by Rachel Shane
Hands tugged on the back of his mask to untie it, but Brett swatted them away.
“Come on, let me help you.” In one swift motion, the hand unknotted the mask and tugged it off Brett’s head.
Brett winced, trying to look away fast, his eyes meeting the other guy next to him, a tall black guy who squinted in confusion. “Who the hell are you?”
Brett’s chin quivered. Every head turned to face him. Fireflies dipped and swooped overhead, ephemeral spotlights flickering on and off and illuminating each guy’s shocked expression. A copse of tall trees encircled the group like a cage, locking them into a small meadow. Brett pointed to his duct taped mouth as if that would excuse everything, but the guy next to him ripped it off for him. Pain stung across his lips.
Brett held up his hands in surrender. “Look, I don’t know what’s going on but I think I was mistaken for Thomas.” So much for performance art.
“Fuck.” The first guy paced along the dirt clearing lined with thick trees circling them from every side. “We can’t trust him.”
“Shit, Enzo, what if he rats?” a blond guy with a puka shell necklace asked no one in particular.
“I’m not going to tattle,” Brett said fast, but his voice squeaked on the last word. If he still held his phone, he’d probably be punching out a text to ShadowGirl, giving her play by play as the situation unfolded, maybe even going so far as to ask her to check on Maya for him.
“Oh, this is bad. This is so fucking bad.” Enzo paced back and forth again, feet crunching over snapped twigs. “If the school finds out, we’ll lose our charter.”
“We’re not even in the fucking fraternity yet.” Blond punched a tree trunk, the leaves rattling like cheerleader pom poms. “Fuck! Maybe they’ll just flush us out before initiation and get new pledges next semester. It’s happened before.”
An itchy crinkle of shame raced up Brett’s spine as the eager smiles on every guy standing beside him flatlined. And poor Thomas must be knocking on a door, waiting for someone to open it for the pledging ritual that would never happen for him.
“Huddle up.” Blond walked backward, waggling his fingers toward his chest like he was directing traffic. The other guys rushed across the grass, leaving Brett alone in their dust on the opposite side of the clearing. Brett took a step toward the group but Blond shook his head. “Not you.”
“But—my sister. She’s back on campus and alone and—”
The pack of freshman turned their backs on him and huddled in their boxers. They each looked like they’ve had some experience with sports or fights or even just blessed genetics. Anything that would give them an advantage in a battle of fists. Their voices were a flurry of whispers with some exasperated shouts.
Brett studied the dirt-covered ground, trying to pretend they weren’t talking about him. At least when people talked about him in school, they had the decency to do it behind his back.
A minute later the Blond guy left the huddle and waltzed back to Brett. The other guys hung back, watching with wary expressions.
“Name?” Blond asked Brett, his face flat.
Brett opened and closed his mouth. Superheroes had secret identifies for a reason. “Blake,” he finally said. “Yours?”
The blond guy bristled. He glanced back at his future brothers, who nodded at him. “Nick. Are you in another house?”
Brett shook his head fast. “I’m a prospective.” He decided not to mention his sister again. Not yet. These guys looked ready to ditch him entirely. He had to become one of them. He stole from Poe’s playbook: performance art after all. “But I’m hoping to come here next year and rush Out house.” Was rush the correct word?
Nick nodded at him and went back to the group. Brett felt like he was on trial and these guys were his jury. They could acquit him or commit him.
As they debated, Brett switched his weight from foot to foot on the moist grass. The tree behind Brett swayed as a flock of birds took off into the night sky, the rushing sound nearly stopping Brett’s heart. Between every trunk, he swore he spotted glowing yellow eyes watching him, waiting to taste his flesh. After another few minutes of discussing, the group swaggered toward him.
“All right,” Nick said. The others behind him crossed their arms like backup dancers. “Here’s the deal. You keep your mouth shut, you get to stay. And then maybe next year you do this for real.” He held out his hand.
Brett’s eyes darted from one guy to another, his paranoia on high alert. But each one wore a smile now. They had decided to include him. Keep him. Make him one of their own.
With shaky fingers, he lifted his hand. Nick slapped him five, then twisted his fingers and bumped knuckles in what seemed like a complicated handshake guys always did in movies. A secret handshake. A secret Brett was now in on.
CHAPTER 17
HARPER
By the time Harper stumbled back to the makeshift parking lot party, it had dispersed. Or more likely it had been broken up. Several police officers milled about, inspecting the tapped kegs. She gasped when she spotted two of the soccer teammates in their custody, moonlight glinting off the handcuffs tied behind their backs. She faced a choice: own up and take the fall for everything or flee now with enough time to take Connor down for good.
