Page 57 of King of Malice
“And I meant it was local to her.” He looks over at me, but that does little to calm me.
In fact, his sidelong glance makes my chest grow tight. “And where is that?” As the highway slips by, all that I can see is open desert.
“Not far now. There’s a small, forested area that’s fed by a river. We have cabins there that we use for The Hunt.”
“The Hunt,” I repeat, a tingle of dread moving down my spine. Dimitri was very specific that he couldn’t share details. I’m surprised that Trent mentions it at all.
“After The Hunt, we like to have a quick place for the winner and the prize to go.”
“The winner? The prize?” I don’t like my friend being referred to as a prize. I look over at him, clasping my hands to stop them from shaking. Why is he telling me this? And why am I just parroting back key words?
“The women volunteer. Most of them are like Cadence, they struggle to build meaningful relationships in the outside world and are looking for a way to disrupt their own patterns. A neural reset of patterned thinking if you will. A way to break their cycle of behavior. Dimitri could tell you more about it.”
“Dimitri knows about neural resets?”
Trent gives me a knowing stare accompanied with a smirk. “Did he not tell you? I’m not surprised. The two of you don’t know each other that well and you did betray him.”
A drum beats in my chest as the blood rushes in my ears.
“Dimitri studied neurobiology before his father forced him to quit and join the family business. But he uses the knowledge he acquired to change the lives of so many women. Something about the fear response helps create new neural pathways better than any other response. If you ask me, he’s attempting to rewrite his mother’s ending, but it makes sense I’d think that. I studied psychology.”
I stare at him, hardly able to catch my breath as the shaking takes over my whole body. Any other time, I’d enjoy the tidbit I’ve just learned about Dimitri but in this moment, I can only think of my friend. “Cadence did this? She allowed a man to hunt her? Capture her?”
“Not man. Men. Five of them. Zane was the winner.”
“That’s not how she was hurt?” I cry, fumbling to pull out my phone and call Dimitri. Somehow, I just need to hear his voice to assure me I haven’t stepped into danger. Because this has started to feel…crazy.
But Trent plucks the phone from my hand before I’ve even processed what he’s doing.
I let out a small cry. “That’s my phone!”
He doesn’t answer. Instead, he rolls down the window and tosses the phone out of the moving car.
I whip my head around, seeing the lit screen as the phone lands on the tar, bouncing a few times before it comes to a stop. I watch until it goes dark, my throat closing as I clutch the back of my seat.
I’ve made that mistake before, thinking that a manattacking me was all just a misunderstanding. There is no mistake here, and no point in asking for more information. Trent is not telling me his motivations.
I draw in a jagged gulp, trying to calm my spinning thoughts as the blood rushes in my ears.
I wrap my arms around my middle. “Where are we really going?” I just manage to whisper through ragged gasps.
“The Hunt,” he answers with a sneer. “You are the next prize.”
“No.” But my voice isn’t much more than a whisper. I can hardly make it work.
“And by the way, a man claims the prize by fucking her. On the ground in the dirt, or against a tree for any of the other players to watch.”
I curl into a ball, the very idea of men fighting, one of them brutally taking me, makes my brain go white and then black.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Dimitri
“Trent is late,”I look down at my watch and then grimace at the five men in front of me. If I’d been paying more attention the last few days, I would have never agreed to this line-up of fighters.
We have applicants by the hundreds, but I’m very careful about whom I accept. They are men of the strongest variety. Soldiers, fighters, stockbrokers, all top of their field and all looking for a deep, meaningful connection with a woman the modern world makes difficult.
The women who participate want the same. A true protector and provider. But I am careful to pair each female with the right contestants.
