Mon,

Yeah, I'm busted. William and I have been talking. It's a long story... but it was because of you. He's still on level one, Mon. That's the problem. By staying he's shown us that he's just as bad as the rest of them. If, you know, getting with Lola wasn't bad enough.

You're lucky you won't be here when everything goes down. Because it's barely hanging in place, Mon. The whole of level one is so fragile. Just a few misplaced moves and they're going tumbling. Maybe they need a little push.

Love ya,

Chlo

I could hear my parents talking in the lounge room as I walked down the hall to the front door. There was the clink of glass and the sound of laughter as I passed the doorway, the music channel playing from the television.

William really wasn't kidding. He was outside. As I pulled open the door, I saw his silver Lamborghini idling on the curb, his profile barely visible through the tinted windows. I called back into the house to tell my parents I was leaving before making my way down the stone path and into the passenger's seat of his car.

"Hi," I said, a little breathless from the cool evening air. I hadn't really catered for much more than the action of actually getting into his car. I was overcome with a slight sense of awkwardness as my greeting hung heavily in the air.

"Hey," he said after a fraction of a moment, turning down the dial of his radio.

I shifted my weight to get comfortable. I didn't know where he planned to go, or why he seemed so... raw? Or emotional? I couldn't even tell what it was about him that made me pick it up. It was just the tightness in his posture, the strange tone of his voice.

"So you go for drives," I stated. "When you're... stressed?"

"When I have a lot on my mind," he verified with a tight-lipped smile. His lips were full, and perhaps they'd almost be feminine if they weren't countered with his structured nose and chiseled jaw.

"Should I be worried?" I asked.

"About her digging or my loyalty?"

"Both."

He gave a sardonic chuckle before turning out of my neighborhood and towards the busier end of town. "You should probably be more worried about her digging."

I let out a tangled breath. Shit. "Tell me everything."

"That's exactly what she said," he said wryly.

"What has her suspicions?" I pressed. His injection of amusement did not help the anxiety pulsing through my body.

"She just knows me too well," he said. "She knows it's weird for me to just date someone, especially someone like you. Especially when there's all the... stuff between her and I."

"Right," I said my brows furrowing. "So she knows we're not real."

"Not that we're not real. Just that there's room for ulterior motive behind us. We just have to act extra cozy. I tried to convince her that you just swept me off my feet. And, well, it's going to make your life difficult."

"Because she'll think you moved on with me and be jealous." I shook my head, the whole situation not making much sense. It was all okay when I was the only one with a game plan, but this was screwing things up. "You need to tell me more about you two."

"What do you want to know?" he asked.

"Well, how long were you two a thing? Does Lola have many, you know, extra boyfriends?"

He visibly cringed as he indicated to make a turn. "Maybe, three months tops? And no. As far as I know, I'm the only one. Other than Francis, obviously." He paused. "Man, this sounds so fucked up."

"That's because it is," I couldn't help but say.

"Not helpful. I'm assuming you offered to come along to help sort out my brain, not to piss me off even further."

I shrugged. "So it was an unintentional thing, what happened between you two?"

He shrugged, and the small smile that made its way onto his expression brought with it an annoying pang of fury. This whole situation really was disgusting. He had to fall for her, of all people. Even if he was the only one to really help Monica last year, to try and guide her home from parties and make sure she got home okay, he was still screwing with the enemy. Literally.

"It wasn't intentional. It just sort of happened."

He'd just seemed so good. That was the problem. William wasn't the kind of guy who took entertainment from other people's suffering; that was one thing I'd picked up from my time with him. But all of this was only proving he wasn't innocent. Not if he could have feelings for someone so horrid. Someone who made my fists clench with hatred.

But, if I wanted to stay on his good side, and to get the most information possible on the subject, I needed to keep my cool. I needed to act as if I was on his side here.

"Sometimes it just happens," I said, my voice husky as I tried to keep my tone genuine, like I was somehow relating to him.

Quiet ensued as William drove. It was a Friday night, and the streets were busy with people exiting fancy restaurants and noisy with the music streaming through the open doors of dessert places. I watched a couple dressed in elaborate fur coats as we waited at the traffic lights, my hand inching towards the radio in order to drown out the silence growing in the car.

"We were drunk when it first happened," he said, interrupting my subtle movement. "It was my birthday party last year. I was stupid, very stupid, trying to impress everyone with how much I could drink. And she was fighting with Francis and I found her crying in my bedroom." He let out a tangled breath. "I'm not good at dealing with people who are crying."

I bit my lip, holding back any response. I wasn't oblivious to his body language or his tone. He didn't expect a response. He just wanted to talk.

"The thing is, Francis and I have been friends since we were old enough to hold a lacrosse stick. His Dad literally based how much he'd sponsor the club we played for by what position his son played and how much game time he got. Francis loved it, he'd get whatever he wanted and he never cared who he compromised. It's just who he is, especially now."

He sighed, pushing his foot down as we accelerated up the road, the lights and people around us fading into quiet darkened parklands on either side.

