Chapter 1203

Hearing someone call her from behind, Josefina turned around and found herself face-to-face with Caiden, his smile as warm and easy as a summer afternoon.

"Caiden?" She felt instantly self-conscious, realizing she'd just been standing there like a deer in headlights.

"I stopped by the school to visit some of my old teachers and heard about what happened," he said, his eyes shining. "Word is, you swooped in at the last minute and saved the day—rescued everyone and saved the school's reputation, too.”

Josefina's cheeks were burning. “That's a bit much," she laughed, waving her hands. “Honestly, I just did what anyone else would've done."

Caiden couldn't seem to look away from her. In that moment, he realized his heart was nowhere near as calm as he wanted to believe. Seeing Josefina was like tossing a massive stone into still water—his emotions were all over the place.

He watched her, that playful spark in her eyes, the way she grinned when she thought no one was looking. It almost made him want to jump in and cause some chaos himself.

Caiden's smile grew wider.

Josefina caught his look and touched her face. "Why are you smiling at me like that? Do I have something on my face?"

Caiden nodded, completely serious. "Yeah, you do."

She quickly wiped at her cheek, frowning. "What is it?"

He laughed. "Beauty."

Josefina stared at him, lost for words. Seriously? Mr. Perfect was actually pulling cheesy pickup lines now?

She cleared her throat, trying to play it cool. "Well, I'm going to check out what's going on over there. You don't have to stick around."

She was about to walk off, but Caiden fell in step beside her. “I'll come with you," he said easily.

At the same time, Cassandra was stuck in the middle of a crowd, completely surrounded.

Mandy crossed her arms. "Wow, I thought you were up to something epic, Cassandra. Turns out it was just a hot mess."

Damita snorted. "Yeah, I don't think anyone can clean this up now."

Cassandra felt her emotions bubbling over-part of her wanted to scream, the rest just wanted to cry. When would this nightmare end?

She snapped, raising her voice, “Move! You're not the police, you have zero right to keep me here. If you don't let me go, I'm calling the cops!"

Mandy shrugged. “Go for it. I'd love

།

to see what the police have to say about why you're still walking free, And you can exp

maybe

everyone what you plan to do about

this mess."

Cassandra's eyes darted to the edge of the group. She spotted Josefina and shouted, “Josefina, is this your doing?"

Josefina, who'd just been standing there minding her own business, was floored. Where did that even come from?

Before she could respond, Mandy jumped in, "Cassandra, you really know how to stir up trouble."

Damita grinned. “You're a real piece of work-always talking trash, even with your mouth full."

Everyone burst out laughing.

Mandy and Damita made one heck of a team.

Cassandra was left fuming, totally out of comebacks.

Suddenly, she noticed police officers making their way through the crowd.

For a moment, Cassandra's eyes_

filled with tears-finally, someone

was here to help her. She

straightened up and announced, "The police are here! You're all in big trouble now!"

She let out a breath she didn't know she'd been holding, grateful to whoever had

made the call. Maybe there were still good people in the world.

As she walked toward them, smiling like she'd already won, the lead officer-Officer Matthews-stopped her.

"Miss Cassandra, would you please

come with us?” he said. "We need your cooperation in investigating the experiment incident that almost put people's lives at risk