Chapter Seven
The second Kade’s silhouette vanishes into the trees, I sag against the trunk.
IT guy.
All this time, my quiet, nerdy neighbor who fixed my printer and pretended not to stare was this sexy beast?
And damn, I was right—without his glasses, he’s lethal. Tonight, he looks like something carved from sweat, blood, and sin. All arrogance, coiled violence, and a tongue that could tie me in knots.
How the hell does he pull that off? I figured he works out. Recites sonnets to his cat. Maybe bench-presses encyclopedias in his spare time. But holy shit. Guess I shouldn’t be surprised he delivers. And then some.
Which is … fuck. How does he know exactly how to wreck me?
The waiver, duh. He’s got the rundown on my secret kinks.
My mouth’s raw from duct tape. My palms are scraped from clawing bark. My thighs are sore, sticky, and—
Honestly? Best. Night. Ever.
Part of me wants to curl up here and fall asleep to the phantom echo of his heartbeat.
But screw that—I didn’t pay eight hundred bucks to snuggle. No, I came to play with monsters. Get hunted and ravished from dusk to dawn—that’s the damn brochure’s promise.
I brush debris off my arms and legs, fix my clothes. My panties didn’t survive round one—thanks for that, Dollar-Store-Ghostface. Lucky I brought spares. Assuming Kade wasn’t lying about coming back.
Assuming he’s not lying about anything.
My stomach drops. The guy Kade attacked sure as hell didn’t look scripted.
He stabbed someone for touching you. Do you really want to hang around and wait for him?
No worries. The Verge’s designed to feel dangerous—not be dangerous.
Besides, there are cameras everywhere—mounted on trunks, angled from posts. Standard safety protocol. But it also means recording everything, and God, please tell me the tree Kade bent me over wasn’t the main event on one of their live feeds. I file away another complaint for the review page.
My watch’s dying: 12% battery. 10:47 pm.
Almost three hours since the game started. Time to be a little more daring. Kade did say he’d tie me to a tree if he caught me wandering.
I peel myself off the trunk. And trip over a root before I’m even upright.
The trees creak mockingly as I pick myself up. Should’ve waited for IT Guy, dumbass.
I take a step—squelch—ankle-deep mud. “Oh, come on.”
Damn it. Which way did Kade go?
Right’s too obvious, so left it is. My watch glows. 11% battery. Fantastic.
Ahead, there’s a gap formed out of two oaks leaning away from each other, trunks scarred with parallel gouges. Claw marks? Axe wounds? Some rich asshole’s idea of rustic decor?
I duck under a low branch.
There’s a boot. Thigh-high. Upright in the middle of the path. As if someone had stepped out of it mid-stride.
“Payton?”
I whip around. A blinding beam of light.
“Kristy?”
She’s a disaster—neon shorts shredded at the seam and hair all sexed up, twigs included.
She darts over and grabs my arm. “You okay?”
“Look—” I spin and point at the boot.
She swings her phone’s beam over it. “Damn. Someone upgraded to Cinderella After Dark.”
“It’s Amanda’s, right?”
“Oh, yeah, baby giraffe!” Kristy nudges it with her toe. The boot tips over, revealing a streak of mud up the side.
“Why only one?”
“Probably kicked it off when she got caught.” Kristy waves her phone’s flashlight around. “Maybe the other one’s nearby.”
“You think she’s okay?”
“Totally. For all we know, that boot’s a casualty of some dick-down diplomacy.”
I snicker. Like my ruined panties lying somewhere in an underbrush. “What about you? Did you … have fun?”
“Hell yeah. Well, I tripped, he caught me—and oof, trust me, getting slammed against a tree looks way sexier in movies. Pretty sure my left ass cheek is concussed.”
I choke on a laugh. “Is that even a thing?”
She twists at the waist, sweeping her phone’s beam down her side until it catches the bark-shaped welt across her lower back. “Does this look bruised to you?”
“Jesus. That tree really left its number.” My chuckle melts into a grimace. No idea what my back looks like. Even with the hoodie, it’s starting to sting.
“Anyway, he did this whole ‘press you close and wheeze like Darth Vader’ thing. Which, okay, fine, I’m into it. His hands got busy”—she wiggles her fingers—“but like, hello, take off the damn gloves first.”
A branch cracks in the distance. Neither of us flinches.
“Then those three little college brats showed up,” Kristy continues, “squealing like they’ve never seen a shirtless, masked predator with a knife before.
Like, seriously? Get your own damn Ghostface, bitches.
And poof—he bolted after them—mid-grope, can you believe that? ” She sighs. “Men are so predictable.”
Until they aren’t.
“Oh, my God, Payton, your neck.”
I slap a hand over the hickey. “What about it?”
She grins. “Damn. Someone went full Jack the Ripper on you.”
I hesitate. “Uh. Yeah. Sort of.”
“Sort of?”
“Okay—we did it.”
Kristy’s eyes go wide. “Damn. And here I thought I got lucky. And we? With one of the Ghostfaces?”
I nod.
