CHAPTER 1

ARIA'S POV

The bleacher metal was burning hot under my thighs.

I didn't move. I didn't care. My eyes were on number seventeen and nothing else existed.

"He is literally glowing," Maya whispered beside me, fanning herself with her notebook. "It's not fair. It should not be legal to look like that."

"It's just sweat," I said. My throat was dry.

It wasn't just sweat.

Zane had just scored in the practice scrimmage and now he was celebrating with his team, and somebody handed him one of those big plastic water jugs and he just — tipped his head back and poured it over himself. Not even to drink. Just poured the whole thing over his head, and the water ran down through his dark hair and down his neck and soaked through his practice jersey until it stuck to every line of his chest and stomach, and he laughed and shook his head like a dog, water spraying off in all directions in the afternoon sun.

My heart did something embarrassing and complicated in my chest.

God.

"Okay we need to—" Maya started.

"Go?" I finished.

"Right now," she said, her voice going tight in a completely different way.

I pulled my eyes off Zane's water-soaked jersey and looked down the bleacher steps.

Bianca.

Three steps below us, hand on her hip, smirk already fully loaded. Her usual matching set of girls stood on either side of her, phones ready, eyes sharp.

"You're in our spot," Bianca said. Not asking. Just stating it like a fact the universe had already agreed to.

I felt the old familiar pull — that shrinking feeling, the urge to just get up and go and make it easy for everyone. Maya felt it too, probably. But Maya had never once in her life given into that feeling.

"We were here first," Maya said, chin up. "There are literally a hundred other seats."

Bianca's smile didn't change but her eyes went ice cold. "I don't want other seats. I want these ones. Best view of the field." A pause, letting the real meaning sit in the air between us. Best view for people like me. Not people like you. "Move."

"No," Maya said simply. Arms crossed.

Something cracked in Bianca's expression. Just for a second — real annoyance, sharp and ugly — before the smooth mask came back. "Fine," she said softly, and somehow fine from Bianca's mouth sounded like a threat wrapped in a bow. Her eyes slid to me, cold and dismissive. "Sit there. We'll see how you feel about your view later."

She turned to go. And then her shoulder slammed hard and deliberately into Maya — a real shove that sent Maya stumbling into the metal railing with a clang.

Bianca didn't look back. Just walked down the steps with her girls, their laughter drifting up like smoke.

I looked at Maya. Maya looked at me.

Let it go, said the old, tired part of me. It's easier.

My face was hot and it had nothing to do with the sun.

The scrimmage ended. Students scattered toward the buildings in loud groups and Maya and I joined the flow, heading to our sociology lecture. We cut through the central courtyard — brick paths, trimmed grass, the big oak trees throwing shade across the walkways.

Then I heard a sharp whistle from above.

I looked up one second too late.

The cold hit me first. A full bucket of water and powdered pink paint, dumped from above, drenching me head to toe in under a second. I gasped and stumbled, the shock of it knocking the air out of me. The smell was sharp and chemical. The cold went straight through my white t-shirt, my jeans, soaked into my hair, dripped off my nose and chin.

I stood there, completely still, dripping pink onto the brick.

The laughter started immediately.

Bianca stepped out from behind the nearest oak tree, empty plastic bucket in hand, her smile wide and genuine and delighted in the most horrible way. Her friends spread out behind her, phones already up.

"Oh wow," she said, her voice doing that fake sweet thing. "Aria got a little pink shower! How cute!"

"So bad!" one of them laughed.

"Maybe it'll wash off the loser smell," another added.

The cold from the paint was nothing compared to what shot through me right then — white hot and thin as a wire, burning away the shock and leaving something much simpler behind.

Rage.

"You absolute bitch," I said, and took a step toward her.

Bianca's eyes went wide in fake innocence. "Me? I'm just taking out the trash, babe. Consider this a public service." The smile turned sharp as a blade. "You don't cross into my space. You don't exist in my world. We clear?"

We were not clear. There was nothing clear. There was just the roaring in my ears and my hands coming up and me moving forward—

I never got there.

Because Maya was already moving, her face twisted with pure fury, going straight for Bianca — and Bianca's friends were ready. Two of them grabbed Maya's arms, yanking her back hard. A third one pulled duct tape from her bag like she'd been carrying it specifically for this moment, and before Maya could do anything they slapped it across her mouth, cutting off whatever she was shouting, and shoved her sideways. Maya hit the ground, eyes blazing, chest heaving, completely unable to do anything except glare.

