Chapter one

The closing bell rang, signaling the end of classes and, for Arya and her classmates, the end of high school. She emptied her locker, stuffing the remaining contents into her school bag. After locking it, she removed her password.

The rest of her class lingered in the school hallway, cheering and chatting loudly.

“Hey,” her foster sister and only friend, Vitalis, said, giving her a small bump.

“Hi,” Arya replied with a smile.

“We’re finally done, Vita!” Arya rejoiced.

“Yes, we are,” Vitalis replied.

Together, they exited the large building that had been their high school. Just outside the school gates, they found Izzy, who attended the middle school a few blocks away.

“Hey, Iz,” they both waved.

“Congratulations, guys,” Izzy said, grinning widely and revealing her gap-toothed smile.

“Thanks,” they replied in unison before continuing toward their foster home.

“How does it feel to be done with high school?” Izzy asked, skipping ahead of them.

“Free!” Arya exclaimed, making Vitalis laugh.

Arya had been abandoned in front of a convent when she was two weeks old. The nuns raised her until she was four but eventually sent her to an orphanage when they grew tired of her. She stayed there until she was seven, after which she was transferred to a foster home. That’s where she met Vitalis, and they became best friends almost instantly. A year later, two-year-old Izzy arrived at the foster home, and Arya practically took over her care. Years later, they were still in the same foster home.

“We’re home!” Arya announced to no one in particular.

“You have to stop doing that,” Vitalis teased, and Izzy nodded in agreement.

“Hi, guys. Congratulations!” their foster mother, Beatrix, greeted them with a tiny cupcake in her hand, topped with a single candle.

“Aww,” Arya cooed.

“Come on, blow it out,” Beatrix urged.

“Nope,” Vitalis said, amusement dancing in her eyes.

“She’s no fun,” Arya said to Beatrix before blowing out the candle. “I blow out the candle; I eat the cake,” she declared, grabbing the cupcake from Beatrix’s hand. She divided it into two, giving one piece to Izzy and popping the other into her mouth.

Arya and Vitalis went to their room to change into their work clothes. They both worked at a diner a couple of blocks away.

“Bye, guys!” Arya called as they left.

“Dean Murphy asked me to prom,” Arya announced, making Vitalis stop in her tracks.

“No kidding?”

“Nope.”

“Cool! Good for you. He’s cute,” Vitalis said with an encouraging smile.

“I haven’t said yes,” Arya admitted.

“Why not? Prom is in two days!”

“I don’t think I’ll go.”

“Like hell, you’re not! You can’t leave me alone on the most important day of our lives.”

“I highly doubt a stupid dance filled with horny teenagers is the most important day of our lives. Anyway, you won’t be alone—you have Tristen.” Tristen was Vitalis’s boyfriend of two years, and their relationship made Arya sick.

“Yeah, but—”

“I haven’t made up my mind. I still might go,” Arya said, cutting Vitalis off.

—

The diner where they worked was a small building owned by an even smaller man. Joe, their boss, was a sweet guy and a close friend of Beatrix. The girls were certain he had a gigantic crush on her.

“Grumpy!” Arya exclaimed as she hugged him, though he didn’t reciprocate.

Vitalis pulled her off him while Joe shot daggers at Arya.

“I’m going to fire you for this one day,” Joe huffed, stomping away.

“Promises, promises,” Arya teased, yelling after him.

“One day, I won’t be able to save you from yourself,” Vitalis warned. Arya simply blew her an air kiss in response.

An hour later, the girls were busy waiting on their respective tables when two expensively dressed men walked into the diner.

The girls exchanged knowing looks, expectant smiles on their faces. They always played this little game—waiting to see who would serve the wealthiest-looking customers. This time, the men sat at Arya’s table. She did a mental victory dance before heading over to attend to them.

As she approached the table, a sudden charge of electricity surged through her body, so real that it almost made her lose her footing. She looked around in confusion, but everyone in the diner was focused on their own business. No one else seemed to notice—except for the pair of striking silver eyes belonging to one of the men at the table.

Great, Arya thought. Now he thinks I’m some kind of weirdo who’s probably going to drop his food.

“Hi, boys! Welcome to Joe’s. What can we serve you?” she said, flashing her brightest (and fakest) smile. But it didn’t seem to matter—one of the men couldn’t even bother to look up from his phone.

“What do you guys have?” he asked, still glued to his device.

Arya scowled. “Well, if you were capable of looking away from that device, you’d see the menu right in front of you.”

That got his attention. He frowned at her, probably wondering where she got the audacity. A lot of people wondered that—it was one of life’s greatest mysteries.

He looked ready to start a scene, but the man with the silver eyes gave him a piercing look and shook his head. Arya thought she noticed a smirk flicker across Silver Eyes’s face, but it was gone so quickly that she might’ve imagined it.

The rest of their shift passed without incident—a rare achievement for Arya.

“Race you home!” Arya yelled as she sprinted in the direction of their house.

“Come on,” Vitalis complained but still ran after her.

“Why do I keep doing this?” Vitalis asked, panting as they reached the house.

“You’re so out of shape,” Arya teased, barely winded.

“No one runs like you, and you know it, weirdo.”

Vitalis headed straight for the shower while Arya went to their room, sitting by the window and staring at the night sky. The moon glistened in all its glory.

A sudden electric current surged through Arya again. Startled, she glanced out the window and noticed movement on the street below. But when

she looked closer, no one was there.

Weird, she thought.

When Vitalis emerged from the shower, Arya went in.