“Keep your head down.Get through the year. Don’t blow this.”
I repeated that mantra like a prayer as I walked deeper into the polished halls of Royal Oaks Prep for what felt like the hundredth time—but was really only the second.
It had been a week since the bonfire. Today was the first day of official school. I rode my bike down old dirt paths, avoiding main roads and then stashed it between wild rose hedges and rocks. Everyone else rolled up in Bentleys or self driving Teslas… I was just a scholarship girl on a bike. But it did have a bell… lol.
A week sincethe kiss.
A week since Leo Holt spun my entire existence into a headline and walked off like I was a footnote.
And I’d done exactly what I promised myself I would: I disappeared.
No eye contact. No TikTok. No Instagram. I wouldn’t even look when Shani tried to show me clips from the party—grainy, fire-lit footage ofmewrapped inhim, framed like a scene from a drama I hadn’t auditioned for.
“Nope,” I said every time, waving her phone away like it burned.
“You’re seriously going to pretend that didn’t happen?” she’d asked, arching a brow. “Because the rest of the school is obsessed. Including yourboyfriend.”
“Stop calling him that,” I hissed.
“Fine. Your stalker, then.”
I’d rolled my eyes, but she wasn’t wrong.
Apparently, King Leo had been asking around—quietly, carefully, but notsubtly. Trying to figure out who I was, where I came from. Shani said he even tried to sneak into the admissions office database, which was locked down tighter than Fort Knox thanks to how many politician kids and blue-blood legacies walked these halls.
“Don’t stress,” she’d said. “The system’s airtight. He won’t find you.”
I wasn’t so sure.
And I wasn’t sure which terrified me more: that he’d figure out who I really was…
Or that he wouldn’t.
My loafers clicked too crisply on the marble floors. They always did. This place wasn’t built for girls like me. It was built for names that lived on plaques and family trusts, for kids with perfect posture and six generations of framed diplomas. For people who didn’t have to reinvent themselves because their image had never been damaged in the first place.
I got in on scholarship, a whispered favor, and more conditions than a user agreement.
One mistake.
That’s all it would take.
And Leo Holt? He was that mistake wrapped in golden skin and careless smirks.
I made it through AP Lit. Ms. Chalmers didn’t blink twice at me when I said Heathcliff was a narcissist, not a romantic. Ieven earned a nod. Pre-calc came next—quiet, efficient, uneventful. History after that. Leo sat two rows over, sprawled in his chair like it owed him rent.
He didn’t look at me.
Not once.
I told myself I was relieved. That this was good. Safe.
But a sick part of me hated it. The same part that replayed the way he’d stepped into my space, smirked like he saw straight through me, and kissed me like he didn’t care who was watching.
By lunch, I felt like I’d made it. No whispers in the hall. No prank flyers on my locker. No dramatic stares.
Unscathed.
Until I stepped into the quad.
