The Pretender and The Prince novel Chapter 33

Back in her dorm, Ondine started to pack.

Ellis called again.

She glanced at the screen, ignored it, and placed her phone face down on the bed.

Her roommate, Yasmeen, trudged in, looking defeated. “I’m doomed. I couldn’t answer so many questions. I’m definitely going to fail. I wonder if Professor Lester will take pity on me…”

“I doubt it,” said Allegra. “You barely went to class. That last one was tough. Even with full participation marks, if your exam score is too low, you still might not pass.”

Yasmeen’s face fell. “Oh, please, let me pass! I really don’t want to have to retake it!”

Suddenly, their other roommate, Reina, chimed in. “Hey, did you guys hear? Kendra from the French department has a sugar daddy.”

“What? For real?” Yasmeen’s mood flipped instantly. “Who told you? Who’s the guy?”

Reina opened a campus app and pulled up the top trending post. “Look.”

Yasmeen’s eyes went wide.

“Whoa, no way! This is huge!” She snatched the phone and scrolled, her excitement growing. “A Porsche Cayenne, so he’s definitely rich. But man, he’s ugly. His face is all pitted, and he’s overweight. Kendra’s the beauty of the French department. This is a total beauty-and-the-beast situation.”

Allegra leaned in. “That guy looks old enough to be her father. I can’t believe she’d go for that.”

Ondine, folding clothes into her suitcase, commented idly, “Maybe he really is her father. We shouldn’t spread rumors without proof.”

Reina added, “Kendra’s family isn’t well off, and I heard they favor her brother. Her roommate said her parents only give her eighty a month and she’s on a student loan for tuition. But when her brother needed an eight-thousand-dollar tutoring course, they paid without blinking. Kendra told her that herself.”

“That’s awful! What kind of parents are they?” Yasmeen said indignantly.

Allegra sighed. “Some parents are like that. They won’t spend money on their own daughter, but there are plenty of men who will.”

“Exactly,” Reina agreed. “Besides Kendra, there are a few other girls at our school with sugar daddies. You see them getting picked up in luxury cars all the time.”

Yasmeen shook her head. “The world these days…”

Ondine’s hands stilled. Something clicked in her mind. She remembered the day they got their marriage license. Seth had sent his assistant, Zeke, to pick her up. Zeke drove a very ordinary Toyota. Ondine had been in Seth’s Maybach before and had seen the fleet of luxury cars in the Thorne family’s garage.