The girls gave her the tiniest shake of her head, warning Harper away.
Harper winced at the idea of abandoning her future teammates, but she spun on her heels and fled from the scene of her crime. Ducking in the shadow of a few bushes lining the boys’ dorm, she pounded out a text to Starr. Are you okay? I’m hiding behind the bushes on the east side of Day Hall.
Translation: are you caught too?
She stared at the screen, swiping it alive every time it had the gall to try to go dark. No texts. No little ellipses indicating Starr was typing. Her stomach squeezed with something like guilt. Or maybe defeat. She banged out a few more texts to Blake in the hope of calming her nerves, but he wasn’t answering either.
A few branches rustled and before Harper could make sense of the sound, Starr was sliding next to her.
Harper let out a breath. “Thank God you’re okay.”
“It’s not God’s doing, honey.” Starr patted her feet. “It’s these babies. Playing soccer for the last eighteen years has finally come in handy.”
A laugh wriggled its way up Harper’s throat, but it died on her tongue. “I’m sorry. A few girls got caught. I—”
Starr flung her arm out in a no big deal gesture. “We knew what we were getting into when we agreed. It’s all not your fault.” She pursed her lips. “It’s the boys’ fault. They called the cops on us. Did you get what you need?”
Harper swallowed hard and shook her head.
“Crap,” Starr said. “Come on then. Let’s go back and regroup. Come up with Plan B.” She leaned in conspiratorially. “This is what I like to refer to as a TV time out.”
Harper snorted, grateful that Starr’s first instinct was to make jokes when Harper’s was making herself scarce.
The two gripped arms and darted their heads around the corner. Harper could feel Starr’s steady pulse amp beneath the veins of her wrist. It matched the increased tempo of her own pulse, the way her blood seemed to be pounding loud enough for others to notice.
A few guys stood in front of Day Hall, their arms crossed like bodyguards. A girl with a springy ponytail tried to bypass them to hop up the steps, but the guys shook their heads and stepped in her path, blocking her. Her arms flailed as she shrieked to them, a few of her words piercing the air. Boyfriend. Inside. Calling. She lifted her phone to her ear and tapped her foot impatiently. Her entire demeanor changed a few minutes after listening to whatever her boyfriend said on the other line. She dropped her cell phone to her side and retreated back down the steps with an angry stomp.
Starr whistled through her teeth at the display, then whisked Harper back to her dorm. “Looks like he’s not taking any chances this time.”
Harper nibbled on her inner cheek. Connor ne
ver did anything half assed. He once dropped everything to drive overnight to Vegas when his older cousin needed to gamble for a little extra cash. When he cooked Harper dinner one night, he didn’t just cook an entreé, he cooked a ten course tasting feast complete with an amuse bouche and a sorbet palette cleanser in between. When he took her to winter formal this year, he showed up in a horse-driven carriage complete with a driver wearing pantaloons and a feather cap because that was exactly what Prince Rupert did for Adora. Before she stabbed him in the chest, anyway.
Inside Starr’s dorm room, they sat on the floor facing each other, bouncing off ideas for Plan B. It was like a mental soccer relay, with Harper assisting and Starr kicking toward the net.
“We could…” Harper glanced around Starr’s room for ideas. Her shelves were filled with items that seemed to be carefully curated for inspiration and admiration. Gold plastic soccer trophies spanning back fourteen years. Wire soccer figurines posed in fierce striking positions. The Olympic symbols cut out of construction paper and looping above the TV. Her walls were covered with posters of famous women’s soccer players interspersed with inspirational quote posters written in fancy swirly fonts. Set your goals. Potential is just untapped skill. Aim high, but only if the goalie is ducked low. Harper grinned at that one.
Connor’s room was decked with scantily clad girls lining the walls as if he needed to constantly prove his manhood. Harper had tried to protest but Connor had simply pointed at his roommate’s side, which contained similar women in bikinis, as if that proved his point. And Harper guessed it did. Connor was a follower. And a jerk. And a womanizer.
“We could fake a truce?” Smoking him out didn’t work and Harper had lost all sense of surprise. Unless they used it to their advantage.
Starr wrinkled her nose. “The boy’s got a naked photo of you he’s threatening to send around. He doesn’t want a truce. He wants something else. We find out what that is and give it to him. Or at least make him think you’re giving it to him.”
