16. River
RIVER
I stare into the dark woods, and I imagine all the ways somebody could kill and dispose of a body here if something goes wrong tonight. The only light we have is the half-moon and the flashlights the frat guys have provided for us.
Out of the twenty-five pledges who started hell week, only twelve remain. I’m surprised that Franklin has made it this far, but he’s persevered despite the suffering.
“If I fail, my dad will kill me,” he’d confessed to me last night.
Yeah. I highly doubt he means it the way I would, and it had made it hard to empathize even though I do feel bad for him. My father hadn’t ordered me to join Kappa Alpha or any other fraternity, but once he’d gotten wind of me joining, he’d been all-in on the idea.
Now I really could end up dead if I don’t make it through this bullshit—and not necessarily in these woods.
Not that he’d know for who knows how long; it’s not like he checks up on me.
Even my mother doesn’t reach out. She’s probably too afraid of pissing him off, but then, that’s always been the case.
“All right, listen up, fuckheads!” Zayden announces .
I turn my attention to him, already ready for this to be over with. I wonder if he could be one of the bodies someone could kill and dispose of out here. It wouldn’t even be hard, spoiled rotten rich kid that he is.
Except I don’t know Zayden’s background. With how he clings to Blaze, I have my suspicions about Zayden’s family.
“The Nu Upsilon Chi chicks are doing their own pledge challenge tonight,” Zayden continues. “Those girls have to survive the night out here in the woods.” He grins at all of us.
That opens things up to all sorts of possibilities, and I wonder if the other guys pledging to Kappa Alpha are half as sick as some of the bastards I’d grown up working with.
I wonder if they’re half as sick and twisted as I am.
“Your job is to track those chicks down and give them a real good scare.” Zayden goes over to Franklin and claps him on the shoulder. “And after one week of not touching any girls… well, we won’t hold it against you if touching happens.”
Blaze, standing with the other frat brothers, coughs. “It’s not just for you though. We’ll be right behind you. Any girls you catch are fair game, but the brothers get first dibs.”
Franklin’s mouth drops open. “But isn’t that?—”
“The girls know what they signed up for,” Zayden interrupts. “We talked it out with the Nu Upsilon sisters, don’t worry.”
I narrow my eyes at him. I wonder if their pledges really know what they’re getting themselves into. If they don’t, well… It’s not like I’m going to contribute to the problem. I’m not interested in touching them.
I’m not interested in touching anyone but Pandora.
I grit my teeth at that realization. She doesn’t deserve my devotion. She’s as much a snake as Blaze Bouchard and his lapdog Asch.
“All right. Those bitches had enough of a head start by now,” Zayden announces. “Anyone who doesn’t catch a girl tonight is out of the fraternity, by the way, so don’t think you can simply stand around and do nothing. ”
Blaze nods approvingly, and I narrow my eyes at him. Maybe he did lure Rachel out here with his flowers.
No sign of Asch, though. Apparently he wasn’t invited for this event.
“On your marks, get set… go!” Zayden shouts.
I know that at least a few of the other guys will hesitate, but I’m not one of them.
I dash forward into the woods, wielding my flashlight as I work on getting through the underbrush without tripping.
I don’t want to embarrass myself, but I also don’t want to be the last one to find a woman, either.
They want us to scare the Nyxie girls? Fine. I can do that.
If they want us to do more, though, they can go fuck themselves.
Thankfully, even at this late part of summer, the leaves are still soft beneath our feet.
All I have to worry about is branches making noise, and it gets easier to avoid that as I adjust to being out here.
I may have grown up in a major city, but that doesn’t mean I’ve never had to find my way around the heavily wooded areas outside of it.
I prowl between the trees, slowing down as I get ahead of the others, and I start to look in earnest.
We aren’t that far away from the campus, and I can see lights through the trees behind me. I also notice the scent of smoke, and I know none of us lit a fire. Zayden had said the Nyxies had to survive a night in the woods. That might include a campfire.
I start walking in the direction I think the smell is coming from. I hear low voices, and I angle my flashlight down so as not to alert anyone to my presence.
Then there’s a shriek, and a female voice yelling, “Fuck! Run, run!”
They don’t even try to be subtle as they scatter.
I hear wild flailing, and I’m not sure it’s only the girls responsible for the noise. One of the guys had probably been careless when he’d stumbled across them. But that’s fine. It makes it easier for me to hunt one of them down by herself.
