61. Utah

CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE

utah

O f all the things that I imagined might’ve happened on this night out, coming to a silent agreement with Jersey that we were about to embark on a joint effort to scare these girls right into getting the other man laid tonight was not even in the top million.

But there was no denying that it excited Memphis. I wouldn’t have guessed she’d be ready to try games quite on this scale yet. She was still learning what she liked, still working her way through the emotions that came with certain things, still up for experiencing new things. This one, though. This felt like it could be way more intense than the other things we’d experimented with so far. Finding the middle ground between being the crazed predator that wanted only to make her mine out here in the fucking corn and still making sure she could see through that to the man I really was underneath, so she’d know she’d be safe through every part of it, felt like an impossible balancing act. It would ultimately just come down to whether or not she trusted me yet.

I froze right where I was when I heard movement behind me. The girls wouldn’t be anywhere near me right now, and I was starting to wonder just how many people were in this field in Halloween costumes for this maze. That could complicate this game in weird ways once I caught Memphis.

I couldn’t hide even a single bit of the shock that must’ve been on my face when Jersey popped up in front of me. He’d gone the other direction when this started.

“How the fu?—”

He smirked. “Marine, junior. Here,” he said and held something toward me. “Paid a couple of kids for these.”

I took a mask from his hand and just fucking laughed.

This had to be the weirdest moment of my entire life. I watched him put his on. It was fucking Venom . The villain from Spider-Man . His was mostly black with the facial features in purple. The one in my hands was black with the face in green.

“Laugh all you want, kid. But put it on,” he said. “You can thank me in the morning.”

He pulled the hood of his sweatshirt up so the only thing I could see of him in the darkness was the face itself.

“You know what you’re doing?” He asked.

Was he offering to stand out here and give me a fucking sex lesson?

“Uh, in this very moment, I can honestly say that I have never been more confused about anything in my life. But I know what body parts to use when I catch the girl who’s running from me.”

The demented chuckle that came from behind that mask was unnerving. Even for me.

“I’ll go back the other way. Catch them in the middle of us,” he said and started to walk away again.

This weird fucking day and that weird fucking guy.

That was pretty much the only thought that existed in my head.

“Kid.” He’d stopped again to face me while I put my own mask on. “Don’t take it too far. I’ll rip your spine right out through your mouth if you hurt her. And I’ll leave every piece of you to rot in this field.”

Well, at least that cleared up that part for me.

We could both be on Team Get Our Dicks Wet Tonight and still refuse to be friends.

I waited where I was for another couple minutes to give Jersey a chance to apparently fucking teleport to the other side of the field so the girls would be between us before I started creeping my way through the rows to listen for them.

They weren’t difficult to locate. We were far enough away from the maze that the screams from that were way different from the giggles of two girls who were out here playing sex games. I nearly laughed to discover that they were running the opposite direction if their goal was to make it back to the parking lot. It was very much on the dark side now and following them on the noise alone made the most sense. At some point, one of them realized that too and very audibly shushed the other. That was another moment that took a lot of effort on my part to hold in the laugh.

“We’re not going the right way,” Memphis whispered.

All the noise stopped entirely, aside from the heavy breathing of both girls. They’d stopped running for the moment.

“How do you know? You said you had your eyes closed,” Trista whispered right back.

“We’ve been running for too long. If we were going the right direction, we would’ve already made it back to the entrance.”

I heard movement from somewhere nearby and both girls gasped.

“I swear to God, J,” Trista whisper-shouted. “If you scare me just for the sake of scaring me, you’ll be the one who I smack the shit out of tonight. You know I will.”

“You can try , Fancy Face,” he said, and that weird demented fucking chuckle seemed to come from everywhere.

I felt better when Memphis giggled.

It erased that hint of panic in me that she might’ve actually hated every second of this.

Jersey might’ve been able to move with some outrageous superhuman speed, but silence was my strength. I spotted just a flash of his mask through the rows of corn across from where I was. I shifted through the rows so that I could walk almost directly behind Memphis.

“You might want to run, sugar,” I whispered while I held that path right past them.

“What in the actual fuck?” Trista screeched. “Why did that sound like he was right there?”

“Um, Triss,” Memphis whispered. “I think they’re wearing masks.”

“No point in whispering now, Memphis,” Trista laughed. “They’re obviously?—”

“Here,” Jersey finished for her from where he stood.

I watched Trista whirl around to face him, and she immediately backed up right into Memphis.

“Jesus motherfucking Christ,” she whispered that time.

“I thought we didn’t have to whisper anymore?” Memphis asked, ever so concerned with the logistics.

“That better be you, J,” Trista screamed at him. “I don’t think we agreed to the mask thing.”

The demented chuckle turned into a blast of fucking thunder when he laughed, and I realized he was giving me the chance to move with the noise. I stepped up right behind the girls again.

I leaned down as close as I could get myself to Memphis without touching her. “Last chance. Run.”

Trista screamed again, and both girls jumped forward to spin around to face me that time. I started to back into the rows of corn behind me to disappear into the dark again, but I got to watch Jersey take advantage of that moment too. He walked right up behind Trista, slapped a hand over her mouth, put his other arm all the way around her upper body to trap her arms against her sides, and he dragged her kicking and squirming right off into the corn.

“Oh, fuck me,” Memphis said quietly when she looked behind her and realized that Trista was just gone. “Triss?” she whispered into the dark.

“Wrong name,” I mumbled while I walked directly behind her just to disappear into the rows again. I waited in silence that time to watch her while she shifted her weight from one foot to the other, trying to decide what she might do. She was panicking. She whipped around to look in every direction at any noise that happened around us, but she couldn’t find me.

“Utah?” she asked, shakily that time.

I moved so I could sneak up behind her another time and she jumped when I grabbed the flannel where it sat over both her shoulders to drag it down her arms so I could lower my head to her bare skin.

“That’s closer,” I whispered and dragged part of the mask along her shoulder.

Colt.

It was all I wanted.

The way it sounded when she said it.

But she only ever called me by my actual name once I’d stripped everything else away.

She tried to breathe, and I didn’t imagine she’d be making another attempt at running with how poorly her lungs were already handling the situation.

Then this little munchkin of the corn elbowed me right in the ribs and disappeared into the darkness.

I laughed but gave her another few seconds of a head start.