Chapter3

Wearing clear nitrile gloves, I slid the envelope across the precinct's front desk.

The desk officer broke the seal and dumped out the contents. A forged Ivy League "Felony Deportation Order" and over a dozen AI-generated obscene photos spilled onto the counter. His head snapped up, his eyes locking onto mine.

"I haven't touched the originals barehanded," I said, meeting his gaze dead-on. "Someone tried to deliver this package directly to my grandmother's room at her nursing home. If she had opened it herself, you'd be looking at a homicide scene right now. The sender sealed it with glue, so you should be able to pull intact fingerprints off it."

The officer frowned as he flipped through the photos, then glanced at the watermarked university crest on the deportation order. "We'll take the case, but the exact charges will depend on the forensics report. Libel, mail fraud, or something heavier—we won't know for sure until we get the prints and trace the letter's origin." He snapped on a pair of gloves and swept the envelope into a clear evidence bag. "I'll write you a receipt. We'll contact you when there's an update."

Inside the university chemistry lab. After completing the final set of experimental data, I sat at the monitor to cross-check the numbers, copying months of raw logs onto a portable hard drive. This was exactly what Jessica had taught me: "Anything on a computer can be tampered with. Only the physical copy in your hands actually counts, and you can never rely on just one backup." I forwarded that exact same set of logs to my advisor's email and CC'd Jessica. A triple backup. Nothing less would do. On the screen, the progress bar hovered at the final few percentages.

Bang.

The lab door was shoved open from the outside. Three silhouettes blocked the exit.

Leading the pack was Mia's most devoted lapdog, the fraternity vice president, Greg. He held up his phone, shoving the harsh camera flash right in my face.

"Look who it is. Staying up till midnight pretending to study?" Greg chewed his gum loudly, his filthy gaze raking over me. "Or are you just waiting for the department head to swing by so you can pay off your next leaked exam with your body, sugar baby?"

The two guys behind him roared with laughter.

The progress bar hit 100%. I yanked the external drive free, shoved it into my pocket, and glared at him. "Back off."

"Not so fast." Greg took a step closer and clamped a heavy hand onto my shoulder. "Hand over the drive. Don't think we don't know you're trying to forge evidence to smear Mia. Smash that thing right now, and you might still walk out of here in one piece tonight."

He reached his free hand toward my pocket.

"Don't touch me!" I thrashed out of his grip.

Greg shoved me hard. Losing my balance completely, I crashed backward. My left knee and elbow slammed into the sharp, right-angled edge of the lab bench. Beads of blood instantly seeped through the fabric of my clothes.

In my previous life, it was in this exact spot that they had pinned me to the floor, crushed my hard drive under their heels, and called me a bitch who deserved it.

"Playing dead?" Greg raised his foot to stomp directly onto my pocket. "Get it out!"

Propping myself up on my elbows, I scrambled back against the fire extinguisher cabinet. I ripped the glass door open, grabbed the dry chemical extinguisher from its hook, and tore out the safety pin. Leveling the nozzle right at those three arrogant faces, I squeezed the lever hard.

A thick blast of white powder erupted outward.

"My eyes!"

"Hack! Cough, cough—!"

The three of them clutched their faces, coughing violently as they blindly crashed back out into the hallway.

I spun around and drove the heavy metal base of the extinguisher directly into the glass of the wall-mounted fire alarm.

The piercing wail of the siren instantly ripped through the silence of the entire building.

Guarding the pocket holding my drive, I stared coldly down the dust-filled end of the hallway.

The elevator doors slid open, and Liam charged out first—someone in the frat group chat had probably tipped him off, and he had rushed over to "take charge" of the situation.

Liam stopped dead in his tracks, his eyes fixed on my bleeding arm. He had never seen the old, fragile version of me standing up this straight and defiant.

"Chloe... are you okay?"

"I thought you believed in Mia's 'evidence'! Why bother pretending to care about me now?"

"Let me guess, she told you I was going to frame her, right? Well, take a good look around—who's the one bleeding here!"

Liam's voice dropped, carrying a faint tremble. "That's not right... Mia told me you were preparing to frame her with fake lab data... but she never actually showed me a single original log..."