The last rays of sunlight paint Ridgeline Hills in shades of amber and gold as Nate's Ford Raptor winds through the familiar curves. Two pizza boxes from Giovanni's slide across the back seat with each turn, their rich aroma filling the cab with memories of countless Friday nights and victory celebrations. But tonight feels different. Heavy. Like the air before a storm.

  Amber hasn't spoken since they left the hiking trail. She stares out the passenger window, one hand absently playing with the moonstone necklace he'd given her just days before. The gesture would seem casual to anyone else, but Nate knows better. It's her tell - the thing she does when she's processing something too big for words.

  He sneaks glances at her profile between navigating turns, trying to decode the silence. The sun catches her hair like a halo, transforming her into something almost ethereal. His fierce, complicated princess - now keeper of every dark secret he's been carrying.

  "You're thinking too loud," Amber finally breaks the silence, though she doesn't turn from the window. "I can practically hear the gears grinding."

  "Can you blame me?" Nate keeps his voice carefully neutral. "Two hours of hiking, one extremely long confession, and now..." He gestures vaguely at the space between them. "Radio silence."

  "What do you want me to say?" There's no anger in her voice - if anything, she sounds tired. "That I'm shocked? Horrified? Grateful?" Now she does turn to face him, those ice-blue eyes piercing straight through his defenses. "Because honestly, I don't know what I am right now."

  Nate's hands tighten on the steering wheel. "You agreed to pizza," he points out, aiming for lightness but landing somewhere closer to desperate. "That has to mean something, right? You wouldn't have gotten in my truck if you hated me."

  A ghost of a smile flickers across Amber's face. "Bold of you to assume I'd let anything - even justified moral outrage - come between me and Giovanni's margherita."

  "There's my girl." The words slip out before he can stop them.

  "Am I though?" Amber's voice carries an edge now. "Your girl? The one you've been protecting? Or the one you've been lying to?"

  "Both." The honesty feels like glass in his throat. "Always both. That's what makes this so..."

  "Complicated?"

  "I was going to say fucking impossible." Nate turns onto the overlook road, where they've spent countless nights watching the lights of Riverside spread out below them like fallen stars. "But yeah, complicated works too."

  "You killed for me." Her voice is barely above a whisper. "You and dad - you actually..."

  "We protected you." Nate turns in his seat to face her fully. "Both times. Hampton Beach, Hannah - it was all about keeping you safe. Your future secure."

  "By becoming murderers?" Now the tears do fall, cutting silver trails down her cheeks. "How is that protecting me? How does carrying that weight for the rest of our lives make anything better?"

  "Because you're still here." Nate reaches for her hand, relief flooding his system when she doesn't pull away. "Still breathing, still dreaming, still headed to Stanford with your whole future ahead of you. And I'd do it all again - a thousand times over - to keep it that way."

  Amber stares at their joined hands, her thumb tracing patterns across his knuckles. "You know what terrifies me most?" Her voice trembles slightly. "Not that dad did it. Not even that you helped. But that some part of me - some dark, twisted part I try to pretend doesn't exist - is actually grateful."

  "Princess..."

  "No, let me finish." She meets his eyes, and the raw honesty there takes his breath away.

  "Am..."

  "No, I need to tell you something," Amber cuts him off, her voice suddenly tight with panic. "About Hampton Beach. About Emily."

  Nate's hands tighten on the steering wheel. "Princess, we don't have to-"

  "I saw you coming out of that bedroom with her!" The words explode from her like shrapnel. "Or I thought... I thought it was you. The drugs Jake gave me, they made everything so blurry, but I saw someone with her and I just... I was so angry..."

  Nate's blood runs cold as the pieces click into place. All this time, he'd assumed Amber's actions that night had been purely drug-induced rage. A bad trip that ended in tragedy. But this...

  "It wasn't me," he says softly, understanding dawning like ice in his veins. "It was Jake. You saw Jake coming out of that room with Emily."

  Amber's hands shake as she wraps her arms around herself. "I followed them to the beach. Everything was spinning, but I was so sure... When I confronted her, she tried to explain, but I wouldn't listen. I just kept seeing you with her, and then I pushed, and she fell, and..." A sob tears from her throat. "Oh god, I killed her because I thought Jake was you. I pushed her, Nate."