"Keep her there," Bianca said pleasantly, like she was asking someone to hold a door.

I stood frozen. Looking at Maya on the ground. Looking at the crowd around us — some of them laughing, some just watching with that nervous look people get when they want to help but don't. Nobody moved. Nobody ever moved.

Bianca turned back to me.

"Now," she said, tilting her head, looking at me like a problem she was about to enjoy solving. "Let's see what else we can do."

One of her girls moved fast. I didn't even register it until I heard the sound.

Rrrip.

My white t-shirt split straight up the middle from the neckline all the way down, the two halves falling open. The cold air hit my stomach and chest and I looked down and there it was — my simple cotton bra, light pink, little cartoon cat print, completely exposed to the sun and the crowd and every camera pointed at me.

My brain went completely blank.

"Oh my GOD," Bianca shrieked, and her delight was real now, not performed — she was actually thrilled. "She wears cartoon bras! Like a little kid! Get every angle, oh my god—"

The phones came closer. I tried to pull the torn fabric together but my hands were slick with pink water and shaking and it was pointless and I knew it was pointless and I stood there anyway, fingers clutching wet fabric, cold air on my skin, cameras everywhere.

Cover up. Run. Disappear. Do anything—

Then the courtyard went quiet.

Not completely silent — but the laughter dropped, the cameras lowered slightly, and a different kind of awareness moved through the crowd like a wave. I followed everyone's eyes.

They stood at the far edge of the courtyard.

The Steel Boys.

Coming from the direction of the gym, they'd stopped at the entrance to the courtyard and were just — looking. All four of them. Reed leaning against the brick archway, his expression loose and unreadable. Cole with his arms crossed and his face completely blank, giving away nothing. Kai perfectly still, dark eyes moving across the scene like he was cataloguing every detail. Jasper slightly separate from the others, jaw tight, eyes sharp.

All four of them were looking at me.

Not the way the crowd was looking. The crowd was watching something funny happen to someone they didn't care about. The Steel Boys were doing something different — something colder and more focused. Like they were assessing. Calculating. Their eyes moved across my pink-soaked hair, my ruined shirt, the exposed skin, the hand-shaped red mark from where someone grabbed my arm.

My skin prickled everywhere their gaze went.

Bianca clocked them immediately. Her whole posture changed in half a second — the performance switching on, softening, making herself smaller and sweeter and wronged. She touched her cheek where a single drop of pink water had landed. "Hey guys," she said, her voice going gentle. "This girl decided to start something with me. Got paint everywhere. We were just sorting it out."

None of them responded.

Reed's lazy eyes did one more slow sweep over me — hair, face, torn shirt, the strip of exposed stomach, the cartoon bra — and his expression stayed exactly the same. Cole's gaze was identical, clinical and cold. Kai's stare landed on me and stayed there for just a moment too long, focused on nothing specific, just present in a way that made my skin feel tight. Jasper's jaw worked. His eyes narrowed looking at Bianca's smug face.

Then, like they'd agreed without speaking, they looked away.

All four of them. At the same moment.

Reed pushed off the wall. Cole uncrossed his arms. They turned and kept walking across the courtyard, unhurried, like we were a slight delay in their afternoon. Like I was scenery they'd already moved past. Bianca's mouth opened slightly — she'd expected something, sympathy or attention or anything — and got nothing.

Their leaving broke something in the air.

The crowd started murmuring again. Phones came back up. Bianca turned back to me with her smirk reloaded.

But something in me had gone quiet.

Not calm. Not okay. Just — done.

The hot rage from thirty seconds ago had cooled into something else. Something solid and flat and permanent, like a decision made at the bottom of your stomach that your brain hasn't caught up to yet.

I dropped my hands. Stopped trying to hold the torn shirt together. Let the pink-soaked fabric hang open. Let the cartoon bra face every camera.

Look. Look at all of it. See what you made.

I turned and walked away.

Past Bianca's hissed parting threat. Past the phones. Past the staring faces. I just walked, pink water dripping off my hair with every step, cold air hitting my exposed skin, sneakers squelching on the brick.

I didn't run.

I didn't look back.