9:14 AM – St. Helena's Academy, Courtyard
It started with a scream.
Vincent had just opened his locker—still half-listening to the recorded lecture playing in one earbud—when the sound cut through the courtyard. It was high, sharp, and unmistakably real. Every conversation dropped dead. Heads turned.
The scream came again.
And then silence.
Adriana stood in the center of the quad, completely still.
At her feet was a bouquet of black lilies. Tied with a red ribbon.
Vincent pushed through the crowd just in time to see her eyes darken. Her jaw tightened. Her hands clenched so hard her knuckles paled.
"Who brought this here?" she asked.
No one answered.
She bent, picked up the bouquet—then slowly pulled the ribbon loose.
Vincent saw it then. Tucked inside the flowers.
A severed finger.
Wrapped in a velvet cloth.
9:18 AM – Headmistress's Office
"Control your daughter, Alex."
"She's not a dog," Alex said coolly, flicking ash from his cigar onto the academy's antique rug. "You knew what she was when you let her enroll."
"She threw a chair out the window."
"She was provoked."
"She said she'd skin the next person who lied to her and hung a sign over the auditorium reading God Save the Queen, She's Armed and Horny."
"…That one wasn't mine," Alex admitted with a smirk.
The Headmistress buried her face in her hands.
"I'm losing teachers," she groaned. "One of them applied for asylum in Canada."
Alex stood. "She's under pressure."
"She's a student."
"She's a Bogdan. You can't separate the two."
Outside the office, Adriana sat in the corridor, arms crossed, still holding the black ribbon. Her face was unreadable—but her foot tapped rapidly against the floor.
When Alex stepped out, she didn't look at him.
"Are you going to ask?" she muttered.
"I already know."
"It was a message."
Alex nodded. "From him."
Adriana swallowed. "He's supposed to be dead."
Alex looked down the hall—where Vincent had just rounded the corner.
"Maybe ghosts have good timing."
10:25 AM – Library, Restricted Wing
Vincent didn't knock.
He just walked in, dropped a coffee beside her on the desk, and sat across from her like they were normal people and the world hadn't just turned upside-down.
"You shouldn't be here," Adriana muttered.
"I'm not scared of you."
"You should be."
He leaned forward. "Was that really a finger?"
Adriana didn't blink. "Do you want it to be?"
Vincent hesitated. Then leaned back, ran a hand through his curls, and sighed. "You know what's messed up? I still want to help you."
Adriana looked at him then. Something fragile cracked beneath her sharp expression.
"You're stupid."
"I've been called worse."
"You will be called worse."
He smiled faintly. "I'm a fast learner."
She stared at him for a moment. Then, slowly, quietly—she pulled the ribbon from her pocket and tied it around her wrist.
"You want to help?" she whispered. "Then stay alive. That's step one."
Parking Lot, 3:11 PM
Noel didn't usually flinch at parking lots.
But this one? This one smelled off. Like smoke and something sour.
He'd been walking toward his motorcycle when he spotted it—red paint on the back of Adriana's car. Two words:
"Long Live Leo."
Noel froze.
Leo was dead. Everyone knew it. He'd taken a bullet during the Salvatore Raid. Closed casket. No funeral photos. Adriana hadn't spoken his name since.
Except…
Noel pulled out his phone. Snapped a picture. Then he texted her:
Noel: You need to come down here. Now.
Adriana: Did someone touch my car?
Noel: It's not just paint.
Adriana: Who else saw it?
Noel: Just me.
Adriana: Good. Stay there.
She arrived two minutes later—still in uniform, braid tight, eyes deadly.
She didn't speak. Just looked. And then her whole body went still.
"Leo?" she said, so quietly Noel almost missed it.
Noel cleared his throat. "They're messing with you."
"No." She stepped forward. "They're warning me."
Vincent arrived a few seconds later—out of breath, clearly not supposed to be there.
Adriana turned on him. "I told you to stay away when things got dirty."
Vincent didn't budge. "It's already dirty. I'm here now."
She stared at him. Something in her cracked. She turned back to the car.
"Long Live Leo," she whispered again.
Then she touched the paint.
It was still wet.
Warehouse Docks, 7:03 PM
"Is it true?" Adriana barked, voice sharp as a gunshot.
The man tied to the chair spat blood. "What truth?"
"That someone's using Leo's name. That he's back."
The man laughed. "You don't want ghosts, princess."
She slammed the butt of her pistol into his nose. Blood sprayed. He screamed.
Vincent flinched from the corner of the room. Adriana had dragged him here "to see the real cost." She hadn't told him what that meant until they were standing in front of a half-beaten informant and a warehouse full of silence.
"Why are you letting me watch this?" he asked.
Adriana's voice was calm. "Because you want the truth."
"I want you to be okay."
"Then understand this—my world doesn't come clean. And you don't walk into it without blood on your shoes."
She turned back to the man.
He was laughing again, through broken teeth.
"You think Leo's dead," he gasped. "You think you're the queen now."
Adriana raised the gun.
"Tell me where he is."
"Or what?" he grinned. "You'll shoot me?"
She pulled the trigger.
Not at his head. At the chair's leg.
It shattered. He fell.
She crouched beside him.
"No," she said softly. "I'll make you wish I did."
Vincent didn't speak.
He didn't move.
He just realized, for the first time, that maybe Adriana wasn't afraid of losing herself—
Maybe she was afraid there was nothing left to lose.
Adriana's Bedroom, Midnight
She stared at the black ribbon on her wrist.
It was a little loose now.
She tightened the knot.
Then checked the photo on her desk.
It was old—four kids, all smiles, all bruises.
Leo. Malik. Her. And a boy with a burned-out stare.
"Long live Leo," she whispered.
But her hands trembled.
Because Leo had never been the threat.
It was the boy beside him—the one they called Bishop.
And Bishop wasn't dead.
The past is clawing its way into the present. "Leo" may be a front—but Bishop is real, dangerous, and watching. Adriana's tight grip on her world is slipping… and Vincent just stepped into the line of fire.