Bryce's P.O.V.

Call me dumb, call me reckless. Use any word you want on me to paint me as the villain for wanting to get back at Grayson for what he did to us. Nothing, not even wise advice from someone I trusted, could've made me stop.

He deserved every ounce of pain I was willing to inflict on him. Going under our radar, he deceived us all and put our lives in jeopardy. All of our lives could've ended that day.

Driving to the exact location Anthony and Ernie gave me, I made sure to use a street that didn't directly drive past the restaurant. Getting spotted would blow my cover, ruining my plan entirely.

I had my phone on me when I drove up to the spot, dialing up Anthony's cell as I turned the car off and took off my seatbelt. I skipped a greeting and was straightforward. "I'm here. Did he leave?"

"No, he's still here." Anthony replied. "Ernie and I are near the side entrance. Listen, change of plans. I don't think going in is a good idea."

"I wasn't going to enter the place anyway. That would be pointless." Grayson would lock eyes with me and flee to the nearest exit if I just ran in here, looking like a brainless fool. "I was going to wait for him to get out."

"No, you don't get it, Bryce. That's not a good idea."

"Why not?"

"There's cops all over this place. Ernie and I got a chance to walk close to the restaurant."

"And what? What did you see?"

"He's talking to the cops."

I lost my grip on the phone, dropping it. I quickly brought it back to my ear. "You...you don't think he's...an informant, do you?"

"Maybe. Man, I don't know. But something doesn't feel right about this." Anthony said huskily. "I say we should leave before things get ugly."

"You're right." I agreed wholeheartedly. "I'll see you back at the apartment, okay?"

"Okay."

We shared a farewell and hung up. Putting my phone away and setting it on the passenger's side of the car, I buckled myself back into my seat. Just when I was about to turn the car back on, I heard a tap on my window.

Checking to see who it was, I saw a man in a cop uniform leaning toward my car, gesturing for me to roll down the windows. He had a badge and a name tag, shimmering in the sunlight. I did as he asked and rolled my window down. I wasn't in the parking lot of the restaurant.

I had lazily slid into a street parking spot. Since I hadn't left the car yet, the meter wasn't paid yet. It blinked an annoying bright red light, waiting to be fed quarters.

"Hi, Officer," I said smugly, restraining any instinct to come off fearful. "Is there something I did wrong? I was just about to feed the meter."

"I'm not a meter maid." He growled.

"I wasn't saying you were..." I could sense that he took offense to my assumption. I wasn't trying to impose anything on him. He leaped to that conclusion on his own. "Is there something I did wrong?"

"License and registration please."

"I didn't do anything wrong though."

"License and registration," he repeated, harsher. "I'm not going to say it again."

"Oh..kay," I said uneasily. "My registration is in my glove compartment. May I reach over there and get it for you?"

"Sure."

I unbuckled my seatbelt and reached for my car registration. Going into my back pocket, I withdrew my license and handed them over to the jerk of an Officer. If I didn't feel so paranoid, I wouldn't have been so nice. But the blank stare he was giving me now made me feel as though he had something on me.

He didn't though. There was no way he already knew who I was. This was all just a coincidence. A bad coincidence.

After taking my things he went to his cruiser that was parked closer to the entrance. His lights were on. I didn't know when he had turned them on. I didn't notice them earlier. Minutes passed and I grew unnerved, wondering what the holdup was.

Another tap on my window caught my attention. It was the same Officer, pushing my license on the glass. He handed them back to me. In that moment, I got a good look at his name tag.

Officer Monroe.

This situation changed from a coincidence to a nightmare. Officer Monroe was the same man who grilled me in the hospital after I got shot. But the last time we met, he knew me as Conner Blackwell. He didn't know me as Bryce Matthews. If I was lucky, he would let me go and not think twice about this unfortunate interaction.

I held my breath, praying that this would end as fast as it had started.

"Am I free to go?" I asked, shielding my emotions and keeping up a stoic expression.

"Not so fast, sir."

Oh no...This can't be good.

"You see, when I ran your plates, it said the car was registered to Bryce Matthews. Which I find strange, because guess what, I've had an eye on you for quite some time."

My fingers stopped tapping on the steering wheel.

"I don't know why you would. I'm just a normal college student."

"But...you're not. And I have files upon files of information that seem to always lead back to you." His mustache twitched. "The first time I spoke to you though, you didn't go by Bryce Matthews."

