All Chapters of HIS ROOMMATE WAS A LIE : Chapter 41 - Chapter 50

Sera PovI couldn’t breathe. Not since Kael had me pinned against the wall, his hand beside my head like a cage I didn’t want to escape from. His voice was low, broken, and desperate that still echoed in my ears and haunted my mind.Why him? Why Luca?I pressed my back harder against the cool plaster of the hallway wall long after he stormed off, as if the wall could help me. My pulse was beating frantically like a drum in my throat, my wrists. My skin still burned where his fingers had brushed mine.River stood a few feet away, with his arms crossed, watching me like I was a bomb about to go off.“You okay?” he asked, his voice softer now.I opened my mouth, but nothing came out. I wasn’t okay; I was wrecked.Kael looked at me like I was the only thing in the world, like I was his—like I had betrayed him by existing near anyone else, and the worst part that made me want to scream was that I liked it. His possessiveness,the heat in his eyes. The way his voice cracked when he said my

Sera PovI waited until the dorm was a silent, no footsteps in the hall or muffled laughter from the common room. I counted to three hundred after the last door clicked shut. Then I slipped out of the room with the towel slung over my shoulder as the chest binder already itching under my hoodie. The straps had been digging into my ribs all day and every breath was a reminder that I was living half a life.When I entered in the bathroom I locked the main door behind me with a click. I peeled off my clothes fingers trembling as they worked the binder’s hooks. When it finally gave, I exhaled freely for the first time in hours.Cool air kissed my skin. My breasts were small but still visible. They ached from the compression. I rolled my shoulders, let my head fall back, and stepped under the spray.For one minute, I wasn’t Seth. I was just me. Sera, tired, terrified, and finally free of the lie for sixty seconds.I should’ve known the peace wouldn’t last long when I heard the lock I

Luca POVI didn’t remember how I got back to River’s room. One second I was standing in that bathroom, staring at a truth I wasn’t supposed to see, and the next I was sitting on River’s bed with my elbows on my knees, my hands hanging uselessly between them like they didn’t belong to me anymore.River stood near the window, staring out at the dark courtyard like it might give him answers if he looked long enough. He hadn’t said a word since Alexander kicked us out of the bathroom. Not one joke not one sarcastic comment. That alone told me how bad this really was.“She’s a girl,” I finally said, just to hear it out loud.River flinched.“Yeah,” he said slowly. “I noticed.”I laughed, but the sound came out wrong. “Funny. I feel like my brain’s still trying to pretend it didn’t.”He turned away from the window and looked at me then, like he was trying to read my face the way he read people so easily. His own expression was pale, unsettled, out of its usual confidence.“I swear to you,”

​Sera’s POVThe breakfast tasted like cardboard though it was the same breakfast i have had everyday but now it tasteless. I chewed and swallowed mechanically, painful aware of the four powerful boys surrounding me. To any outsider, it might have looked like a normal morning for the Academy’s elite circle, but to us, the air was electric, charged with the debris of the life I’d just blown up.​"I can't do this," Luca muttered suddenly. He pushed his plate away; the chair let out a loud screech against the floor. He didn't look at me—and he walked out without another word.River watched him go, then looked at me with a sad, complicated smile before following him. "Give them space," River murmured as he passed Kael.Then there we were, two. Well, three, if you counted Alexander, who remained at the end of the table like a wall clock.​"Alexander," Kael said, his voice dropping to that dangerous frequency whenever he was furious. "Leave."Alexander didn't move at first. He looked at me,

​Sera’s POV​The next day the iron gates of Virelade Academy swung open to admit a fleet of black sedans. It was the annual Academic Exchange—a week where Aldrich Academy’s top students crossed the valley to "collaborate." In reality, it was just a show off between two academies. ​I adjusted my collar, the skin of my neck feeling weird. Without the binder, I had layered two t-shirts under my uniform blazer, but I still felt like a beacon. Every time a breeze caught my clothes, I froze.​"Keep your head down," Kael’s voice came from behind me. He didn't stop to look at me, but his shoulder brushed mine as he walked past, a brief, grounding contact that made my heart stutter.​As the Aldrich girls filed out of the cars, the atmosphere in the academy shifted. The Virelade boys straightened their ties, their voices dropping an octave. But I only saw one person.​Juliette.​She looked like a queen returning to a conquered territory. Beside her stood Elise and Camille, her "minions" who ac