Chapter 8
Gabriella’s POV
I was leaving the lab when Ryder Gomez, my laboratory classmate, blocked my path. “Come on, Gabriella, why are you so cold? Just give me one chance!” Other students gathered, eager for the drama.
I sighed, facing my persistent admirer. “Look, Ryder, like I’ve told you a hundred times, I’m focused on my PhD. Dating isn’t on my radar.” He’d been pursuing me for months, refusing to take no for an answer. Ryder stepped closer, urging me to attend a party he was organizing. Before I could refuse him again, a tall figure intervened.
“She said no. What part of that don't you understand?”
I recognized that voice, that posture. Kayden. Even in another life, I would know him instantly.
Things escalated quickly. The men began shoving, and I intervened to prevent a campus police incident. “Stop it!” I yelled, pulling Kayden back. “What is wrong with you? Did you not get my message?”
“I rejected you too, remember? So what’s with this stalker behavior?”
“And this is between me and Ryder—what gives you the right to play bodyguard?”
Kayden deflated. He looked at me with wounded eyes. “What gives me the right? How about the fact that I love you?”
I laughed bitterly, wanting to avoid further public display. I grabbed his arm and pulled him around the corner of the science building. There, I saw his red-rimmed eyes; he’d been crying. Six months had aged him considerably. When he noticed me staring, tears streamed down his cheeks. He grasped my hand, clinging to it as I tried to pull away.
“Gabby, I finally found you. I’m not letting you go again.” His voice cracked. “I know you’re still angry, but I swear I’ll do better.”
“All these years, I thought Charlotte was different—pure, genuine, unlike those fake socialites. But she was the biggest fake of all. She used me for my money, and that baby… it wasn’t even mine.”
“Charlotte never loved me. She only wanted my bank account. God, I was such an idiot to think she cared.”
“She planned the whole thing, needed a patsy to fund her real life with her boyfriend and their child. She completely betrayed me.”
The revelation stunned me. Charlotte had never truly loved him? Looking back at my past life, it felt like a karmic reckoning.