Terror Tuesday (Cult Campus #2)

Chapter 1

one

Fear is for the guilty.

That’s what they tell us. Seventh Society instills guidelines for the betterment of all. Rules are made for everyone’s safety.

I just wish people followed them.

Then we wouldn’t have issues like Delta Pi Alpha initiates shooting up one of my family’s restaurants in a turf war.

“You’re driving too fast,” I say, clutching the door handle of Hunter’s Porsche. Echoes of my heartbeats jar my insides into a tumultuous rhythm. My foot presses on the floorboard as if it could slow us down.

He scoffs. “You said to get you out of there. I’m doing that.” Then, quieter, through a gritted jaw: “Can never do anything right with you.”

Rumbles travel through my stomach as my throat constricts with nausea.

He’s upset, and it’s best not to test him when he’s like this.

It’ll only start another argument. Or finish the one we had at Luminescence over his flirting with that Sigma Lambda Psi sister.

Better not to bring it up while he’s operating the vehicle that could kill us both.

“I gotta stop and take care of some business.” He says it like a command without room for disagreement. But I do anyway.

“You shouldn’t go to the warehouse again. If you get caught, not only will you be expelled, but the entirety of Beta Kappa Eta will be sanctioned—”

“Enough, Olivia! God, your voice could make a straight man gay. I can’t take the nagging tonight. You give me such a headache sometimes.”

Tears sting my eyes with his frustrated sigh that follows. He blows cold air over my body like a chilled blanket, and horror rises inside me. Like I’m drowning in fear.

If he left me, who would I be then? Who would I get appointed to? Who would even accept me?

I cannot be alone.

It’s my fault. Even though he’s breaking every Northview University law, I shouldn’t have tested him when he’s already on edge.

Turning my face away, so he doesn’t see me cry, I stare out the glistening window, watching the Brutalist buildings whizz by in a blur of grittiness. “Fine. Could you drop me off first?”

“No. We’re already here,” he says curtly, pulling up to a large metal structure deep in a black hole of an alley.

When he throws it in park, the leather seat squeaks as he shifts to me. “You coming or what?”

With a glance at his light eyes, I pause. Why would he even ask? I would never put myself in that position. “No.”

“Stay in the fucking car until I’m back.” He checks himself in the rearview, runs a hand through his dirty-blonde waves, then grabs the keys and jumps out.

It’s dark. Quiet. My fingers shake as I dig through my beaded evening bag, pulling out my father’s knife. The one he gave me on my sixteenth birthday, inscribed:

For the daughter who wields both steel and silence:

May your blade speak when your voice cannot.

I’ve never had to use it and hope I never do.

We’re in the bad part of town. The side that doesn’t appreciate university students like us “richies.” Hunter’s Porsche sparkles in the dim light like a homing beacon, I’m sure.

Especially with his license plate—H4RTG0D—declaring to everyone he’s a Remington, destined for med school to follow in his father’s footsteps.

For someone so interested in the organ, he usually lacks one.

A buzzing notification almost makes me lose control of my weapon, but I quickly snag my phone from my bag and check the text.

Ryan

Are you safe? U okay?

Olivia, shit’s going down. Text back now.

Aiden

O, where are you? Need me to send someone?

Henry

I didn’t get shot at all. I’m good.

Ryan

I’m fucking standing right here, dumbass. I know.

Aiden

O???? Where r u????

Don’t make me bring Dad into this. You know what that will mean.

A slight chuckle escapes my lips, and I relax, knowing my overprotective brothers always have my back.

Me

I’m safe with Hunter! Enjoy the party!

Even as I send it, I bite my bottom lip.

Am I safe with Hunter?

Despite the fact that I may likely become his appointed—a title given by the Seventh Society to bind a senior fraternity brother to a sorority sister as his wife in a permanent alliance—I’m not sure I am.

There’s no such thing as divorce once the bond is made.

No escape. And even though Hunter’s family holds sway, and Beta deals drugs on the side with a wink and a payout, I’ve never been fully convinced I’d be safe in his hands.

I’m his presumed future, but only until the appointment is official.

And I don’t know if that’s security…or a sentence.

But it’s safer than being alone.

A scream wrenches from my throat at the sound of metal clanging against metal. It’s too close. Too…deliberate. My breathing halts in my chest. Did someone want me to hear the sound?

