Stealing His Crown

"Wren is such a pathetic third wheel, always wedging herself between the golden couple!" The shrill laughter slammed into the lockers right next to the GPA ranking board.

I stared a hole through the printed list. Rank One: Declan. Rank Three: Eloise. And me? The ruthless overachiever who used to bleed for that top spot?

Nailed humiliatingly to second place. Again.

Inside the classroom, that arrogant number one leaned against a desk, aggressively caging his delicate, artificial girlfriend between his arms. "Baby, just bump your GPA up by zero point one next time, and we can stand shoulder to shoulder on stage as the commencement speakers." He let out a low chuckle, his eyes dripping with a nauseating sense of arrogance and superiority.

Playing couple goals with academic rankings? Want your names glued right next to each other? Fine. I'll take back first place and give you exactly what you want.

Chapter 1 I've been an absolute freak for competition since day one.

My trajectory was set the moment I crushed everyone in the thirdgrade state spelling bee, soaking in the toxic, jealous glares of my peers.

My vanity only mutated and swelled as I got older. Before high school, I monopolized every single rankone spot in my grade.

The sheer rush of feeling those awestruck stares burning into my back? It sent shivers of pure electricity down my spine.

The joy of being an arrogant showoff was just that gloriously shallow. I walked into Ningcheng Prep as the undisputed valedictorian of my middle school district.

And then, I slammed right into a brick wall named Declan. Through freshman and sophomore year, I didn't snag first place a single time. Not. Even. Once.

Me, the girl who lived to flex, permanently nailed to the number two spot. The teachers always tried to soften the blow. "Wren, your performance is already phenomenal.

Just a bit of bad luck. Doublecheck your work next time." But I'd hear them whispering in the staff room. "Declan's just wired differently. His approach is so mature.

I heard he used to train for the Math Olympiad…" Classmates would come to my desk begging for help with their homework, only to twist the knife with their highEQ compliments. "Wren, maintaining second place is still godtier.

You're literally the only person in the entire grade who can even hold a candle to Declan." Declan. I kept a bright, breezy smile plastered on my face. "What can I say?

Skill issue on my part." Inside, my nails were biting so hard into my palms they almost drew blood.

The second the parasite left my desk, my deskmate, Jade, leaned in, eyes gleaming with a secret. "Wren, guess what I just heard." "Mhm?" I didn't take my eyes off the calculus sheet, just tilted my ear toward her. "Declan's dating someone." Who gives a damn? "Take a wild guess who." I finally peeled my eyes off the paper and leveled a look at her. "Who?" "Eloise," Jade whispered. "Who the hell is that?" Jade gave me a deadpan look.

She rolled her eyes so hard I thought they'd get stuck. "My god, Wren. Anyone who scores lower than you is just invisible, huh?

She's literally ranked third in the midterms, right behind you and Declan." Through Jade, I got the rundown on my rival's little high school romance.

Declan and Eloise were both in the AP class next door. Last semester, Eloise was hovering around rank fifteen. This semester, she skyrocketed.

Anyone knows jumping two hundred spots in the middle of the pack is easy, but breaking from the top fifteen into the top three?

That takes a completely different kind of firepower. "Word is, they started studying together after class last semester. Getting privately tutored by our number one?

No wonder she shot up the ranks. Talk about a golden ticket," Jade sighed. Her name finally clicked. Jade was wrong—I did check the names around my rank after every exam. Eloise.

Long black hair, big doe eyes, lashes that curled perfectly. The definition of cute. Jade poked my arm, dropping her voice again. "You really don't care?

The teachers definitely know what's going on. But, I mean, it's Declan. They just look the other way." The school had a strict zerotolerance policy for dating.

But when it's rank one and rank three, and their idea of "dating" is just aggressively solving equations together in the library? What could the faculty even say? "Nope.

Why would I care?" I flashed a flawless smile. Date. Go right ahead and date. I hope you both get kicked straight out of the AP honors track for failing your finals.

The venomous thought tasted like sweet ash in my mouth.

Chapter 2 The results of the final midterms before the end of sophomore year were posted, and the hallway in front of the ranking board was choked with students looking for drama.

I stood near the back, but the names were perfectly clear. Second place. Again.

