“You cocksucking bastard!” she shrieked.

I took one last shot, then turned off my camera. That should do it.

“Consider this a lesson why you shouldn’t trust strangers you meet on the Internet,” I told her, offering a nasty smile. “I’m gonna go get something to clean up the glass. Be a good girl while I’m gone—unless you want another lesson? I can do worse than pictures, you know.”

I opened the door and stepped out quietly. She screamed at me again, the sound tearing through me as I jogged down the stairs.

Skid looked up from the couch and cocked a brow.

“Do I wanna know?” he asked.

I shook my head.

“Naw, just took your advice,” I replied. “I hurt her bad. Should be enough to do the trick.”

“Right thing to do, brother.”

I shrugged.

“Guess so. Fuckin’ sucks.”

“Yeah, that’s why I don’t usually follow my own advice,” Skid muttered. “Glad you did it, though. Frees her up to find someone else. Get her out of this game.”

“Every once in a while, I wonder what life would be like outside the club,” I admitted, rubbing a hand through my hair. “You know, if we didn’t have all this shit to deal with? If we could just live like normal people.”

“Never gonna happen, so might as well forget it,” Skid replied. “Hell, you’d be bored off your ass. Can you imagine holding down a regular job? Fuck, what would you even do? I know you’re fuckin’ great at hunting people down, taking them out—”

“Don’t say shit like that, bro.”

Skid laughed.

“My bad. You’re fuckin’ great at whatever it is you do for Burke,” he said. “Probably fetching coffee, delivering flowers. Shit like that. But a regular job? You’d be fucked, man. It is what it is.”

“Sometimes I hate this.”

“Yeah, me, too. But you know what? Sometimes it fuckin’ kicks ass, so let’s focus on getting through the next day or two. Then we’ll head back home and get you laid. She’s not the only pussy in the world.”

“Don’t talk about her like that.”

Skid snorted.

“Fuckin’ pussy.”

“I said don’t talk about her like that.”

“I was talkin’ about you, asshole. Biggest damned pussy in the house.”

This time I decided tackling him was worth the effort.

EM

I refused to speak when Hunter finally returned, focusing my gaze exactly two inches above his right shoulder. After a few minutes of one-sided conversation, he gave a frustrated sigh and walked me over to Sophie’s room.

She’d been cuffed to a bed just like me, and even in sleep she looked as rough as I felt. Shit. I hoped to hell Skid hadn’t decided to teach her the same kind of “lesson” Liam gave me.

“You okay?” I asked, sitting down on the side of the bed. She opened her eyes slowly, face twisting.

“I need the bathroom,” she whispered.

I looked over at Liam—no, Hunter. I needed to remember that. Liam was the imaginary nice guy. Hunter was the giant douche who’d taken dirty pictures of me.

“Can she go to the fucking bathroom?” I asked, not bothering to hide my hatred.

“Yeah,” he replied, his face blank. He walked toward us and I scooted out of the way, glaring at him while he unlocked Sophie’s cuffed arm. “C’mon. Both of you.”

I grabbed Sophie’s hand and pulled her across the hallway and into the bathroom.

“I can’t believe how stupid I was,” I told her, feeling sick. “I actually invited him to come and meet me. I made it so easy. Idiot.”

Sophie used the toilet and then washed up, cupping her hands to get a drink. She seemed so quiet, so subdued. I couldn’t understand why she wasn’t more pissed. Hell, she should be pissed—at me. I got her into this shit.

“Do you have any idea what’s going to happen to us?” she asked. “Skid scares the crap out of me.”

“Did he hurt you?” I demanded, feeling my blood pressure rise.

“No.”

“That’s good,” I muttered. “This is a pretty fucked-up situation. Toke—he’s the one who cut me at the party—he’s gone off his rocker. This shooting thing makes no sense to me at all, but if it really happened, we’re screwed. Nobody knows where Toke is, not even Deke, and he’s Toke’s president. They’ve all been looking for him since the party. Cutting me was not okay, and Dad wants to make sure he pays for it.”

“Shit,” she said, eyes wide. “So your dad couldn’t give them this Toke guy, even if he wanted to?”

“I don’t think so,” I said slowly, wishing I could fix things—for her, if not for me. Hell, Sophie was a mother. What would her little boy do without her? “I mean, he’s really protective of me. When Toke hurt me like that, Dad lost it. If Dad could find him, he’d be found already. We’re pretty fucked here, Sophie.”

“Do you think they’ll hurt us?” she asked, her face pale.

I thought about my answer carefully. I didn’t want to freak her out, but I wanted to be honest.

“Liam won’t,” I said, and for some reason I believed it. Maybe because he hadn’t raped me? “I mean, he won’t hurt me. I don’t think he’ll hurt you, either.”

She cocked her head at me.

“You do realize he was lying all along, right?” she asked. “Just because you liked him doesn’t mean you can trust him.”

I almost started laughing, because that was rich.

“Oh, I know that. Believe me, I’m well aware that I’m the fuckwit that got us into this.”

“You’re not a fuckwit,” she said forcefully. “He’s a liar and he’s good at it. Not your fault that he targeted you.”

“You guys okay in there?” Hunter called through the door.

“We’re fine,” I snapped. “Give us a fucking minute, asshole!”

Christ, I wanted to kill him.

Sophie’s eyes widened.

“That was pretty bitchy,” she hissed. “Do you think that’s smart? Maybe I’m reading the situation wrong here, but don’t we want him in a good mood?”

I snorted, thinking about those pictures.

Hunter was such a prick.

“Fuck that. I’m a Reaper and I’ll be damned if I’ll suck up to some Devil’s Jack dickwad.”

“Well, I’m not a Reaper,” Sophie said, her voice quiet but hard. I looked at her, startled—this was the first real emotion she’d shown. “And I’d just as soon not die here and leave Noah an orphan, so don’t piss him off.”

That took the wind out of me. Shit, I needed to be thinking. I knew it was up to me to get us out of this, and to pull it off I’d need to use my head. Damn. We finished up and left the bathroom. Hunter jerked his head toward Sophie’s bedroom. It took everything I had to obey him quietly, but I kept picturing Sophie’s boy and reminded myself I had to be smart about this.

“Go lie down on the bed.”

We did what he said. Thankfully, he only cuffed one hand each, which was far more comfortable than having both stuck up over my head. I tried to ignore him as he leaned over me, tracing a finger across my cheek.

“I’ll bring you some food,” he murmured.

“I’m gonna buy a bright red dress to wear to your funeral, Liam,” I hissed. Shit. I needed to control my tongue …

“Yeah?” he asked. “Make sure it’s short and shows off your tits.”

“I hate you.”

“Keep tellin’ yourself that,” he muttered, then walked out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

I closed my eyes, trying to picture a dress bright and slutty enough to send just the right message as I stood over his coffin. Sophie cleared her throat.

“Don’t worry,” I muttered. “We’ll find our way out of this. We’ll escape somehow. Either that or the guys will find us.”

I wondered if she believed me.

Probably not. I didn’t even believe myself.

HUNTER

I slapped together two peanut butter sandwiches, feeling strangely guilty because Skid and I had killed all six pizza pockets between us while we played Halo.

That left sandwiches and stale potato chips for the girls.