St. Aurelia felt like a bomb about to go off. Every hallway was just people waiting for someone to screw up. But the school didn't care, it just kept moving. Today was the Advanced Chem Invitational, basically a sacrifice for the grades.
I was at my station. The smell of bleach and acid was making my eyes water and my stomach turn. Across the way, Dmitri was rolling up his sleeves. Real slow. Like a prick. The white lab coat looked… good on him. And for some reason, watching him roll up his sleeves and realizing how good he looked irritated me. He was pretending to be normal when he definitely wasn't.
"Simple deal," Professor Thorne barked. "I give you the product. You give me the math and the result. Fast and perfect. Go."
The board lit up: C_{27}H_{44}O.
Cholesterol. Great.
My hands just went on autopilot. Glass, liquid, heat. But I couldn't stop looking sideways. Dmitri wasn't just working, he was watching me. Judging every time I moved a beaker.
"Nice pace, Isabelle," he muttered.
"Shut up," I snapped. I was trying to hold the dropper steady, but my hands were twitching.
He let out this little huff of a laugh. "You're shaking. Nervous? Or just out of your league?" He was moving through his titration like it was nothing.
"I'm fine," I lied. It felt like my heart was in my throat.
It turned into this weird, quiet race. We were moving at the same time. Like a mirror. We both reached for the silver nitrate at once and our hands smashed together.
That wasn't a mistake. I knew he did that on purpose. It felt like a shock. I pulled back like I'd been burned. I saw his eyes, the blue was gone, just dark and... hungry. It was disgusting. And terrifying. And I couldn't breathe.
I finished a second before him. The liquid turned perfect pink.
"Done," I said. My voice was shaky as hell.
Thorne walked over. "Duval: 99.9. Volkov: 99.8. Duval wins."
Dmitri didn't even look mad. He looked... happy? He leaned over my desk, way too close. "Nasty talent you got there," he whispered. I could see the pulse in my own neck jumping. "Don't let them ruin it. I'd hate to see you get dull."
Dmitri's POV
I was walking Isabelle toward the library. Mostly just to show everyone she was with me, when she decided to actually open her mouth. I expected her to be all quiet and moody, but she looked at me with this sideways smirk that caught me off guard.
"You're doing that thing, Dmitri," she said.
"What thing?"
"The 'bodyguard' thing," she said, nodding toward a couple of sophomores who had scrambled out of our way the second they saw me. "The thing you never fail to mock Julien for. But yours is different. You look like you're about to punch the wall just for being in your way. It's kind of interesting to watch."
I snorted, shoving my hands in my pockets. "Maybe the wall should move. Besides, it keeps the idiots from bothering you."
"Oh, right. Because you're so much less 'bothersome' than they are," she shot back. She shifted her violin case, her eyes dancing with something that looked suspiciously like she was making fun of me. "Does it hurt? Your face, I mean. Being that grumpy all the time must take a lot of muscle."
I stopped walking and leaned down into her space, trying to get that 'mask' back on. "Careful, Duval. You're starting to sound like you actually enjoy my company."
"In your dreams, Volkov," she said, not even flinching. She actually stepped closer, poking a finger at my chest. "I just think it's funny. The big, bad king of St. Aurelia is basically just a glorified hall monitor today. You even got the scowl down and everything."
I grabbed her wrist, not hard, just to stop her from poking me. My heart did this weird, annoying thud. "I'm a lot of things, Isabelle. A hall monitor isn't one of them."
"Whatever you say," she murmured, her voice dropping. She didn't pull her arm away. For a second, it was just us and she looked way too smug for someone who was supposedly my 'prize.'
I was about to say something to wipe that look off her face when the admin doors creaked open. My father, Viktor, walked out with Rousseau and a bunch of men in suits.
My father usually looks like he's made of granite. But then he saw Isabelle. And he just... broke.
He stopped dead. He went gray. As if blood had drained out of him. His hand started shaking, fingers twitching like he was having a stroke.
"Elena?"
It sounded like a ghost word. He looked horrified. Scared. I'd never seen him look like anything but a god and now he was falling apart in the hallway.
Isabelle froze. "I'm not Elena. I'm Isabelle, sir."
He didn't hear her. He was staring through her. Rousseau moved fast, stepping between my dad and her. He grabbed my father's shoulder hard.
"Sorry, Miss Duval," Rousseau said. "Mr. Volkov is just stressed. Board meetings usually are long. The brain gets tired." He turned my dad around. "Viktor. My office. Now."
He dragged him away. My father kept looking back over his shoulder. He looked like he was being haunted.
I looked at Isabelle. She was shaking. "Don't worry about it," I said. I stepped in front of her so she couldn't see them anymore. My voice was weirdly soft. "He's just stressed. He thought you were someone else."
"He looked at me like I was a monster," she whispered.
"He's an old man," I lied. "Men see things when they're tired. Go to the library. I'll find you."
I didn't follow her to the library. I doubled back and hung out in the alcove by the Headmaster's door. I heard my dad's shoes hitting the floor a minute later. He hadn't left. He went straight for Rousseau.
The door didn't click shut. Old building, lucky me. A tiny bit of light hit the carpet. I pressed my back against the stone wall and stopped breathing.
The voices inside weren't "polite" anymore.
"You were supposed to keep her dead, Alex." My dad's voice was like a knife. "The Valois thing was done. If the board finds out she's tied to the estate, the lawsuits will bury us."
"We brought her here to watch her, Viktor!" Rousseau sounded like he was losing it. "We didn't think she'd have that face or gain that much attention. People are looking. People are asking questions."
"Then kill the question."
It was a cold, flat sentence. Like a business deal.
A sharp breath left me as the words sank in, my body going stiff.
"Before anyone figures out the girl scrubbing pots actually owns the vineyard land. If she hits eighteen, she's a legal disaster. Fix it. Quietly. For good. Or I pull the funding and you can figure out how to pay for your new wing yourself."
Nobody said no. They just sat there.
I heard a desk thud. Someone grabbed some papers. Meeting over.
I slipped away into the back hallway before they could catch me. My blood felt like ice water.
He didn't see a ghost. He just ordered a hit.
Isabelle wasn't a girl to him anymore. She was a problem on his spreadsheet. And the solution was to delete her. This wasn't a game. It was a goddamn execution.