Chapter One
Tessa
Iam absolutely not breaking into the animal shelter right now.
Except, I am.
Because clearly, when I applied to Havemeyer Law School, what I meant was: Hi, I’d like to dismantle my entire future, one ethically gray decision at a time—starting with breaking into my place of employment.
“You’re just checking the perimeter,” I whisper to myself, stepping over a rusted chain near the alley gate like I’m not scheduled for a shift tomorrow. “You’re not doing anything illegal. You’re observing like a responsible adult who trespasses recreationally.”
That sounds dumb even to me.
The flashlight tucked into my hoodie pocket clinks against my hip with every step. I forgot to mute my phone, my fingers are shaking, and my hair is falling out of this stupid bun, no matter how many times I redo it.
Welcome to my villain origin story.
I shouldn’t be doing this.
Not when Dean Mills’s words are still ringing in my ears from the other day:“You are a transfer student. Technically.But make no mistake, your acceptance here was not a vote of confidence. It was a risk. A calculated one. And not by me.”
He made it clear that I’m here on borrowed time and in someone else’s favor—someone who “cashed in a favor large enough to override my vote.” He told me that if I “cheat, lie, plagiarize, or breathe wrong” in any of his programs, he’ll personally see to it that the Bar takes one look at my name and laughs.
I already have one ethics violation trailing me. The confidential mediation notes I leaked to help a classmate. The mistake that got me suspended, nearly expelled, and somehow—mysteriously—forgiven by someone with enough pull to get me into Havemeyer Law.
I should be invisible. I should be making myself so small and perfect that nobody remembers I exist until I graduate and disappear into some corporate law firm where I can spend the rest of my life paying off student loans and pretending I belong.
Instead, I’m about to commit a felony for a partially blind dog named Waffles.
Because when I look at him, I see me.
The real me. The one who used to curl up in the back of my mom’s beat-up Honda when her latest boyfriend was screaming about money or beer or whatever excuse men use when they want to break things they didn’t pay for.
My hand drifts to my wrist. I press my thumb to the skin there, checking for a pulse. Like I need proof I’m still here. Still real.
Waffles has the same look in his eye, like he’s bracing for the next hit. He’s learned not to hope too hard because disappointment hurts worse than hunger.
I know that look.
I wore it for most of my childhood, and a good stretch of last year, too, if I'm being honest.
The shelter notes said he was surrendered for “aggression.” But I’ve been working at Midtown Animal Care long enough to read between the lines. “Aggression” usually means he defended himself when someone tried to hurt him. It means he bit back when he was cornered. It means he refused to just take it.
Smart dog.
I did that once, too. When I was fifteen and my mom’s boyfriend, Jerry, tried to “teach me respect” with the back of his hand. I grabbed the nearest lamp and cracked it across his skull. He left that night. Never came back.
My mom cried. Not because Jerry was gone, but because she thought she’d failed me. She thought my anger was proof she hadn’t protected me well enough.
She was wrong. My anger saved us both.
And now it’s going to save Waffles.
Because tomorrow morning, at seven a.m., they’re going to kill him. They’re going to put him down for having the same survival instincts that got me through high school, into college, and all the way to law school.
No.
Not on my watch.
