\u00a0<\/p>\n
Chapter 150\u00a0<\/p>\n
Chapter 150\u00a0<\/p>\n
Violet\u00a0<\/p>\n
39\u00a0<\/p>\n
65 vouchers\u00a0<\/p>\n
I have always thought I didn\u2019t like hobbies. I used to believe I was the kind of person who simply endured life, without ever finding something that genuinely thrilled me, but I was wrong. I found one. A twisted one, perhaps, but it was satisfying nonetheless.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I loved watching people think they had won. I loved the exact moment when someone like Nora believed she had finally cornered me, when victory glittered so brightly in her eyes that she stopped thinking. And even more than that, I loved the moment right after, when realization hit, when the ground vanished beneath their feet and they understood they had never been standing on solid ground to begin with..\u00a0<\/p>\n
That shift from triumph to terror was intoxicating, like watching someone step off a cliff believing they could fly.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cMiss Nora, you have some explaining to do. What is the meaning of this?\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
The dean\u2019s voice cut through the room, echoing off the walls of the conference hall.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The air shifted instantly. Conversations died as people leaned forward, every gaze snapping to the photographs spread across the table. For a moment, no one spoke. They only stared at the pictures, then at Nora, then back at the pictures again, as if they needed to look twice to be sure their eyes weren\u2019t lying.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I understood their confusion. Anyone would have been shaken by this. The woman who had screamed the loudest, accused me, and demanded punishment with fury was the very person staring back at them from those images.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The hunter had become the prey, and the supposed victim had revealed herself as the predator.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Even the one who orchestrated everything looked lost now, her carefully constructed world cracking apart piece by piece.\u00a0<\/p>\n
My lips curled into a slow smile as I studied Nora\u2019s face. Her smug confidence was gone. She stared in disbelief, as though she couldn\u2019t comprehend when the rules of the game had changed, or how she had lost control of it so completely.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cW-what is this?\u201d one professor stammered, pushing his glasses up his nose as he leaned closer to the table. \u201cWhy\u2026 why do all these pictures have your face in them, Miss Nora?\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Nora\u2019s mouth opened, then closed. Her face drained of color so quickly it was almost frightening. Her eyes widened, pupils blown, fixed on the photographs. She looked like someone drowning in plain sight, surrounded by people yet utterly alone.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Another professor slammed his palm against the table.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are speaking to you,\u201d he snapped. \u201cAre you deaf? Don\u2019t you have anything to say? Why is your face in these pictures? What is the meaning of this?\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
64\u00a0<\/p>\n
99\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cDon\u2019t tell me,\u201d he continued, his voice rising with each word, \u201cthat you were the one in these photos all along, and you framed Violet instead.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
A woman across the table shook her head slowly.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThat doesn\u2019t make sense,\u201d she murmured. \u201cWhy would she do something like that? Why would anyone plan something so elaborate just to destroy another student? That\u2019s insane.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Her gaze hardened as it locked onto Nora.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cExplain yourself. Someone like you wouldn\u2019t do something this vile. Would you, Nora?\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
21:01 Fri, Jan 9\u00a0<\/p>\n
Chapter 150\u00a0<\/p>\n
55 vouchers\u00a0<\/p>\n
Every eye in the room turned toward Nora again. She was trembling now, her hands clenched at her sides, shoulders tight, her breath coming too fast. She looked small, and fragile. And as I watched her stand there, exposed and cornered by her own lies, I felt nothing.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy aren\u2019t you answering?\u201d she demanded. \u201cNo normal person would do this. Only someone truly cruel, no, only someone who is a demon, would use something like this.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
I almost laughed at the word they used.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A demon?\u00a0<\/p>\n
Demon was far too kind for someone like Nora.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Normally, I wouldn\u2019t even spare her a glance. Even with all the things she had done to me, all the bullying, all the whispering, she had never been directly involved in my brother\u2019s accident. That was the only reason I didn\u2019t want to pay attention to her. But Nora was not the kind of person who knew when to stop. And knowing her, knowing the way her mind worked, I was certain that if she had known about Riley\u2019s plan to hurt my brother, she wouldn\u2019t have hesitated for a second to join in.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Nora wasn\u2019t satisfied with just winning Matthew. That had never been enough, What she wanted was destruction. She wanted to erase me, humiliate me, strip me of everything I loved until there was nothing left. Even after I stepped aside and gave Matthew up, she still wasn\u2019t satisfied. A person like that didn\u2019t deserve sympathy.\u00a0<\/p>\n
If she wanted to destroy me, then I would destroy her first, until there was nothing left of her perfect little world.\u00a0<\/p>\n
If they saw Nora as a demon, then fine. I would gladly become the devil.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I glanced briefly at Roman. I was grateful, because I knew what it had cost him to step in like this. But this was not something I needed him to fight for me. If I wanted help, I would have asked his brother. Hades\u2019 revenge would have been swift and devastating; I knew just how dangerous he was. But I wanted to do this with my own hands.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I leaned back against the chair, my posture relaxed, as I looked around the room filled with professors who only minutes ago had been eager to tear me apart. My voice came out cold.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m sorry to break your bubble, but those are the real pictures.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
A ripple of unease spread through the room. I could see it in their eyes, the shift from confidence to uncertainty.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I didn\u2019t stop.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t care about your beliefs,\u201d I continued, crossing my arms slowly. \u201cI don\u2019t care about who you trust or what kind of image you had of her. None of that matters. What matters is evidence. And what you\u2019re looking at right now is evidence.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
I tilted my head slightly, my gaze returning to Nora, who still stood frozen, trembling, her face drained of all color.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A slow smile curved my lips.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, what are you going to do now?\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
No one answered.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHow are you going to punish her?\u201d I paused, pretending to think. \u201cWhat did she say again earlier? Oh yes.\u201d My eyes flicked back to Nora. \u201cSomeone like her should be expelled and disgraced. She should be blacklisted from every college in this country.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe those were her exact words. So that\u2019s what you should do. You should expel her and blacklist her from every college in this country.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Nights Burn With Regret \u2014 by Nathan Perez 150 \u00a0 Chapter 150\u00a0 Chapter 150\u00a0 Violet\u00a0 39\u00a0 65 vouchers\u00a0 I have […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[83],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28066","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-craving-the-guardian-novel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28066","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28066"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28066\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28066"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28066"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28066"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}