He Asked Me Out to Get Back at Her, I Gave Him a Rulebook Instead Chapter 01

He Asked Me Out to Get Back at Her, I Gave Him a Rulebook Instead Chapter 01

When the campus billionaire’s big public confession crashed and burned in front of my roommate, he shoved the flowers at me instead.

My roommate, old money with the attitude to match, sneered. “Ronan needs someone on his level.”

“He’ll come crawling back.”

“And you, taking another girl’s flowers? That’s desperate, not cute.”

So Ronan Ashford turned me into his revenge project. And he made sure the whole campus saw it.

That’s when the stream of floating comments appeared, translucent words drifting across my vision like a glitch in reality.

[Girl, don’t fall for it! He bet his boys you’d be easier to get than the heiress.]

[The second you say yes, he’ll use you and toss you aside!]

[He and the heiress end up together anyway, big fancy wedding and all, and YOU get dragged online as the homewrecker.]

Eventually, a notification from Ronan would pop up. [Got you a dress. You’d look amazing in it.]

[If it’s not your thing, give it to your roommate.]

And that same night, I would type up a hundred rules for dating me and hit send.

[Fine. I’m in. Break a single rule and we’re done.]

[Rule 1: Don’t mention any other woman around me. That includes your mother.]

…

My family had no money and no connections. And my face? Cute on a good day. Nothing that turned heads.

The one thing I had going for me was grades. Top of my cohort, every single semester.

But at Briarwood, everyone was smart. And half of them looked like they’d stepped off a magazine cover.

So I learned to keep my head down and my real self locked away.

Until Ronan.

He’d spent three months chasing Vivienne Whitmore. Three months of expensive gestures and zero results. And when she shot him down in front of everyone, he turned around and handed me the bouquet.

Everybody knew who Ronan was.

If we hadn’t ended up at the same school, if he hadn’t picked my roommate to obsess over, our worlds would never have touched.

Someone posted a blurry side-profile shot of him on the university’s anonymous tea page at the start of the semester. It went viral overnight.

People zoomed in and clocked his watch at six figures.

His TikTok got dug up too. Someone matched the location tags and the watch.

I overheard him one day, irritated. “Who the hell posted that? My DMs are a disaster.”

By the next morning, every post about him was gone. Just like that.

I buried my nose in the bouquet. No one had ever given me flowers before.

Vivienne watched me from her bed, unimpressed. “Ronan asked me for your Snap. Don’t catch feelings. I’m serious. You can’t handle him.”

Vivienne studied my face.

When I didn’t answer, her voice softened into something almost like pity. “He’s only adding you to get under my skin. That game got old a long time ago.”

She doused herself in perfume and swapped her slides for heels.

She squeezed my shoulder on her way out. “He’s hot, though. I’ll give him that. Go for it if you want. Doesn’t bother me. I’ve got options.”

My phone buzzed. A Snap request from Ronan, followed by a chat: [Hey. Thanks for taking the flowers.]

Vivienne glanced at my screen and scoffed. “He was never that nice to me.”

She grabbed her phone and fired off a voice note to Ronan, mimicking him. [Oh wow, thank you for taking the flowers.]

The door slammed behind her.

So much for not being jealous.

The floating comments rushed in again.

[God, his temper is awful and his ego’s even worse. No wonder he has to grovel later to win her back.]

[The side character looks so innocent. Easy target. No wonder the MMC bet he could bag her in three months.]

[The FMC got jealous and dared him to chase the roommate. She didn’t think he’d actually do it.]

[If the side character just doesn’t fall for him and takes the breakup money later, she walks away with $300K. But if she gets clingy? The internet will destroy her for being the other woman.]

[The MMC and FMC are an enemies-to-lovers train wreck. They fight nonstop even after they’re married. Maren’s just collateral damage in their war.]

My thumb hovered over the accept button.

He’d bet his friends he could get me?

And I’d walk away with three hundred thousand dollars just for agreeing to end it?

Was any of this real?

Only one way to find out.

Either I’d pocket three hundred grand, or I’d end up with a billionaire who played by my rules.

Either way, I won.

I tapped ‘Decline’ and left a quick reply.

The text flickered back.

[Wait, she rejected the add request??]

[LMAO she said since he likes her roommate, she shouldn’t add him. I can’t.]

[His face right now. I’m DEAD.]