My Fake Boyfriend Is the School Bad Boy novel Chapter 183

Chapter 183 Punching The Bathroom Glass Mirror

RYDER’S POV

“No.” The word left my mouth like a physical strike.

“It is the only logical path to salvage your academic record.”

“If your lawyers touch her, I will walk into the board meeting and confess to everything,” I swore. I planted my boots on the rug. I braced myself for the war. “I will tell them I forged the document. I will tell them I threatened her. I will burn the Steinmann legacy to the

ground on a public stage.”

Arthur narrowed his eyes. The temperature in the room dropped ten degrees. He recognized the iron resolve in my posture. He realized I possessed zero fear of his corporate threats.

He shifted his strategy. He moved from defense to extortion.

“You are seventeen years old, my father reminded me. His voice turned smooth and lethal. “I possess legal custody. I control your trust fund. I control your assets. You live under my roof.”

“I will leave.”

“If you attempt to walk out the front doors, I will call the local police,” he promised. He leaned his hands flat on the desk. “I will file a harassment report against the Petrova family. I will claim the girl is unstable. I will tie her mother up in endless legal battles. They lack the financial resources to fight my firm. I will bankrupt the diner she works in. I will destroy their entire existence.

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The breath trapped in my throat.

He found the single weakness in my armor. He bypassed my pride and targeted her safety. He knew I accepted any punishment to keep the fire away from her quiet life.

“Leave her mother out of this, I demanded. My hands curled into fists at my sides.

“Then you submit to my authority,” Arthur commanded. He held his hand out, palm up. “The truck keys. Now.”

I stared at his open hand. I thought about Raisa sitting in her small, cramped kitchen. I thought about the deep exhaustion lining her mother’s face. They possessed nothing but hard work and fragile dreams. A legal battle with the Steinmann empire meant complete

annihilation.

I reached into the pocket of my leather jacket. I pulled the metal keys out. I tossed them onto the mahogany desk. They landed with a

sharp clatter.

“The phone, my father added.

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Chapter 183 Punching The Bathroom Glass Mirror

I pulled the cell phone from my back pocket. I placed it next to the keys.

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“You are grounded,” Arthur finalized. He picked the keys up and dropped them into a desk drawer. “You will remain on this estate. You will not contact the girl. You will not contact anyone from the school. You will stay in your room until I decide the next step.”

I did not offer a verbal response. I turned my back on the billionaire patriarch. I walked out of the study.

Marcus and another security guard waited in the hallway. They fell into step beside me. They escorted me up the grand curved staircase. They treated me like a hostile prisoner inside my own home.

We reached the second-floor landing. We walked down the corridor to the west wing.

I stepped into my bedroom.

“We will monitor the exterior doors,” Marcus stated. He stood in the doorway. “Do not attempt to bypass the window alarms.

He pulled the heavy oak door shut. The lock clicked.

I stood in the center of the dark hardwood floor. The silence of the massive room pressed against my eardrums. The air felt heavy, laced

with the scent of cedar wood and rain.

I looked toward the open walk-in closet.

I knew the cheap cardboard shoebox sat hidden on the top shelf. I knew the chewed yellow pencil and the blue ink star eraser rested inside. I spent four years watching her from the shadows. I built a monument to her existence in the dark corner of this room.

I offered her a fake contract to cross the massive divide between us. I promised to protect her from the affluent elite.

I broke the promise.

She lost her rank. She lost her campus access. She sat in a cold house on the East Side, dealing with the fallout of my ruined reputation. I trapped her in my chaos, and now I sat locked behind iron gates, unable to shield her from the incoming fire.

The massive, suffocating helplessness transformed into a burning rage.

The heat started in my chest. It rushed through my veins, hot and destructive. I needed to move. I needed to tear the walls down.

1 paced across the bedroom. I walked past the unmade mattress. I walked into the adjoining bathroom.

The white tile looked sterile and unforgiving. I turned the brass faucet on. The cold water rushed into the porcelain sink. I splashed the freezing water onto my face, trying to shock the anger out of my system.

It failed.

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Chapter 183 Punching The Bathroom Glass Mirror

I stood up straight. I gripped the edges of the porcelain sink. I looked up.

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My reflection stared back at me in the massive glass mirror.

I saw the dark hair plastered to my forehead. I saw the bruise on my jaw from a fight weeks ago. I saw the golden flecks in my hazel eyes. I saw the son of Arthur Steinmann. I saw the heir to a ruthless, unfeeling empire. I saw the boy who dragged a brilliant, shining star down

into the dirt.

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