Chapter 40: Emma?

"There’s no time to break down the logistics. I need you to get to this location as fast as humanly possible."

"Where are you? Send me the drop!"

"Sending Location now. And whatever you do... do not wake or tell Chloe."

Sophia paused, frowning. "Why shouldn’t I tell her?"

"Just don’t. Get here first. Move."

She cast a nervous glance toward the other side of the room, where Chloe was fast asleep in her bed. Sophia let out a quiet sigh of relief that her roommate hadn’t been stirred by her sudden movement.

"You’re lucky she’s sleeping right now," Sophia muttered under her breath, grabbing her jacket. "I’m on my way right now. Send the pin." The mental connection closed.

Almost instantly, a glowing pin dropped onto the map interface of her phone. Sophia didn’t hesitate. She snatched her car keys off the nightstand and sprinted out of the suite.

Within minutes, she had unlocked her black Mercedes, fired up the engine, and roared out of the student parking sector, tearing down the highway toward the isolated coordinates Morales had provided.

When Sophia arrived at her destination, her headlights swept across a decaying, abandoned storage facility standing on the edge of the industrial sector.

The main entrance gates were heavily padlocked and bolted shut. She slammed on the brakes, hopped out of her Mercedes, and tugged hard on the heavy iron doors, but they wouldn’t budge an inch.

"Are you kidding me?" she muttered, glancing around the desolate, windswept perimeter before marching back to the driver’s seat.

Backing up her vehicle to secure a clear runway, she slammed her foot down on the accelerator. The Mercedes surged forward, crashing violently into the rusted iron barrier.

CRASH!

The impact shattered the aged locks, tearing the doors off their hinges and forcing the entrance wide open.

Sophia cut the engine, grabbed her phone, switched on its blinding flashlight app, and plunged into the dark, echoing interior. "Morales!"

Her voice bounced off the concrete walls, swallowed by the cavernous silence of the building.

There was no immediate answer.

She pressed deeper into the complex, sweeping her light across dusty crates and rusted machinery. "Morales! Where are you?!"

Still nothing.

On the opposite side of the reinforced storage wing, Morales was straining his voice calling out for her, but his words died against the thick, industrial-grade soundproofing installed in the subterranean holding rooms.

He quickly realized the problem. The room was acoustically isolated.

He couldn’t afford to waste another second shouting into a void.

’Syatem, send an emergency message to Sophia tell her to check the reinforced sub-room in the left wing of the building..’

[SYSTEM]

Ding! Message successfully routed and delivered to target device.

Sophia’s phone vibrated violently in her hand. She stopped dead in her tracks, bringing the screen up to her face.

Reading the system-routed text, she spun around sharply, locking her eyes onto the iron-bolted door of the left wing, and broke into a sprint.

When she slammed the door open, her flashlight beam cut through the gloom, instantly landing on two figures bound tightly to chairs in the center of the room.

"Morales!"

She kept her phone away, rushing across the concrete floor. The moment she reached him, she threw her arms around his shoulders, pulling him into a desperate, fierce embrace, pressing several quick, frantic kisses against his cheek.

"You’re alive... Thank God, you’re okay!"

"Easy, Sophia," Morales hissed through gritted teeth, wincing as the sudden movement aggravated his head trauma. "I’m not exactly operating at peak condition right now."

Sophia instantly pulled back, her eyes catching the dark, dried blood staining his temple and hair. Panic flared in her chest. "What the hell happened to you? Who did this?!"

"Long story. Get me out of these chains first."

Sophia dropped her gaze to his wrists, quickly inspecting the heavy industrial locks securing his restraints. The mechanism required a fine-tooled key, and there was nothing in the empty room that fit the profile.

Then, her eyes landed on a heavy, iron-headed sledgehammer resting against the base of the wall.

She lunged across the room, grabbing the heavy tool by its handle. "Shift your hands as much as the slack allows."

Morales angled his wrists awkwardly within the biting iron links.

Sophia gripped the sledgehammer with both hands, raised it above her head, and brought it crashing down onto the lock with all her might.

CLANG!

The first strike warped the heavy steel shackle.

CRACK!

The second blow shattered the locking mechanism entirely. The chains fell away with a heavy clatter, freeing Morales’s hands. He let out a ragged breath, massaging his raw, bleeding wrists.

"Now help her," Morales said, pointing his chin toward the chair beside him.

Sophia blinked, turning her attention to the second captive. "Who is she?"

"Amelie. She’s the leader of my assigned group."

Before Sophia could pepper him with more questions, Morales urged her again. "Please, just cut her loose first."

Nodding quickly, Sophia rushed over. She reached out and pulled the thick cloth gag down from Amelie’s mouth, then set to work smashing the remaining padlock with the hammer. A few moments later, Amelie tumbled forward out of the chair, finally free.

The moment she caught her breath, Amelie spun around toward Morales, tears streaming down her pale face. "I’m sorry! I’m so, so sorry!"

"Hey, take a breath. There’s no need to apologize," Morales reassured her, pushing himself up from his chair. His legs shook violently under his weight, threatening to buckle.

Before he could hit the concrete, Sophia rushed to his left side, looping his arm securely over her shoulder to bear his weight. Amelie instantly stepped up to his right, offering her shoulder as well.

Supported by the two girls, Morales hobbled out of the dark sub-room, navigating the wreckage of the storage facility until they finally reached the safety of Sophia’s Mercedes.

The drive back to the academy was tense and heavy with silence. Sophia kept her eyes locked on the illuminated highway, navigating the midnight streets with intense focus, while Morales rested his bruised head against Amelie’s shoulder in the back seat. His body needed every spare second to recover its energy reserves.

Amelie occasionally looked down at him, her expression a mix of guilt and lingering terror.

After several minutes of heavy quiet, she finally broke the silence, her voice trembling slightly.

"I... I think I might actually know who posted that bounty on your head, Morales."

Morales slowly lifted his head off her shoulder, blinking through the residual fatigue.

In the front seat, Sophia glanced at them through the rearview mirror. "Who?"

"Emma Bentley," Amelie whispered, her jaw tightening.

Both Morales and Sophia reacted in unison, their voices overlapping in pure disbelief. "Emma?"

Amelie nodded firmly. "Earlier today, right outside your suite, I saw her taking high-resolution pictures of your dormitory door. She was checking the hallway up and down to make sure no one was watching before she snapped them. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but... I’m almost certain she leaked your exact residential coordinates to whoever set this up."

Sophia gripped the steering wheel so hard her knuckles turned white. "What a treacherous little bitch."

Morales remained completely silent, staring out the darkened window of the car. Emma Bentley.

He replayed her bizarre visit to his room earlier that evening in his mind, her lingering touches, her deliberate poses, the way she tested his mattress and flashed a glimpse of her lace underwear.

At the time, he had simply written her off as an arrogant influencer trying to test his resolve or play a standard seduction game.

Clearly, there had been a much more sinister secondary objective at play. He leaned his head back against the seat, closing his eyes as a dark, dangerous resolve settled deep within his chest.

First Jayden, and now Emma.

This elite academy was proving to be far more tedious and backstabbing than he had originally anticipated. And the worst part? He hadn’t even begun to properly enjoy his new wealth yet.