Chapter 3: Drawing Lines

Vale had rules. Quiet, unspoken ones.

1. Don't get involved with boys from rival families.

2. Don't let anyone see more than what you want them to.

3. And never—never—let someone like Kian Bennett under your skin.

Too bad she was breaking all three.

It started with a glitch in the school's media room. The projector wouldn't connect, and Ms. Reyes was fumbling with HDMI cables like they were alien tech. The rest of the class took it as an invitation to scroll on their phones, but Vale stood up.

"I can fix it," she offered casually.

Ms. Reyes blinked. "You're sure?"

"Pretty sure."

Vale knelt down at the laptop, fingers moving fast. A few shortcuts. A line of code in the terminal window. A backdoor no one would've expected a high schooler to know about.

The screen flickered to life.

Kian, watching from the back row, raised an eyebrow.

Ms. Reyes clapped lightly. "Well! We have ourselves a tech genius."

Vale shrugged and returned to her seat, brushing it off like it was nothing.

But Kian didn't let it go.

"You code?" he asked under his breath, later, as they waited for the next class to start.

"Not really," Vale replied, pulling out her notebook.

"That was not a 'not really.' That was an 'I know exactly what I'm doing' move."

She gave him a side-eye. "Do you always interrogate people for being capable?"

He laughed. "Only when they pretend they're not."

Vale didn't answer. She didn't have to. The truth was, Lila was the only one who really knew—about the late-night projects Vale did just for fun, the websites she'd built in secret, the programs she tested under fake names.

Kian noticing even a sliver of that felt… different.

The next class dragged on, but Vale kept catching Kian looking at her when he thought she wasn't paying attention. Not in a creepy way. In a curious way. Like he was trying to solve her.

After school, Lila caught up with her at the lockers.

"So?" she asked, one eyebrow raised.

Vale didn't even pretend to be clueless. "He noticed the tech thing."

Lila smiled. "And?"

"And nothing. It's fine."

"It's never fine with you. Either you don't care at all or you're secretly spiraling."

Vale rolled her eyes but couldn't help the grin. "I'm not spiraling."

"Yet."

Just as she closed her locker, a voice behind her said, "Hey, Carter."

Vale turned around, heartbeat doing that stupid flutter thing again.

Kian leaned against the wall, casual but clearly waiting for her.

"I was wondering," he said, "do you ever help people with their computers… outside of class?"

She narrowed her eyes. "Why?"

"Let's just say mine's been acting possessed lately."

She paused, pretending to think. "I don't fix haunted laptops."

"I'll bribe you with coffee."

Vale bit back a smile. "I don't drink coffee."

"Hot vanilla?"

She tilted her head. "Now we're talking."

As they walked out of school together, Lila watching from behind with the smuggest smile imaginable, Vale felt it.

That invisible line she'd drawn—between her and Kian, between her and feeling too much?

She was about to cross it.

And maybe, just maybe, she wanted to.