Page 100 of Terror Tuesday

No matter how much he scares me.

Would he hurt me?

I hope only in the ways that matter.

I’m practically skipping across campus from the high of being around Elliot, then carefully slow my steps in case Vanq is watching. The cheeriness only flickers when my phone vibrates with a news alert: the body of Representative Reggie Blackwell was found this morning in the marina. So disfigured, they had to use dental records.

Vanq.

The police closed it as a horrific boating accident. No signs of foul play or further investigation… Likely something he also arranged somehow.

And just like that, it’s over.

I stand in the center of campus, phone in hand, gazing at the article.

The monster who ruined me is dead. And I don’t feel relief. I feel…blank. Maybe because no one will ever know what he did. Justice in the shadows doesn’t come with a trial or an apology. There’s no public outcry about his death for what he’d done. His legacy will continue without anyone knowing…

The afternoon is spent in my personalOmegaoffice. I shut the door and stare at the final vote count. Two and a half weeks since Naomi’s murder, and I’m choosing her replacement.

It feels like a betrayal.

But the sorority must have a vice president. EvenBetachose their new president, Ayan Dutta, and secretary, my cousin, Logan Dawson. The game doesn’t stop just because our hearts do.

The silent vigil, the memorial plaques lining our halls—none of it feels like enough. No tribute can bring those girls back. And the campus “warnings,” the carefully crafted cover-up stories? They only make it worse.

When I look into my sisters’ eyes, I see the grief we’re not allowed to speak of. They see mine too. But we don’t cry. We don’t ask questions.

We know the cost.

Slipping up would mean disobedience, and the Seventh Society would make us pay.

Back in my room, I pause when I open the door, half expecting Vanq to be waiting with chloroform and a whip. Instead, there’s another card laying on my bed, a cryptic note scrawled on it in familiar handwriting. I approach it slowly as if it could tell the sins written deep in my heart. Fear trembles through my fingers, dread coiling tight as I lift the note—like touching it might ignite the truths hidden deep in my heart.

One final step. A thread pulled tight.

Two paths emerge—shadow or light.

His gaze is warm. A steady hand.

A life of peace, a place to land.

But whispers call from darker things,

Where truth is bound in blood and strings.

If comfort calls, turn from the flame.

But if you burn—whisper my name.

Friday night, beneath the skies,

Choose my mask… I’ll shed the disguise.

But choose with care. Your fate is spun.

One road ends. The other’s begun.

The fucker is going to make me pick between them. And part of me wonders if it really is a choice. Will he hurt Elliot if I go to him? Will I be damned to live a life of crime and murder if I choose Vanq?