Clear Lake Academy holds the worst of the worst delinquents from around the country. Each and every student there holds a notorious background that led them there and almost everyone avoids them.
After setting the tenth building on fire, which just...
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The sharp click of a gun being set sliced through the darkness. Small. Precise. Deadly. And then silence. It wrapped around the library like a suffocating blanket, pressing in on every side until it felt impossible to breathe.
Pandora and Bentley went rigid.
It was as if ice water had been poured over them both, shock freezing their bodies in place. Instinct took over—they clung to each other, pressed close, desperate for warmth, for something real to hold onto in a moment that no longer felt it.
Their foreheads stayed pressed together, breaths mingling, uneven and shallow. Neither of them dared to open their eyes. Because opening them meant facing it.
Facing her.
"Wilson~"
The voice rang out, light and sing-song.
And that voice dug deep into Pandora's soul and ripped it to shreds. Her entire body recoiled at the sound, something deep inside her splintering violently. That voice—once comforting, once safe—now tore through her chest, ripping apart everything she thought she knew.
Her heart didn't just break.
It shattered.
Pandora jerked away from Bentley before she could stop herself, panic overriding everything. His grip tightened instinctively, trying to keep her close, to protect her—but she shoved against him, desperate, and turned.
Bentley's breath caught. Over her shoulder, through the dim light, he saw the figure clearly now and dread settled deep in his bones.
The name barely made it out.
Because there she stood.
Sophianna Dalton.
Sophianna Dalton who was their friend; The girl who laughed the loudest at Hayden's jokes, who stole quiet glances at Adir when she thought no one noticed. The girl who had slipped so effortlessly into their lives, into their circle, into their trust. Like the idiots they were, they had welcomed her with wide, warm arms —and god be damned, in their eyes, she would never have done this, never have committed such a betrayal, and above all else she should have, at the very least, held some sort of loyalty towards them for being a friend.
But standing before them now—Sophianna wasn't that girl.
She stood poised, composed, holding a gun with unwavering ease, the barrel pointed directly at them. A twisted smile stretched across her lips, sharp and unnatural.
She looked... prepared. Like this moment had been waiting for her.
Her red satin dress caught the faint light, the soft fabric clinging and flowing at once, stopping mid-thigh. Gold jewellery gleamed against her skin, delicate and deliberate. Her heels clicked faintly as she shifted her weight, matte and elegant. Her dark hair fell in perfect curls around her shoulders. And her lips—painted a deep, blood-red.