I was so pissed I was ready to go home and sprint ten miles on the treadmill just to burn off the rage.

Before I could even fully process the fury, a mocking voice drifted from the front of the crowd. "Why is Wren always wedged right between the lovebirds like a giant third wheel?

Hahaha…" "Our class is cursed with those two freaks. Rank one and rank two have literally never changed hands.

But honestly, I think Eloise actually has a shot at bumping Wren down next time. She was only six points behind her today." The humiliation didn't end there.

After school, I realized I had left my house keys in my desk and doubled back to get them. Passing the AP class next door, I caught sight of Declan tutoring Eloise.

The classroom was completely empty except for the two of them, huddled together by the window.

Declan's voice drifted out into the quiet hallway. "Baby, just bump your GPA up a fraction next time, and our names can finally be right next to each other." Being stuck as the eternal number two was humiliating enough.

But apparently, nobody was rooting for me to drag Declan off his throne. Instead, half the school was practically praying for someone else to drag me out of second place?

A dark, incredulous laugh escaped my throat. A switch flipped in my brain. The little couple wanted their names side by side? Fine.

I will take first place and give them exactly what they want. At dinner, my parents didn't even bat an eye at my ranking.

They handed out their usual, predictable praise. "Second place is incredible, sweetie. Your mom and I never pulled grades like that when we were in school.

Don't put so much pressure on yourself." Absolutely not. I had to get first. There was no alternative.

But with my current scores, hiring another generic, overpriced goldstar tutor was not going to cut it. The crunch of tires on gravel echoed from the driveway next door.

My mom glanced out the window. "Spencer is home for the summer. Do you want me to go ask him for his old study guides?" Spencer. Two years older than me.

His senior year, he caused an absolute sensation by securing an earlydecision acceptance to an Ivy League.

The day his acceptance letter arrived, he was not just splashed across the front page of the school paper—every single parent in our wealthy, gated community was talking about him.

He completely stole the spotlight. Before I could respond, my dad chimed in. "Spencer was on a completely different academic track.

His old notes probably wouldn't even help her." The moment those words left his mouth, a lightbulb shattered in my head.

I shot up from my chair. "What's with the sudden movements?" My mom jumped.

I sat back down, aggressively shoved the last few bites of dinner into my mouth, and slammed my fork onto the plate. "I'm going next door to borrow Spencer's notes." The front door of the house next door was wide open.

I strode straight in, tossed a quick greeting to Roland and Rosalind on the first floor, and made a beeline for the second floor.

Dressed in a simple white tee and relaxed denim, Spencer was lounging on the secondfloor sofa, scrolling through his phone.

The room was dim, the harsh glow of the screen illuminating the arrogant, flawless lines of his jaw and profile.

His collar hung slightly open, exposing the sharp, defined lines of his collarbones.

Every careless, relaxed shift of his body radiated a lethal, lazy magnetism—the exact kind of bastard who could make someone's heart skip a beat without even trying.

To be brutally honest, I hated Spencer.

Ever since I met him at age ten, forced to listen to our parents trade pretentious childrearing tips, I knew immediately: he was a massive showoff.

And no showoff can stand being in the same room as someone who outflexes them. Years of watching him operate had only cemented my first impression.

He glanced up as I walked in, one eyebrow arching smoothly. "Well, if it isn't little Wren—" Before he could finish that condescending sentence, I closed the distance between us, slammed both hands heavily against the coffee table in front of him, and caged him directly into the corner of the sofa.

Chapter 3 Caught off guard by the sudden proximity, Spencer stiffened against the sofa cushions. "Wren, what exactly are you doing?" I stared him dead in the eye, my tone deadpan. "Spencer, I heard you're home for the summer.

I want to hire you as my tutor.

This is my way of showing absolute sincerity," I blinked, leaning in closer, pinning his gaze with a highly aggressive stare. "…" "So, Spencer, can I book you for the next two months at standard market rate?" "…Try not to make hiring an academic tutor sound like an illicit transaction." "Noted." Spencer pushed my arms away, stood up, and looked me up and down. "I recall your grades being pretty flawless.

Why do you need me?" I paused, swallowing my pride before laying out the brutal truth. "Let me get this straight.

