Chapter 20 – The Note
Sam's POV
By the time I got back to my room that night, my nerves were shot. My skin still buzzed with the uneasy certainty that Elias had touched my stuff, maybe even cracked open the notebook I kept hidden.
It wasn’t paranoia. I knew where I left things, the exact angle of the spine against the mattress, the weight of it pressing under me when I lay down. That notebook wasn’t just scribbles—it was my sister’s ghost, bleeding through every word I wrote when I thought the pressure would eat me alive.
And now it sat on the desk. Like someone wanted me to notice it.
I locked the door behind me and crossed the room in two steps, snatching it up. My heart pounded so hard I thought it might break my ribs. I flipped through the pages, scanning for anything out of place, for a missing scrap, a smudge, anything.
But then I saw it.
A folded piece of paper wedged between the pages, right in the middle of the notebook. One I didn’t put there.
My fingers went cold as I slid it out. The paper was thick, expensive, the kind of stationery rich people used to write letters instead of texts. Unfamiliar. Unsettling.
On the front, in sharp block letters, was one word: Sam.
I froze.
No one in this dorm called me by my first name. Not Elias, not Declan, not anyone. I was always “Hale.” Sam was what my sister called me, what my mother whispered when she thought I was asleep. Sam was me. The real me.
My pulse raced as I unfolded the note.
The handwriting was clean, deliberate. Male.
I know what you’re doing. Meet me tomorrow night. Midnight. East stairwell. Come alone.
I read it again. And again. My eyes burned as if the words were seared into me.
I know what you’re doing.
The walls of the room seemed to shrink, pressing closer. Who wrote this? Elias? One of Declan’s cronies? Someone else entirely?
If it was Elias, why leave a note instead of confronting me directly? That wasn’t his style. He liked to poke, prod, watch me squirm. This… this was different. This was precise. A trap, maybe.
If it was one of Declan’s guys, then I was screwed. They couldn’t know, not yet. If they had even the slightest hint of the truth, they’d chew me up and spit me out.
But the part that terrified me most was the possibility that it wasn’t them. That it was someone else. Someone who saw through me without even trying.
I stuffed the note into my hoodie pocket and paced the room. The window showed only the reflection of my own pale face, eyes wide and frantic. I wanted to rip the note into pieces, flush it, burn it. Pretend it never existed.
But I couldn’t.
Because whoever wrote it knew. And if I ignored them, they’d only push harder.
When Elias finally came back, I was sitting on my bed with my arms folded, trying to look like I wasn’t about to come apart at the seams. He pushed open the door with his usual careless grace, hair damp from a shower, T-shirt clinging to his shoulders.
“Hey,” he said casually, like nothing in the world could touch him. “Did I miss anything?”
Every instinct screamed to ask him if he’d left the note. To demand answers. But I couldn’t. Not without giving myself away.
I shook my head, forcing my voice steady. “Nothing.”
He dropped his bag by the bed and stretched, eyes flicking toward me. Just for a second, they lingered. Searching. I tensed, waiting for him to say something, to make some sly remark that would confirm my worst fears.
But he didn’t. He just smirked faintly, climbed onto his bed, and grabbed a book like it was any other night.
The note in my pocket felt like it was burning a hole straight through me.
The hours crawled by. I couldn’t focus on homework. Couldn’t focus on the chatter in the hallway, the distant echo of laughter from down the dorm. My mind circled the same question over and over: who wrote the note?
Midnight. East stairwell.
Was I supposed to go? Was it a trap?
My chest tightened at the thought of my sister, her face in those last days. If there was even a chance this note was from someone who knew the truth—who could help me bring Declan down—I couldn’t ignore it.
But what if it was a setup?
My hands shook as I shoved my notebook back under the mattress, the way it was before. Only this time, I knew it wasn’t safe. Nothing was safe anymore.
When the dorm finally went quiet, I lay in bed staring at the ceiling, listening to Elias’s breathing even out. Sleep came easy to him. Or maybe he just faked it better than I could.
I turned on my side, clutching the note in my hand under the blanket. My mind was a storm, spinning so fast I felt dizzy.
I could picture it already: the stairwell at midnight, shadows stretching long, the creak of old steps under my weight. Someone waiting. Someone who knew me better than they should.
I squeezed my eyes shut, willing myself not to think about it anymore. But the words replayed, soft as a whisper against my skin.
I know what you’re doing.
And for the first time since stepping foot in Dorm 9, I wondered if maybe I wasn’t the hunter anymore. Maybe I’d just become the hunted.
I don’t know how long I drifted in that restless state between sleep and wakefulness, but when I finally turned, Elias was watching me. His eyes caught the faint glow of the lamp, steady, unblinking.
“Can’t sleep?” he murmured.
My throat tightened around a thousand lies I wanted to tell. I forced one out. “Just thinking.”
“About what?”
The note crinkled in my fist under the blanket. My heart pounded.
“Nothing,” I whispered.
His gaze lingered a moment longer, too sharp, too knowing. Then he smiled faintly and rolled onto his back. “Right.”
But I knew he didn’t believe me.
And as I lay there, wide awake, clutching the note like a lifeline, one truth lodged itself deep inside me.
Whoever wrote it, whatever they wanted, midnight tomorrow would change everything.