Chapter 18 Pip
EIGHTEEN
PIP
Where is he?
The boat stopped. The shift of his weight behind me, the sound of him rummaging for something followed by the crunch of his boots on rubble as he dragged the boat further ashore, and now?
Nothing.
The hairs on my arm prickle. Something is off.
I reach up to try lift my hood to peek.
This feels wrong. This feels-
Boom.
A blast of intense heat, flashing, and abruptly loud explosions similar to gunshots emit from inside the boat, instantly ripping me from my thoughts. Instinctively, I catapult myself over the side of the boat to escape the commotion, hitting wet rubble hard with a thud.
I rip the hood off to see fire crackers. Fucking fire crackers! Exploding and wrecking havoc, the sound reverberating in the aluminium hull. My ears ring in response to the trauma they’ve just experienced.
I scramble up the beach to the forest line, gasping for breath and clutching my chest as my heart attempts to tear free from my chest cavity.
I scan my immediate surroundings. Nothing is familiar. Nothing! What the hell is this? Where has he taken me? Where the actual fuck is he?
A vibration from my phone in my clutch, still miraculously hanging from my wrist, beckons my attention. Reluctantly, I pull it out to read.
Unknown:
Baby, you wanted a chase.
This cat is ready to hunt his meal,
and I am RAVENOUS…
Wait… What?
Something slices through the air above me so fast I don’t process it until I hear the sound of impact—a dull, solid thunk above my head.
I freeze.
My eyes lift slowly, dread creeping into my stomach as I see what’s embedded into the tree.
A hunting arrow.
I turn my head. There he is. My masked stalker, standing further down the beach with a crossbow in hand. He waves his illuminated phone at me as mine vibrates again.
I don’t need to read the message. Fuck that.
I just... run!
Fear replaces my earlier reservations with a primal urge to survive. This was all part of his game. I’m the fucking game! Dressed as a stupid deer of all things.
There are no defined trails, only dense brambles and plenty of fallen trees obscuring my path. The noise I make pushing through the branches echoes around me.
There’s no moon out, and I can’t see more than five feet in front of me. But ahead, I hear a babbling stream. I run toward it.
I trip a few times as my dress catches on thorny shrubs, and eventually, I come to a small stream several feet wide. Leaping over it, I slip on the lichen and moss, falling on my hip.
Pain flares. I hiss, pushing up on shaking arms—
And then, as if tonight couldn’t get worse, the toy inside me shifts and slips free, landing with a small splash in the water beside me.
Good. Finally. Maybe now my body will stop betraying me. My night vision is starting to kick in; I can make out in the shadows ahead a large boulder big enough to hide behind through the thickets.
I make my way to it, ducking into a shallow crevice to catch my breath. I’m nearly hyperventilating, my hands shaking with mortal fear. I hold my hands to my mouth to muffle my sounds.
The forest at night is terrifying. A few birds can be heard cooing in their sleep. A coyote howls in the distance. I also hear the scratching of nearby squirrels, no doubt curious as to what’s going on below.
A noise to my right has me tensing; I squint to see what it is. A harmless little bunny emerges from a shrub.
I’ve nearly got my breath in check when a loud snap of a branch and slow, hard footsteps trigger a new kind of fear—I’m out of time.
I tie up the hem of my dress to free up my legs to move and sneak out of my crevice, trying to stealth myself below its rocky platform. The loud thuds of footsteps are getting nearer and nearer.
I run as fast as I can, hitting every fucking branch on the way down to the bottom of a gully.
Too late.
A heavy body crashes into mine, arms coiling around my waist like steel bands, dragging me down.
The ground vanishes from beneath me, and then we’re tumbling, rolling, bodies colliding as we hit the bottom of the embankment.
I scream my protests, my arms flailing in defense.
My breathing is erratic; my head spins as tears run rivers down my cheeks. I squirm and writhe from his grip.
Slipping out of my fur vest, my elbow connects with his face. He releases me and groans.
Using his distraction, I get up and kick him in the stomach as hard as I can muster before turning on my heels and legging it up the other side of the embankment.
I need help! I need to find somewhere safe!
Branches tear and shred my body.
My ears ring with shock and fear. I feel numb.
I don’t know how long I run before I see it.
A cabin.
Lit from within. Firelight flickering against the windowpanes.
I make a beeline for the cabin. It’s in a clearing near the outskirts of the forest overlooking the water.
I look over my shoulder before running out of the protection and cover of the trees for the porch.
I knock on the door frantically when a snap in the distance sends shivers down my spine. Fuck, he’s getting close!
I grab the handle. Locked. Jesus fucking Christ!
Panic replaces my remaining sanity. I rummage nearby flower pots and lift the door mat, hoping to find a key.
Then I see the keyhole.
Not just a keyhole—a brass etching, intricate, deliberate. A stag.
I feel the color leech from my face.
“No. No, no, no!” I plead. My hand shakily reaches to clutch the key hanging from my neck. No, it can’t be.
“Please, God, please, please, please!” I mutter to myself, willing with everything I have that this key will not work. Willing this not to be an elaborate setup. Willing this not to be his cabin I’ve run straight to.
Pulling the chain from my neck, I insert the key into the slot. With a gentle turn, the mechanism clicks with ease.
My last hope fades with that sound. It's not the sound of refuge but the sound of captivity. I’ve been herded to my doom.
“No,” I whisper through sobs.
A large hand booms on the door over my shoulder, startling me.
The heat of his presence—dense, inescapable, pressing into the air around me like a force of gravity, suffocating yet intoxicating. The steady, controlled rise and fall of his chest against my back, his breaths deep and measured, as if he’s the only one at this moment who isn’t unraveling.
I don’t need to turn.
I don’t need to see.
I already know.
A gloved hand moves around me, slow and deliberate, until the sharp tip of an arrow traces the curve of my cheek, gliding in a featherlight caress that is both a warning and a promise.
A gasp escapes me, too soft, too helpless, and I hate it. I hate the way my body betrays me, trembling under his touch, fear and something far more dangerous intertwining in a way I can’t control.
I squeeze my eyes shut, but the tears still slip free, hot and unrelenting.
Then, finally, he speaks.
“I caught you.”
My stomach drops. My mind short-circuits, grasping for a reality that no longer exists because that voice—that voice shouldn’t belong to him. But it does.
Recognition detonates inside me, not like an explosion, but like a slow-burning fuse, unraveling every assumption, every fear, every breath that led me here.
I turn—slowly, unwillingly, as if my body knows that whatever I see next will change everything.
He steps back just enough to let me take him in.
The arrow slips from his grasp, landing with a muted thud at my feet, but I barely register it.
Because his hands—those hands, rough and strong, familiar even through my haze of shock—are pulling off his hood and balaclava.
That tattoo.
Those eyes.
A smirk on his face. “Hey, you.”