I read the message three times, trying to process what it was suggesting. That sophomore year had been orchestrated? That the betrayals and secrets had served purposes beyond what we'd understood? That junior year would be worse not because of family escalation but because of some larger truth we hadn't discovered?
The implications were terrifying. If someone had been orchestrating everything—the exposures, the conflicts, the escalating warfare—then we'd been playing a game we didn't know existed while thinking we were just surviving family pressure.
And the final line: "The people closest to you are the most dangerous of all."
Was that warning about Alexander? Julian? My own family? Everyone I'd learned to trust this year?
I was still processing the message when another knock came at
