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Laughter erupted all around me, seemingly coming from every shadow and blind spot. A violent shiver shot through me as the weight of stares seared my flesh, and I slowed to a stop despite my every instinct screaming for me to keep going, to run faster.
I desperately tried to find the source of both as I stumbled backward to lean against a tree. Somehow, the grayish-blue fog was growing thicker, more ominous as it twisted itself around and through the undergrowth. The next time the dark, husky laughter sounded, it didn’t come from a dozen mouths. It came from a single one that was so close to my ear that it tickled my skin and chased goosebumps down my spine.
As I slowly turned, I expected to find Rowan there, but there was nothing but empty space and the scent of pine, moss, and earth.
“I expected more of a chase from you, Moira Darling.” Rowan’s deep, raspy words sounded as if they’d rebounded off every solid surface before they collided with my eardrums. “Run, little girl. When I catch you, I don’t intend to leave any part of you untouched. Maybe you want me to do wicked things to your lithe body. Is that why you stopped running? Is that pretty mind of yours wondering if I’d be your filthiest, most depraved fantasy or a nightmare? The answer is both, but I promise that you’ll like it either way. Does it make your lovely, pink cunt wet when you think of how I’d feel stretching it while you begged me to ruin you? I’ve thought about little else since leaving you at the gate of your manor. How you’d taste on my tongue, or how you’d feel around my cock. But mostly, I imagine how you’d sound screaming my name as you come for me.”
Pushing off from the tree, I felt the fear growing as I stepped into the darkness. Branches scraped my flesh as I forced myself to move through them, abandoning the path I’d been moving through. The echo of branches snapping beneath footsteps caused my legs to pump faster, harder, which made them sting as the surrounding sounds began growing louder by the moment.
The wind caused the leaves to rustle high in the treetops before a shower of leaves rained down around me, even as I burst into an empty clearing. Spinning in a circle, I searched the shadows as hair-raising scratching sounds came from within them. Had I run in circles? Frustration simmered through me as I slowly treaded farther into it, as confusion creased my brow.
“Is this fun for you? Do you think this is funny?” I whirred through the chatter of my teeth as fear trickled down my spine. “What kind of psychopath thinks chasing a bitch through the woods is a good time?”
“Would it help you pretend you’re not into this if I said yes?” he asked, but his voice still came from every direction. It was as if I were standing in the middle of a tunnel and he spoke from both ends at the same time. “I can smell your body’s reaction to being hunted. You’re not that great of an actress or liar. You enjoy being the prey for the hunter. It’s okay to like it, Moira Darling.”
“You’re a fucking psychopath,” I whispered as my eyes rounded from the heightening of my senses. “No one enjoys being hunted like an animal.” Whispers of his touch slid over my battered flesh, sending tingles of pleasure over every inch of my body.
“No? Your heart isn’t pounding from the exertion, which has heightened all of your natural, animalistic instincts? Your anticipation hasn’t caused your pupils to fully devour those lovely, bottle-green irises? Right now, you’re searching the air for my scent because you’re hunting me even as I corner you. Your primal, basic fucking nature has been forcefully evoked and awakened. Which makes everything much more intense.”
While he wasn’t entirely wrong, it didn’t mean I wasn’t fueled by the need to runaway. I tried—and failed—to ignore the caveat that I wanted to run toward him, not away. The thought floored me as I realized I hadn’t been running from him this entire time. Was I the hunter? No, because Rowan was larger and much more primal. If I was being honest, I wasn’t running away. It was a dance of dominance. One I’d been losing because I hadn’t known the steps to the dance before entering the dancefloor.
“Ah, my enticing prey now understands the game is afoot,” he taunted. “The rules are easy enough. You run, and when I catch you, because I’ve always caught those I hunt, I’ll decide what happens next.” Every word he spoke seemed to drive my mind into a dangerously lustful state of emptiness. I didn’t merely crave to be filled, pleasured, and devoured—I needed it more than I needed air in my lungs.
“Those aren’t rules,” I returned in a breathy pant of air. “That’s like a play-by-play.”
“Will having rules help?” He licked his lips as I nodded my reply. “Fine. You can’t say no once you’ve agreed to play the game. You’ll be given a short head start, but it won’t help you much. Since you’re new to being prey, I’ll try to be gentle with you, Bishop.”
“And if I refuse to play?”
“You won’t.”
“But if I do, then what happens?” I asked with a pulse between my thighs, confirming his theory.
“I’d keep you here until you changed your mind. Slowly driving you insane with the need to play with me. I warned you that I wasn’t a good person. It shouldn’t surprise you that I’m willing to play dirty to get what I want.”
“And what the hell do you want, Teivel?” The voice that formed that demand must have belonged to a siren, because it couldn’t have been mine.
“To give you what you want.” His eyes sparkled with amusement as my thighs clenched together to stave off the ache his words caused. “You’re really not a good liar. The scent of your need is thick enough I could drink it, darling. Play the game, and I promise to ease the ache between your lovely thighs, which hasn’t stopped growing since the moment I dropped you off outside your grandmother’s manor.”
“Fine,” I conceded with an air of disinterest.
“Then there’s only one question left, Bishop.”
“And what would that question be?”
“When I catch you, which do you intend to take me as? Man, or beast? I assure you that there’s very little difference between them anymore.”
The thought of either option had arousal rushing to my slit, and my nipples pebbling so hard it was borderline painful. The idea of being ravished by some beast actually turned me on.
Admittedly, I’d always consideredBeauty and the Beastmy favorite fairy tale. However, that was because the Beast had a massive garden, library and magical beings to help me brew anything I’d want in his spacious manor. I’d never considered what I’d have wanted if he’d never returned to being a man. I mean, how desperate would I have been if he hadn’t?
“Which one would be gentle?” I felt his eyes on me everywhere, caressing every inch of my sensitive flesh all at once.
“Neither,” he growled huskily.
Shit, I was into this. My pussy clenched with the need to be stretched in the way he taunted me with earlier, and I was hungry to have him make me feel wild, primal and filthy. It was as if I’d shed the weight of social constraints and allowed the devolution to twist me into something else. Something that wasn’t held by rules or societal expectations and wanted to embrace every debauched whim I’d ever had.
“Holy shit,” I whispered.