I follow the path after her, listening as she starts to cry. I roll my eyes at the sound, wondering what kind of bullshit they fed the girls to get them to agree to this. Did they really think it was going to be easy to elude us?
I hear a sound from behind me, and I pause.
I wonder if one of the other guys is already stalking the prey I’ve chosen, but the sounds stop when I look over my shoulder.
I have to admit that it might be sort of amusing to be stalked by one of the women, but I doubt any of them have the guts for that.
I continue slowly in the direction the girl is running in. It’s pathetically easy to trace her wild path, which consists of so many broken tree branches all around it, and my strides are faster than hers.
It gets even easier when she trips over a large tree root and cries out. I close the distance between us, and as soon as she sees me, she starts crying and sobbing.
“Please! I’m sorry! Please leave me alone!” she begs.
I sneer at her, shining the flashlight down on her tear-streaked face. “You signed up for this,” I tell her. “Get up. You haven’t run enough yet.”
The girl sobs and starts to get up. She’s wearing shorts and a pair of light sneakers, completely unsuited for a night of running in the woods.
Maybe I should spare her that and drag her to the frat brothers now.
“If you climb a tree, the guys won’t find you,” a familiar, feminine voice says.
I turn around to see Pandora leaning against a tree behind me. She waves and smiles when I shine the flashlight at her.
“Seriously?” I complain. “Since when are you pledging with Nu Upsilon?”
“I’m not pledging. I’m stalking .” Pandora goes up to me and wraps her arms around my shoulders. “You got a problem with that?”
“Yes, actually,” I say, trying to push her away. She only holds on more tightly, which doesn’t surprise me at all. “Get out of the way. I can’t drag you back to the frat. ”
I could, but she’s a liability.
“You don’t think they’d want me?” Pandora licks her lips. “I bet I could easily convince Zayden to fuck me. And that small blond guy… think he’s ever even seen a cunt? I could be his first.”
Jealousy rages through me, and my hand shoots out to grab her by the throat. “You won’t do either of those things,” I snarl at her. “You won’t do either of them .”
I don’t want to share her, and the fact that I have to share her with Blaze and Asch is bad enough.
“Yeah?” Pandora grins up at me and cups my cock through my jeans. “How are you going to stop me?”
Before I can answer, she suddenly squeezes tight, twisting my cock in her hand, and I gasp in pain. My hold on her neck loosens, and she darts away.
“Catch me if you can!” Pandora shouts, dashing into the woods.
I curse, then go after her in earnest. I don’t know what will happen if I turn up with her instead of some Nyxie, but right now, all I care about is that she fucked this up for me.
Someone needs to pay, and the idea of it being Pandora is alluring.
The leaves don’t make much sound beneath our feet, and she’s better at dodging tree branches than the sorority girl had been. It surprises me for reasons I can’t really put into words. I wouldn’t have expected Pandora to have any experience in this kind of scenario.
But here we are, and she’s better at this than I’d have expected.
It’s fine.
I’m better.
I remember Pandora’s tip about climbing a tree, and I look up occasionally to make sure I’m not walking past her. I spot the sorority pledge I’d let go earlier, but I ignore her, trailing after Pandora’s much more subtle path.
Even in the dark, Pandora seems to know where she’s going. Others might assume she bolted without a plan, but I notice how our path curves, and we start heading back toward where we started .
I pause at a small stream and listen. There’s the water, and some shouting in the distance.
I also hear another set of feet approaching.
Pandora won’t get the drop on me again.
I spin around and shine the light in her direction.
Except it isn’t Pandora. It’s Blaze, and he covers his eyes with his arm to shield them from the light.
“River?” Blaze shakes his head. “Where’s the girl you’re chasing? Or did you lose her?”
“Up a fucking tree,” I say, bemused. “But I’m chasing more interesting prey. Did you lose yours ?”
Blaze shines his light around. “I figure I’d claim whatever girl you caught. Since you’ll be Asch’s little brother, and I have to make sure you’re up to the task.”
That’s bullshit.
“Where is Asch, anyway?” I ask, before starting again in the direction I think Pandora must’ve bolted in. “Or is he too much of a pussy to get involved in something like this?”
“There were only twelve pledges left,” Blaze points out. “We figured it would be unfair if there were more frat brothers than pledges. He got the short end of the stick and didn’t get to participate.”
Something about that sounds off, but I’m more focused on finding Pandora.
I shine my light on a small boot print, and Blaze nods.