• [ r a w a n d e x p o s e d ] •

♥ louisa ♥

THE CROWD WAS howling and shouting at the sight in front of them. "More?" Lexi, shrieked from the centre of the courtyard, slipping out of her dress and chucking it into the crowd that was keenly watching her. "You like that?"

Clad in expensive lingerie and heels, her hair was scattered wildly over her shoulder and her make-up smudged into distortion. Her once perfectly winged eyeliner was a blur spread down her cheek. Flashes from the phone camera's shattered through the dark moonlight, capturing her every wobble.

Ashlei, Talisa and I had been watching the events from a distance for the past forty minutes and in that time, Lexi had only gotten worse and worse.

A satisfied smirk sat on my face as I watched her make an utter fool out of herself. She sure was putting on a show, if that was what you called stripping in front of everybody. She was destroying the small about of dignity that she had left.

Served her right.

I pitied her. Some people failed to differentiate between good attention and bad attention. Lexi was one of them. To her attention was everything and she didn't seem to care about how or why she got it.

I watched as she chugged another drink from a stranger before mumbling incomprehensibly to herself. A moment later she stumbled, disastrously crumpling to her knees, but swiftly raised her hand in a wave. "It's okay! I'm alright, I'm alright," she laughed emptily, posing scandalously at the lustful men's cameras.

Half of the people here had snuck in and definitely, were not members of Forteaux Academy. I was certain I'd seen somebody from the paparazzi a little while ago. That would be on the cover of the Daily Mail tomorrow.

Her parents wouldn't be impressed.

Standing up again warily, she tried to continue. Even from a distance, I could see her struggle to keep her eyes focused and hold her head up. "If I can get through five abortions, a little trip is nothing, don't you say!" Although I hardly found that surprising, everyone else did and soon the chatter began.

What the heck? Is that Lexi Walters? Wasn't she trying to join the elite?

Wait, did she say five abortions? I thought she'd know what protection is.

Jeez, with the number of people she's screwing around with, I'm hardly surprised.

Damn, look at what she's wearing right now! Take another photo.

Put on the flash you dweeb, you can't see anything!

Beside me, I heard Talisa snigger as Ashlei gushed about how much of a genius I was. I shrugged my shoulders. "I didn't force her to take so many pills. It was her own choice."

Sure, I'd manipulated her into doing so but I didn't physically shove the drugs down her throat. She took them willingly.

It was her choice and choices have consequences.

"Come on, let's go for a wander," I said, wanting to clear my head.

I couldn't help thinking about everything Lexi had said when we were upstairs. I wasn't at all surprised that Logan had made a deal with Lexi.

He was smart.

He was aware that Lexi craved to climb up the hierarchy and was stupid enough to trust that Logan would help her do that. He had planned on manipulating her from the day Gabriel arrived here.

All of her attempts of throwing herself at Gabriel made complete sense.

"You've got to be kidding me. A walk? Now?" Talisa said, holding up her crutches. "These crutches are a pain in the arse." I looked at her pale green eyes and bit back a smile.

"I didn't tell you to snap your damn heel," I grabbed her hand and pulled her up. "Although I'm sure your little tumble was a complete accident." Sarcasm coated my voice as a smirk grew like a waning pendulum from the corner of her mouth.

"A girl gotta do what a girl gotta do."

Ashlei jumped into the conversation confusion, "Wait, did you want Gabriel to carry you?" She raised her blonde eyebrows innocently as dainty laughter slipped out of my mouth.

One would think it was due to her stupidity yet, in reality, I wasn't surprised at how well she could fake naivety.

"Sometimes I wonder how anyone could be so naive, Ashlei. Is your head 99.9% air?" I joked, untwisting a strap of my dress as a small smile framed her face.

We spent a good half hour, mingling with others at the party. Currently, I was talking to Natalia Churchill, a Brazilian girl who was part of the cheerleading squad. "Your dress is so pretty, by the way," she complimented, fiddling with her curly brown hair. Talisa has gone to smoke and Ashlei had disappeared a few minutes ago.

"Ah, thank you," I responded curtly, wanting to move on and talk to somebody else.

It was nearly midnight and I was so done with socialising but one thing I knew for sure was the importance of keeping up the appearances.

"If you want, we can go get a drink?" She offered with keen eyes and a kind face. Natalia's entire face was morphed into an expression of sheer desperation and hope at falling into my good books. She couldn't wait to brag to the rest of the cheerleading squad that she had a drink with Louisa Darling.

I raised my eyebrows and gave her a pitying smile. "Maybe next time." Her face dropped yet she nodded readily, biting her cream coloured nails.

After she turned around, I let out a huge eye roll that I'd been hiding. I knew that the only reason she was being so nice was that she wanted to level up to the next tier. Behind that kind face, she was probably as bad as everyone else here.

Regardless, I was used to people wanting to use me by now, and frankly, I didn't give a damn anymore.

"Quite the fiasco you made earlier," a familiar voice said from behind me. I cursed under my breath, slowly turning around to meet a pair of stormy grey eyes that I was recently seeing too much of.

Gabriel's angular straight nose was nothing compared to the sharpness of his cheekbones, which battled for attention against his carefully crafted jawline. It looked as if it could cut a diamond with a light touch. His glowy skin carried tones of olive and tan that hinted at Italian or perhaps Greek descent. Most importantly, he seemed far too good to be true.

