My phone vibrated in my pocket again. I pulled it out to see another text from Hunter.
Hunter: Damn, that’s cold. Didn’t even save me a spot…
I whipped my head around and looked up. Hunter was standing at the very top of the auditorium steps and waving at me, a grin lighting his perfect face. The other Princes were already seated a few feet away from him at the very back, and Elijah was trying to get his attention to point out a spot they’d saved for him.
I grinned back at him before replying to his text. Sorry. They just sat down!
Hunter: Should I come down there and assert my authority so we can sit together?
Me: Lol. Don’t be mean. Just sit with your friends and I’ll see you after.
Hunter: If you insist. Btw, got any idea what this assembly is about?
Me: Nope. You?
Hunter: I heard something shocking is going to be announced. But knowing Sanders, his idea of ‘shocking’ is an announcement about a new set of encyclopedias for the library.
Me: So accurate it hurts…
Hunter: You know what hurts? Having to sit up here and look at you all the way down there.
Me: Wow, I’m that hideous, huh?
Hunter: You know what I mean. I can barely even look at that ponytail without wanting to grab it and… never mind, you’ll find out later.
Me: Tell me now!
Hunter: Nope. Punishment for not saving a seat for me. You can wait :)
A few seconds later, Sanders tapped on the microphone on the dais at the front and cleared his throat. “Good morning, everyone,” he said. “Thank you for being here this morning. I apologize for the disruption to your normal schedules, but we are facing a very serious problem here at RFA. A problem which must be addressed.”
He paused and let his gaze skate all over the vast room.
“I’d like to begin by reminding you all of our expectations for you. Those expectations match your enormous potential. We expect you to be dedicated. We expect you to be determined. We do not expect you to disappoint us by using drugs.” He paused and narrowed his eyes. “Yes, I said drugs. There was an incident yesterday in which three junior students were caught using Adderall to aid their performance in a test.”
Adam snickered next to me. “Jesus, this is the huge announcement?” he whispered to me and Trina. “A few kids popping pills to get through an exam?”
Sanders’ voice boomed through the air again. “I have decided that from now on, every RFA student must complete an online drug awareness and safety module before they graduate.” He lifted his hands as a collective groan echoed in the room. “Now, now. Don’t complain. It’s only a short module, and if you study the material properly, it should only take a few hours to complete. We’ve put together a quick guide on how to access the module through the RFA website, which I’ll show to you right now.”
The lights dimmed, and an enormous screen at the very back of the auditorium lit up. A PowerPoint presentation started playing, showing us a step-by-step guide to accessing the drug module and completing the short tests in it.
On Step 3, the screen suddenly went black.
“Sorry, everyone,” Sanders muttered. “It seems we’re having some technical issues. Give me a few seconds, please.”
Before he could fix anything, the screen lit up again, and a video started playing. I recognized it immediately… because I was in it.
The sight of it made me feel as if a large, cold stone had just dropped clean through my gut.
The footage was shot four years ago, but it was unmistakably me. Puberty had hit me like a freight train at the age of thirteen, so by the time I was fourteen, I looked mostly the same as I did now. I was an inch shorter and my cheeks were slightly rounder, but apart from that, there wasn’t any difference.
On the screen, I was lying on a king-sized bed, head lolling back on a black pillow. A man was settling his weight over me, one hand grasping at my breasts through my thin tank top. There wasn’t much visible below my waist, but it was obvious that I wasn’t wearing any pants.
To anyone who didn’t know what this video really was, it looked like I might be enjoying what was happening to me, because the seconds being displayed were the ones in which I woke up and slowly realized what was happening to me—that my piano teacher was assaulting me.
My eyes were slightly narrowed as I stared up at him, heavy-lidded from the drugs he gave me, but anyone who wasn’t aware of that could be forgiven for thinking it was a sensuous, passion-filled gaze.
In the next few seconds, he leaned down to my right ear and said something before planting a kiss on my forehead. It looked like he might be leaning down to whisper sweet nothings in my ear, when in reality, he’d leaned down to tell me that nothing was happening and it was all a dream. Unfortunately, there was no sound to make that clear.