You've been nailed to the number two spot for two solid years of high school?" Spencer stared at me, genuine amusement breaking across his face.

He actually threw up a thumbsup. "Savage." Was he mocking me?

From what I knew, even though Spencer was entirely focused on elite academic competitions back in the day, nobody could ever drag him out of rank one whenever he bothered to take the standard finals.

The guy had zero weak subjects. "So you're here to steal my playbook on how to dominate first place?" A hot flush crept up the back of my neck, but I gave him a tight nod.

It takes an arrogant overachiever to know one.

A low chuckle vibrated in Spencer's chest. "If you're desperate enough to corner me like this, you must really want that crown." People like us loathe asking for help.

But Spencer was a trustfund kid; he didn't need my money. If I didn't push, why would he waste his summer tutoring?

And honestly, between begging him and staying the eternal runnerup, I would rather die than stay in second place. "So? Will you teach me?" I leveled a piercing look at him.

Spencer wore that same infuriating, lazy smirk—the exact one he sported his senior year when he effortlessly bagged his Ivy League early acceptance.

He made winning look like an absolute joke. God, I was jealous. "Bring me your latest exams tomorrow.

I'll take a look," Spencer said, slipping his phone into his pocket. "No promises." That meant yes. Overachievers always left themselves a thirty percent margin of deniability.

The next day, I dumped a stack of test papers onto Spencer's desk. Not just the recent midterms, but the finals from the last two semesters as well.

He flipped through every redinked mistake. His first piece of feedback? "Nice handwriting." Obviously. I figured out the power of perfect penmanship in elementary school.

I burned through crates of calligraphy practice books just so I could casually hit people with an "Oh, it's just okay" whenever they complimented my notes.

The flex was intoxicating. "You barely lose points on careless errors.

You're meticulous," Spencer analyzed, his eyes scanning the pages. "Basically, if a concept was covered in the syllabus, you locked down the points.

Your fatal flaw is the final, heavyweight bonus questions.

It's totally normal to miss the ones that push beyond the standard curriculum." Spencer paused right there, leaving the second half of the sentence hanging in the air.

But I heard it loud and clear. I couldn't solve them. But Declan could. And that was exactly why he owned the throne. Chapter 4 "And you can't just focus on Calculus and Physics.

You need to ace your AP Literature and History classes to get perfect scores. Crush them across the board." I leveled a flat, deadpan stare at him. No kidding, genius.

Getting a perfect score in AP Lit is already brutal enough, but maxing out AP History too? Easy for him to say.

Spencer caught the tight set of my jaw and let out a low laugh. "What's with the glare? You hired me to build a flawless transcript, didn't you?

Doubting my methods already?" The absolute arrogance of this guy. When would I learn to flex that effortlessly?

Spencer's parents had been thrilled when they heard I drafted him as my tutor. Their reasoning? It would finally drag him away from his gaming console.

A hardcore gamer who still casually annihilated the academic bell curve? I wanted to scream into a pillow.

Since the Ivy Leagues were already out for the summer but my prep school was still grinding through the final weeks of the semester, our sessions were strictly confined to the weekends.

During the week, I snapped photos of the brutal practice problems that stumped me and fired them off to Spencer, stockpiling them for our Saturday sitdowns.

In reality, my pride wouldn't let me leave them unsolved. By the time I sent the photos, I had usually reverseengineered the logic myself.

Come Saturday, Spencer leaned back in his chair. "Figured them out yet?" I gave a sharp nod. "Nailed them." Spencer slid a legal pad across the desk.

It was covered in a few handwritten equations. "Take a swing at these, then." His penmanship was sharp, aggressive, and perfectly structured—infuriatingly onbrand for him.

Seeing it dragged up a dark memory: the only reason my mother had forced me into those elite calligraphy classes years ago was because Spencer's parents had bragged about them.

I burned through crates of practice books just so I could casually drop an "Oh, it's just okay" whenever people praised my handwriting.

The problems on the pad were entirely alien, but the underlying mechanics mirrored the nightmare bonus questions that always tripped me up.

I chewed through the first two with a bit of lateral thinking.

The third one bogged me down, turning my scratch paper into a warzone of scribbles, but I eventually clawed my way to the right answer. The final question, though?

