Page 22 of Striker

But Viper said Sniper just didn’t make the cut, so maybe it’s not my fault he was whipped and then removed from the school. In the end, it doesn’t matter.

I’m Striker.

I hit my target every time. I’m fast and smart and even though I’m prone to outbursts, I control it better than anyone here.

My gaze drifts to my brother with pale eyes the color of ice and beautiful, deep skin. I hope when he’s named he isn’t left wishing it was different.

Chapter 9

Cora

“Viper, can you atleast acknowledge you hear me talking?”

He doesn’t answer. He doesn’t look at me. Of course he doesn’t. Ever since that first day here, none of them have spoken to me. It’s like they’re worried if they speak, important information will slip out and I’ll know where I am, who they are, and what is happening.

They don’t have to worry about that. I’m clueless. The only thing I know is Clyde and Rune haven’t come for us. Viper told me they don’t know how to find us. At first I figured it was a scare tactic, but now I’m starting to believe him.

Viper adjusts his weight, his eyes on the cards in his hands. We’ve established a boring routine of them taking me down to the kitchen, watching me eat, and letting me outside. We do this three times a day, Striker usually the one to retrieve me, and even Reaper once, though I’m glad I haven’t seen him again. He’s too dark. His black eyes too intense.

In the evenings after I’m led from the garden back to my room, either Viper or Breaker will stay and play silent Gin Rummy, or Texas Hold’em until I’m yawing and then they leave.

Today is day seven and I’m so sick of cards, of them not talking to me, and of not knowing what is happening that I want to scream.

When I first woke up, I worried they’d torture us. Force us into depraved sexual acts and beat us. Keep us chained like animals. I never once worried I’d die of sheer fucking boredom.

Viper places a card down and takes another, acting like I didn’t just ask a question.

“Is she okay?” I ask for the third time today. “Do you play cards with her, too?”

Nothing.

“Rune used to play cards with Delly and me when we were kids.”

Viper’s eyes slide up to my face.

“He’d always let us win.”

Pretty blue-green eyes dip down to his cards. I didn’t notice in the club how his eyes are the color of the Mediterranean sea. I did, however, notice that night, just as I do now, how absolutely massive he is.

He’s leaned up against the metal headboard, his enormous body taking up what feels like half the bed. I’m at the end of the mattress, my back pressed to the railing of the footboard, my dress tucked under me. Even though they won’t let me out past the kitchen or the garden, made threats that sound more like promises, and won’t let me see Delly, I’m not scared. Not really. Not like when they took us.

I watched them kill Rune’s guards, but after that first day here, I don’t feel like they’d hurt us that way. Maybe it’s the way Viper and Breaker look at me. Or the way they touched usthat night. Roughly, their hands demanding but never pushing. Never forcing.

I could just be hanging on to a sliver of hope, but I don’t think so. I’m good at detecting the bad in people, having witnessed enough evil first hand to know when a man isn’t what he pretends to be.

And Viper, Breaker, Striker, they don’t feel bad.

Reaper though… he’s something entirely different.

“How did you guys get the nicknames?” I ask, remembering Breaker saying he was given the name as I shift, crossing my legs. Viper’s gaze locks on to my exposed thigh. My stomach flips.

Ripping his gaze from me forcefully, he adjusts his weight, and that’s when I notice it. The prominent outline of his dick straining against the thick fabric of his pants. Between my thighs pulses. I swallow, averting my eyes, but he catches me looking and I detect the subtle movement under his mask that tells me he’s smirking.

“Let me guess,” I say, blinking away the memory of that gigantic cock in my mouth. Of his hands on me, in me, pleasuring me in ways I’ve never experienced before. “You guys wrote down the stupidest codes names from video games and pulled them from a hat. You got last pick.”

His eyes narrow.

“And lost.”

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