"You must have a faulty memory." I said, running my hands down the curves of my steering wheel. "I've always have and always will be Bryce Matthews."

"That's not what you said to the hospital." He flicked the top of his hat, pushing it upward. "You know pretending to be someone else and using their health insurance is against the law. You're old enough to know that." He knocked on the door. "Please Mr. Matthews, exit the vehicle and place your palms on the hood."

"But Officer - "

"Step out of the vehicle." It was a demand now, less of a request than it was before. I pulled the keys out of the ignition and stepped out of the car, closing the door and putting my hands where I was instructed to. Forcefully, he pushed my head down on to the hot metal, pressing my cheek up against it as he put the handcuffs on me.

From the corner of my eye, I saw Grayson standing outside the restaurant, grinning at me with another Officer behind him. One thing that I didn't expect, besides the presence of so many law enforcements, was the sight of a badge on Grayson's clothes, pinned on his shirt.

He was a cop, too.

It didn't make sense to me though. Hadn't he been the one behind Lora's death? Or was that a lie, too? I was confused, muddled, puzzled - literally every adjective that meant I had no fucking clue what was going on.

I should've stayed home.

•••

I was asked if I wanted something to drink, but I knew that trick. They were just trying to get a sample of my DNA. I said no to the drink. They asked if I wanted a cigarette, but that was only the same tactic masked as something else for a bit of my saliva.

"I'm fine." I grumbled.

My hands were shackled to the table, linking my cuffs to a ring around the top of the table. Having had a bad reputation with the law in New York, I never got used to the feeling of speaking to the authority.

The Los Angeles Police Department smelled like coffee and corruption. NYPD weren't angels or anything, but there was something slimy about the officers that scolded me through the blinds of the interrogation room, waiting for someone to talk to me.

They couldn't keep me here for that long. They didn't have anything on me besides the healthcare fraud. That could easily be settled with an expensive fine if anything. I could cover it if that was the case.

I had only done two job for Sophia's dad so far in the last month and it paid handsomely well, covering my usual expenses and then some.

Officer Monroe was accompanied by a bald man, sipping on a Styrofoam cup and holding a thick manilla folder that had my name scribbled on the tab. "Good evening. I'm FBI agent Kerrington." He flashed his badge.

FBI? My back stiffened at the sound of that.

Agent Kerrington gazed at me, glancing down at his folder. "I heard you didn't want anything to drink."

"I don't." I reminded them. "I'm not thirsty."

Agent Kerrington gave a small nod and pulled out the silver chair ahead of me, scratching against the cement floor. He slammed the folder down and brought the cup down, brushing his short freshly shaved face as he peaked inside.

"Don't you think this is a little extravagant for a healthcare fraud case?" I scoffed, jiggling my handcuffs. "I'm not harmful towards the general public. You're acting a little overboard. If anything, you should be looking into this police force."

Agent Kerrington squinted at me. "What do you mean by that?"

"Your little pal Grayson," I pointed my chin toward the window where I could see the smug fool watching us, still wearing that dumb smirk of his. "He's a real suspect."

Officer Monroe ducked down and whispered something into his ear. "Oh. That." He glanced at me again. "You're referring to Ms. Lora Fuentes, aren't you?"

"I am." I cleared my throat. "I know Grayson Liu was behind it."

"His real name is Calvin Tu," the FBI agent informed me. "And Lora is safe and away from public view. She's currently being protected until the investigation is done."

"What?" I yelped, startled and out of breath at this. "You mean...she wasn't killed?"

"No, she wasn't. One of our agents created that scenario so Agent Calvin could move in closer to Mister Santiago. It was a ruse purely created so Calvin could make Mister Santiago trust him and gather critical information from him. The police report, the murder, the body. It was all fake." He revealed. "Lora's not coming back - for her own safety of course. We haven't finished up here yet."

I swallowed a shallow breath. "W...why are you telling me this then?"

"Because we need your help."

"Screw that. I'm not helping you," I barked. It was instilled in me to not be a snitch. "You can get help from someone else."

"I don't think there's anyone else who can assist us on this case other than you." Agent Kerrington leafed through the pages. "You're our only hope. And with the information we've gathered on you, I don't see why you wouldn't."

"A guilt trip isn't going to work on me." My brows furrowed, deepening. "Like I told Officer Monroe, I'm a college student."

