A Twist of Fate (Complete)

Ch. 29 - Class with Keaton

The next morning when Everly's alarm went off, she immediately checked her phone and was disappointed to see that Keaton still hadn't texted her back. She wondered if he had seen her text and decided to ignore it, or maybe he just fell asleep early last night and hadn't even seen it yet. 

Her mind was playing over every possible scenario, making it impossible to fall back to sleep, so she decided to get up and get ready. After a long, hot shower she put on a baggy sweatshirt and some comfortable jeans and pulled her long brown hair up into a low maintenance ponytail. She was too depressed to put any effort into her appearance today. 

When she walked out of her dorm building to go to class she was shocked to see two paparazzi waiting outside for her in the bushes, one taking pictures and the other recording a video with a large professional looking camera. They rushed over and got in her face, making her feel intimidated because both of them were men that were larger than her and she was all alone. The flashes of light from the camera were blinding so she lifted her hand to shield her face from it. 

"How long have you and Brad Lancaster been dating?" one of them asked.

"We're not dating," she said, still shielding her eyes. "We're just friends."  She passed by them but they followed her and kept asking questions.

"You used to date though didn't you? I saw a post on your Facebook from a few months ago where you said you'd been together almost four years and he was the love of your life. He commented that he couldn't wait to marry you and have babies. Why did the two of you break up?"

Her Facebook page was set to private so that only her friends could see her posts, so she had no idea how he saw that. She hung her head and blocked her face from the cameras as she kept trying to walk towards class but they were blocking her path making it almost impossible. She wasn't sure what to do. Then she felt a hand clasp around her arm pulling her forward and she looked up and saw that it was Keaton. 

With his other hand, he grabbed one of the paparazzi guys up by the collar and pulled tight. "Leave her alone and get the fuck out of here," he growled in his face. "or I'll make sure the only stories you'll be covering are the local high school graduations." 

"How do you plan to do that? You think just asking me nicely will work?" he laughed smugly, looking over at the other paparazzi guy and he laughed too. 

Keaton wasn't smiling. "My Dad is Rowan Ashcroft. Have you heard of him?"

The two men looked at each other and their smug smiles quickly faded and they suddenly looked scared. Both of them nodded slowly. 

"Good. Then you know I have the power to make it happen. I suggest you leave, delete the pictures and videos you took and never bother her again or I'll make sure you both never work in this town again. Tell all of your paparazzi friends the same. Everly Sutton is off limits. Got it?" 

They both nodded, looking shocked and one of the men said, "Yes, yes sir. We're sorry. We'll leave her alone," he stuttered. 

Keaton let go of the man's collar and pushed him away and they both scrambled off, looking back at him a few times. 

Everly watched them run off and turned to thank Keaton but he was already gone, heading in the opposite direction. 

"Thank you," she called out but there was no response and she watched him turn the corner around a building and disappear.

She pulled out her phone and texted him, 'Thank you for what you just did for me. I appreciate it.' 

She waited a minute and when she didn't get a response back she sent another text.