I burned through two full sheets of paper, exhausting every formula I knew, and hit a dead end every single time.

I finally slammed my pen down and glared at Spencer. "I'm stuck." The bastard just smirked, leaning against the edge of the desk. "Don't sweat it.

That one's ripped straight from an Olympiad qualifying exam. It's totally normal for you to hit a wall." I ground my teeth. Cheap reverse psychology.

I locked my eyes back onto the paper, practically trying to burn a hole through the equation out of pure spite. Spencer let out a low chuckle. "Alright, back off.

Let your tutor actually justify his paycheck, will you?" He reached over, his long, lean fingers closing around my pen.

He circled two completely unassuming variables in the equation.

He leaned in closer, his voice dropping right next to my ear as he mapped out the logic, his eyes flicking to my face to check if I was following.

What had been a chaotic mess of numbers suddenly snapped into crystalclear focus with just a few of his clipped sentences. "You'll never see anything this heavy on a standard AP exam, but it forces your brain to operate on a different frequency." He tapped the pen against the paper and slid it back up to the third question. "My answer for that one is already correct," I pointed out, my brow furrowing.

I had no idea why he was wasting time dissecting a solved problem.

Spencer's lips curved into a sharp smile. "If you and Declan both nail the exact same final bonus question, how do you prove you're playing in a higher league?" I paused, analyzing the angle. "Step efficiency.

Whoever delivers the cleaner, more elegant proof wins." "And beyond that?" I drew a blank. "Think about it, Wren.

What happens when everyone else drags themselves across the finish line using the one standard method they memorized… and you drop two entirely different, flawless proofs on the page?" Spencer uncapped the pen and aggressively slashed the words [Alternative Method 2] directly beneath my work.

The realization hit me like a shot of pure adrenaline. My eyes snapped up to his, widening. Oh, that was brilliant. It was the ultimate, arrogant flex. I absolutely loved it.

Chapter 5 Without missing a beat, Spencer mapped out five completely different ways to tear that equation apart. Two of the methods were straightup collegelevel theorems.

But by the time he finished breaking them down, I had them locked in. I ground my back teeth together. The jealousy was suffocating.

July rolled around, and my prep school finally let us out for the summer.

The day the final semester grades dropped, I was curled up in Spencer's living room, grinding through practice tests. I refreshed the school portal. Rank two. Again.

Spencer glanced over from his phone. "Scores posted?" I let my head drop onto the desk with a dull thud. "Yeah." "Not bad. You're only trailing rank one by five points total.

That's a solid jump from last time." Nobody at school actually believed I could dethrone Declan. His previous total scores used to completely eclipse mine by double digits.

In the hallways, I played the effortlessly cool runnerup. In reality, I was chewing the inside of my cheek until it bled.

Spencer's casual praise didn't do a damn thing to soothe my ego. Then, he slid a heavy notebook across the desk. "I mapped out your intensive prep schedule.

Grind through this all summer, and you can get back to your toxic little rivalry next semester." "I am not competing," I snapped.

Spencer gave a wildly condescending nod. "Right, right, totally not competitive. Just a girl who hates losing more than she loves breathing." I glared at him but couldn't argue.

Failing to conquer that number one spot had mutated into a fullblown obsession.

I spent the entire summer practically living at Spencer's house, burying myself in textbooks until my vision blurred. Even my Ivy League tutor needed days off, though.

Whenever Spencer took a break, I locked myself in my room and hammered out practice tests.

Occasionally, the prep school crowd would drag me out to the mall or a pool party, and I'd play along.

Whenever the conversation inevitably shifted to summer SAT prep courses, I'd flash a perfectly careless smile. "Oh, I didn't sign up for any of that.

I've just been bingewatching Netflix and gaming all break." Technically, it wasn't a lie. I did watch shows—mostly fiveminute movie recaps playing at triple speed on YouTube.

And I did game—only because Spencer insisted on "mandatory brain resets" and forced me to run a few duo matches with him on the console.

Their reactions fed my ego perfectly. "Wren, why would you even need a tutor? If I had your GPA, I'd just pack my bags for college right now!" "Must be nice being a natural genius.

My mom hired some ridiculously expensive private tutor for me.

