Chapter 68 The Price Of Secrets
Danielle's POV
Campus had never felt this empty.
For three days, Liam’s seat in class stayed vacant.
I tried to focus on my lectures, but my mind wouldn’t stop replaying the last moment I saw him: the way his eyes didn’t meet mine after I slapped him.
I thought I would hate him forever.
I overheard that Liam Carver had “left campus for personal reasons,”
No one knew where he went. Not even his friends. And the more I thought about it, the clearer it became; the hack, the missing data, the flash drive…
I had this strong urge that it had something to do with his father.
Everyone acted like it was normal. Rich families did odd things all the time; trips, sudden transfers, “family emergencies” that were just code for drama behind their walls.
But I knew it wasn’t normal.
“Hey Kalix,” I called out, waving at Liam's friend.
“Sorry to bother, I just haven't been seeing Liam around and uhmm… I'm kind of worried,”
“His father is back from the trip, he went home,” Kalix responded.
Mr. Carver’s reputation was a shadow that swallowed everything around it.
Ruthless, calculated, known for shaping his sons into miniature versions of himself.
I remembered the night Liam told her how suffocating that was and how he always felt like a disappointment compared to his older brother.
Now it made sense.
He hadn’t hacked the school records to hurt me.
He’d done it because he was desperate to fix his grades before his father returned from a business tour.
“Thank you,” I murmured before I could get my mind straight.
Still, he’d destroyed my peace.
I couldn’t shake the image of the dean’s office, the accusing stares, the shame that clung to her name.
Returning to my room, my laptop sat across me, with its dim light on my face.
“I’m a tech expert,” I whispered to myself. “I can fix this.”
Even if fixing it meant breaking a few rules.
I closed my dorm door, locked it twice. My fingers hovered over the keys, trembling.
I wasn’t a hacker. Well, not really.
But I understood the systems, firewalls, root access.
I masked my location with a VPN, switching IPs from Atlanta to Canada to Luxembourg…until I couldn’t tell where I was “logging in” from anymore.
The school server blinked open like a guarded vault.
It felt wrong.
I typed Liam’s student number.
His last semester’s failing grade stared at me like a bruise on an otherwise perfect face.
“I’m not doing this for you,” I murmured under my breath.
I edited the score, just one.
Then I closed everything, wiped my traces, shut my laptop, and sat still until the air settled around me again.
I expected a knock on my door that night or the next morning
But nothing came.
A week passed.
No summons. No accusations.
No alarms blaring through the campus halls.
It had worked.
My first hack.
That afternoon, after my last class, I found myself walking past the cafeteria, past the library, all the way to the bench Liam took me to, the first time we really talked.
The bench wasn’t special.
It was old, chipped, shaded by an oak tree that shed too many leaves.
But it had become ours somehow.
I sat down slowly.
The breeze was colder today.
“I hope he’s okay,” I whispered.
I hated that I cared this much.
Was the meeting with his father bad? Did he get punished for the missing grade?
Did his family blame him for disappearing from school?
Was he?
A tap on my shoulder cut straight through my thoughts.
I jerked around. My breath caught in my throat.
Liam.
Standing right behind me, hands in his pockets, looking tired and rumpled and ridiculously handsome in the most annoying way.
His hair was a mess, like he’d been running his fingers through it during an argument.
For two seconds I just stared at him.
Then I did something stupid.
I screamed and launched myself at him.
His laugh rumbled against my ear as his arms slid around me, warm and steady.
“Well,” he drawled, voice teasing, “my rookie missed me.”
“Shut up,” I mumbled into his shoulder, but I didn’t let go.
He smelled like mint gum and cologne and home.
And I hated that too.
I had no business thinking of him that way.
He leaned back slightly, eyes glinting.
“You know, after our last… eventful meeting, I didn’t think you’d be so thrilled to see me.”
Heat slapped my cheeks because he was right.
I slapped him last time. I told him to stay away.
But now?
Now I couldn’t unglue my eyes from his face.
“How…” I swallowed. “How did the meeting with your father go?”
Liam’s smile faded into something more genuine.
More grateful.
“It went perfect,” he murmured. “Someone edited my results. Gave me the score I needed. Saved my ass, actually.”
My heart thudded so hard I feared he could hear it.
He didn’t know it was me.
Good.
His hand brushed my knuckles lightly.
“Thank you,” he breathed. “From a grateful heart.”
I looked down.
Because I couldn’t look at him and stay sane.
For a moment, a slow, stretching, dangerous moment occured as our faces drifted close.
His eyes dropped to my lips. Mine fell to his.
The air tightened. My breath tangled.
His fingers brushed the side of my neck.
My pulse tripped under his touch.
Just a tilt. Just one tilt and we’d…
Liam blinked.
The spell snapped.
He cleared his throat, stepping back half an inch too fast.
“Sorry. I didn’t… That wasn’t.."
“It’s okay,” I whispered, even though nothing about this was okay.
We stared at each other, breathing too carefully.
Friends with feelings neither of us wanted to acknowledge
because love was a luxury I couldn’t afford.
And he was a Carver.
A complication wrapped in danger.
Still…
I didn’t move away.
And he didn’t either.
The world kept moving around us, students chatting, footsteps echoing, birds screaming but we stood there like idiots, pretending we weren’t seconds away from ruining every boundary we swore to keep.
“I should go,” he finally murmured.
“Yeah,” I breathed. “Me too.”
But neither of us moved until a full minute later.
And even then, I kept replaying that almost-kiss in my head.