Chapter Twenty-Two – Reese
When it comes to Logan Crew, I need to be careful.
It’s not the first time I’ve followed him, and it’s not the first time he’s felt my presence.
It’s more than I can say for most people; when I don my baseball cap and baggy hoodie, I tend to blend in around here.
The campus and its surrounding areas, most guys dress like this.
It’s an art, blending in to your surroundings. It’s a skill most people will never have. I’ve always been particularly good at it; a predator melding with its prey while on the hunt, it lets you get closer to your prey, so that when you’re ready to take the final swipe, it’s a killing blow.
But something is different about Logan. There’s more to him than my research shows. For someone like him, he certainly doesn’t have much of an online presence, and it makes me wonder just why that is. He has to be hiding something.
And Wren—she’s too good for him. He doesn’t deserve her. She is unique in every way, and he’s your typical playboy douchebag. Nothing remarkable about him at all, save for the shadow in his past.
Tonight, I didn’t start out following Logan.
I began the night watching Wren’s house, because I knew she was planning on asking Logan out to a karaoke bar.
My expertly-placed mics and cameras inside her house told me everything: the time and the place.
She discussed it quite a lot with her roommate, Sloane, who offered to come tonight, but Wren turned her down and said she needed to do this on her own.
So Wren walked, alone, to Logan’s house once it was time, and I trailed her from behind, across the street.
She had no clue she was being followed; the girl was blissfully unaware the entire time.
It would have been all too easy for me to take her, but…
even now, I don’t know that my maze would be perfect for her.
There’s a different sort of hunger inside of me when it comes to that one. My curiosity was piqued at her peculiarity, and the more I find out about her, the more curious I am.
If I told her to run for me, would she? Would she let me chase her…
would she let me catch her? The obsession that runs through my blood is at a boil when I think about her—a ridiculous notion, since we’ve hardly spoken, but sometimes you just know.
Humanity might like to think of themselves as the apex beings on the planet, but deep down, we’re all animals.
If animals can know things intrinsically, why can’t we?
Wren is mine. I simply need to find the right time to go to her, to prove to her that this thing between her and Logan cannot happen. It can’t continue because she already belongs to me.
I slip inside the karaoke bar a few minutes after Logan and Wren enter.
I stand in the back, near a jukebox that remains unused while people are performing on the stage.
I know Wren can sing—it wasn’t hard to find the videos she and her ex share once I knew they were out there.
The girl has an angelic voice, full and luscious, the kind of voice that could easily sing anything and sound great.
I do wonder if Logan will be able to match her. I’ll find out tonight.
Logan goes to order something, and that’s when he senses me again. I turn and give him my back as I pretend to study the jukebox. I stand near a group of guys with their girlfriends, all drinking and having a good time; to the untrained eye, it might look as though I’m with their group.
Only when Logan returns to the table with two drinks do I meander my way to the karaoke sign-up sheet, and I spot Wren and Logan’s name near the bottom, one of the final spots tonight. Seems like I’ll need to make myself scarce for a while. Pity, but doable.
How I wish I could get closer to their table, to overhear what they’re talking about, but I don’t want to push my luck. Not here. There isn’t enough cover, and while the inside of the karaoke bar is pretty dim, there aren’t enough shadows to truly cover me.
Oh, to be a fly on that table, to eavesdrop on what must surely be a riveting conversation.
And by riveting, I mean riveting on Wren’s part, but Logan?
I somehow doubt he has anything interesting to say.
If anyone’s going to run the gambit of my maze, it should be him. Wren is too good for my mazes.
Plus, I don’t want her to disappear afterward. The only thing I want is for her to be mine.
Being around so many people having fun, watching people go up on stage and sing to their heart’s content, hearing the laughter and joy in their voices as they mess up verses or sing the wrong words; all reminders that I am not like them. I’m not like any of them.
My desires are darker. What I think is a fun time would make most of these fools piss their pants. I’ve never been like my fellow mankind; it is the curse me and my brothers share, and it sounds like that curse has touched everyone who has a bit of Scott blood.
Yeah, let’s just say you can never trust a man whose last name is Scott. We’re all vile heathens with strange kinks and even stranger urges.
Logan and Wren look as though they have a good time, mostly.
Sometimes Logan acts miffed, while other times Wren blushes like she said or heard something she shouldn’t have.
As the night wears on, it becomes increasingly difficult for me to remain still; I want nothing more than to grab her and leave this place, to take her someplace private and…
And tell her to run. Tell her I’ll give her a five-minute head start.
And then I’d chase her like I’ve never chased anyone before.
Normally I don’t partake until the very end, until they’ve made their decision.
My mazes always end in a choice, and no one ever makes the correct one.
Maybe it’s the adrenaline pumping through their system at the time, or maybe everyone I choose is just shitty.
Regardless, they choose poorly, and they pay the price.
Though I am Professor Reese during the day, these hands of mine aren’t clean.
It pains me to stand there, to blend in for so long when all I want to do is go to her and take what’s mine. Prove to Logan that she cannot and will not ever belong to him because I laid claim to her the very first moment I saw her in class. This thing between them is simply because she’s hurting.
People come and go on stage, like a revolving door. Eighties and nineties are the jams of the night apparently; nobody can sing anything else it seems. Everyone hates on the eighties and nineties, but when it’s time to do karaoke, apparently it’s all they can do.
Then again, how are you going to get up there and sing some of the newer songs on the radio? Many of them don’t lend well to karaoke.
And then, thankfully, enough time has passed that it’s their turn, and I have to find another area to skulk in.
Don’t want to stand directly facing the stage, but I don’t want to slip outside and not hear them, either.
So I go to the bar and sit on a stool. I’ll only see them if I turn my head, but at least I’ll hear their voices, and they won’t know it’s me.
Frankly, I don’t know what I expect, at least not out of Logan.
The first verse is sung by Wren, and she nails it—though I don’t recognize the song.
Her voice is beautiful, sultry, smooth like velvet.
A siren’s voice, luring sailors to their doom, and in this case, I am the sailor.
It’s an odd thing, for the tides to have switched just like that.
Her voice… I could listen to it all night and never tire of it.
Wren is full of surprises, and I can’t wait to discover what other secrets she keeps close.
I’ll unravel those layers one by one even if it’s the last thing I do, and when she’s bare, when every ounce of her is exposed to me, I will make every part of her mine.
My drifting thoughts are interrupted by a switchover, when Logan begins to sing.
To my surprise, he’s not bad. Not bad at all.
In fact, he’s quite good—too good for this to be his first time singing.
A low voice, rough and scratchy but well-controlled; he has experience on a stage, I know it.
A simple glance over my shoulder at the two on stage proves as much.
The entire karaoke bar is caught, rapt. Everyone’s eyes are on the duo on the stage—and on that stage, while Logan loses himself to the song, Wren loses herself in him. The way she looks at him, how I wish I could peer inside her head and read her thoughts. There’s more to this, I can feel it.
And then… well, then shit hits the fan, as I suspect things often do when Logan is involved.