"We all know how he and Dela got together. Lola, I mean. She told me to call her Dela when I met her in freshman year. I don't know why. Everyone else just calls her Lola. Anyway, it was a big, elaborate show and she felt so flattered. But, just like with everything else, Francis always wants more. He won't be satisfied, she's like, an accessory to him."

"She seems pretty happy to be on his arm," I noted, careful to assess his reaction. He gave a half smile.

"Oh, she is. That's the thing about her, she just loves to impress everyone. But, that night, she was crazy. I've never seen her so flawed. Just the way she was so upset... I guess she puts so much effort into showing everyone how perfect she is that I was so shocked to see her sad."

Of course vulnerability would be something William found attractive. He seemed like just the type who wanted someone to save.

"I know you're probably judging me right now. You obviously hate her. I just want you to understand that she's human too. Her whole bad bitch personality only runs so deep. It's no excuse for anything she does, it's just that there's something behind all of that that isn't completely fucked up."

"Are you seriously giving me a reason to like her?" I asked, failing to keep up my supportive demeanor. "After everything she did to Monica?"

William slowly shook his head, his eyes glancing over to meet mine before traveling back to the mirror. "No. I'm not. I guess I'm just trying to help you understand why we happened. We were just two broken people drunk out of their minds meeting at a party. After that, we just had that connection. It was really all we had."

I didn't miss the fact that he considered himself broken. William Bishop seemed anything but, but if I knew anything it was that people could be experts at hiding things. Some unfamiliar, untamed part of me dared my hand to move closer to his, but I squashed it quickly. "What made that connection break?"

"Francis," he said. "He knew she was seeing someone and he must have done something to stop it. She wouldn't listen to me, she'd already made up her mind when she told me she didn't want to see me anymore."

"Sounds like you still have some loose strings to me." So Francis knew. Which means, if my slip of words to Maddy got back to him, then it wouldn't have the largest impact possible. I couldn't decide if that was a good thing or a bad thing this early in my plan.

He shrugged. It occurred to me that out of all the targets I could have chosen to be my connection to level one I'd chosen the worst. If Lola had feelings for William, then I was one hundred percent going down for this. "They may be loose but I've cut my side clean. It wasn't hard to get over things after..."

"After Monica?"

"After Monica." He cleared his throat, making his confirmation even clearer. "It was just a reminder of who it was that I was dealing with. The kind of person she is."

I fidgeted with my seat belt, suddenly unable to look him in the eye. So he did care about what happened to Mon, even if it wasn't enough for him to turn them in, or to say something. To say anything. Then something struck me as suspicious. Why was he trusting me with any of this? It made no sense for him to confide in me, especially when he knew the truth.

"William, I-"

"Will," he corrected, a small smile playing on his mouth. But it wasn't the full kind, it wasn't traveling further than his lips. His eyes were hard, his jaw tense, and his knuckles white against the steering wheel.

"I just..." My voice trailed off, and I decided against questioning his ease at telling me. If he did trust me, then I couldn't make it feel unnatural. I still needed him on my side, even if going through him to get to level one was a wrong turn. I had to stick with it. "I'm glad you can talk to me about this."

His brows softened, his eyes illuminating under a street light for only a fragment of a second, enough to give me a flash of emerald along with his smile. "I'm glad you're here to listen."

Oh, how oblivious he was to the inner workings of my brain. If only he knew how dangerous it was to give me information like this. It only made me guilty that I had no choice but to use it.

"Anyway, I just wanted you to be aware that you'll be high on her hit list. Just be careful tomorrow night. Don't give her anything to use against you."

"I'll do my best," I said, though my tone made it clear that I didn't believe it would be enough.

"We'll do our best. My head's on the line as much as yours, and you're not bringing us down, Whittaker."

"Right." Then something else nagged at the corners of my brain. "You know Maddy wants me to do coke with the girls tomorrow night, don't you?

Any worry of him laughing at my innocence disappeared, and he gave me a look of concern. "You don't have to do that."

"I have no doubt they'll make me look like an idiot if I don't."

"Just drink enough – or pretend to drink enough – and they might let you off the hook. Say you don't usually drink so they get excited about that instead," he instructed.

"Do you do it?"

He shook his head. "Me and a few others like Zach don't. Our coach would kill us if he found out we were doing party drugs."

"Coach for which one of your million extracurriculars?" I asked.

"All of them, but lacrosse in particular," he said.

I suppressed an eye-roll. "So just act as drunk as possible and they won't make me do harder stuff."

"Hopefully," he said. "Seriously, though, if they pressure you into anything, come find me."

It made me feel a whole lot better that he was on my side on this one. "If only Monica had your guidance."

My words seemed to wrap around the car like a ghost, making us feel a whole lot more distant than the intimacy which had grown with our conversation had let on. Will's face had paled, his expression now grim, and I knew I'd crossed a line from the tormented whirlpool in his eyes.

He felt guilty for what had happened to Monica Pennington.