Veronica's POV

Pain shot up my face as it swelled instantly, the sting making me hiss through my teeth.

“Damn it! Even my parents never hit me!”

I lifted my hand, ready to slap her back, but someone grabbed my wrist midair.

It was Frederick Reese.

He flung my hand away in disgust, his brows furrowed.

“Elodie, that’s enough! You’ve gone too far,” he scolded. “Do you even realize how important a girl’s reputation is? What will people think of Renee after this?”

The cruelty on Renee’s face vanished in an instant, replaced by trembling lips and teary eyes as she threw herself into his arms.

“Frederick, if you hadn’t come, Elodie would’ve bullied me to death,” she whimpered.

And that was all I needed to know, he was that guy, the one my blind little sister used to date.

I’d already dug into their history. Frederick had been two-timing, dating my sister while fooling around with Renee on the side. He loved watching two women fight over him like he was some prize. And now he wanted to lecture me about “reputation”?

Funny how he’d stayed silent when people spread lies about my sister.

I yanked my arm free and, without thinking, slapped him hard across the face. “Reputation, my ass.”

The sound cracked through the room. Frederick staggered back, clutching his cheek in disbelief.

Before he could say a word, I started firing off rumors like bullets. “You’re such a scumbag! You swore you only loved me, and the next second you’re sleeping with Renee! That baby she aborted, wasn’t it yours?”

His eyes went wide. “What nonsense are you talking about? We’re just friends!”

“Oh, really? ‘Just friends’ who bring you underwear in the middle of the night? ‘Just friends’ who you call 'baby' while sending hotel payments to Renee? You even used my membership card to book your room. Have some shame, both of you!”

The words poured out before I could stop myself.

The students watching were stunned.

“Holy crap! This is insane.”

“I knew something was off between them! Guess the real girlfriend just exposed it all.”

With every whisper around the room, Frederick and Renee’s faces grew paler.

I was just getting started, but before I could continue, the professor walked in and tapped the lectern.

“Class is starting. Quiet down.”

He then cleared his throat and looked around. “Renee, from the journalism department, your last piece was impressive. We’ve submitted it to the provincial competition. Keep up the good work.”

Renee’s rage melted into smug satisfaction. She stood gracefully and smiled. “Thank you, Professor. I’ll do my best.”

But my eyes narrowed as I looked at the essay he projected on the screen.

“Professor,” I said evenly, “there must be a mistake. I was the one who wrote that article.”

Every gaze that had been admiring her turned to me in surprise, and the classroom buzzed again.

But the professor’s expression darkened. Clearly, he hadn’t expected me to confront him in front of everyone. He spoke in a cold, practiced tone. “For competition entries, the first requirement is a good reputation. After all your incidents, you’d only hurt the school’s name. Renee is an excellent student. She’s the better choice.”

He said it like it was the most natural thing in the world.

I tilted my head, smiling slyly. “Tell me, Professor. Is it really because of her ‘good image,’ or did she pay you off?”

“Or maybe,” I added, feigning confusion, “you're her sugar daddy, that's why all the good things land in her lap.”

I sighed dramatically and put on my most innocent look.

Veronica's POV

“No way, an old guy going after a younger girl?”

The pen in the front row clattered to the floor the moment the words left my mouth. The classroom went dead silent.

“Elodie, are you out of your mind?!” Renee screamed, furious enough to chew me up and spit me out.

Meanwhile, the professor trembled, fumbling for his phone. “You’re slandering a faculty member in public. Do you know how disrespectful that is? I’m calling the police.”

“Go ahead. Call them.” I smiled faintly and answered before he could press the dial. “Maybe they can look into the bribe you took for stealing my article and claiming credit. And while they’re at it, they can check the rumors about me, the nude photos and ‘special job’ stories, so people stop throwing dirt at me.”

The professor’s face showed a flicker of guilt, and he didn’t push the button in the end.

Amid the murmurs of everyone watching, I quietly gathered my things and stood. “My work is mine and mine alone.”

The red paint on my clothes had dried into a sticky, foul-smelling mess. It was unbearable, so I headed straight back to the dorm to shower.

