Chapter 1

She stared at herself in the mirror. Her stomach was very much bruised and she could barely walk without limping. She already came up with the excuse that it was from track practice. When she tried to do a hurdle, her foot got caught and she landed hard on her stomach. It sounded plausible and that's all she needed. There was a knock on her door.

"5 minutes and we are leaving," she heard her father say from the other side.

She knew not to waste any time, knowing her father hated being late. She took the black dress she bought a few years ago, but never wore as the tag was still on it and quickly put it on. She didn't know why she bought it, but all she remembered was that her mom said she looked beautiful in it and she couldn't put it down.

Grabbing her worn out flats, she put them on and grabbed her bag. She slowly descended down the stairs seeing her father standing at the front door along with her little brother.

"Don't you look handsome," she told him as she rustled his head of curls which he groaned, annoyed his sister was messing with his hair. He ducked away from her as he tried to fix his once perfect hair, back in place.

"What did I say about shoes in the house?" her father asked

She turned to her father before looking down. "Sorry."

He sighed taking in a few breaths before breathing out. "It's fine, but next time don't do it."

She sighed in relief, relieved he wasn't angry at her, but she knew that he wouldn't do anything along as her brother was there.

"Now, let's get going."

Jade didn't know much about the Lockwoods, besides knowing that they were apart of the Founding Families, but other than that, that's about it. She never talked to Tyler Lockwood since he was a grade above her and wasn't friends with any of his friends. Mayor – former Mayor Lockwood and Mrs. Lockwood would greet her when ever they would cross paths since they were on good terms with her father. The three would sometimes have dinner together. She remembered once seeing the three of them at the grill together.

Walking on the Lockwood property, she walked next to her brother who was having a hard time trying to take his tie off.

"Need a hand?" she asked which her brother nodded enthusiastically, as it seemed he wasn't too keen on the tie.

She stopped him as she slowly bent down, remembering her bruised abdomen. When she went to grab the tie, she felt a rough hand grab onto her wrist. She looked up at her father.

"What are you doing?" he gritted out

"Trying to take this tie off. Trey doesn't–"

"Leave it."

"If I don't do it, then he will."

He gave her a scathing look as if wordlessly saying, are you questioning me? She knew that look all to well and decided not to continue. She at least attempted to loosen up the tie so it wouldn't irritate him as much.

They walked up to the house and were met with Tyler Lockwood standing just outside the door, greeting the guests.

"Hey Mr. Spencer, thanks for coming. Come on in."

"I'm sorry for you lost Tyler. Your father was a great man."

Tyler just nodded, then smiled at Jade and her little brother in greeting before welcoming other guests behind them.

"I'm going to go find Carol," he looked at Jade. "stay out of trouble and keep your eye on Trey."

She nodded before he kissed her on the cheek and rustled his son's hair before walking away. She sighed in relief at finally being away from him and out of his scrutiny. She put both hands on her brother's shoulder before moving him in the direction where she thought she saw food. It wasn't even minutes later that one of Trey's friends from school approached them and asked if he could go play outside. She was reluctant knowing exactly what her father said, but then when her brother started to beg and kept repeating "please Jade" over and over, she gave up. He thanked her before he followed his friend as they ran outside. Jade stood by the large window that looked out to where she could see Trey and his friend playing around.

"Hey, Jade."

She turned away from the window and looked up to see the one guy she would've never expected to talk to her ever again. Jeremy Gilbert.

"Hey, Jeremy," she said playing with her bracelet. "how are you?"

He rubbed the back of his head. "Good . . . fine actually. How are you?"

"I'm pretty good."

There was a moment of silence between the two, before he spoke up. "We should catch up sometime. I feel like it's been a while since we last talked."

She nodded knowing what he meant. It's been months since she last spoke or even hung out with Jeremy. They used to be really good friends until his parents car wreck and then everything seemed to change. She smiled at the possibility regaining an old friendship until she saw her brother run up to her.

He had tears in his eyes and was holding his head. She panicked.

"What happened?" she asked as he stood in front of her and Jeremy. He removed his hand from his forehead and there was a large cut that went from the top of his eye brow to his hairline. This was not good. She looked over at Jeremy.

"Do you know where the bathroom is?"

He nodded. "Yeah, I can show you it."

She followed after him dragging her brother along. She forgot that she was in no condition to walk too fast to keep up with Jeremey, as her ribs sent her a warning, clenching her teeth from the pain she was feeling. Reaching the bathroom, Jeremy opened the door for her as she quickly ushered her brother inside. She took a piece of paper towel, wet it, squirted some soap on the towel and then applied it to the open wound. Trey kept flinching back, since it hurt.

"Stop moving." she protested, "The more you move the longer we are going to be here."

He sighed before attempting to stay still has his sister tried to clean the cut and the rest of his face. While she was doing that, Jeremy had left and came back just as she finished.

"I found some band-aids," he said handing a handful to her. She thanked him, appreciative of him for staying to help as she stuck the band-aid on her brother's forehead before moving his bangs back to the front of his face.

"Good, as new." she said, "Now try not to get word of this incident out to dad."

He nodded before sweeping past her and out the bathroom. She sighed shaking her head. What was she going to do with him?

She cleaned up and washed her hands before drying them and turning to Jeremy. "Well wasn't that 'fun.'"

He laughed at her sarcastic tone before they walked out of the bathroom. They headed back to where everyone else was at, continuing the conversation.