There is a very specific kind of silence that follows the word betrayal.
It is not shock. Not exactly. It is sharper than that. More awake. Like everyone in the room has suddenly remembered they are standing on glass.
No one speaks for a second after I say it. Not Charles. Not Aaliyah. Not even Madison.
The library feels too small for what we now know. Or think we know. Because suspicion, I am learning, expands faster than truth.
Charles is the first to move. He takes the screenshot from my hand and looks at it again, jaw tight, eyes dark.
"Someone from my house?" he says, more to himself than to us.
I hate the way his voice sounds. Flat. Contained. The kind of control people use when anger is one bad breath away from becoming dangerous.
Aaliyah folds her arms. "Okay. New rule. Nobody spirals, nobody storms off, and nobody does anything stupid and rich."
Madison raises an eyebrow. "That is an oddly specific category."
"It's the category all three of you keep trying to live in," Aaliyah replies.
Under different circumstances, I might have appreciated that more. At the moment, my nerves are too busy trying to leave my body.
I look at Madison. "Who slipped this into your locker?"
"If I knew that, we would not still be standing here," she says.
Her tone is clipped again, but there is something thinner underneath it now. Something frayed.
Charles looks up from the paper. "Why didn't you bring this to me sooner?"
She gives him a cold look. "Because, as we already established, you have the subtle instincts of a fireworks accident."
"Oh, that's funny, coming from you."
"Children," Aaliyah says flatly. "Please. We're in a crisis and you're still doing divorced-energy improv."
I close my eyes briefly.
America is exhausting.
When I open them again, I say the only useful thing anyone has said so far.
"We need to think."
That gets their attention. Good.
I step toward one of the study tables near the center of the room and lay out the facts in my mind like cards. Then, because apparently this is my life now, I do it out loud.
"We know there is an account," I say. "Capitol Crown. It has access to school gossip, private events, and now things from inside the White House."
Charles sets the screenshot down. "We know whoever runs it—or feeds it—has been doing this for months."
"Maybe longer," Madison adds.
Aaliyah pulls out a chair and sits backward in it, arms folded over the top. "And we know somebody is escalating on purpose. This isn't random posting anymore. It's targeted."
"Yes," I say. "At me. At Madison. At Charles. At anyone connected closely enough to make the story bigger."
Madison leans one hip against the table. "Which means they're not just chasing gossip. They understand narrative."
I glance at her. "That sounded deeply sinister."
She shrugs once. "I grew up in public relations. I know what story-building looks like."
That, annoyingly, is useful.
Charles drags a hand over his face. "So what, we make a list? Suspects? People with access?"
"Yes," I say.
He looks at me. "You said that way too fast."
"I am French. We respect structure."
Aaliyah mutters, "And vengeance, apparently."
I ignore her.
Madison reaches for a pad of scrap paper from the librarian's desk and slides it toward me along with a pen. I take it. Of course I do. Apparently I am leading this now.
Wonderful.
I write three words across the top:
ACCESS. MOTIVE. OPPORTUNITY.
Aaliyah squints. "Wow. You made it look like a murder board in under ten seconds."
"It is called competence," I say.
Charles actually smiles at that. Small. Brief. But enough to loosen something in my chest.
I look down at the page.
"First category," I say. "School access."
"Too many people," Madison replies immediately. "Student council, yearbook, debate, event committees, teachers' aides, basically anyone with half a brain and no moral center."
"That narrows it down to this entire building," Aaliyah says.
"Helpful," Charles mutters.
I tap the pen against the page. "No. Madison is right. Start with who moves easily between groups. People no one notices watching."
Aaliyah nods slowly. "Invisible social climbers."
"Or visible ones pretending to be harmless," Madison says.
I write as they speak.
"Second category," I continue. "White House access."
That stills the room again.
Because saying it aloud makes it worse. Makes it real.
Charles leans both hands against the table. "That list is smaller."
