Chapter 2 — First Encounter

Ruby balanced a cardboard box on her hip, her fingers going numb from the weight. Morning heat pressed against her skin as she kicked the front door shut with her heel. The moving truck had already driven off, her mom had rushed out early for paperwork at her new job, and now it was just Ruby—sleep-deprived, disoriented, and drowning in boxes.

She took a steadying breath.

Okay. Two more loads. I can survive this.

But when she stepped outside, her resolve dropped straight to the floor.

There, parked diagonally across the driveway like it owned the entire property, was a shiny black car. Sleek. Expensive. The type of car someone buys when they want everyone within a two-mile radius to know they have money.

Ruby blinked at it.

“Seriously?” she muttered. “Of course this would happen.”

Because why wouldn’t her very first morning in this new neighborhood start with someone blocking the driveway? Why not add that to the growing list of things testing her patience?

She shifted the box higher and marched toward the car. No movement inside. Tinted windows. The engine quiet.

“Great,” she huffed. “A mysterious, inconsiderate phantom driver.”

She lifted a hand and knocked on the window.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

Nothing.

Ruby scowled. She was one second away from knocking harder—like wake-the-dead harder—when the window finally rolled down.

Slowly. Dramatically.

As if the person inside wanted to build suspense.

Her mouth went dry.

Messy dark hair, artfully disobedient.

Hazel eyes half-lidded in a way that looked effortlessly bored.

A jawline sharp enough to cut through her already-fraying patience.

He looked like someone who had been sculpted specifically to irritate innocent strangers.

Kai Kingston.

Though Ruby didn’t know his name yet.

The boy—or man, because he had that irritating almost-grown confidence about him—rested his elbow on the window and gave her a lazy once-over. Not creepy. Not flirtatious. More like he was evaluating a mildly interesting inconvenience.

“Delivery’s around the back,” he said flatly.

Ruby blinked.

Was he serious?

“Delivery—? I’m not—” She breathed out sharply, steadying her voice. “I live here.”

Kai raised an eyebrow. Just one. Slowly. Annoyingly.

“Oh,” he said, sounding entirely unimpressed. “You’re the new neighbor.”

“Yeah,” she said, exasperation leaking into her tone, “and you’re blocking the driveway.”

He didn’t apologize.

He didn’t even pretend to care.

He just stared at her with that maddening, unreadable expression—somewhere between amused and indifferent. Then, without acknowledging her further, he shifted the car into reverse with a smooth motion.

The engine purred, low and expensive.

He pulled back a few feet, enough to clear the driveway, but he didn’t drive away. Instead, he leaned slightly out the window, his lips lifting into a smirk that looked far too practiced for someone his age.

“Welcome to the neighborhood, princess.”

Princess.

Ruby’s jaw dropped.

Before she could react—before she could tell him exactly where he could stuff his stupid expensive car—he accelerated down the street and disappeared around the corner.

Ruby stood frozen in the middle of the driveway, her box still clutched to her chest, her brain struggling to reboot.

Princess? Who the hell—

She exhaled through her nose slowly, trying not to scream into the sky like some tragic heroine in an old movie.

“I don’t even know him,” she whispered to herself, “but I already hate him.”

She stomped back inside, muttering under her breath the entire way.

---

Inside, the house felt emptier than ever. The walls echoed slightly, the smell of paint still lingering. Ruby set the box on the couch and leaned forward, bracing her palms on her knees.

She had moved plenty of times before—thanks to her mom’s unpredictable job—but this… this felt different. Unsettling. The academy, the new neighborhood, her mom’s remarriage and all the silent tensions that came with it…

And now a smug, hazel-eyed stranger calling her princess.

“Unbelievable,” she murmured.

She straightened up and wiped her forehead with the back of her hand. Her hair had already started sticking to her skin from the heat. Wonderful.

After a few seconds, she grabbed another box and headed toward the door again. She wasn’t going to let some arrogant boy ruin her morning. She had bigger problems—like the fact that she was starting a prestigious academy in two days and owned exactly zero of the things on the school’s convoluted supply list.

Still, the memory of his smirk gnawed at her.

Who parks in someone else’s driveway like that?

Who looks that bored and entertained at the same time?

And why did her stomach do that weird flip when he leaned out of the window?

She scowled at the thought.

“Nope. Not thinking about him.”

She marched down the steps and set the next box in the hallway. For the next half hour, she focused on unpacking—determined to shove Kai Kingston right out of her brain.

But her brain refused to comply.

Every time she closed a cabinet or broke down an empty box, she heard it again:

Welcome to the neighborhood, princess.

Ruby groaned out loud.

“Great. Now I have a neighborhood nemesis.”

She wasn’t wrong.

But she also had no idea just how tangled her life would become with his—or how that single annoying encounter was only the beginning.

The beginning of everything extraordinary.