Paper Trail

Chapter 10: Paper Trail

Aima's POV

I turned and pretended I didn't see her.

James's words followed me all the way back to the staff quarters, while I locked the door, and even until I sat down on the bed.

The worst part was that I couldn't say they were wrong.

I pulled my canvas bag out from under the bed and tipped everything onto the blanket: James's five notebooks, the plastic folder of receipts, and the messages I had printed at the library.

Then I started to read.

I read the notebook from when he was fifteen. On the last page, he had written, "Aima gave me her lunch again today. Don't tell her I cried." I turned over the receipt stuck to the page after it. It was for a pair of boots. The date was the week of my mum's funeral.

I had paid for his boots while I was still wearing worn-out sandals.

Something in my chest went cold and quiet. I still find it hard to believe that he could do this to me, no matter what the circumstances were.

I sorted the pile by date and then added it up on my phone with my thumb. Physio, camps, boots, train tickets, rent. It came to more than forty-one thousand pounds. It was every penny my parents had ever saved, the price of a house and a hair salon.

None of it was a secret. It was all written down, in his own handwriting and mine, with dates and amounts.

All I needed was a place to show it—a place with so many cameras that he could not say he had never met me.

And the perfect place will be the finals, I thought.

I took out a new blue notebook I had bought at the campus shop and wrote on the first page, pressing so hard the pen nearly tore the paper:

"Finals night. Every camera. Every receipt. Every word he sent me. He will say my name himself."

I looked at it for a long time. It should have felt like victory. Instead, my stomach hurt.

I put the blue notebook under my pillow and lay down in Dom's jacket, but I couldn't sleep.

---

The next afternoon, I was carrying a crate of bottles across the car park when someone called my name.

"Aima? Hi. Can I talk to you?"

I turned. Jemima Vanterpool was standing by a white car, holding two cups of coffee. She was wearing a soft grey coat this time and no diamonds. Her hair was tied back, and she looked younger and more tired than she did on camera.

"I got you a latte," she said, holding it out. "I didn't know what you drink."

I looked at the cup. I thought of the vial and the water bottle, and I almost laughed at myself. But I took the cup without drinking from it.

"Why are you here?" I asked.

"Because I saw what he did to you," she said quickly, as if she had practiced. "That night. I stood right there and watched him say he didn't know you. It was horrible. I'm so sorry, Aima."

She sounded sincere. That was what unsettled me. If I hadn't heard her on the phone with her father, I might have believed every word.

"You're his fiancée," I said. "You're supposed to be on his side."

"I know." Jemima looked down at her coffee. "Maybe I don't know what side I'm on."

It was a strange thing to say. I waited, but she didn't add anything.

I decided to test her. I took a slow breath and used the calmest voice I had.

"He'll get what he deserves," I said. "Soon. I'm going to make sure of it."

The change was small, but I saw it. Her smile stopped halfway. Her fingers tightened around the cup until the lid buckled.

"What do you mean?" she asked quietly.

"Nothing." I shrugged. "Just that people can't treat others like that forever."

Jemima stared at me. For a second, she looked frightened, and I did not think it was for herself.

"Be careful," she said. "People get hurt in games like this. And sometimes it's the wrong people."

Then she turned and walked to her car quickly, driving away without looking back.

I stood in the car park with an untouched coffee. I didn't understand her. The girl who planned to drug James had just told me to be careful.

---

That night, I couldn't sit in my room any longer. I went down to the laundry room behind the changing rooms with a basket of dirty towels. It was past ten, and the corridor was empty.

I loaded the machine and pressed start. The drum began to turn with a low hum.

"Nice job, flower girl."

I spun around.

Vance was leaning in the doorway with his arms folded and a smile I had never seen on him before. It was slow and satisfying. He still had his bag on his shoulder, as if he had been waiting.

"I thought everyone had gone home," I said.

"Except me." He stepped inside and pushed the door shut with his foot. "I wanted to talk to you. About the store cupboard."

My heart stopped.

"I don't know what you mean."

"Of course you don't." He took out his phone and tapped the screen. "Let me remind you."

A voice came out of the speaker. It was low and rough—it was Dominic Isaiah.

"None of this was real. Not the kiss. Not any of it. It's a game, and we both know the rules."

Then my own voice: "We both know the rules."

The towels spun round and round behind me. I couldn't move.

"I was in the corridor," Vance said. "I'd come to find Dom about tomorrow's drills. Imagine my luck. I didn't just hear it. I recorded it."

"Delete it."

"No." He put the phone back in his pocket, still smiling. "Just think about what the press will say if this goes out."

"That's blackmail," I whispered.

"It's a negotiation." Vance leaned close. "Break up with Isaiah. Publicly, before the finals. Tell everyone it was never real, and that you're going back to the man who loves you. Do that, and this recording goes nowhere."

"The man who loves me," I said slowly. "You mean James."

Vance didn't answer. He didn't need to.

His phone buzzed in his pocket. He glanced down, and the screen lit up his face. I saw the name at the top of the message, saved with a small crown beside it.

It read just a single letter J.

"Did she agree?" the message read.

Vance looked up, and his smile widened.

"Dakas sends his regards," he said.

I understood it then. Vance had never been a Titan at heart. He had been James's eyes inside Dom's team the whole time.

And now he had a recording that could destroy us both.

Oh goodness! How do I escape this?