Mia announced that she was finally over Liam Carter on a Wednesday night, and five women in our dorm suite cheered like she had just beaten cancer. I didn’t clap. I was too busy wondering how a girl who had spent three years sacrificing money, grades, sleep, and dignity for one man could supposedly stop loving him between breakfast and dinner.
Chapter 2
Haley could barely breathe well enough to speak.
“It wasn’t a normal studio,” she cried. “They locked the doors. They made us hold our IDs next to our faces while we were in lingerie. Mia disappeared, and this morning we got emails. Chloe, they know where my father works. They know where Sasha’s parents live. They know everything.”
I opened our group chat.
The cheerful name Mia had chosen—Sweet 302: Rebirth Era—looked obscene now.
Messages from Friday night filled the screen.
Why do they need my Social Security number?
Mia, answer your phone.
The photographer took our IDs into the back office.
They won’t let us leave yet.
Mia’s bags are gone.
Then I saw the screenshot.
The email showed professional photographs of my roommates wearing lingerie, each woman holding her driver’s license beside her face. Their names, addresses, birth dates, and photographs were perfectly visible.
Below the images was a demand for fifty-five thousand dollars.
If payment was not made by midnight Sunday, the photographs and identifying information would be distributed to parents, university administrators, employers, scholarship offices, and other contacts.
At the bottom was one line that explained everything.
FILE 06 — CHLOE LYNN — UNFULFILLED. BALANCE REDISTRIBUTED AMONG ACTIVE SUBJECTS.
My entire body went cold.
Mia had not invited us to a photo shoot.
She had delivered us as collateral.
And I had been the missing piece.
I called Haley immediately.
“Do not pay them anything.”
“What choice do we have?”
“The moment you pay once, they know the threat works.”
“They’ll send the pictures.”
“Where’s Mia?”
“Gone. Her clothes are gone. Her laptop is gone.”
I drove back to campus that morning.
During the three-hour trip, I thought about Liam.
Liam Carter was everything Mia believed the universe had promised her. Tall, polished, wealthy, and effortlessly charming, he came from the kind of family whose name appeared on hospital wings and scholarship buildings. His father served on the board of a regional bank. Liam drove a white BMW and wore watches that cost more than my mother’s car.
Three weeks earlier, rumors had started moving through campus.
Liam was gambling.
Not friendly poker games in the fraternity basement, either. He had reportedly gotten involved with underground sports betting and private card games run through a warehouse district east of town. His car had disappeared. People had seen him arguing with two men outside the library.
The number in the extortion email was fifty-five thousand dollars.
By the time I reached the dorm, the connection seemed sickeningly obvious.
Sasha opened the door and pulled me inside.
The four women looked shattered. Haley was wrapped in a blanket. Elena sat against the wardrobe with her knees against her chest. Priya stared at her laptop. Sasha’s lip was split from biting it.
“They sent another message,” Priya said.
A countdown timer filled the screen.
Thirty-two hours remained.
The attached spreadsheet contained an astonishing amount of personal information. Haley’s father was a minister, and the extortionists had his church email. Elena was an international student, and they had identified her scholarship sponsor. Priya’s medical-school adviser was listed. Sasha’s parents and younger sister were included.
“They’ll ruin us,” Elena whispered.
“No,” I said.
Sasha laughed bitterly. “How exactly are you planning to stop them?”
“First, nobody pays.”
“We can borrow the money.”
“And next month they ask for more.”
The room fell silent.
I walked to Mia’s empty desk.
Her drawers had been hastily cleared, but when I pulled one all the way out, a little pink notebook fell from behind the wooden rail.
Most of it was embarrassing devotion.
Liam smiled at me today.
Liam needed eighty dollars.
Liam says I understand him better than anyone.
Near the back, the tone changed.
Meeting with Ray. Foundry alley entrance.
Then a phone number.
Then an address.
Liam’s temporary apartment on 14th Street.
Underneath that was a sentence that made my skin prickle.
If Chloe runs, call backup number. Don’t let her leave town.
“She’s with Liam,” I said.
Haley grabbed my wrist. “You are not going there.”
“Not yet.”
I turned toward Priya’s laptop.
The extortion email had been sent through an encrypted provider, but the countdown clock was pulling information from an external server. I studied computer science as a minor. I wasn’t a hacker, and I didn’t need to be one.
The domain belonged to a company called Apex Media and Talent Management.
The company belonged to Raymond Geller.
Within fifteen minutes, public business records gave me his legal address. Another search showed two prior convictions involving illegal lending and extortion.
Ray wasn’t some invisible criminal genius hiding overseas.
He was a local predator using technology to make himself look untouchable.
That changed everything.
I didn’t call campus security.
I called the state investigative bureau.
At first the receptionist sounded skeptical. Then I mentioned Raymond Geller’s name.
I was transferred twice.
A detective named Marcus Vance came on the line.
“Tell me exactly what you have.”
I told him.
The photographs.
The IDs.
The countdown.
The company.
The server.
Mia’s notebook.
Liam’s gambling debt.
When I finished, Detective Vance was silent for several seconds.
“Miss Lynn,” he said, “we’ve been investigating Geller’s bookmaking network for six months.”
I looked at the four terrified women around me.
“What do you need?”
“Proof tying the debt directly to the coercion.”
I looked down at Mia’s notebook again.
“I think I know where to get it.”
