As soon as the bell rang I was out of the classroom and reaching for the door that would let me outside into the nice and warm air.

I didn't wait for Marie because I was starting to really dislike that girl.

I know that she was the one who "took me in" when I was new here but I was able to stand on my own now and was glad when I could get away from her.

I was walking through the parking lot when someone grabbed my arm and held me back.

I turned around quickly, thinking it was Hayden but instead saw Max standing in front of me with a slight smile on his face.

"Hey, K.C."

"Uh, hi."

Max let go of my arm and stuffed his hands into his skinny capris. "About yesterday....,"

"Oh, right! I'm so sorry!" I cringed. "It's just that I totally forgot I promised to meet up with someone and I just forgot to say bye. I'm really sorry--"

"It's okay," Max chuckled. "How about we make up for it tonight. Say...7:30?"

His hands softly ran down from my elbow to my hand, engulfing it in his.

"Please. It doesn't even have to be a date. I just want to get to know you."

He sent me a sweet smile and cocked his head a little to the side.

I let out a quiet sigh. "Alright. Okay."

"Great!" Max exclaimed. "I'll pick you up at 7:30 then." He stepped forward and softly kissed my cheek. He smirked at how red my cheeks had gotten and then let go of my hand to walk away.

After gathering myself, I started to walk home.

When I had been halfway home, I stopped walking abruptly.

I totally forgot that I was suppose to meet Hayden tonight!

Damn it!

It would be fine. I can make it to him and back in less than half an hour, right? I could make it back in time. There was no problem.

I groaned at my idiocy and continued on walking home, muttering a few curse words under my breath on the way.

______________________

I walked through the front door, letting it fall shut behind me and walked past the kitchen where I saw my dad putting dirty dishes into the dishwasher.

"Hey, dad," I said and leaned against the doorway with my arms crossed over my chest.

"Hi, K.C.," he replied, glancing up at me shortly.

"Did you hear about the kid that died?" I asked him, wanting to know if everyone knew about what had happened.

"Yes," he replied and closed the dishwasher before turning away from me. "And good riddance at that," he muttered under his breath, not intending for me to hear him.

"Why?" I questioned him. "Because he wasn't like you? Because he wasn't an Elite?"

My dad sighed and turned around to face me. "The kid was dangerous. I'm sure everyone is a lot safer without people like him around."

He walked past me and into the living room where he started to look through the bookshelf.

"What's that suppose to mean?" I asked him as I followed him.

"I don't want to talk about it, K.C." he told me in a firm voice.

"I didn't think you were the kind to think that not everyone deserved their life," I inched on.

"Kimberly Chloe. I said, I don't want to discuss this with you any further," he warned and pulled out a book.

I huffed and shot him one more suspicion look before turning around and walking up the stairs to my room.

I threw my backpack on the floor and fell onto my bed, not wanting to think about anything right now. There were too many questions to be answered.

Why was my dad acting so weird? Why did the principal lie about the death? What was going to happen now? And why did Max want to meet up with me tonight?

As I shut my eyes to try and sleep, I heard a loud bang coming from downstairs.

Luckily it didn't sound like a gunshot but more like something heavy fell.

Getting up, I slowly creeped down the steps incase someone was breaking into the house our something. I walked down the hall quietly and walked past the living room which my dad was still in.

I stayed in the hall and just peeked my head through the doorway to see what he was doing.

There were papers scattered all around him. Lists and mind maps and tables. There were pen scratches over several words that I couldn't see from the distance.

I turned me head a little more but lost my stance and had to move my foot to stop myself from falling. Quickly, I hid behind the wall because I had caused the floor to creak with my step. I heard the shuffling of papers and then saw my dad racing to his office with all of the papers in his arms, not even glancing back. He walked into his office and locked the door, leaving me by myself.

I walked into the living room. hoping that he forgot a paper so that I could see what he doing. Unfortunately, he had gotten every paper and it looked like there had never been a mess here just seconds before.

I'd have to find out what he was doing later. Right now I had to figure out how I was going to do this meeting two people in the same night thing.

I walked up the stairs, back to my room and began to think.

It takes 10 minutes for me to get to Hayden's place. So that was 20 minutes in total. And I'd have to get ready to go out, which would probably take another 5 to 8 minutes leaving me with about 2 minutes to talk to Hayden. Damn it....

Unless...I just go over to his place earlier.

Yeah, I'll just do that. And he said himself that he doesn't want me to walk alone when it's dark anyway.

________________________

At exactly 6:40pm I climbed out of my window just like the night before.

