PLAY WITH FIRE

PROLOGUE

SCARLETT VALENTINE

May 24th was going to be a good day. Correction; it was supposed to be. A late night. A High School Senior party. The boy I liked. His older brother. A mistake. An accident. A 6 year prison sentence weighing me down for a crime I didn't commit. Nobody believed I could have possibly been a victim... I bet they're all feeling pretty fucking stupid now.

It has been 5 years, 3 months and 14 days since I heard the words 'Scarlett Valentine, I hereby sentence you to 6 years imprisonment in Cope Penitentiary, 5 without parole'. Everyone within the courtroom celebrated my sentence that day, everyone except for my loving and supportive family, and the two Kincaide brothers; Holden and Wyatt. The boy I liked, and the boy that should be in the position I am in right now.

Nobody believed me when I'd preached the truth, that Wyatt Kincaide had drugged me. Not a single person but the family I share blood with. I remember my Mum in that damn courtroom right as evidence of me being hyped up on drugs was made public.

"Surely you have the fucking technology and equipment that allows you to tell the different between a normal drug and a date rape drug" Judge Turner, a blonde bitch with glasses threatened to have my mother kicked out of the court room, and no longer be allowed to sit in on the case if she kept opening her, and I quote 'big god damn mouth' in a court of law.

My family never gave me grief for what I was accused of. They knew I was innocent and made a point of it to anyone and everyone that wrote the word 'murderer' on our front fence. My Dad always called it 'blood instincts'. I'd continuously questioned, that if blood knows when blood is telling the truth, how come the Kincaide's didn't know when blood was lying?

"Maybe they do '' He would always reply, "After all, the Kincaide's are known for their united front ".

School was a harder scene than court. Nobody tried to hide the fact they were staring, both students and teachers. Nobody lowered their voices as I passed through the hallways, nobody ignored me like they had before the arrest. Suddenly, I was the center of attention, a position I'd never wanted to be in, or rather deserved to be in. I ignored the looks of judgment, the names, the shoves, the vandalism. I had prided myself in tuning everything out.

But the one thing I couldn't tune out or ignore was the way Holden Kincaide looked at me from May 24th onwards. I don't blame him. I'd apparently stolen his older brother Wyatt's car, and been high as a kite when I killed his best friend in a car crash. I'd tried telling him everything from the beginning of that night until the next morning when I woke up in the hospital, handcuffed to the bed. But Holden didn't believe a single word that came from my mouth, instead all he did was laugh and call me a pathological liar, saying that if prison doesn't kill me somebody someday would. My crush on the second Kincaide brother terminated the second that fell from his mouth.

On July 18, 2015, I was sentenced to 6 years in prison for the manslaughter of 18 year old Nolan Hartley. All 12 members of the jury found me guilty. All 12 members of the jury are fucking wrong.