"You couldn’t get through the front door of a company like this in your entire lifetime. Not as an employee. Not as an intern. Not even as a visitor."

The entourage behind her chuckled appreciatively.

Stan looked at her for a long, quiet moment.

He thought about the thirty percent stake sitting silently in his portfolio. He thought about the fact that, in terms of ownership hierarchy, Vivian Reeves, branch manager of a regional office, reported up a chain that ultimately terminated at him.

He thought about how spectacularly her face would rearrange itself if he told her, right now, in front of her entire entourage, that the company she was using as a status symbol was partially his.

He thought about all of this.

Then he shrugged.

"The company’s alright, I guess."

Maya glanced at him sharply. Vivian’s entourage went quiet.

"Alright?" Vivian’s eyebrow twitched. "Star Entertainment Company, a global entertainment powerhouse, is alright?"

"So-so," Stan said, picking up his menu. "Nothing special."

He said it the way a man might evaluate a moderately interesting rock he’d found on the sidewalk.

Vivian stared at him.

The audacity of it, the sheer, baffling, physics-defying arrogance of a man who’d been soaked by her Ferrari yesterday calling one of the world’s premier entertainment companies so-so, temporarily short-circuited her capacity for speech.

Her entourage exchanged confused glances. Maya pressed her lips together very tightly, suppressing something that looked suspiciously like a smile.

Stan returned his attention to the menu and began studying the dessert section with genuine interest.

He owned thirty percent of the company. Vivian managed a branch office.

So-so was, if anything, generous.

The comment had been offhand. Barely a sentence. The kind of throwaway remark a man makes when he’s looking at a menu and not paying attention to the social minefield behind him.

But to Vivian Reeves, it was a declaration of war.

"What did you just say?"

She was on her feet before the words had fully left Stan’s mouth, her chair scraping backward across the polished floor with a sound that turned heads at three adjacent tables.

Stan looked up from the dessert section with genuine bewilderment. He hadn’t intended to provoke her. He’d simply stated his honest assessment of a company he owned a third of, and his honest assessment was that it was, relative to his overall portfolio, unremarkable.

"I said the company was average," he repeated, more carefully this time. "That’s all."

"Average?"

Vivian’s voice climbed half an octave. Her cheeks had gone red, not with embarrassment, but with the incandescent fury of a woman whose single greatest source of professional pride had just been dismissed by the man she already despised most in the world.

"Star Entertainment Company, one of the top entertainment conglomerates on the planet, is average to you?"

"I didn’t mean it as an insult—"

"You didn’t mean it? You stand there and call my company mediocre in front of my colleagues, and you want me to believe you didn’t mean it?"

Her finger was jabbing toward his face now, her composure dissolving with each word.

"I let the umbrella incident go. I decided to be the bigger person. And this is how you repay that? By mocking my career to my face?"

"Vivian, I wasn’t—"

"Do you think I’m easy to bully? Do you think because you got away with it once, you can keep pushing?"

Stan opened his mouth to explain, realized the explanation would require revealing that he owned thirty percent of the company she was defending, and closed it again.

There was no version of this conversation that ended well. Telling the truth would humiliate her far more thoroughly than the comment already had. And continuing to argue would only feed the fire.

"You’ll regret this," Vivian said, her voice dropping into something quieter and more dangerous. "You will pay for messing with me."

She turned and walked out. Her entourage scrambled to follow, a few of them throwing parting shots over their shoulders as they went.

"Kid, are you out of your mind? You dare offend Sister Reeves?"

"You have no idea what’s coming for you."

"You’re finished. Absolutely finished."

Maya watched them file out with an expression of weary contempt.

"For the record," she said, loud enough for the stragglers to hear, "Vivian walked over here and started this. Stan made one comment to get her to move along, and she turned it into a full performance. Maybe she should spend less time being offended and more time minding her own business."

The remaining members of Vivian’s group suddenly found themselves unable to produce a comeback. Maya Zimmerman was Maya Zimmerman, the daughter of the Zimmerman family, and picking a verbal fight with her was the kind of decision that aged a person’s career prospects by several decades.

They left without another word.

Stan shook his head slowly.

"If she’s angry, that’s her problem. I didn’t do anything wrong."

"Maybe not," Maya said, reaching for her water glass. "But be careful. Vivian doesn’t just get angry. She gets even."

"I’ll manage."

After dinner, Stan drove Maya home, then headed back toward campus.

He’d barely cleared the university gates when a familiar figure materialized from the shadows near the entrance, wearing the particular expression of a man who has been pacing for the better part of an hour.

It was Zack Howard.

"Stan." His voice was tight. Urgent. The same tone he’d used that morning when the dorm had been gutted. "We have a problem."

"What now?"

"Vivian Reeves went to the principal."

Stan stopped walking.

"She’s demanding your expulsion. Tonight."

The words hung in the evening air for a moment.

"The principal actually agreed to this?" Stan asked.

"Vivian’s family donates more to this university annually than most departments receive in their entire budget. The principal doesn’t say no to Vivian Reeves." Zack grabbed Stan’s arm. "She’s given you twenty-four hours. If you don’t go to her and apologize, on your knees apparently because that’s her thing, you’re out. Expelled. Academic record, gone."

Stan stared at him.

He’d known Vivian was petty. He’d known she was vindictive. But convincing a university principal to expel a student over a restaurant comment about an entertainment company? That was a level of weaponized privilege he hadn’t fully appreciated until this moment.

’She’s more dangerous than I gave her credit for,’ he thought. ’Not smarter. Not stronger. Just more willing to burn everything down over nothing.’

"Stan, I’m serious." Zack’s grip tightened. "Go apologize. I know it sucks. I know she doesn’t deserve it. But this is your degree. Your future. She’s not bluffing."