Harley’s POV
My phone drags me out of a dead sleep at six-fifteen in the morning.
I fumble for it blindly, knocking my planner off the nightstand, my brain still buried under layers of exhaustion. The screen is too bright. Unknown number.
I answer on reflex, pressing the phone to my ear with a hand that doesn't feel like mine yet. "Get off your ass and be at the nearest bus stop in fifteen minutes. Wear something that doesn't look like you pulled it from a donation bin. And fix your hair—you're about to become the most talked-about girl at Wentworth."
The line goes dead before my mouth finishes forming the word what.
I stare at the ceiling for three full seconds, processing. Then the voice registers, that clipped, entitled tone that could only belong to one person on this planet, and I'm already reaching for my clothes while cursing Tate Mercer's entire bloodline.
The bus stop on Delancey is four blocks from my building.
I make it in twelve minutes, slightly breathless, wearing my best-altered blouse and the leather jacket that used to be Aro's. My hair is slicked back because I didn't have time for anything else, and my pride is already bruised from obeying a phone call like a trained dog.
Then I see the car.
A black sedan that costs more than my apartment building's annual rent sits idling at the curb, gleaming under the pale morning light like a spacecraft that crash-landed in the wrong zip code.
Two guys from the corner store are already circling it, their expressions caught between admiration and opportunity.
The window slides down and Tate's face appears, sunglasses pushed up into that careless blond hair, looking offensively well-rested. "Get in."
"You called me at six in the morning, hung up before I could speak, and now you're parked in my neighborhood like a neon sign that says rob me." I cross my arms. "Start talking, Mercer. What's the plan here?"
"The plan is that you stop standing on the shitty sidewalk drawing attention to my car and get your ass in before someone strips it for parts. I'm not setting foot in this neighborhood—I'd like my wheels to still be attached when I come back.”
I want to argue. I want to tell him exactly where he can park his precious sedan and what anatomically creative things he can do with his six-fifteen wake-up calls.
“Since we're playing the happy couple now, we arrive together. Every morning. That's how this works, so move your ass, Valdez."
Well, the deal is the deal—I made it, and now I have to live in it.
I climb in and the door shuts behind me like the lid of a very expensive coffin. Leather seats, climate control, the faint scent of something woodsy and clean that probably costs more per bottle than my mother earns in a week.
Tate pulls away from the curb without looking at me.
"First order of business—ground rules.”
Without taking his eyes off the road, Tate raised his palm, bending his fingers at each point in turn.
“Physical contact stays minimal. Hand-holding, maybe an arm around the shoulder, nothing that requires actual effort on my part. We walk together, eat lunch together, and you look at me like I hung the moon.”
He paused, one eyebrow arching in challenge. “Think you can manage that without vomiting?"
"I'll manage if you manage to keep your hands above my waist and your comments about my underwear to yourself.”
I crossed my arms, rolled my eyes. After a short pause, a smart thought hit my head: “We need a story. People will ask, and if our answers don't match, this whole thing falls apart before lunch."
Tate stared at the road for a moment, thinking, then met my eyes with unexpected focus. "Fine. It started during corrective hours. I saw a different side of you—you saw a different side of me. Proximity led to feelings.
He shrugged, but his gaze stayed locked on mine. “Keep it vague, keep it simple, and for God's sake, keep it boring enough that people stop asking after the first week."
"That's actually… not terrible."
"Don't sound so shocked, it's insulting. Now, about your wardrobe situation."
His eyes flicked sideways, scanning me from collar to hem with the subtlety of a building inspector.
"Is that leather jacket supposed to be ironic, or do you genuinely think you're auditioning for a motorcycle gang?"
"This jacket has more personality than your entire closet, Mercer.” I fire back. “And speaking of—what is that cologne? Did you bathe in it, or did you just stand too close to the sample counter?"
"It's Tom Ford, and it costs more than your rent."
"That's not the flex you think it is. That's actually deeply sad."
His jaw tightened, but I caught something at the corner of his mouth—not quite a smile, quickly killed.
The car hummed through streets that gradually widened, cracked sidewalks giving way to manicured lawns, and the nervous energy between us thickened with every passing mile.
We were really doing this.
The girl from Southside and the governor's golden son, about to walk into Wentworth Academy holding hands like the world made sense.
The parking lot is already half-full when we pull in, and the effect is instantaneous.
Every single head turns. Conversations stop mid-sentence. Tate rounds the car, opens my door with the kind of exaggerated chivalry that belongs in a period drama, and offers his hand.
The gesture looks devoted even as his mouth tells a different story.
"Stop gaping at me like a fish and act lovestruck, not braindead," he hisses through a smile that could sell toothpaste. "You're supposed to be falling for me, remember? Not suffering a stroke."
"Hard to look lovestruck when the sight of your face triggers my gag reflex."
I take his hand and step out, smiling up at him the way I've seen girls smile at boys they actually like—soft, warm, and completely disgusting.
"How's this? Convincing enough, or should I bat my eyelashes harder?"
"Dial it back about thirty percent. You look unhinged."
We walk toward the entrance, and from the outside it must look perfect—two people smiling at each other, exchanging soft words, bodies angled close. The reality playing beneath the performance is pure warfare.
"You know, it's ironic. The boy who's cycled through half the girls at Wentworth is pretending to be a devoted boyfriend." I murmur sweetly, keeping my expression adoring while students part around us like the Red Sea. "How many of your exes are watching right now and calculating your average relationship shelf life?"
"At least I have a shelf life to calculate.” He lets out a condescending chuckle. “Given where you come from, I'd be genuinely surprised if you hadn't lost your virginity at fourteen in someone's sticky backseat. Probably to some boy with a neck tattoo and a warrant, right?"
The words hit something soft beneath my armor—something I didn't know was still exposed. I feel the impact in my chest, hot and sharp, but I keep my smile locked in place so tight my cheeks ache.
He's wrong about that particular detail, but there's no way in hell I'm correcting him—not when it would only give him more ways to dissect the choices I haven't made. Let him think whatever feeds his superiority complex.
He walks me to my first class, his hand warm against the small of my back, and the hallway buzzes around us like a hive someone just kicked. Nobody believes this. I can see it in their faces—the confusion, the suspicion, the delighted scandal of it all.
Tate Mercer and Harley Valdez?
The boy who humiliated her with paint and the girl who dropped him with a knee to the groin?
As Tate pulls away with a final performance-perfect smile, my gaze drifts across the hallway and collides with Sloane.
She stands frozen near the stairwell, her eyes locked on me with a hatred so pure it's almost beautiful—raw, trembling, volcanic. Her manicured fingers grip her coffee cup hard enough to dent the cardboard.
I hold her stare for exactly two seconds, then turn away.
The social order just cracked down the middle, and every predator in this school just caught the scent of blood. The only question is whose.