Page 64 of The Arianna Arrangement

Charlotte chuckled, but it was almost drowned out by the sound of everyone reacting to Leyla’s post. Right about that time, Jack approached the table and sat next to her, giving her a kiss on the lips, completely ignoring all the attention on them.

When the cafeteria door opened again, the room went silent. I didn’t have to turn around to know it was Bradley that entered. The only reason everyone would stop talking is so that they could hear whatever drama was about to happen.

Much to everyone’s surprise, he didn’t approach our table. He just got his food and headed out to the courtyard without saying a word to anyone. Not that he had anyone to say anything to. He was going to spend the rest of this year as a social pariah and I couldn’t wait to see just how far he’d fall.

My last class of the day was in the front of the building, so I followed Leyla outside and we said our goodbyes, then I waited for Potter to arrive. Not wanting anyone else to stop and talk to me since my social battery was tapped out, I pulled out my phone and scrolled through social media.

Memes about Bradley were popping up all over and it appeared the Crestwood Prep student body had been busy since lunch.

The minutes ticked by and I was starting to get irritated. Yes, Potter’s last class was in the tech building all the way across campus, but he should have been here by now.

I pulled up the tracking app we all had so I could see exactly where he was. Potter had designed it and the Givenchy family was the only ones that had access to the entire app. It would be hard for someone to hack an app no one knew existed.

It looked like he’d taken a detour on the way back from the tech building and was between the arts building and the football field in one of the only areas of the school without cameras.

I swear to God if I’ve been waiting just for him to get his dick wet, I might just chop it off.

Just like I’d never clit blocked my bestie, I wouldn’t cockblock Pott either, but I mean, a heads up would have been nice. I could have found another ride or stayed in the air conditioning a little longer.

If he wasn’t going to have the decency to give me a heads up, I wasn’t going to give him the courtesy of finishing. Of course, I didn’t want them to hear me coming so I made sure to quiet my steps and go into stealth mode when I approached. I planned to snap a couple pics, maybe get a video, so I could blackmail Potter the next time he pissed me off.

Which would probably be within an hour. That guy really knew how to push people's buttons.

The strategy completely changed, though, when I heard the voices before I saw what was going on.

“You’ve completely ruined my life!” Bradley’s voice wasn’t loud enough to draw attention to himself, but the forcefulness of it had the hair on the back of my neck standing on end.

I looked around the corner and saw Potter pinned to the wall, blood dripping from the corner of his mouth, one eye already swelling, and a knife at his throat.

All the Givenchy boys knew how to fight, and though Potter’s strengths definitely lie more in the digital realm, I was surprised to see that Bradley had done so much damage. How the fuck had that happened?

That was a question that could be answered later. Now, I needed to get the psycho with the knife away from my family.

“You’re going to come clean to everyone. Tell them that I don’t have any infections and get them to stop with the bullshit. You’re also going to get that bitch of a cousin of yours to drop Jack and get back together with me.”

“How do you expect me to do that when you have me pinned against a wall?” Potter raised an eyebrow, acting totally unaffected by the situation, but I could read him better than most and he was freaking the fuck out.

Thankfully, Crestwood Prep didn’t have metal detectors, perks of being a prep school in what was considered the safest city in America. Quietly, I sat my belongings on the ground after pulling my weapon from my purse.

Right before I’d moved to Crestwood, Sandro had gotten me a Ruger LCP Max in rose gold and I carried her everywhere with me. On silent feet, I made my way towards the guys. I was pretty sure that Potter noticed my approach, but he didn’t shift his attention away from Bradley.

I pressed the barrel of the gun against Bradley’s temple. While I didn’t plan to pull the trigger, if push came to shove, I would protect my family, and I didn’t want the bullet to pass through the air in his head and hurt Pott.

“I’m going to need you to remove the knife from the throat of my husband’s second.” While everyone knew the Givenchy’s and how their hierarchy would work, sometimes reminding people of your place in the world, or in this case, Potter’s, helped bring more clarity to the situation.

I’d seen it first hand growing up when people would give Marco shit and Sandro would remind them he was his second.

Bradley chuckled. “What are you gonna do? Shoot me?”

I released the safety and cocked the gun. “Play stupid games, win stupid prizes, Blackwood.” He didn’t move the knife, but also didn’t make any moves to test me. “You’ve always known me as part of the Givenchy clan, but don’t forget who I really am. I am, and always will be, Arianna Vitale, mafia princess.

“Think long and hard about that. You picked an area of the campus with no cameras so no one would see what you were up to. That means, if I have to pull this trigger, the only two people that will know what really happened are me and Potter. You know we’ll both take that secret to our graves. I have no moral compass and a strong stomach, so if the bullet isn't through and through, I have no issue digging a finger into your skull to retrieve it.

“With Potter’s tech genius, before your body is even discovered, the cameras showing either of us being in this area will be wiped and looped, and all of the city cams will show us heading back to my house twenty minutes ago. Pretty sure he can have our cell phone GPS aligning with that story before cops arrive on the scene.”

Potter’s cocky grin appeared on his face. “My tech genius could also hack into your devices, posting a suicide note on your phone while I falsify a video and plant it on the school's cameras that show Alex walking away with a gun in his hand. How much trouble do you think your bestie would get into if the cops suspected he helped you try to turn your suicide into a frame job?”

As all of this sank in with Bradley, the knife was moved away from Potter’s neck.