Alistair Frost's crocodile loafers clicked across Eldenwood's cloisters, each step echoing his transactional calculus. The medical report burned in his briefcase: No penetration. Hymen intact. Sergei's impotence had transformed violation into mere trauma—a negotiable commodity.
"Observe Adrian Stone," he instructed his wife Giselle. "That's how resilience manifests. Not this..." His gesture encompassed Holly's hunched shoulders. Sunlight through stained glass cast her as a shattered mosaic.
Giselle adjusted her Hermès scarf. "The transfer petition requires Thornwood's endorsement."
"Precisely." Alistair paused before the headmaster's oak doors. "Remember: You're the traumatized mother. I'll handle the liability negotiations."
Holly's whisper fractured the performance: "Must I join the Honors Track? The scrutiny..."
Alistair's palm smacked limestone. "Would you prefer becoming the 'Almost-Raped Scholarship Girl'? Annabel Yates glides through scandals like an ice cutter! Vivian Vaughn weaponizes attention! You? You dissolve."
He thrust his Montblanc toward the quadrangle. "Go. Project normalcy."
Giselle: (Applying lipstick compact-mirror) "Shoulders back, Holly. Tears are bourgeois."
Holly: "But Byron Shaw saw Mr. Frost pressuring Adrian—"
Alistair: "Shaw's too busy debauching Vaughn's daughter to notice state secrets. Move!"
Chancellor's Hall swallowed Holly's footsteps. Forty pairs of eyes tracked her progress—aristocratic gazes dissecting her uniform's crooked seam, the butterfly bandage peeking above her Peter Pan collar. Silence crystallized until Dahlia Whitlock's gasp shattered it:
"Darling! Your poor knees!" Dahlia gestured at Holly's tights, where laddered threads mimicked abrasions.
Annabel Yates didn't glance up from her Vanity Fair. "Sheep always stumble in new pastures."
Holly sank into her Tudor-carved desk. Three aisles away, Vivian Vaughn held court.
Dahlia: (Leaning across aisle) "Seriously, Hols—did he... y'know?"
Holly: (Fumbling textbooks) "I fell running. Just fell."
Annabel: (Snapping compact shut) "Convenient narrative."
Byron: (Loudly from Vivian's desk) "—so Thornwood confiscated my Ducati! Said 'reckless endangerment'!"
Vivian: (Twirling crystal lollipop) "Should've wheelied through chapel. Patron saints adore audacity."
Byron: (Tugging her braid) "Says the girl who tried to bribe Stone with Fauchon violets!"
Vivian: (Slapping his hand) "Unhand me, heathen! This coif took forty minutes!"
Annabel's knuckles whitened around her Cartier pen. Byron Shaw—heir to the Shaw munitions empire—had never tugged her perfectly coiled chignon. Vivian's audacity transformed Eldenwood's rules into mere suggestions, while Holly's trauma shriveled under peer review.
Byron flicked Vivian's earlobe. "Admit it, Sapphire—you'd trade ten Ducatis for Stone's homework notes."
"Fifteen," Vivian shot back, kicking his Oxfords. "With matching leather jackets."
Their laughter bounced off vaulted ceilings. Holly watched Annabel's reflection distort in a chrome pencil case: Jealousy sharp enough to draw blood.
Vivian: "Now shove off! Seraphina's saving this seat for..."
Byron: "For some chinless wonder who'll bore her senseless?" (Grabbing Vivian's lollipop) "Whereas I—"
Vivian: (Stabbing his wrist with pen) "—are trespassing! Beat it, Shaw!"
Byron: (Sucking stolen lollipop) "Mmm... rejection tastes violet."
Thornwood's voice boomed through the PA: "All students report to Regent's Quad for Academic Burden Relief Act symposium."
Chaos erupted. Byron used the diversion to palm the blood-orange nectar from Adrian's desk. "Stone won't miss this. D'you spike it with courage yet?"
Vivian snatched it back. "Unlike some, I don't poison offerings."
"Shame." Byron's smile turned lethal. "His glacial demeanor needs thawing." He nodded toward Holly, now trembling as Dahlia interrogated her. "Your new project's crumbling. Why not redirect?"
Vivian followed his gaze. Holly's fingers pleated her tartan skirt—a nervous tell screaming vulnerability. In that instant, Vivian saw beyond the Frosts' carefully constructed facade: A girl drowning in silent shame.
Byron: "Admit it—rescue missions fascinate you more than Stone's cheekbones."
Vivian: "Sod off, Shaw."
Byron: (Mock-saluting) "Aye aye, Captain Charity Case!"
Annabel: (Appearing beside him) "Must you enable her savior complex?"
Byron: "Darling Annabel! Still polishing that ice throne?"
Annabel: "Better frozen than feral."
Vivian uncapped the nectar. Sunset through Venetian glass ignited the liquid into molten gold. She crossed to Holly's desk and slammed it down.
"For the nerves," she declared. "Sicilian sunshine in a bottle."
Dahlia gaped. Annabel's pen screeched across vellum. Holly stared as if handed a grenade.
"The Academic Burden symposium," Vivian continued loudly, "is actually about faculty embezzlement. Rumor says Thornwood's diverting scholarship funds."
Gasps ricocheted. Byron choked on his stolen lollipop. In the sudden silence, Vivian's whisper carried:
"Distract wolves with fresher meat, Frost."