But halfway through washing, I glanced up and froze as I saw a tiny red light blinking from the vent above the shower. It was a miniature camera.

So, that was how Elodie’s private videos had been leaked.

Anger slammed through me. I wrapped a towel around myself and ran out, shouting down the hall, “There’s a peeping Tom in the girls’ dorm! There’s a camera in the bathroom!”

I pounded on the dorm supervisor’s door.

The girls on the floor, drawn by the commotion, poked their heads out. As soon as they heard the word “camera,” their faces went pale.

“Miss, look at this.” I held up the little camera, trembling. “I just pulled it out of the bathroom. Everybody needs to check their rooms. If photos or videos are taken and spread, we won’t be able to clear our names, just like me.”

Tears blurred my vision. The girls near me stared for a long moment, whispering to each other.

“Isn’t she the one who had those nude photos circling around? So, it was a setup. This is awful.”

“We have to call the police. This can’t go unpunished.”

The supervisor reached for her phone to dial 911, but a hand suddenly snatched it away.

Renee was breathing hard, eyes wide with panic. “No, don’t call. This must be a misunderstanding.”

I stepped closer, keeping my voice low but urgent. “Renee, we share this dorm. What if she recorded you, too? You can’t be soft about this. We have to find out who did it.”

Renee forced a nervous laugh, but before she could say anything, I pushed harder, feigning hurt. “You wouldn’t have done it, would you? You were the one showing my nude photos to the guys today.”

As soon as I said it, the crowd’s mood shifted.

“Exactly! There are only four girls in this room. Why were only Elodie’s pictures leaked? Maybe someone’s targeting her.”

Veronica's POV

“Maybe she’s the one who released them. Otherwise, why would she stop us from calling the police?”

“Open her phone! Maybe she has other people’s photos saved on it!”

As such, they swarmed on her.

Overpowered, Renee couldn’t stop them from grabbing her phone and forcing it unlocked.

Sure enough, the gallery was full of nude photos, and most of them were mine.

Under the scrutiny, her face flushed bright red as she stammered out a few words, struggling to defend herself.

“I didn’t mean to!” Renee defended.

But no one believed her. Every pair of eyes turned on her was filled with disgust.

“How could you do something like that to another girl? You’re disgusting.”

One of the girls deleted all the photos and then turned to the dorm supervisor. “Ma’am, this can’t just end here. We need to report it to the administration.”

“Yeah, we can’t let it slide,” another chimed in.

Renee shook her head, crying and protesting, but they still dragged her straight to the academic office.

I wasn’t about to miss the chance to let everyone know what I’d been through, so I followed closely behind.

Not long after, the school officially reprimanded her for secretly installing a camera in the dorm showers.

As she sat there crying, writing her self-criticism, she glared at me with pure hatred. “Elodie, you just wait. This isn’t over.”

Even so, I didn’t even glance her way. I just turned and left.

After that, I didn’t go back to the dorm. I found a small apartment off-campus instead.

The next morning, my mom called, her voice filled with worry. “Veronica, are you being bullied at school? So many people are calling and saying terrible things. Even our home number got leaked. They said there’s a post about you on your school forum.”

My heart dropped. I opened the school’s online forum right away.

Sure enough, there was another scandalous rumor plastered across the homepage.

[Journalism student, Elodie Lane, adds a new sugar-daddy scandal to her list, following rumors of nude loans and sex work.]

Beneath it was a blurry photo of someone who looked like me getting into a luxury car.

Even though the image wasn’t clear, the commenters were ruthless.

[Why is someone like her still at Horizon University? She’s a disgrace.]

[My friend’s in the journalism department. He said she even accused a professor of harassment in class yesterday. What a mess.]

I didn’t even need to think about it. I knew this was Renee’s doing.

Gripping my phone, I marched straight to her. She was lounging in a chair, legs crossed, a smug smile on her face.

“That’s what you get for crossing me,” she sneered. “At Horizon University, I have a hundred ways to ruin you.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Is that so?”

She smirked, thinking she had the upper hand, but before she could say another word, her little sidekick tapped her shoulder nervously.

“Renee… Elodie just posted something new on the forum.”