Whipping my head around, I expect a person to be standing there. Perhaps a shadow moves, but it’s almost impossible to make anything out. Damn the rear window! A sheen of rain covers the glass, turning the outside into a kaleidoscope of shapes I can’t decipher.

Eyes dart through the ebony midnight. It’s moments before I can relax again. Maybe a game on my phone will distract me.

How long has he been in there? When I glance up at the rusted metal door inlaid into the side of the building, there’s no light seeping from beneath it. If something happens, I could dash inside and yell for help. Maybe I’m overreacting.

As my eyes crawl to my lap, they catch a movement in the rearview mirror.

A darkened figure rushes through the alleyway about twenty feet behind the car. More than one? I’m not sure.

I twist around and look, but there’s no one. Was that another noise?

I’m not waiting around to get murdered while thieves take this car to the chop shop.

With a grip on the handle of my blade and nails digging into my bag, I thrust my body from the car, ready to scream or fight.

Not that I’d know how, but I’m prepared for whatever may come.

It’s only a few feet to the warehouse door, and I push through, slamming it closed behind me to prevent whoever it was from entering.

I stuff my knife back in my purse and straighten my shoulders, teetering on a stiletto to face the eerily lit hallway. Fluorescents hum every few feet, a bowl of shadows engulfing the space between them.

Unfamiliarity settles in as I step into the wide space that feels too cramped for a warehouse. The cinder block walls hold only two doors halfway down. I’m not sure which Hunter went into.

My gait falters when one of them flings open, my pulse skyrocketing to extremes. A hand flung out to the side steadies me as my fingers press into the concrete.

Bryce Holloway, the Beta secretary and official fix-it man for President Hunter Remington, exits a room with his phone against his ear.

When he sees me, his bloodshot eyes light up.

A red tint to his nose lets me know he’s been partying hard despite the interruption in our festivities earlier.

Which means his jabs will make me the punching bag.

“Thick Livvy!” He pauses and speaks into his phone. “I gotta call you back. Yeah, as soon as Hunter tells me what he wants. Just hold your balls.”

Attempting to ignore him, I stroll up, ready to enter where he came from, but he steps in my way. “Where you going, girl?”

“I heard a noise, so I’m trying to find Hunter. Is he in there?”

With a sly motion, he leans his forearm on the wall above me, blocking me in. “Has the president of Omega Nu Epsilon gone rogue? Come to cheat for your sisters?”

I shake my head rapidly, glaring into his light brown eyes as they scan my breasts. Inadvertently, I slide my palms down my gold sequin dress, tugging on the bottom to lengthen it. “No. ONE doesn’t need help with grades. We earn them,” I mock him with a sneer.

As he makes some denigrating remark that I ignore, I duck under his arm.

The metal door groans, opening into a cave-like space lit only by the blue lights of monitors lining a narrow wall. Wires, carts filled with computer parts, dust, cords… Everything is askew. Messy. Dusty.

Each facet on my dress sends a prism around the small room as it catches the glow of electronics. Like I’m a mirror ball in a cyberpunk crypt.

Hunter sits next to a man wearing a black hoodie, facing the displays. “Thought you were staying in the fucking car, Olivia.”

As I open my mouth, Bryce sticks his head in. “Hunter. We need you. There’s that, uh, problem hanging about.”

Hunter’s not moving, but I can sense his frustration. “Give me a fucking minute.”

Bryce shuts the door, and I wander in closer to the only empty seat, a metal folding chair near a rickety shelf filled with crumbling cardboard boxes. Hunter’s eyes dart over to me like I’ve interrupted his speech, but he continues his conversation with the man sitting next to him.

“The payment was already made.”

Velvet pours from the throat of the figure covered in black clothes from head to toe. His voice is smooth and practiced, like he’s used to making people listen. When he turns toward me, the shadows swallow his face whole. No features. No eyes. Just darkness staring back. A mask?

“It’s not enough. Not for how much work I’m doing to ensure Beta’s grades are where you want them to be.”

“You quoted the same price as last semester!”

“Perhaps you shouldn’t have recruited people with room-temperature IQs, then. More work, more payment. Take it or leave it.”

Hunter sits back with a huff, and I know he’s raging inside. No one denies him without consequences. With a sudden shift, he stands, shoving the metal chair beneath him back a few inches. “I gotta find more cash. I’ll be right back.”

My legs twitch to follow him as he leaves, but I freeze when he pauses at the door. “Stay here, Olivia.”