  Nate pulls the truck over so abruptly that the tires squeal in protest. The pizza boxes thud against the back of his seat, but he barely notices. His entire world has narrowed to the shattered girl beside him.

  "Listen to me," he takes her face in his hands, forcing her to meet his eyes. "None of this is your fault. You were drugged, confused. Anyone would have-"

  "Would have what?" Amber's laugh sounds like breaking glass. "Murdered an innocent girl because they were too high to know what they were seeing? God, Hannah must have figured it all out."

  "She was going to expose everything," Nate confirms gently. "Not just your diagnosis, but Hampton Beach too. The police reports, the witness statements..."

  "And daddy made her disappear." Amber's voice sounds hollow. "Just like he made Emily's death look like an accident. Just like he's probably done a dozen times before." She turns to face him fully, tears streaming down her cheeks. "How can you even look at me? Knowing what I did?"

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  "Because I love you," Nate says simply. "Every broken piece, every dark shadow. And because I understand better than anyone how one moment of chaos can change everything." He pulls her close, letting her bury her face in his neck. "We're in this together, princess. Always have been, always will be."

  "Promise?" The word comes out muffled against his skin.

  "Promise." He presses his lips to her temple, tasting salt and expensive shampoo. "Stanford's still our fresh start. Everything that happened here - Hampton Beach, Hannah, all of it - stays buried in Riverside."

  Nate brushes his lips against Amber's temple, a gesture so familiar it almost hurts, before putting the truck back in drive. The ridge calls to him like a beacon - their place, their sanctuary above the chaos of Riverside Heights.

  When they reach the overlook, Nate's out of the driver's seat in seconds, circling around to open Amber's door. She takes his offered hand with practiced grace, but there's something different in the way she holds on just a fraction longer than necessary. Like she's afraid he might disappear if she lets go.

  The ridge stretches before them, bathed in dying sunlight. Memories flood Nate's mind as he breathes in the crisp evening air - Sunday picnics with his parents, back when life was simple and the biggest drama was whether Mom had packed chocolate chip or oatmeal raisin cookies. His first real date with Amber freshman year, both of them trying so hard to act sophisticated while sharing gas station sodas and convenience store chips. That night sophomore year when Jake produced a bottle of his dad's whiskey and a joint, christening them into Riverside's time-honored traditions of teenage rebellion.

  "Hold on," Nate murmurs, releasing Amber's hand to grab supplies from the truck bed. He spreads out the old blue blanket - the one that's followed him through countless football practices and beach days - before turning back to help her up.

  The last rays of sun catch Amber's hair like spun gold as she settles onto the blanket. Even after everything - the tears, the confessions, the weight of secrets finally spoken - she's still the most beautiful thing he's ever seen. Still his fierce, complicated princess.

  Nate retrieves the pizzas and climbs up beside her, their shoulders touching as they look out over their kingdom. Below them, Ridgeline Hills' ancient forest stretches toward the horizon, its leaves dancing with sunset colors. Beyond that, Riverside proper sprawls like a miniature model of itself - all perfect houses and manicured lawns, hiding its darkness behind white picket fences and security systems.

  "Remember our first time up here?" Amber's voice carries a hint of their earlier lightness. "You were so nervous, you knocked your Coke into your lap."

  "In my defense," Nate bumps her shoulder gently, "you were wearing that blue sundress. The one with the little flowers. I could barely string two words together."

  "Smooth talker." But there's a ghost of a smile playing at her lips as she opens the first pizza box. The familiar scent of Giovanni's margherita fills the air - basil and fresh mozzarella and memories of simpler times.

  They eat in comfortable silence for a while, watching the sky paint itself in increasingly dramatic shades of purple and orange. It's almost possible to pretend they're just another teenage couple sharing dinner and a sunset. Almost.

  "Do you ever wonder," Amber asks suddenly, setting aside her half-eaten slice, "what would have happened if we'd never met? If you'd gone to Brookswood High like your mom wanted? Or if I'd stayed homeschooled?"

  Nate considers this, watching a hawk circle lazily above the treeline. "Honestly? No." He turns to face her fully. "Because every version of me would have found every version of you. Even if it took longer. Even if we had to go through different paths to get there."

  "Even knowing everything?" Her voice catches slightly. "All the chaos I've brought into your life? Emily, Hannah..."

