My body tries to save me because I’m too tired, too stupid, and too fucking naive to realize how idiotic it was for me to come out here now.
Kai just trashed my room, and I expect him totalkto me? That we’ll kiss and make up?
There was a reason he gagged me so often when we played our games. I was chatty. Always trying to lure him into conversation.
He was the strong, silent,violenttype.
…what are you doing out here all by yourself, m’lady? You climb out your palace window again? Bet the king would pay a pretty price to get you back. You think that blunt knife is gonna stop me, m’lady?…
And while he left many a bruise and scrape on my young body, he never went far enough to make me question—even briefly—if he’d truly hurt me.
Now I’m risking everything on the idea that he’s still the same boy, when I know he’s not.
Who’d have thought Haven Lee would be such a soppy fucking romantic?
Fuck this. I’m leaving.
The puddles I splash through paint icy mud across my calves and shins. The smell of the forest intensifies as I crash through the foliage en route to the campus.
A light beckons there. Open ground. Maybe even a security guard who could intervene if?—
Someone lunges at me.
I gasp, rear back, lose my balance, fall. Hard.
The clack of my teeth smacks through my skull like a baseball bat, stunning me. Roots and small stones dig into my ass and the tender flesh of my palms, muddy rain from the ground seeping instantly into my underwear.
He’s just a silhouette, but I recognize the way Kai moves as he stalks toward me. What I don’t recognize is the rough, unhinged tone of his voice.
“You can’t outrun the bandit, m’lady.”
My body wants to go into freeze mode, but I fucking refuse.
I flip around on hands and knees, scramble up, bounce off a tree trunk.
Spotting a gap in the trees, I feint right, then dive left. My heart soars as I hear Kai’s footsteps falter behind me. Such a pathetic victory, but fuck, it feels good.
“Leaving so soon, Miss H?” Kai calls out.
His voice is so fucking close, my hair would stand on end if I weren’t soaked through. I try to turn back to the campus, but Kai changes direction too, cutting me off.
Fuck!
I spin around, already running again, my jaw clenched hard as I realize he’s herding me into the impenetrable heart of the woods.
Notourwoods, but it doesn’t matter, does it?
God knows how far they stretch, but I can only hope I’ll reach civilization before Kai reaches me.
The only other option is to turn and fight, but I know he’s stronger than me. That he can overpower me as easily as a wolf can a kitten.
Out here, my only ally is the darkness.
So I plunge headfirst into it, and beg it to hide me.
But even as I’m running for my life, a fucked-up part of me is getting off on this. My heart is racing, and it’s not just fromadrenaline. It’s the same illicit rush I used to get when we played this game as kids.
Fuck, I’ve missed this.