I'm so drained I don't even have the energy to watch a movie, let alone game…" "What are you playing right now?" one guy asked.

I dropped the name of the shooter Spencer made me play. The guy's eyes lit up. "No way, me too! We should squad up sometime." "Absolutely," I smiled sweetly. Crap.

Now I actually have to carve out time to get good at that stupid game. Spencer's methods were completely unhinged compared to the rigid, standardissue tutors I was used to.

He didn't sugarcoat anything. "Drilling the fundamentals is fine, but playing it safe won't get you that crown.

I'm throwing concept models at you that won't even show up on the AP exams, just to forcefully rewire how you attack a problem." He didn't just tear apart my physics and calc limits; he aggressively overhauled my AP Lit and History essays, too.

I practically claimed the secondfloor living room as my own territory. We even hauled his massive mahogany desk out of his private study just for me.

During the day, with his parents at their corporate offices, it was just the two of us and the housekeeper who came by to prep lunch.

Though, Spencer constantly derailed things with his lethal, tempting interruptions. "Wren," he'd drawl. "Craving some absolute garbage food right now?" I was highly suspicious that half the ridiculous sum my mother paid him went straight into fueling our DoorDash addiction.

While I bled over my practice tests, Spencer would usually crash on the sofa behind me, scrolling on his phone.

After finishing a brutal physics set, I spun around in my chair to demand he grade it. Instead, I found the arrogant bastard dead asleep on the cushions.

I crept over and crouched quietly beside the sofa. Up close, his skin was aggravatingly flawless. The sharp, arrogant slope of his nose.

The thick, dark line of his lashes resting against his cheek. His breathing was warm and steady, rising and falling in a rhythmic, hypnotic cadence.

His collar hung lazily open, radiating a heavy, intoxicating hit of pure, mature male heat.

In the dim, quiet stillness of the room, he gave off a lethal, suffocating magnetism that made my throat instantly go dry. "…" I swallowed hard.

Hating him for being so effortlessly perfect was as natural as breathing. Chapter 6 I gave it ten minutes.

When he showed absolutely zero signs of waking up, I reached out and poked his bare forearm. Spencer stirred, his eyes blinking open to find me crouching right next to the sofa.

It took him a full three seconds to process reality. "Sets done?" He pushed himself up, pinching the bridge of his nose. "My bad. Ran duos until four in the morning.

Kinda dead right now." He rolled off the sofa, walked over to the mahogany desk, and snatched up my legal pad. One careless scan was all he needed to mentally grade the entire page.

I leveled a flat, deadpan stare at his back. Grinding video games until dawn, and he still managed to drag himself out of bed to rake in tutoring cash?

The sheer, ungodly stamina of this guy. The jealousy spiked sharp and hot in my chest. That set the rhythm for the entire summer.

Every time I pictured that number one spot, I ground through practice tests until my knuckles cramped.

I burned through every single released AP exam and SAT practice booklet from the last five years. If an answer had a definitive, objective truth, I locked down the points.

August vanished. My prep school started weeks before his Ivy League semester kicked off.

Before I left, he slid a brand new, terrifyingly thick binder across the desk. "Your AP teachers have to cater to the slowest kids in the room.

This schedule is tailored specifically for you." He tapped a stack of fresh prep books. "Picked these up at the bookstore.

Text me if you hit a wall." I had to hand it to him—Spencer was ruthless but effective.

He charged by the hour, but he constantly pushed our sessions past the limit and actively turned down the overtime pay my mom tried to hand him.

Senior year didn't shuffle the AP roster. The faces were the same, but the air in the classroom was thick and suffocating. The faculty constantly forcefed us toxic positivity.

I lost count of how many times I heard the "The Ivy League draft isn't over until May, any of you could be the dark horse" speech.

Then came the first official AP simulation exams of senior year. I locked in, tearing through every single test packet with lethal precision. I doublechecked every margin.

Spencer’s brutal summer bootcamp had actually paid off. My brain sliced through the heavyweight bonus questions with terrifying clarity.

The day the rankings dropped, I forced my breathing to stay even, masking my absolute desperation as I casually strolled past the glass display board in the main hallway.

My eyes tracked straight to the very top slot