"A college student that's very close with one of the leading figures in our four-yearlong investigation," he stated, throwing down a photo of me standing next Sophia's dad. "We've been trying to get George de la Torres for years now. Each time we try to raid his location, he's always gone long before we can capture him."

I looked the other way. "I don't know who that is."

"Bryce." Agent Kerrington blew out a sigh in distress, releasing a scent of coffee off his breath. "We need you as much as you need us."

"I don't need you guys."

"Yes, you do. We have enough intel through Grayson to testify against you. Both audio and video proof that you sell illicit drugs and conspiracy to murder."

He got my full, undivided attention when he laid his cards before him, showing that he'd use any trick up his sleeves to make me bend over and comply to his request.

"With Grayson as my witness along with hours of evidence against you, we can put you in jail for a long, long time. You're a young man. Do you really want to do this and be imprisoned for decades, Bryce?"

I exchanged a look with the two officers. "I'm not speaking any further. I'd like my one call and access to a lawyer." They got up from their seats. "And take your little scrap-book project with you," I gestured to the pictures they had of me.

Agent Kerrington collected his photos. "Think about the offer, Bryce. You really don't want to throw your life away for these criminals."

"Another officer will come in five minutes and give you access to a phone," Officer Monroe said before shutting the door.

As they left, I thought to myself and wondered if this was the worst day of my life. I quickly told myself that this wasn't. But it could easily become the worst day ever if - out of bad luck - my least favorite person in the world and known enemy resurfaced and broke into my life again.

Julio Martinez wasn't anywhere near me though - thankfully. He was probably somewhere in the Valley, getting in a fight with a guy two sizes smaller than him to feed his huge ego. The last time he tried to fight me, I had given him a large gash on his face using a pocket knife.

"Do you still want that phone call?" A female cop came in, poking her head.

"Yeah, I do." I said and she came over to the table, unhooking me from the table and relocked my handcuffs, then escorted me to the pay phones.

•••

Sophia's P.O.V.

A 'Help Wanted' sign was calling my name on the front door of the bookstore a block off campus. The bookstore was half a collection of books and half a coffee shop; it was a hybrid of a dream to me.

I used to enjoy reading, long before I started college. But with the late nights and heavy loads of class work, I didn't find any time to crack open a good book.

Nicolas and I finished our study session and we were waiting for Bryce to drive back to campus to pick me up. Nicolas promised to keep me company while I waited. I tried calling Bryce's cell phone again after we were done with our study session, but he didn't answer.

"No, Sophia." Nicolas seemed to read where my mind was going when I walked closer to the bookstore. "You told me Bryce doesn't want you to get a job. It's not safe."

"Bryce is my boyfriend, not my parent. I can take a job if I want to." I entered the bookstore, twirling inside and rushing my body into a hard structure. Two hands held on to me, stopping me from spinning. "I'm so sorry. I didn't see you there."

I pushed my hair out of my face, seeing the person I had accidentally stumbled into. "Oh my God, Julio!" I beamed at the person before me. "I haven't seen you in forever."

"Sophia, I didn't know you lived around here." He smiled back at me. I didn't realize how close our bodies were until his left hand glided down my side. I shuffled back and looked for Nicolas.

"Nic," I called at him and motioned to our childhood friend. "You remember Julio, don't you?"

Julio lived two houses down from me for more than eleven years. He was the first guy I had a crush on, and unintentionally the first guy I kissed. My brother Rio and Julio were the closest, always hanging out with each other and always getting caught up in trouble together.

He looked so different. He wasn't as scrawny like when he was a young teen. He had grown at least another foot, towering at six feet and two inches - give or take. He had dark raven black hair that almost brushed his shoulders. He wore a white T-Shirt, a jean jacket, and black jeans that were cuffed over his converse.

"Julio Martinez," Nic chuckled, bumping his fists with Julio's. "I thought you moved to the Valley? What are you doing here?"

"Oh, it's my sister's wedding. I came back to go to the ceremony." He smoothed his hand across his hair, showing a scar that I didn't know was there before.

"Ouch. When did you get that?" I pointed to his scar. "I don't recall you having that."

He rolled his hazel eyes. "Ah, it's nothing. Some dumbass tried to jump me."

"Well, I hope he looks worse," I commented. "Hey, how long are you staying? You should come back to the old neighborhood. I know my mom would love to see you and your sister."

"I'll consider it." He said, breaking into another smile. "I'm glad I ran into you though. What's your number?"

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author's note:
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