Page 11 of Betray Me
That night, I lie in bed staring at the ceiling, the hidden documents seeming to pulse beneath my floorboards. At 11:30, I make my decision. I dress in dark clothes, retrieve the photos of Luna, Janet, and me, and slip out of Pemberton Hall.
The path to the boathouse is treacherous in the darkness, overgrown with years of neglect. Every shadow could hide a threat, every sound could signal danger. But I need answers more than I need safety.
The boathouse looms against the starless sky, its rotting wood groaning in the wind. The door hangs askew, and I slip inside, hand clutching the photos like a shield.
“I was wondering if you’d come.”
I spin toward the voice, heart hammering. A figure steps from the shadows—tall, athletic, male, face obscured by a hood.
“Who are you?”
“Someone who hears things. Someone who’s tired of carrying secrets.” He pulls back his hood, and I gasp.
I recognize him immediately—Max Brooks. The moonlight streaming through a broken window catches his face, and for the first time, I truly see him. Not just the notorious campus playboy with the reputation for hookups and flirtation, but something more. His jaw is sharper than I remembered, his features almost classical in their symmetry. There’s an intensity in his dark eyes that makes my breath catch, a depth I’ve never noticed before in our shared chemistry classes. The shadows play across his cheekbones, and I realize with a jolt that Max Brooks is devastatingly handsome in a way that makes my chest tighten.
His dark hair falls slightly over his forehead, tousled in that effortlessly, perfectly styled way that I’d always assumed was calculated. But here, in this moment of raw vulnerability, I see it’s just him. Natural. Real. The moonlight catches the gold flecks in his eyes, and I have to force myself to look away.
“Max? What are you doing here?”
“Trying to help make things right.” He moves closer, and I see the lean muscle beneath his dark sweater, the fluid grace inhis movements that speaks of the athlete he used to be before parties and scandal became his reputation. One of his expensive signature watches glints on his wrist, but even that seems less like ostentation now and more like armor—the last vestige of the image he projects to the world. “I’ve been digging into your families for years, Belle. Trying to find out what happened not only that night but other nights, too. But when I heard the FBI was reopening the case…”
His voice has a roughness to it, a genuine emotion that transforms him from the campus Casanova into someone achingly human. The way he says my name—Belle—sends an unexpected shiver through me.
“Were you at the party?”
He shakes his head. “Not exactly. But I heard rumors. I saw surveillance footage. Enough to suspect that things got out of hand.” His laugh is broken glass. “Janet was one of my best friends growing up, and I failed her. Spectacularly.”
The pain in his voice makes me want to reach out, to comfort him. I see now that his reputation as a player might be its own kind of armor, a way to keep people from looking too closely at the wounds beneath.
“What happened to her?”
Max’s eyes close, and even in that gesture, there’s something beautiful—long lashes against his cheeks, the vulnerability in the way his shoulders drop. “She wasn’t supposed to be there. Wrong place, wrong time. She was Robert Wilson’s daughter, being groomed for her role in the network. Wilson was supposed to seal his connection with my family, but he didn’t. That night,he took her to the Queens’ house instead, and Janet was forced to do something no person should ever be asked for.”
“What’s that?”
“I suppose she was taken there for the same reason you and Luna were. You know, the real purpose of those parties. Not just blackmail material on politicians and celebrities. The girls were being auditioned for something worse. International clients. Buyers.” His voice drops. “Janet’s father was horrified. He tried to leave, to take Janet with him. They wouldn’t let him. They couldn’t.”
My knees weaken. “Did they kill her to punish him?”
“I don’t know.” Max’s eyes meet mine, and the intensity there makes my stomach flip. How had I never noticed the way his gaze could strip away pretense and see straight through to the truth? “I need your help, Belle. And I know you could use mine. I’m your only hope of proving that you and Luna aren’t murderers.”
The world tilts. Max is asking me for help. Max, whom I’ve never taken seriously. Max, who’s been a flirt. The very same Max Brooks, whom I’ve only known as my ex-boyfriend Nicolas’ lab partner in chemistry. But standing here in the moonlight, I see someone entirely different—someone carrying his own burden of guilt and secrets, someone who might be the only person who truly understands the weight I carry.
“You and Luna were drugged extra heavily that night. They needed alibis, witnesses who couldn’t actually witness. But the drugs were too strong. You both had reactions—convulsions, memory gaps more severe than planned. I don’t know thedetails, but I can help you fill in the blanks. We can figure it out together.”
“Where’s Janet’s body?”
“I don’t know. That’s what I’m trying to find out. She deserves… to rest.”
I can’t breathe. Can’t think. What happened? Was I an active participant? Did I kill an innocent girl, a poor victim?
“Why tell me now? We’ve been classmates for three years.”
He runs a hand through his hair, a gesture that draws my attention to the elegant shape of his fingers, the way his whole body speaks of carefully controlled tension.
“Because things are coming out in the open. The network’s getting sloppy. They’re becoming desperate. The FBI’s investigation is wider than anyone knows. They’re close to finding evidence not only about that night but about countless others, too. Your parents planned on pinning it on you and Luna—two traumatized girls who snapped and killed one of their own.” Max pulls out a flash drive. “Pieces of surveillance footage from that night. Not everything—some was destroyed. But enough to fill in some of the blanks.”
I take the drive with numb fingers. “This will destroy what’s left of my family.”
