Chapter 3: The Mansion home and a Warning

~Isabel~

When she used the formal title 'the Master', I knew right away this would not be an easy stay.

I sat at the edge of the large bed and opened my laptop to check my student email before heading downstairs. A bright red notification popped up on the screen from the university office.

WARNING: Tuition balance of £3,000 is due in exactly seven days. Failure to pay will result in immediate cancellation of your admission.

Seeing the deadline made my heart sink. I closed the laptop, quickly washed my face, and walked downstairs to face my new reality.

The dining room glowed under a giant crystal chandelier.

Arthur Sterling sat at the head of the long table, laughing loudly at something my mother just said. He looked exactly like his photos…silver strands at his temples, a suit, and the kind of confidence that only comes from owning billions.

My mother looked like a different person. She had ditched her struggling-mom vibe, draping herself in a fancy red dress with a glittering diamond necklace. She looked like she had lived this lifestyle her entire life.

"Bel! You’re finally here!" She got up from her chair, kissing my cheek right away. I caught the smell of her perfume… rose oil, not the vanilla lotion I remembered from home.

"Arthur, this is my Isabel."

Arthur stood up with a warm smile. His eyes looked kind, but they were sharp as he looked me over, almost like he was calculating my exact worth to his family.

"Welcome to London, Isabel. I hope the long flight went okay for you?"

"It was... fine. Thank you, Mr. Sterling. For everything."

"None of that formal talk here. Call me Arthur. Come, sit down. We are just waiting for my son to join us..."

The doors opened behind my back.

Suddenly, the warm room felt cold, and a scent of male cologne filled the air.

"You're late," Arthur said, though his voice did not sound angry.

"Meetings ran over at the office."

That deep voice hit the back of my neck with a shock. I turned around slowly in my seat to see who spoke.

There he stood. The arrogant guy from the New York cafe.

He looked breathtakingly dangerous.

He took off his dark suit jacket, carelessly rolling up his sleeves, but then freezed in the doorway.

For a split second, a flash of recognition clicked in his dark eyes. He recognized the clumsy girl who spilled the coffee tray on his companion.

Then, his face turned hard and unreadable.

"William," Arthur said, missing the weird tension in the room. "You remember I told you about Sarah’s daughter, Isabel? She starts her internship with you on Monday morning."

His eyes moved slowly over my frame, looking closely at my face, down at the floral dress I wore, all the way to my shoes. It was not a pleasant look.

He looked at me like he just inspected a cockroach that crawled onto his floor.

He stepped closer to the table.

"I remember her," he murmured. "The clumsy girl with the tray."

He brushed his shoulder against mine as he walked past, hitting me just hard enough to give me a shove, then sat directly across from me. He stared right at my face while he addressed his father.

"I did not realize the Mayfield girl came as part of the wedding package."

"William, please be nice," my mother said with a nervous laugh, adjusting her necklace. "Isabel is brilliant. She is going to be a huge help to you at the company."

William leaned back in his chair, his long fingers tapping consistently on the table.

"Is she really going to be useful? Because usually, the people in my office provide real value, Sarah. They don't just sit around and waste my father’s money."

"That is quite enough," Arthur warned, his voice hard and displeased.

The rest of dinner felt like a nightmare.

I stared at my plate, my throat too tight to even swallow a single bite of food.

William watched me the entire time. He noticed every single time I bit my lip or clenched my jaw, like he was waiting for me to slip up again.

"So, Isabel," he said, cutting off my mother’s conversation with Arthur. "Tell me. What exactly do you plan to learn in my department? Besides how to spend my dad's cash?"

That sentence again.

The temper I tried so hard to hide snapped right then. I dropped my fork, looking hard into his eyes.

"I expect to work hard," I said, without backing down. "Mr. Sterling. I don't want any freerides from your family. I came here for the job, and I fully plan to earn every single cent…"