She squeals. “Was it, like, scary-hot or just I-need-therapy hot?”
I open my mouth. Close it. How do you explain ‘The guy who fucked me into next week against a tree is my nerdy neighbor who definitely wasn’t supposed to be here’ without sounding clinically insane?
“It was … intense.”
“No shit. Which Ghostface was it? The one with the nice ass, or the one who—”
“My neighbor.”
“Whoa.” Her phone’s beam jerks upward, casting a horror-movie glow on her face. “You’re telling me one of the Ghostfaces is some guy who lives next door to you?”
I nod. “Technically, he lives across the street. And his name’s Kade.”
She squints. “Wait. Did he follow you here? Because that’s either serial-killer energy or … I don’t know, aggressively romantic?”
“Maybe he signed up in advance?”
“Okay, so worst-case, he stalked you. Best-case, he just happened to show up at a kink-fueled cosplay orgy and picked you out of a crowd?”
“Pretty much.”
“Girl. That’s not a meet-cute. That’s a true crime podcast.”
Kristy’s still yammering, but my brain’s already sliding sideways.
Did IT Guy know I was coming here before yesterday?
Or was it just some unholy twist of fate—my quiet, flannels-and-sweaters-wearing neighbor deciding to moonlight as a knife-wielding fantasy at the exact same Halloween fest I happened to attend?
And if he did stalk me here … why the hell does that make my stomach flip in a way it really, really shouldn’t?
“Payton?” Kristy snaps her finger. “Details. Now.”
“He stabbed a guy,” I blurt out. “The other Ghostface.”
Kristy reels back as if I’d just told her I fucked Bigfoot.
“In the thigh.”
Her jaw drops. “Did he say anything? Like ‘touch her again and die’ or ‘mine’?”
I shake my head. “Didn’t need to. The knife said it for him.”
Kristy fans herself with both hands now. “Jesus. And you let him dick you down after that? With his mask on?”
“It … kind of happened.”
She slaps my arm. “Kind of happened? Girl, you got raw-dogged in the woods by your hot, possessive neighbor. Meanwhile, I got a near-quickie with Ghostface Wannabe and a bark rash on my ass.”
I sigh. “Kristy—”
“Nuh-uh. I refuse to be the B-plot in your slutty horror arc. I demand a rewrite.” She cackles. “But first, I gotta pee.”
“Right now?”
“Yup.” She does a frantic little dance. “Adrenaline dump. I’m about to water these ferns.”
I grab her arm before she can push down her shredded shorts. “There are cameras everywhere.”
“Says the woman who just got railed against a tree. Like prom night at Camp Crystal Fucking Lake.” Kristy wriggles free, utterly unbothered. “Come on, Payton. Bar’s already set. What’s a little moonlight stream compared to public deforestation sex?”
I groan, adjusting my skirt like that’ll somehow erase the crime scene still throbbing between my thighs. “Can’t you pee in secrecy? Like a normal person?”
She winks. “Normal is for people who didn’t get knifed into an orgasm.”
My brain short-circuits somewhere between knifed and orgasm, and all that comes out is a strangled, “It wasn’t like that.”
Kristy shoots me a look that’s ninety percent disbelief and ten percent awe. “You got claimed. Staked. Impaled. Own it.”
She disappears into the bushes. Still giggling.
And I’m left standing here. A violated fern at my feet. Trying to figure out if I need therapy—or round two.
“Kristy, wait.” I stumble after her. “Let’s find an actual restroom. I need to wash this mud off anyway.”
She glances back, grinning. “Just mud?”
I roll my eyes, hunting for a comeback.
She laughs. “Relax, Panty McMudstain. Pretty sure it’s biodegradable. Like your dignity.”
I flip her off as we tromp through the trees. “Wonder how Lana’s doing.”
Kristy pushes a branch out of her way, strutting a few paces ahead. “Well, I bet you’re in the lead for best night so far.” She tosses me a smirk over her shoulder. “Unless Lana’s out there getting railed by Pigface and the Reaper in a tent full of fake intestines.”
I make a face. “Ugh. Don’t remind me who she ended up with.”
Kristy grins. “Lucky us, right? Admit it. You’re living your best slutty scream queen life.”
And annoyingly … she’s not wrong. “How do you even know where the restroom is? Or where we are?”
Kristy shoots me a look like I’ve questioned her ability to breathe.
“Babe. I pre-gamed with three shots and the event map. I may not know my own blood type, but I can sniff out a Porta-John like a truffle pig on a bender.”
I snort. “Great. So we’re navigating a horror-themed forest in the dark, and my guide is a tipsy GPS with resting bitch face.”
She throws me a wink. “Better than trusting your dick-dazed internal compass. Pretty sure you left half your brain back there.”
“Not my brain.” I tug my hoodie tighter.
“See? Slutty. Scream. Queen. You’re practically final girl-ing with benefits. Where is your man, by the way?”
“Out there … somewhere. Fetching my backpack.”
“Aww. Look at you, domesticating the predator. Next, you’ll be sharpening his knives before he heads off to stab the nine-to-five.”