"I don't know what you mean," I said sharply. Craving a distraction, I began fiddling with my ebony hair. Sensing a tad bit of frizz, I loosely began braiding it into a plait before pulling out a few strands to frame my face. "Unless you're talking about Lexi."

He raised a dark eyebrow as if asking me to continue.

I hated being told what to do yet I complied anyway. "She's in the toilets throwing up if you're looking for her."

He wrinkled his nose before allowing the corner of his mouth to creep upwards. "Nah, I'm relishing my moments of Lexi-free time. I thought it was clear that Lexi was obsessed with me. Not the other way around," he said, arrogantly before letting out a sound between a laugh and scoff. "Although, it turns out she'd been bribed to do that too."

I knew that he was testing for my reaction.

When I refused to say anything, he sighed and folded his arms, unknowingly tensing his biceps. "Did you know?"

"Know what?" I asked, still not looking at him.

"Know about the deal between Logan and Lexi."

In all honesty, I had no clue. I already knew that Ashlei and Logan had been sleeping together for a few years yet I was completely unaware of this so-called deal between him and Lexi. I was still kicking myself. I should have seen it coming.

Rubbing my forehead, I warily checked to see if Logan was about. The last thing I wanted was for him to get even more jealous. Logan had probably gone home after Lexi had accidentally exposed their deal. "No, I didn't."

Gabriel narrowed his eyes slightly, "But you didn't seem surprised."

I hadn't thought anybody would have picked up on that. "Yeah? Well, that was because-" I forced myself to stop.

Why on Earth was I explaining myself to him?

Alcohol was clouding my judgement right now. "That's none of your business," I snapped, sitting down on the stool in the corner of the room. "What did you want anyway?"

The sod followed me and sat beside me as I groaned. Why couldn't people just leave me alone for a minute? His catastrophic eyes held mine for a moment as if trying to read me.

I broke eye contact.

"I'm not stupid, Louisa. I know what you did."

I looked at him feigning confusion. "I don't have time for this Gabriel. Just spit it out. I haven't done anything." Unsatisfied, I bitterly added a sentence. "And you are stupid."

He let out a hearty laugh from his chest that lifted into the chilly air. "Don't give me that I'm-an-innocent-little-angel face," Gabriel said in between laughs before composing himself again. "I know you messed with Lexi's pills and planned everything that happened tonight."

My face fell before I could control it. "No, I didn't. What are you talking about?" I knew he could see right through me and I hated that more than anything. The moment of feeling raw and exposed.

He leant against the counter across from us and rested his head in his hands, still holding eye contact with his annoyingly pretty eyes that I wanted to gorge out. And here I was with my boring brown ones.

This time I refused to look away.

"Storytime!" Gabriel sang in a ridiculous voice, flapping his hands around. "Once upon a time, the super-hot Gabriel Reid was sitting on the sofa with his super popular acquaintances when he saw Louisa Darling give Talisa a huge nod and signal. She may as well have been waving a huge red flag naked - not that I'd mind the naked part."

I scowled at him yet he continued regardlessly. "Miraculously, a moment later Talisa - a girl who somehow didn't spill her drink when she fell down the damn stairs - manages to totally empty the contents of her glass onto Lexi. Randomly, a huge argument breaks out and a couple of hours later, Lexi has exposed herself to the entire academy." Gabriel paused for emphasis before tapping his fingers against his chin. "Now I'm not a genius but that sounds slightly suspicious."

He leant close towards me until he was mere centimetres from my face, before whispering, "Am I right or am I right?"

I shoved him backwards until he almost fell off his chair. The way he spoke to me made me feel like a complete idiot. My eyes looked to the sides to make sure nobody had heard him. "If you have any sense of what's good for you, you'll keep your mouth shut," I hissed, keeping my voice low."Take what happened today as a warning of what I can do."

Gabriel smirked at me, his eyes twinkling. "Oh my! Dear Darling, I'm terrified," he started, pulling at my fucking cheek. "I'll try although it might accidentally slip. Anyway, let me in on all the good stuff. I wanna know why you did it?"

One look at his face told me he wasn't going to let this go.

Yet one look at the person storming behind him launched me into panic mode. Still in his navy button-down and clutching a glass of what I presumed to be whiskey was Logan.

"I gotta go," I stuttered, standing up and rushing away from Gabriel as fast as possible. I vaguely felt a hand try to stop me yet I shoved it away and walked towards the main door as fast as possible, pushing my way between the dancing bodies.

Just as I was about to escape from Talisa's house, a hand snakes around my waist and pulled me flush against a chest. The smell of whiskey engulfed me as I slowly turned around brought my eyes up to meet a face with deceivingly angelic golden hair.

Logan stared at me for a few seconds, his eyes seething. "Not so fast Louisa, I think you've got a shit tonne of explaining to do."

A moment later, I was thrown into his red Lamborghini.

I thought I'd include a little more description on Gabriel this chapter so you guys can get a bitter picture! Get hyped for the next chapter where lots of stuff will be revealed... dun, dun, dunnnn! Hit that star if you enjoyed the chapter!
KiwiAndKoalas x

♥ 𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐞 𝐯𝐨𝐭𝐞 𝐢𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐞𝐧𝐣𝐨𝐲𝐞𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫! ♥