LUST FELT TOO LATE ( HEART OF SINS 1)

———NOVA———

I’ve never liked loose threads.

They itch.

Scratch behind the eyes. Crawl under the skin. Linger at the edge of your thoughts like static—until you can’t breathe around it anymore.

And Seraphine Vale?

She was no thread.

She was a goddamn tapestry stitched out of secrets, and every time I pulled at the fabric, more of us unraveled.

I didn’t mean to become obsessed.

But after Callie’s party… after everything—the screaming, the shaking, Elias breaking like glass you can’t glue back together—after she vanished like smoke...

…I started digging.

And I didn’t stop.

Not when I saw how Elias stopped speaking.

Not when I realized how empty the dorm sounded without her laughter echoing from the kitchen.

Not when the silence started sounding like grief.

We all gathered that night in the dorm living room.

It wasn’t planned.

It wasn’t even intentional.

It was like all of us just… gravitated there. Like whatever force had stitched our lives together through Seraphine’s orbit hadn’t quite let us go.

Callie sat on the couch, spine straight, fingers wrapped tight around a steaming mug.
June was pacing, muttering, chewing her nail down to the skin.
Ronan leaned against the counter, arms folded, silent but present.
Archer stood near the window, half in shadow, eyes unreadable.

And Elias?

He sat like a man waiting for a final verdict.

Hands trembling in his lap. Shoulders curled inward like he didn’t know how to hold himself upright anymore. His eyes flicked toward the TV screen, then back to the floor.

He looked like someone who already knew what I was about to say.

So I started.

“I looked into her,” I said, voice sharp. “After the party. After she disappeared. Something wasn’t sitting right.”

June froze mid-pace.

Callie’s head snapped up.

Ronan’s brow furrowed.

Archer finally turned from the window, gaze narrowing.

I clicked the remote.

The TV lit up with Seraphine’s smiling ID photo—brown curls, soft lipstick, white coat.

“Seraphine Vale,” I said. “Top of her class from the University of Chicago. Degrees in psychology, neuroscience. Journal publications. Charitable work. Everything… too perfect.”

They stared.

I clicked again.

Another file. Same face. Same name. Same achievements.

But different university.

Different city.

Different year.

I said softly. “I found her academic record duplicated across seven universities. Same credentials. Same photo. Like clockwork. Every few years, she just… moved. Restarted. And no one ever noticed.”