"Is it?" Madison asks. "Staff, security, guests, maintenance, interns, event contractors—"
"That doesn't mean all of them had access to that hallway," he snaps.
I look at him carefully. "Do you know who did?"
His jaw tightens. He thinks.
"Not exactly," he says at last. "But that floor is monitored. Staff rotate. Agents are there. It shouldn't be easy."
"Shouldn't be," I repeat.
The phrase hangs there. Useless and ugly.
Because none of this should be easy. And yet.
Aaliyah watches Charles for a moment. "Do your parents know the full White House-photo part?"
"No," I say before he can answer.
Three heads turn toward me.
I lift my chin. "Not yet."
Charles stares. "Monique."
"We tell them," I say calmly, "when we know enough to tell them something useful."
"That is insane."
"That is strategic."
"That is how horror movies start."
"That is how royal families survive scandals," I reply.
Aaliyah makes a face. "Hate that both of you make compelling points."
Madison, maddeningly, says nothing. But she is watching me with a strange expression now. Less hostile. More assessing.
I dislike it. Probably because I understand it.
Charles straightens. "Fine. Then we do this quickly. We figure out who had access, we figure out who's feeding the account, and then we tell the adults before this gets worse."
"Agreed," I say.
He looks slightly startled. "Really?"
"I did not say I wanted to live in a teen thriller forever," I reply. "Just long enough to be useful."
Aaliyah points at me. "That is the exact kind of sentence people say right before the third act goes horribly wrong."
"She's not wrong," Madison murmurs.
"No one asked you," Charles says automatically.
"And yet I remain correct. It's exhausting."
Before he can answer, the library lights flicker once. Then steady.
All four of us go still.
Aaliyah slowly turns to look at the ceiling. "If a ghost enters this scene, I'm transferring schools."
"No ghost," I say.
But my grip tightens on the pen anyway.
Because the timing is unfortunate. And now I am suspicious of literally everything.
I force myself to keep writing.
"Who benefits?" I ask.
Madison doesn't hesitate. "Someone who likes power without having to stand in it."
Charles shakes his head. "Or someone who wants leverage. Over my family. Over hers." He nods toward me. "Over attention itself."
I add another line. POWER. LEVERAGE. ACCESS.
Aaliyah leans in. "Could it be more than one person?"
That makes all of us pause.
I look up slowly. "A network."
Madison's expression sharpens. "A source at school. A source somewhere else."
Charles looks suddenly ill. "A source at my house."
No one says anything. Because there is nothing kind to say to that.
I set the pen down for a moment. The room has gone too quiet again.
Then, because silence is dangerous when Charles looks like that, I say softly, "We do not know that yet."
His eyes lift to mine. Storm-dark and unreadable.
"No," he says. "But somebody knew where we were standing."
I cannot argue with that. So I do not.
Instead, I say, "Then we start smaller."
Madison nods. "School first."
Aaliyah blinks. "Why school first?"
"Because it's where the account lives socially," Madison says. "It gets traction here first. It tests things here. If there's a source chain, school is the easiest place to trace movement."
"And," I add, "because if we are wrong, it is easier to survive being wrong here than inside the White House."
Charles lets out one humorless breath. "That is a truly terrible sentence."
"Yes," I say. "A lot of them have been lately."
We spend the next twenty minutes doing something I never imagined I would do in America: forming a secret alliance in a private school library with the president's son, his ex-almost-political-fiancée, and a girl who looks one inconvenience away from fighting the entire East Coast.
It is deeply undignified. And somehow effective.
By the time we are done, we have the beginning of a plan.
Aaliyah will ask around quietly through people outside Madison's orbit—the ones others ignore, which means the ones who usually hear the truth first. Madison will look into event committee access, student media, party guest overlap, and anyone connected to last year's Homecoming leaks. Charles will find out, carefully, who had access to the White House areas where the photo could have been taken—without alerting his parents that he is actively investigating something terrible.
And me?
I will pay attention. Which sounds vague. But it is not.
