinely interesting directions.

Stan slid his hands into his pockets and started toward the exit, the small private smile from earlier returning to the corner of his mouth.

He had exactly one objective these days, and it was a simple one.

Spend money.

....

With that Stan proceeded to head back his dormitory, soon he reached his destination...

He pushed open the dormitory door and suddenly stopped dead in his tracks.

His roommate Zack Howard was standing in the middle of the room, dressed in a full formal suit, pressed collar, polished shoes, the whole performance.

On any other day, this guy would argue over splitting a two-dollar coffee. Today he looked like he was about to attend a wedding.

"Brother," Zack said with a smile, straightening his jacket with quiet dignity, "let’s go get some barbecue."

Stan stared at him for a long moment. ’Barbecue?!’

This man, who once made him split the delivery fee three ways, this guy who’s very stingy is actually feeling generous today and was offering to treat him to barbecue.

"Who died?" Stan asked, clearly not buying this version of Zack...

Zack broke into a grin he’d clearly been holding back. "I have a new girlfriend."

’No wonder...’ Stan laughed and grabbed his jacket off the chair. "Then we absolutely have to go."

The restaurant wasn’t far from campus, a lively street-side spot with red lanterns strung over the entrance and the smell of charcoal and cumin drifting half a block away. Zack led him to a table near the back where two women were already seated, picking through the menu.

"Stan, here’s Zoey Lin," Zack announced proudly, gesturing to the girl across from him like a man unveiling a painting. "My girlfriend."

Zoey looked up and smiled, warm, a little shy. Pretty in an unassuming way. Her friend sat beside her, scrolling her phone with the particular boredom of someone who’d agreed to this outing as a favor.

"And that’s Hailey Yates her friend," Zack added as an afterthought. "Zoey and Hailey this is Stan, a close friend of mine..."

Hailey glanced up briefly, then back at her phone. Unlike Hailey who was acting a bit stiff, Zoey was friendly exchanging pleasantries with Stan the next second.

Then they ordered. The grill came alive. Smoke curled toward the lanterns, and for a while the conversation was easy, the kind that flows naturally over cold beer and sizzling skewers.

Zack kept stealing glances at Zoey like he still couldn’t quite believe his luck. Stan found himself smiling at his friend’s poorly concealed happiness.

But then a shadow fell across the table.

Stan felt it before he saw it, a shift in the air, the way a room changes when someone walks in fully intending to change it. He looked up.

A man in a tailored black suit was cutting through the restaurant with the unhurried stride of someone who had never once been told to wait. Mid-twenties. Good-looking in the architectural way that money tends to produce. Everything about him screamed rich...

His eyes found Zoey first, then swept the table with a faint, evaluating smile, the kind that had already reached its conclusion before it began.

"Zoey." His voice carried easily over the noise of the restaurant. "Barbecue? Really?"

He let his gaze slowly drift across the plastic stools, the laminated menu, and the mismatched condiment bottles. "You couldn’t find anywhere worse?"

The table fell silent.

Zack’s jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. The remark left him in an awkward position. He was the one who had suggested coming here for barbecue, and those words felt like a direct slap to his face.

Zoey produced an awkward smile. "Wade. I didn’t know you’d be here."

Wade Hollis is Zoey Lin’s ex-boyfriend. The two had already broken up. After finding out that Zoey is now with Zack, he had deliberately approached her to provoke and disgust her.

"You don’t mind, do you?" he said, in the tone of someone who had genuinely never considered the possibility that anyone might.

Zack gritted his teeth, his fist tightening until his knuckles turned white.