People trusted Elliot Ashbourne because he never looked like someone who could ruin your life.
He had the kind of smile that made adults feel comfortable, and the kind of confidence that made people his age mistake arrogance for leadership. His father's name carried weight in the city spoken softly in boardrooms, loudly at fundraisers, and Elliot wore that inheritance like a second skin. He didn't threaten. He didn't ask. He suggested. And people followed.
Daniel Kade noticed this before anyone else did.
Daniel always noticed things early. It was the habit of someone who grew up watching instead of speaking, learning how to stay useful in rooms he was never meant to enter. He sat two rows behind Elliot in most classes, laptop always open, pen always moving, eyes sharp. Elliot paid him well to stay ahead assignments, exams, and projects that needed polishing. Daniel didn't resent the arrangement. Money was money. Pride didn't keep the lights on.
What Daniel didn't like was how easily people bent.
Jaquan Miller bent because bending was easier than breaking.
Jaquan had known Elliot since middle school, back when they bonded over basketball courts and skipped classes. He was tall, loud when he needed to be, charming in a way that made teachers sigh instead of punish. Elliot was the planner; Jaquan was the amplifier. Wherever Elliot went, Jaquan followed, laughing first, questioning later.
Lila Croft was different.
She had grown up in a house that taught her how to smile before she learned how to disagree. Her parents liked Elliot. Loved him, actually. His family's influence fit neatly into their long-term plans for her life. Their approval pressed down on her shoulders like a constant, invisible hand.
She did like Elliot, just not in the way everyone assumed she should.
She loved how decisive he was, how sure of himself. What unsettled her was how easily that certainty dismissed others. How quickly he decided what mattered and what didn't.
Daniel mattered to her.
She didn't know when it started. Maybe it was the way he listened when she spoke, or how he never interrupted her thoughts to show off his own. Maybe it was how he never treated her like a prize already won. Whatever it was, it lived quietly inside her, unspoken and dangerous.
Marlene Holt saw it all.
Marlene had always been good at noticing the spaces between people, the pauses, the glances held too long, the words swallowed instead of spoken. She didn't come from money, but she didn't come from nothing either. She lived somewhere in between, which made her wary of extremes. She trusted instincts more than charm.
And her instincts didn't like Elliot Ashbourne, but she accommodated him because he was dating her closest friend, Lila.
They were all hanging at Elliot's residence. They sat on the back deck of his family's lake house, the air warm despite the season, the water stretched out like glass. Elliot leaned back in his chair, phone in hand, scrolling with the ease of someone who never worried about battery life or signal loss.
"I found something insane," he said casually.
Jaquan perked up immediately. "Define insane."
"A camping site," Elliot replied. "Up north. Near Blackridge Mountain."
Maren stiffened. Just slightly.
"People actually camp there?" she asked.
Elliot smirked. "That's the point. It's popular because of the stories."
Daniel looked up from his notebook. "What stories?"
Elliot finally glanced at him. "Old war ground. Soldiers died up there. Supposedly, their souls come back around this time of year."
Jaquan laughed. "Man, that's fake."
"Everything's fake until it isn't," Elliot said. "Look at this."
He turned the phone so they could set pictures of towering trees, mist crawling over the mountain, and campsites bathed in golden light. It was beautiful. Too beautiful.
Lila leaned forward despite herself.
"When was this taken?" she asked.
"Last year. Some travel vlogger. Millions of views."
Daniel frowned. "People disappear up there."
Elliot shrugged. "People disappear everywhere."
That was the moment Marlene knew something was wrong not because of the mountain, but because of how lightly he said it.
"It's just for content," Elliot continued. "A few nights. We record, we relax, we unplug. None of us have gone camping in years."
He looked around, measuring them.
"You all trust me, right?"
The silence that followed was brief, but it mattered.
Jaquan nodded first. Lila hesitated, then smiled. Maren glanced at Daniel. Daniel looked back at Elliot, searching his face for something honest.
And still, he nodded.
Trust, Daniel would later realize, didn't shatter all at once.
It cracked quietly right there on that deck, beneath a sky too clear to warn them.
Lila's dorm room always smelled faintly of lavender and clean laundry—controlled, intentional, like everything else in her life.
Maren lay across the bed, boots kicked off, scrolling aimlessly on her phone while Lila sat at her desk pretending to read. The book had been open to the same page for ten minutes.
"You're not studying," Maren said without looking up.
"I am," Lila replied automatically.
Maren snorted. "You've been staring at that sentence like it owes you money."
Lila closed the book, exhaling. "He's exhausting lately."
Marlene's eyes finally lifted. "Elliot?"
"Who else?" Lila leaned back in her chair. "Everything is a performance with him. If it's not his idea, it's stupid. If it's not his way, it's wrong."
Marlene tilted her head. "That's not new."
"I know. But... It's louder now." Lila hesitated, then added quietly, "Daniel wouldn't do that."
There it was.
Marlene didn't smile. She didn't tease. She just waited.
"He listens," Lila continued, almost defensively. "He doesn't talk over people. He doesn't make jokes at someone else's expense just to feel bigger."
"You admire him," Marlene said.
"Yes," but ... "That's all."
Marlene sat up. "You don't talk about anyone else like that."
Lila stood and crossed the room, arms folded. "It doesn't matter. Even if I did feel something which I don't it wouldn't work. My parents would lose their minds. Daniel doesn't come from... our world."
Marlene studied her. "Does that bother you?"
Lila didn't answer.
Across campus, Elliot Ashbourne dismissed her without even realizing he'd done it.
"You're overthinking it," he said, tossing his phone onto the table. "It's camping, Lila. Not a philosophy debate."
"I just asked if we'd have signal," she replied.
He laughed. "Why? So you can text your parents every hour?"
Jaquan watched the exchange and said nothing.
Lila pressed her lips together and nodded. She always nodded.
Two Weeks.
That was the timeline.
"We go after exams," Elliot announced later that night. "Two weeks. Perfect window."
Daniel glanced up from his notes. "Weather?"
"Already checked," Elliot replied. "Clear. Cold at night. Perfect atmosphere."
Atmosphere. That word lingered.
"Speaking of atmosphere," Marlene said suddenly, "there's a party this weekend."
Lila turned. "What?"
"A big one. Delta house. One of the senior girls is hosting an open invite."
Jaquan grinned. "You inviting me?"
Marlene smirked. "Obviously. Don't get sentimental."
Elliot clapped his hands once. "I'm in."
Lila hesitated. "Elliot..."
"Relax," he said. "You'll have fun."
Daniel shifted near the doorway, a cup of water in his hand.
"You should come too," Lila said before thinking.
All eyes turned to him.
"I don't really—" he began.
"Exactly," Jaquan said. "That's why you should."
Marlene added, "One night won't kill you."
Daniel looked at Lila. She smiled not politely, not socially, but genuinely.
"Okay," he said finally.
The party changed things.
Not loudly. Not immediately.
But enough.