Just Drop Out (Hannaford Prep #1)

PROLOGUE

The forest at the edge of Mounts Bay, California, is rumored to be haunted.

The kids at the local high school have spent generations whispering about the bodies buried in shallow graves, waiting for the wolves to scent them and dig them up for food.

There are even more legends about the souls that walk among the towering redwoods.

It’s quiet, not silent, but compared to the ever-present sounds of traffic and human experience, it’s eerie and only amplifies the haunted feeling.

While I don’t believe in ghosts, there’s definitely something ominous lingering here.

It’s probably just my guilty conscience giving me the creeps as I look over the corpse of my last opponent.

My hands are still covered in his blood, cold and congealing in the cool night air, and I wipe them down my jeans, but it’s useless.

My clothes are just as bloodied as my hands, even my face is spattered with the red stains of his life ending.

I look like something out of a horror movie, which is about right, considering I’ve just bashed a man’s skull in with a rock while a whole crowd of people watched in sick fascination.

There isn’t a person spectating that dares to make a noise; the vise-like grip of the Twelve holds their tongues.

I’m not afraid of being caught.

I’m small for my age. Years of food insecurity have taken their toll, and I was the youngest contender in the Game this season. None of that matters though; I’ve won. I’ve beaten thirty men and teenage boys to take the victory and the spoils of this war.

The rushing sound of blood fills my ears as stars dance around my vision, my feet stumbling a little on the loose dirt as I make my way over to the men watching from the perimeter of the fighting ring.

It’s easy to distinguish them from the rest of the observers.

They’re the only ones not looking at me with fear in their eyes.

Cloaked in black, they’re all wearing hard looks on their faces with black ink etched over their cheeks.

My hands tremble at the thought of wearing those same marks, but I ball them into fists to hide it.

They’re the marks of the Twelve and with the blood covering me, I’ve earned mine here tonight.

I’ve earned the right to stand with them and be one of them.

To be free.

“Congratulations, you’ve won the Game,” the Jackal speaks, and I shiver unexpectedly at the cold tone of his voice, so unlike the warmth he usually extends to me.

I manage to nod my head, my movements distorted and jerky. I want this over with. I want a hot meal and an even hotter shower.

“Welcome to the Twelve. You’re replacing the Hawk. Who do you choose to be?”

The problem with being so focused on surviving the Game is that I never had the chance to think about what would happen afterward.

After the bloodshed, violence, and murder.

Of course, it’s a logical progression that I’d choose a name once I was the last one standing, but I never actually got around to it.

I guess a hawk is a good embodiment of freedom, but it feels strange to take a dead man's name, like climbing into his bed with the sheets still warm. I look around at the other men that make up the Twelve. Their names are what they’re known as on the streets, what their gangs cover themselves with as protection and a warning.

I could have that too. I could make myself a queen of my own empire.

I could rule the streets and never go hungry again.

I could escape the cycle of poverty my mother left me in.

My eyes land back on the Jackal, and I lift my chin until I no longer feel like I’m looking up at him.

“I am the Wolf.”