I know how people lie with posture. I know how rooms shift when power enters them. I know what it looks like when someone is watching and pretending not to.
I have been trained for court long before I ever stepped into a cafeteria.
So yes. I will pay attention.
When we finally leave the library, the sun has dropped low enough to stain the hall windows gold. School feels emptier now. Safer only in the way abandoned stages feel safe—until you remember someone might still be behind the curtain.
Aaliyah walks beside me as Madison moves ahead to take a call and Charles lingers a few steps behind us.
"You know this is insane, right?" she says quietly.
"Yes."
"You also know I'm only going along with it because if I don't, the three of you will absolutely make everything worse."
"That is fair."
She glances at me. "And because I trust you."
That catches me off guard.
I look at her. Really look at her.
Her expression is casual. Too casual for the sentence she just dropped into my chest like something fragile and dangerous.
"You should probably reconsider that," I say lightly.
"No," she replies. "I'm very stubborn."
"Yes. I had noticed."
She bumps my shoulder with hers. "Good."
Ahead of us, Madison ends her call and turns back, her face once again arranged into something polished enough to cut glass.
"I have to go," she says. "My mother's already asking why I'm late, which means she knows I'm lying about where I am."
Charles mutters, "That must be genetic."
She ignores him. Impressively.
Then she looks at me. Not at the group. At me.
"If anything else comes through," she says, "you tell me."
"Why you?" Charles says immediately.
Madison finally turns on him. "Because I have been dealing with this account longer than any of you, and because whether you like it or not, it understands me. Which means I understand part of it."
He looks like he wants to argue. Probably for sport.
I step in before that happens.
"If anything comes through," I say, "we all know."
A beat.
Then Madison nods once. "Fine."
For some reason, that feels bigger than it should. Like a treaty neither of us trusts but both of us intend to enforce.
She leaves first. Of course she does. Walking away like exits were invented specifically for her.
Aaliyah watches her go. "I still don't like her."
"Neither do I," I say.
Charles adds, "Shocking."
"But," I continue, ignoring him, "I think she is telling the truth about being afraid."
That quiets him.
Aaliyah sighs. "I hate when nuance enters the room."
"It is very inconvenient," I agree.
By the time we reach the front steps, my security detail is already waiting. So is the car. So is the life I briefly forgot existed while pretending to be a detective.
The sky above D.C. is turning the color of bruised lavender. I am tired in my bones now. Not just from gossip, or fear, or too many thoughts. From vigilance.
From realizing every person around me might contain a version of danger I have not named correctly yet.
Aaliyah hugs me quickly before stepping back toward her own ride. Not dramatic. Not delicate. Just firm and real.
"Text me if you get anything," she says.
"I will."
"And if you do something reckless?"
"I will probably not text you first."
She points at me. "That is exactly why I'm worried."
Then she's gone.
Charles and I are left standing by the car for one strange, suspended second. The agents give us space in the way professionals do when they are pretending not to notice teenagers with complicated faces.
He looks at me. Not as the president's son. Not as the boy from the party. Not even as the almost-kiss in the hallway.
Just as himself. And that is somehow the hardest version of him to stand in front of.
"You should've told me," he says quietly.
There it is.
Not accusation. Not really. Something gentler. More wounded.
I look down at my gloves for a second before answering.
"I know."
"That photo—" He stops, jaw tightening. "Monique, that wasn't just gossip. That was inside my home."
"I know," I say again.
He exhales sharply and looks away toward the street. Cars move past the gates. The world continues with its usual bad manners.
"When you saw it," he says, still not looking at me, "were you scared?"
The question is so simple it almost undoes me.
"Yes," I say.
Now he looks at me. Fully.
And whatever he sees on my face seems to pull something softer out of him. His shoulders lower. His anger shifts shape.
"You're not supposed to handle that alone," he says.
I laugh once, without humor. "That is a very American thing to say."
He frowns. "How?"