  "Hey." Nate catches her chin gently, making her meet his eyes. "You didn't bring chaos into my life, princess. You brought color. Light. Purpose. Everything else? That's just the price of loving someone completely. And I'd pay it again. Every time."

  A tear slips down Amber's cheek, catching the last light like a diamond. "I don't deserve you."

  "You deserve everything," Nate whispers fiercely, pulling her close. "And I'll spend the rest of my life proving it."

  They stay like that as true darkness settles over the ridge, the first stars emerging like scattered diamonds above them. Below, Riverside's lights flicker to life one by one - a constellation of their own, mapping out the only world they've ever known. Soon they'll have to descend, rejoin the carefully choreographed dance of secrets and shadows that is life in the Heights.

  But for now, in this moment suspended between sunset and starlight, they are just Nate and Amber. Just two hearts beating in sync, holding onto each other as their world shifts and changes around them.

  The empty pizza boxes crinkle in Nate's hands as he makes his way to the nearby bin. Night has crept in fully now, wrapping the ridge in velvet darkness broken only by distant city lights and emerging stars. When he turns back, he catches Amber trying to suppress a shiver.

  "Cold?" He studies her profile in the darkness.

  "I'm fine," she insists, but another shiver betrays her. Some things never change - his princess would rather freeze than admit discomfort.

  "Sure you are." Nate reaches through the truck's window, retrieving his old Riverside High hoodie from the backseat. The grey fabric is worn soft from countless practices and victory celebrations, BROOKS 67 still barely visible across the shoulders.

  Amber's face softens as he hands it to her. She slips it on with practiced ease, the oversized garment swallowing her slight frame. "Mmm," she burrows into the collar, inhaling deeply. "Smells like you. Like autumn and grass and that ridiculous cologne your mom keeps buying you."

  "Hey, don't hate on the cologne." Nate kneels before her, gently unlacing her pristine white sneakers. "Mom says it makes me smell sophisticated."

  "Mom says a lot of things." But Amber's voice carries genuine affection for Katherine Brooks and her endless attempts to refine her son's tastes.

  Nate sets her shoes aside carefully before tucking the blanket around her legs. The gesture feels almost sacred - this fierce, complicated girl letting him take care of her in these small ways. He settles beside her again, and she immediately curls into his side like she was made to fit there.

  "Just a few more months," he says softly, watching the lights of Riverside twinkle below them. "We survive graduation, survive summer... Then before anyone knows it, we're gone."

  "Where would we go?" Amber's voice carries a dreamy quality he hasn't heard in weeks. "Before Stanford, I mean."

  "Anywhere you want, princess." Nate pulls her closer, imagination already spinning possibilities. "We could do Europe - get lost in Paris, eat our way through Italy. Or maybe somewhere totally off the grid. Some beach in Thailand where no one's ever heard of Riverside Heights."

  "Somewhere with no cell service," Amber adds, warming to the fantasy. "No social media. No college admission boards or football scouts or..." She trails off, but Nate hears the unspoken words: No ghosts. No guilt. No shadows following us from Hampton Beach.

  "Just you and me," he promises, pressing his lips to her temple. "Two months of perfect freedom before real life starts again."

  "And then Stanford." She says the word like a prayer.

  "And then Stanford," Nate echoes. "Fresh start. Clean slate. No one there knows anything about us except what we choose to tell them."

  Amber shifts to look up at him, her eyes reflecting starlight. "Promise me something?"

  "Anything."

  "Promise that no matter what happens - no matter what secrets come out or what storms we have to weather - we face it together. No more carrying burdens alone."

  "I promise." Nate seals the words with a kiss that tastes like possibility and redemption. "You and me against the world, princess. Always has been, always will be."

  They stay wrapped in each other and blankets until the night air grows truly cold, until the lights of Riverside dim as the wealthy retreat behind their security systems and designer drapes. Tomorrow they'll have to return to their carefully constructed roles - golden couple, star wide receiver, perfect princess. They'll have to face Jake's knowing smirks and Lisa's suspicious glances and all the weight of secrets still keeping.

  But for now, they are just two hearts beating in sync beneath a canopy of stars, dreaming of escape routes and fresh starts. And maybe, Nate thinks as Amber's breathing evens out against his chest, that's enough. Maybe love really can wash away blood. Maybe Stanford really will be their salvation.

  Or maybe some shadows are meant to follow you forever.