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TWENTY-THREE
Remi
Consciousness slowly seeps in. I'm cocooned in warmth and feel infinitely safe. Blissfully, I snuggle in closer, never wanting to leave. I rest in this place of peace—somewhere between remembering and forgetting—before reality slowly creeps in. My left and right hands twitch, feeling supple, muscled flesh underneath them, and I recall exactly where I am.
Nestled between Cashel and Bentley, in a place I both love and hate. I sold my soul to these two devils, and I just pray it’ll be worth it. As I bask in the bruising throb of my swollen core, the sting still searing on my ass from multiple spanks, and the pulse of my abused breasts and nipples, my mind flits to the map. The hoops I jumped through to get the damned thing solidify its importance, and my survival always comes first, no matter the price. At least, that’s what I tell myself to soothe the ache growing inside of me—a cross between guilt and shame—because sometimes it’s easier to play the victim.
Next to me, the boys rouse, and I pretend to be asleep. To my left, I sense Bentley raise an arm to run a hand through his dark, and likely disheveled, hair. “Some night,” he murmurs in a husky voice.
“Some fucking night,” Cashel echoes.
It takes everything inside of me not to smirk. At least these two are just as shaken as I am, but my feminine satisfaction quickly disperses when I calculate the magnitude of what we've done and the punishment that surely lies in wait—but that's a worry for another day. I have enough on my plate to be concerned about.
Like this fucking map. What the hell does it represent?
Unfortunately, there’s no time for me to examine it because a blaring bell sounds as Cashel and Bentley jump out of bed. The blond devil leans over to shake me. “Get up, lass. We’ve got to go.”
“What's going on?” I slur groggily, my throat slightly sore from last night’s activities—partly from having two different cocks shoved down it and partly from coming so many times and belting out my pleasure.
“It's the breakfast alarm. We need to move our asses. If we're all not down there in time... ”
Bentley doesn't finish his sentence because he doesn't need to. We already have enough punishments in our near future and don't need any more. I quickly toss on my rumpled shirt and skirt from last night, cursing the powers that be for not providing me with underwear or a bra after my shower. Then I throw up my blonde curls into a messy ponytail.
The dorm room doors unlock just as the boys finish getting dressed, and as a unit, they leave. I wait a beat before sneaking out and blend in behind a group of students, hoping no one notices me coming from the boys’ wing.
Luckily, as I merge with the students on the steps and head down to the cafeteria, everyone seems too frantic to care where I came from. No one speaks, and the trepidation hangs like a palpable noose in the air, waiting to strangle us to death. A single guard leads the silent convoy of students as we ponder what’s in store for us today. The whole group seems subdued, and I wonder how much life is left in all of us. Even if we’re still fighting, this shit takes a toll on you mentally and physically.
Is Principal Windsor just waiting until we slowly all die off?
With this haunting thought, I enter the cafeteria, and my gaze immediately seeks out the dark blue one of Professor Vaughn, but I don’t spy him and my stomach flips. Is he waiting to punish me for spending the night with the boys? The idea makes my pussy clench, and I grit my teeth against the wave of arousal that sweeps through me. I’m seriously fucked in the head. Bitterwood has turned me into a basket case because I shouldn’t crave his touch, but here I am hoping to be punished by the man again.
Except Bentley and Cashel will torture me—and not in the sexy way—if I do anything with Professor Vaughn. They made that and their distaste for himveryclear last night. Studiously, I avoid my new “masters”, who sit toward the opposite end of the room. I prefer to keep to myself and ponder the new predicament called my life.
Shoveling in the disgusting gruel that passes for food, I grimace and wonder why Windsor couldn't at least afford to feed us better. It’s probably another punishment on his part—perhaps the cruelest one yet—when a tray plunks down next to me. Startled, I look up into the deep brown eyes of my roommate, Bianca.
“Where were you last night?” she asks in a hushed whisper.
This would be the perfect moment to taunt her—to pretend that I was with her boyfriend—but I saw her face yesterday. There’s an emptiness in her gaze from whatever she experienced during the scavenger hunt, and that horror now lives deep inside of her. I can't find it inside myself to egg her on anymore. Maybe she sees the same thing in me because when I answer, “Just doing something to survive,” she gives me a sad, solemn nod of acknowledgement, as if to say,“Aren't we all?”
We eat in silence, side by side, not quite friends, but not really enemies, either. I force myself to choke down the disgusting porridge because I don't know what today has in store nor do I know when I'll eat again. Next to me, Bianca seems to be doing the same thing, and our baleful glares are identical replicas of our opinion of the repulsive food.
We catch each other's stare, and a small, hysterical bubble of laughter creeps up and out of my throat. To my surprise, she mirrors me as we dissolve into giggles, cackling like a pair of lunatics. Across the room at the front of the cafeteria, the giant, blank screen bursts to life. Instantly, our smiles fall because Principal Windsor’s sinister face appears.
“Good morning, students! Isn't it a lovely new day?” Nobody answers him because it's a rhetorical asshole question. “I hope everyone had a successful day yesterday at the scavenger hunt because that success will determine whether you live or die today.”
His words send a chill down my spine, and the gruel gurgles uncomfortably in my stomach. Every day when I wake up at this living nightmare called Bitterwood, I expect to be confronted with an obstacle whose defeat could mean life or death for any one of us. So I’m not exactly surprised by Windsor’s words, but I’m so fucking aggravated by the mystery they hold, by the information he doesn’t tell us. That's what I despise the most…not knowing what’s to come.Of course, it's exactly what Principal Windsor wants, for everyone to be flummoxed and unprepared making our deaths that much sweeter.
For the millionth time since I've woken up at this hellhole of a school, I wonder what this man gains from all his assholery—maybe just the sick satisfaction of torturing other souls. There are truly evil people in the world that don’t care about money. They just want to see others suffer by their own hand.
Principal Windsor is probably one of these perverted fucks who gets off to watching others die. His deep-timbered voice brings me out of my musing. “Be sure to clean your plates like good little boys and girls. You’re going to need all the energy you can get because the next event starts in sixty minutes.”
A timer goes up on the screen under him, Principal Windsor’s lips stretch into a vicious, victorious grin.
Sixty minutes until what starts?
“Of course, not everyone will be participating today—some of you have a pass.”
At the principal’s new announcement, I feel Bianca tense next to me and recall what Bentley and Cashel said about their pass—the terrible things they had to do to get it were left unsaid...
