Ella started pounding her fists against the doors, hoping someone would hear the commotion. “Goddammit, this can’t be happening right now!”
“You’re trapped with me, Ella.” I closed the distance between us until my front and her back were a hairsbreadth away. Bringing my mouth to her ear, I whispered darkly, “Looks like it’s just you and I in this hellhole, sweetheart.”
C H A P T E R6
Kill For You
Ella
The Present
12:07 a.m.
The universe was goading me, rubbing salt in my wounds and refusing to give me the reprieve I’d begged for—the one I, respectfully,earned.
Of all the possible outcomes, this one I had not anticipated. Getting paired with my ex-boyfriend for Initiation Night? Plot fucking twist. And not the good kind.
It suddenly made sense why I couldn’t find my teammate in the foyer. Cade must have heard me calling for team six and decided to get a head start. He knew if I realized we were partnered, I would have run from St. Victoria like a bat out of hell.
“We are not trapped. This is all part of the game,” I said through gritted teeth, feeling Cade’s breath stir the short strands of my hair, warming the flesh of my collarbone in a manner far too intimate for exes who were broken beyond repair.
“Mm. You don’t say.” That deep voice, laced with unmistakable hunger, had another involuntary shiver running through my spine. “Do you want to play with me, Ella?”
Goddamn him.
Cade was fighting dirty.
Since our breakup, it was clear he wanted me back and would do everything in his power to achieve that goal. Including throwing our past in my face to remind me of how good we once had it.
Do you want to play with me, Ella?
There was nothing innocent about the request. It was a sentence he’d used many times in the past when we were acting out our filthiest fantasies, right before he brought us to sweet oblivion.
I hated what those words did to my body. The goosebumps on my skin. The tingles running from the top of my head to the tips of my toes. The heat simmering in my core.
And I hated the way Cade crowded me with his close proximity. I used to love it when he overpowered me with his strength when we fucked. There was nothing like being gagged, handcuffed, and clutched by him as I rode him like a rodeo.
Obviously, he remembered this and was using it to his advantage.Asshole.
“No, I don’t want to play with you,” I snarled and spun around in his caging hold to face him. “Get that through your thick skull.”
“You afraid of being alone with me, princess?” he egged on, the bravado in his tone feeling false and…forced. “I thought you’d do anything to be Queen of Initiation Night, especially if it meant making history.”
Fuck.
Cade knew I was hell-bent on breaking the record since last year.
Now he really had me cornered. If I backed out now, I’d be perceived as pathetic because I wasn’t able to suffer through three hours for the sake of winning my prize.
And I never backed down from a challenge.
My Cordova pride—the Leo in me—would not allow it.
“I’m not afraid of anything, Cade,” I retorted with a scoff. “Least of all you.”
His lips curved into a half-smirk. “Prove it, Ella.”
Beyond the walls of St. Victoria, a torrential downpour began, crashing against the windowpanes with a ferocity that mimicked my inner turmoil. I jolted when lightning and thunder joined the cacophony.
