Page 31 of Rat Race

Fuck. I love dominant partners.

They didn’t look back at me as they yelled, “So what? He’s a shit person, there’s nothing satisfying in going after him. You’ll get more money when you cross the finish line!”

I looked back at where we had left Hiram, ready to yell every curse in the book at him and promise to come back and cut off his head, but paused when I saw what we wereactuallyrunning from.Water.

It had started as a trail behind the rats, but then it quickly turned into a strong current.

I was jerked into the same hallway the mechanical bulls had come from as they pulled us far away from the water. I clearly wasn’t running fast enough because the cowboy got annoyed with my pace and pulled me into their arms. But it was too late. The stream just got stronger, the water crashing against the walls and following us.

I looked back to see Hiram attempting to follow us.

“What your fucking han?—”

I was cut off by a monstrous wave coming straight for us. Hiram’s face was the last thing I saw before it rushed in and knocked us Weston and I off our feet.

Cam

Crab boil

Some people just didn’t use the good sense that God graced them with.

The blonde’s outfit was suggestive, barely coverin’ her chest with thick pink straps attached to the scrap of fabric that the stylists had dared allege was a skirt. In a different setting, it would’ve been the sort of thing that would’ve earned a low whistle and the offer of a free drink. But down here? I barely had time to think before I was pullin’ the girl into my arms to get away from the water threatening to pull us down.

She was too slow, especially when she kept wanting to go back for that Architect.

Bloodthirsty little woman.I might’ve been running, but I could tell how rabid she was when I first saw her with him. Even behind the mask, her eyes were alight with anger. Her hand was steady when she held the spike over his chest.

She never wavered.

A woman like that would do well in the Games.And back home.Pa would arrange the wedding him-fuckin’-self if I ever took someone like her home. He wanted me to be happy, wanted me to succeed, but most importantly, he wanted the family’s legacy to continue. Having someone like her at my side wouldensure that the future of our family’s legacy wouldn’t just survive but thrive.

I lost my footin’ as the water caught up to us, swept around a bend quickly enough that I cracked my head and elbow against the stone walls and let go of the pretty blonde.

Pain ricocheted throughout my head and black spots sprouted across my vision. It was enough to make me lose my thoughts, even for just a moment before getting my shit back together.

Fuck. An injury like this can take me out for good if I’m not careful.

Ella and I’d been separated at some point, taking opposite directions in our mad dash to find higher ground. Which there didn’t seem to be any of. Just miles and miles of flat land that was still rapidly fillin’ with water.

Fuckin’ hell, you’d think they really are tryin’ to drown us.

What a boring way to knock out some of the competition. Not much of a show—there wouldn’t even be any blood.

The girl wasn’t far from me, but the current kept sweeping her up, and she was strugglin’ to swim against it.

Again the voice in my head that sounded strangely like Pa told me to leave her, but I used it as a sign that the opposite was probably the right thing to do.

“Grab hold!” I ordered the blonde, offerin’ my hand. She hesitated, a look of mistrust in her light blue eyes before grabbin’ on.

It turned out that self-preservation often won out in times like this, and sure, I wasn’t perfect, but I could sure as shit swim. Every year Pa forced me and my siblings into the freezing cold lake on the outside of our farm and had us swim laps until our lips were blue and our toes threatened to fall off.

This was a far cry from the terror of those times, so even with my injury and poundin’ head, I was sure to be fine.

I wrapped my arms around her slim body and pulled her as close as I could to me. We were swept along, our bodies twisting and jerking as the water took us along.

I tried to open my eyes and see where we were going, but it became murky, and I honestly thought it was safer to close my eyes than risk an infection.

My back hit the concrete walls more than a few times, and that threatened to pull the air from my lungs. Each time my grip got looser and looser on the woman until it was by the grace of her tiny arms wrappin’ around my neck that she was able to stay on.

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