I stumble out of the room, glancing back at the boys who’ve all put on the same golden devil masks I remember from the first time Caleb and Ares chased me.
Fear finally makes my heart tremble behind my rib cage.
But this kind of fear … it’s not the kind you want to deny. It’s the kind you want to obey.
So I turn around and run while the boys stay behind, collecting God knows what other toys from Ares’s cabinet. By the time I’ve made it out of the Tartarus House, I can already hear them rushing down the stairs.
Fuck.
My heart races as I run through the back exit and come out in the rose maze.
Remember the route. Remember.
God, why can’t I remember?
Panicked, I run off to one side and into the maze, left, right, C, right, right, left, left. I don’t know where I’m going, and when I turn a corner and come to a dead end, I can feel my own breathing pick up.
“Little rose … I can smell your perfume luring me.”
His low, gravelly voice makes goose bumps scatter on my skin.
I turn around, and a rose’s thorns scratch my cheek, but I keep running into the next turn and another one until I’m lost in the maze once more. The roses in this part are unkempt and completely overgrown, and I stumble over the prickly branches, nearly falling into the bushes. I only manage to capture myself on … two strong arms.
“Hello, darling, going somewhere?” Long black hair flows behind the mask, and I take a step back.
“Blaine,” I mutter, jerking myself free from his grip, and I bolt off as fast as I can.
“Run, run, my darling! We both know they’ll find you eventually. But I do enjoy watching this chase.”
I can hear him laugh behind me as I keep running in the opposite direction of wherever the crackling sounds are coming from. Twigs snap in half and make me gasp as I turn around to a ghostly figure wearing nothing but a black pair of pants and shoes appearing from behind the hedge, sparkling gray eyes boring a hole into my chest.
Ares.
My blood runs thick with icy cold fear as I rush in the opposite direction, but then I see another figure emerge from the darkness, blond streaks of hair and tattooed skin peeking out from underneath a hoodie.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
I run to the left, and within seconds, I find myself out of the maze, running across campus grounds, past the Skull & Serpent Society building, and into Priory Forest and beyond. I don’t stop running, not even as my lungs grow frigid and my body begins to shiver as painful spasms shoot up my legs.
The adrenaline keeps me going, makes me feel alive. It makes me feel like I could face the world with a smile because no matter what it sends my way, I can take it.
Thanks to them.
Caleb
I can see her bolting past the campus grounds from a distance, and I signal Ares to her location, who goes for the pursuit.
A chase like this is all I’ll ever crave, and now that Crystal had a taste of us, I just know she can’t get enough of it either.
Blaine passes me by. “Gotta run quicker than that.”
“I don’t see you helping,” I rebuke.
“I already had her in my clutches,” he muses.
I frown at him. “You had her? And you let her go?”
“Of course. Gotta give her a head start against you guys.”
I grumble. “What the fuck, Blaine!”
“Where’s the fun without a chase?” he says, shrugging. “Now go on, chase her. I’ll be waiting.”
He runs right past me, headed straight for Priory Forest, and I fucking hate that the sheer length of his legs makes him faster than me.
“Keep running, slut! Doesn’t matter where you go; we’re going to fucking catch you,” I yell at Crystal, letting off some steam before I bolt into the woods she just entered.
I zigzag past the fallen trees, keeping an eye on the others. Ares is to my right, a little in front of me, but when I look ahead, I can clearly see Crystal running up the hills behind the school.
That cheeky little thing thought she could escape us by exiting the rose maze? Not a chance.
We run as fast as our legs will take us, slowly but surely catching up with her.
One glance over her shoulder has me going wild with lust.
“That’s it, slut, run for your fucking life because when we catch you, it belongs to us!”
We come up to a giant wall, which she’s scaling, and I jump up and make the climb right behind her. To my left, Ares runs around the other side, disappearing from view. But I don’t give a damn what he’s going to do because I’m nearly there. I can hear her breath and heavy grunts as she drags herself up the slopes toward Priory Lake.
Right before she manages to lift herself at the top, I grab her ankle and hold on tight, adrenaline invigorating my decrepit mind. “Gotcha.”
Crystal
When I look down and see the demonic mask staring back at me, I shriek. Caleb’s tattooed hand curls around my ankle, forcing me to stay put when I was just reaching the top.
Shit.
I try to shake him off, to no avail, and then I see the shadowy outline of two feet crackling on the dead leaves in front of me. My gaze tilts upward toward the stars, a familiar set of equally blinding eyes staring right back at me through the devil’s mask as the man goes to his knees and takes my chin with a firm grip.
“Mine.”
My eyes widen as his hand moves to my wrists, and he lifts me off the cliff with ease. But my mind is at war with my body, wanting two very different things. Have the power, or submit to his every whim. With a swift jerk, I break free of his grasp and run for Priory Lake in the back, but Ares quickly overtakes me, throwing both hands around my body to drag me to the ground. I crawl through the dead leaves, but with a simple, strong grip, he forces me to stop and twists me around underneath him.
“I have you now, little rose. And I will give you what I promised you.”
Caleb towers over me with a few feet of rope. “You ready, little slut?”
Ares pins my wrists above my head and leans over to smash his lips onto mine briefly before he murmurs, “Tie her up.”
Caleb wraps the rope around my wrists and suddenly drags me from underneath Ares. “Wait, where are we—”
I shriek as he hoists me up a fallen log and lays me down with my back flat against the wood, tying my wrists beneath the wood so I have no way to escape as my legs fall to the side.
From the corner of my eye, I spot Blaine approaching.
“This isn’t necessary,” I say.
“It very much is,” Ares answers, pushing my legs up one by one so Caleb can tie them together.
I’m blushing from the hog-tie position they have me in right now.
“My, oh, my, you’ve got yourself in quite a beautiful position there,” Blaine muses, removing his mask, his tongue running along his lips. “Just like the dirty smut books I read.”
Caleb snorts. “What kind of racy books do you read?”
“None that would ever tickle your caveman brain,” Blaine retorts.
Caleb narrows his eyes at him. “While you were reading about all those things, we were actually doing them to her. Now watch.”
“Gladly,” Blaine replies as he sits down on a stump and leans back against the tree behind it, pulling out his hard-on to play with it.
But when Ares’s fingers slide up my thighs, I forget everything I was focusing on.
“Your fear excites me,” he murmurs, fingers curling underneath my dress. “But it’s no fun when you give it to me willingly.”
He pulls the knife from his pocket and slides it up my belly, making all the hairs on my body stand up. He looks damn terrifying with that mask on, but I know what I signed up for when I ran like hell from them.
It’s this … this part, not just the thrill to run but the thrill to be caught that makes me feel alive.
The knife cuts through my dress like butter, splaying it over the wood as my naked body is on full display, and from the corner of my eye, I definitely see a hard-on in Blaine’s hands. Ares circles my nipples with the tip, toying with me, teasing me to my limits. The knife reaches my throat, and I can feel my own heartbeat against the metal.
“You like me teasing you …” he says. “Admit it.”
“Yes,” I say in a breathy moan.
The knife slides up to my cheeks, where the rosebushes cut me. “You collect scratches like I collect scars, little rose.”
“Pain doesn’t faze me,” I murmur.
He leans over me, a devilish smile appearing behind the equally devilish mask. “Then you won’t mind if I carve deep enough to hear you scream.”