I had told my dad that I was getting ready to go out with a friend, which was sort of true I guess. Only that I was actually getting ready in about half an hour.

After getting down with almost no trouble, I quietly made my way around the house and down the streets, taking the path that I was growing familiar with.

So that I wouldn't be noticed too much incase any Bandits walked by, I had put on some dark wash jeans and a black shirt with sleeves down to my elbows with cut-outs along the shoulders. And of course, completed with my converse.

I made my way to Hayden's in a fast pace since I didn't really know what time it was.

Soon enough, his house came into view and I walked up the steps, knocking on the old door.

"Hold on!" I heard his voice call from inside.

The door opened and in front of me stood Hayden. However, he was only standing in front of me with a towel wrapped low around his hips.

I gaped at him, even though I tried my hardest not to.

But the water drops running down his chest and abs, disappearing into the towel were just too distracting.

"What are you doing here?" he asked with a questioning but stern look, while running his hand through his dark, wet hair. "You weren't suppose to be here for another ten minutes."

I swallowed and forced my eyes to look into his, not wanting them to wander anywhere else.

"I have some other plans tonight so I needed to come earlier," I answered after I had found my voice, thankful that my voice didn't quiver.

I sent him a sure smile as I pushed past him and walked into his living room, sitting down on his comfy couch.

He sighed. "Alright, wait here. I'll be right back."

After a while, Hayden came back, wearing some grey sweatpants and still no shirt.

Now that the shock had gone away of seeing him shirtless. Once again. I kind of enjoyed the view and was sad when he grabbed a shirt that was laying over the back of the reading chair and put it on.

"So?" he asked me and sat down in front of me on the coffee table, looking at me expectantly.

"What are you looking at me for? You're the one who told me to come here," I pointed out.

"But it seems like you were very urgent to get here," he smirked.

I rolled my eyes. "Like I said. I have something else to do tonight."

"And what is that?"

"I don't think that this is what we're suppose to be discussing."

"Alright, fine," Hayden said and stood up. "We obviously know that the police was lying about Joseph's death."

"Unless..," I cut in. "He didn't get murdered. I mean, how do we know that the dude didn't just kill himself?"

Hayden sighed. "When I was checking the body, I found footprints on the side by the bushes."

"What if they were just normal footprints?"

"I doubt it. What you also didn't see was that one of his fingers was cut off. His ring finger to be exact."

I cringed at the thought. Just thinking of the imagine almost made me sick.

"The ring that he always wore was gone, so I'm guessing whoever killed him took it. And I know that the footprints belonged to whoever killed him because there were blood drops on the dirt."

"Okay....so we know that he really was murdered. We just need to know why and by who. And why the police are covering it up."

"Exactly," Hayden agreed.

"How do we do that?"

"You think if I know I'd be here consulting with you?"

I rolled my eyes. "No need to be rude."

"I'll ask around. See if I can find anything or get any information," he said.

"Great. And I'll do the same."

"No," he said to me.

"What? Why not?" I argued.

"Because I don't want you any more involved in this than you already are."

"Then why did you want me here?" I questioned.

"To tell you exactly that."

"You're kidding me," I dead panned. "I'm not just going to leave this alone."

"Yes, K.C., you are," he spoke with a firm tone.

I just rolled my eyes, my gaze moving to the clock that I could see hanging in the kitchen.

"It's already 7:12?!" I exclaimed and sprung up.

"Yeah. Why?" Hayden asked and also glanced at the clock.

"I need to go," I said and walked to the front door. I was about to open it but Hayden's hand pushed against it, keeping it shut.

"Just hold up a minute," he spoke.

I groaned and turned around to face him, looking at him and watching his smirk.

"I would like to know where you're going."

"And I would like a private jet that can take me to wherever I want. Looks like we both want things that we can't have," I replied sarcastically.

Hayden did a fake gasp. "Are you going on a date?"

"No," I lied. "I'm just...meeting my dad for dinner."

"You're lying," he mused as his smirk deepened.

He took his hand away from the door and crossed his arms over his chest, with an amused look on his face. "With who?"

"With no one. Now if you'll excuse me," I turned around to open the door. I got halfway down the steps when I heard Hayden's voice.

"I'll find out either way," he called out. I could hear the smirk in his voice.

"I don't doubt it," I called back and waved without turning around before walking down the street and back to my house.

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I know this is just a filler and I'm sorry. I promise thing will get more interesting soon. I just need to story to build up correctly.

I hope you enjoyed the chapter! Remember to vote and comment!

Love you!

Emili