By the second day, the fake relationship was the worst-kept secret on campus.
By the third, I wasn’t sure it was fake anymore.
Riven walked me everywhere.
Every class.
Every cafeteria trip.
Every corner of campus where trouble might breathe.
He didn’t touch me much—just enough to look convincing.
A hand at my waist when crowds got too close.
A brush of fingers against mine when someone whispered too loudly.
A thumb across my shoulder when I tensed.
But every touch felt like a spark being dragged across my nerves.
And he watched me.
Constantly.
Quietly.
Like I was something fragile wrapped in dynamite.
Today, it was raining—a thin, cold drizzle that clung to everything.
I stood under the dorm awning, hugging my books. “You don’t have to walk me today. You’re soaked.”
“I’m not leaving,” Riven said simply, rain dripping from his hair onto his hoodie. “Come on.”
“I can walk alone.”
“No.”
“Riven.”
He stepped closer. “Lia.”
I sighed dramatically. “You’re impossible.”
“And you’re stubborn.”
“…fine.”
He opened an umbrella—something black and sleek and definitely expensive, contrasting wildly with the rest of him.
We started walking.
I tried to ignore the warmth at my side. Tried to ignore how he subtly angled the umbrella more over me than himself. Tried to ignore the way he matched his steps to mine like he’d memorized my pace.
“You’re quiet,” he said.
“So are you.”
“I’m always quiet.”
“Yeah, but today feels different.”
His jaw flexed. “People are watching.”
“They always are,” I muttered.
He looked at me then—really looked—and something in his eyes softened.
“They won’t hurt you,” he said. “Not while I—”
He stopped abruptly.
My breath caught. “While you… what?”
He didn’t answer.
Instead, he took my books from my arms without asking, holding them easily in one hand.
“You don’t have to—”
“I want to.”
“I didn’t say I needed—”
“You don’t need to need something for me to give it to you.”
I stared at him, stunned silent.
Thunder rolled in the distance, too soft to cover the pounding in my chest.
“Riven,” I said quietly, “this is supposed to be fake.”
“I know.”
“So you can’t just—”
“What I feel isn’t part of the agreement,” he said calmly.
My heart tripped.
“You feel something?”
He didn’t even blink. “Obviously.”
“Riven—”
A car splashed by, sending a wave of muddy water toward me.
Before I could flinch, his arm wrapped around my waist.
He pulled me into his chest—solid, warm, smelling like rain and clean soap and something darker underneath.
Water exploded across the sidewalk, just inches from us.
But all I could feel was him.
His breath near my ear.
His heartbeat against my cheek.
His fingers pressing into my hips like he never wanted to let go.
When he finally pulled back, the space between us felt charged. Electric.
Too much.
Too real.
“Fake,” I whispered weakly. “We’re supposed to be fake.”
He brushed a strand of wet hair from my cheek, eyes darkening.
“Then stop looking at me like that.”
My breath hitched. “Like what?”
“Like you want it to be real.”
I swallowed. Hard.
“Do you?” I whispered.
His voice dropped to something that made every part of me tense.
“I’ve wanted this for longer than you know.”
My heart slammed violently in my chest.
“Riven—”
“I said too much.” He stepped back abruptly, eyes shifting away for the first time in days. “Forget it.”
Forget it?
Forget that?
Not a chance.
My voice trembled. “Why do you talk like… like we have a history?”
He didn’t respond.
Instead, he handed me back my books, turned slightly away, and said:
“Because pretending is getting harder.”
CHAPTER FIVE — THE SECRET FROM SEVEN YEARS AGO
I wasn’t looking for it.
I wasn’t trying to uncover anything, or dig where I had no business digging. My biggest concern that afternoon was finishing a stupid intro psych assignment and avoiding Riven long enough to get my heartbeat under control.
But fate didn’t really care about my plans.
It cared about his.
The library was quiet—just the soft shuffle of books and the hum of outdated fluorescent lights. I found an empty table in the archives section, far from where most students dared to sit.
I liked it here.
Safe.
Still.
Predictable.
At least until I heard two passing voices behind the shelf.
“—you hear Riven Hale’s back in the city officially?”
“Yeah. Hale family’s pissed. He’s the black sheep, right? Didn’t he… disappear a few years ago?”
“After that incident at the river,” one whispered. “You remember? Kid almost drowned. Riven was involved.”
My body locked.
The air in my lungs froze.
The river.
Drowning.
Kid.
I pushed up from the table so fast my chair scraped across the floor.
The two students glanced at me, startled, but kept talking as they walked past.
“That was seven years ago,” the first said. “He was like… what? Sixteen?”
“Yeah, and the kid he pulled out—apparently she never knew it was him.”
My heart slammed into my ribs.
No.
No.
It couldn’t be—
“Parents didn’t want the attention,” the other continued. “Hale name was already tied up in crime. They kept it quiet.”
My vision blurred.
I grabbed the edge of the shelf.
Seven years ago.
A river.
A drowning.
I was twelve.
I remembered the cold.
The panic.
The water swallowing me whole.
A hand pulling me back.
A boy’s voice saying, “Stay awake. Please stay awake.”
The memory hit like a tidal wave.
I stumbled back, books rattling.
It was him.
Riven.
He saved me.
That’s why he said again.
That’s why he looked at me like he’d known me forever.
That’s why he protected me like breathing.
Because he already had.
But why… why didn’t he ever say anything?
The question dug under my ribs as I shoved my books into my bag and all but ran out of the library.
I didn’t know where he was.
I just knew I had to find him.