"Because where I come from, people hand you impossible things and call it grace when you carry them quietly."
That lands. Hard.
He steps closer. Not too close. Just enough.
"Well," he says, voice low now, "where you are now, you don't have to do that with me."
I hate the way that reaches somewhere unguarded. I hate it because I want to believe him.
And wanting, as always, is the dangerous part.
I lift my chin. "Do not say emotional things next to a motorcade. It ruins my image."
That finally earns a small smile. "Your image is terrifying. I think it'll survive."
"Good."
He hesitates. Then: "Did you mean it?"
I blink. "Mean what?"
"That we find them first."
I stare at him.
Then I answer with the most honest thing I have said all day.
"Yes."
His expression shifts. Something almost proud. Something almost worried. Something much too warm.
"Okay," he says softly. "Then we do it together."
Together.
Another dangerous word. This country is full of them.
Before I can respond, one of the agents clears his throat with the politeness of a man who knows exactly when he is interrupting something and intends never to mention it.
"It's time," he says.
Of course it is.
Charles opens the car door for me. I pause before getting in.
"American boy," I say.
He looks at me. "Yeah?"
"Do not get yourself sold out before tomorrow."
That startles a real laugh out of him. "Same to you, French girl."
I narrow my eyes.
He lifts both hands. "Kidding. Mostly."
I get into the car before I can say something that sounds too much like affection.
As the door closes, I look out the window and watch him step back from the curb, hands sliding into his pockets, tie loosened again, face thoughtful.
The car begins to move.
And I realize something that makes everything feel slightly worse.
This would all be easier if I trusted no one. If Madison were simply cruel. If Charles were simply careless. If Aaliyah were simply loyal.
But none of them are simple. And now the danger isn't just the leak. It's the fact that I am starting to care what happens to all of them.
Back at the White House, the evening should feel safer. It does not.
Every hallway looks different now. Every polished surface reflects too much. Every staff member who smiles politely becomes, for one ugly second, a question mark.
I hate that. I hate what suspicion does to a place. How quickly it strips beauty out of it.
Dinner is formal and strangely quiet. The President is on a call for most of it. The First Lady asks me gentle questions about school with the unmistakable precision of someone also checking whether I am on the edge of collapse. I answer well. Of course I do.
Grace, after all, is what we call it when girls like me bleed invisibly.
Later, alone in my room, I kick off my shoes and sit by the window with my phone in my hand. Washington glows beyond the glass. Distant. Clean. Unbothered.
I open the group chat Aaliyah forced us to make fifteen minutes ago. She named it: terrible decisions committee
I hate that I smiled.
There are already messages.
Aaliyah: if any of you die i will actually be furious
Charles: very comforting thank you
Madison: I already regret being in this chat
Aaliyah: great that means it's working
I stare at the screen for a second. Then type:
Me: None of us are dying. That would be extremely inconvenient.
Three dots appear almost immediately.
Charles: wow she's joking. she must really be spiraling.
I roll my eyes so hard I nearly see France.
Then another message comes in.
Not in the group chat. A separate unknown number.
My stomach drops before I even open it.
One new image. One line of text.
The image is blurry, taken from outside, through glass. A library window. Four figures inside. Me. Charles. Madison. Aaliyah.
Tonight.
The message beneath it says:
Cute alliance. It won't save you.
For one second, I cannot breathe.
Because this means two things.
First: we were watched again.
Second: whoever is doing this now knows we know.
I look up at the dark window across from me. At my own reflection in the glass. At the room behind me. At the White House around me.
And for the first time in this country, my anger and fear settle into something colder. Sharper. Cleaner.
Not panic.
Purpose.
I take a screenshot. Then send it to the group chat without a word.
The typing bubbles appear instantly.
And just like that, Chapter 10 begins to end the way all terrible American problems seem to begin: with a message, a threat, and the unmistakable feeling that whoever is watching us has just made a mistake.
Because now?
Now it's personal.