Harper slumped against Starr’s bed, folding her knees into a tent and burying her face against them. “He wants an internship with my dad, which doesn’t even start for another month and a half.” A month and a half in which Harper would be a marionette tugged by his puppet strings. The threads were already strangling her.
Starr’s face sank. “Then we need to find dirt on him. Use it to even the playing field. If he reveals yours, you reveal his. And voila!” She flourished her hands. “He loses the upper hand.”
It sounded good…except for one big problem. “I don’t have any dirt on him.”
“Crap. Then we have to find another way to get past his little body guards and into his room.”
“Without him being in there,” Harper pointed out.
“Right. What we need is a distraction. We need a—”
A loud scream echoed the hallway followed by the thunder of hundreds of footsteps pounding close.
“What the—” Starr leaped to her feet, Harper only a few steps behind.
The screams increased, more voices joining the fray. Starr wrenched open the door and screamed herself. Harper had just enough time to see a stampede of rats scampering through the hallway before Starr slammed the door shut. Except it didn’t close. Instead a rat caught and wriggled through, scurrying right toward Harper.
She shrieked and jumped onto the bed. Starr let out a sound that could only be described as a bloody ear-piercing scream. She not only leaped onto the bed but onto Harper as well, wrapping her long limbs around Harper’s strong body. Harper could feel Starr shuddering as the rat wriggled into Starr’s gym bag.
Since she hadn’t shut the door, more rats rushed in like the girls were the Pied Pipers of Wisconsin. They whirled around the room, squeaking and burrowing under furniture.
“I…” Starr’s shaking rattled. “Am.” Her eyes widened at the sight of a rat burrowing in her discarded soccer jersey. “Terrified.” Her whole face went white. “Of rats.”
Cold panic climbed Harper’s spine. Outside the room, faint screams reverberated from the floor below. She was close enough to reach the door and peer out. Clear. She let out a slight breath. “Okay, we’re going to jump off this bed, run into the hallway, and close the vermin inside.”
Starr shook her head frantically, her teeth chattering.
“Your only other option is to stay here.” Harper grabbed a granola bar on Starr’s nightstand. “I’ll hold them at bay. You jump first. Count of three. One.”
Starr yelped.
“Two.”
Starr clutched Harper tighter.
“Three!”
Starr let go and donned the fiercest face Harper had ever seen as she pushed off the bed and landed in the hallway. One of the rats charged after her, Harper tossed down the granola bar onto the floor, still in the wrapper, but it was enough to distract the rat. She didn’t waste time leaping off the bed and landing with a thud into the hallway. She slammed the door shut and then leaned against it, her breath ragged.
A text vibrated in Harper’s pocket and she was grateful at least that she’d made it out with her cell phone.
Her hands curled into fists at the sight of the sender’s name. Connor.
You think I’m trash? Well now you know what I think of you. You’re a fucking dirty rat. You can thank my friend at the bio lab for the metaphor.
Cold panic sluiced through Harper’s blood. In any other circumstance, rescuing animals from testing would be a win. But this was inhumane to everyone involved.
Also? I figured out Blake’s real identity. Retaliate against me and he goes down too.
Shit. She couldn’t involve Blake in this. Harper’s knuckles turned white from squeezing her phone. She didn’t care about plans or decency or anything besides the hot revenge boiling in her veins. She squared her shoulders and marched right down the stairs. Only a lone rat scurried out of her path when she reached the nearly fifty girls huddled together inside the downstairs lounge, shaking. “They’re on the fourth floor,” one of them said. “We have them quarantined.”
“They’re also in my room,” Starr added in a shaky from behind Harper.
“I called animal control,” someone else said. But Harper didn’t stick around to hear anything else. She stomped right past the terrified girls into the dark night. Her feet trampled grass as she stalked the hundred feet it took to reach the guys’ dorm.
Harper didn’t even get within twenty feet of them when a sharp pain pierced her shoulder. It felt like a rubber band snapping on her skin. She shrieked and grabbed her arm, her fingers coming away with blue paint. Like an infection, the paint spread quickly. The spot throbbed with more pain than being hit with a soccer ball and when she glanced up, she spotted Connor, leaning out his window, aiming a paintball gun at her. Another shot fired from a different direction, this one stinging her side with a bloom of orange against her black outfit. Knifelike pain pulsed against her new wound. When she looked up again, five more guys were aiming paintball guns out the windows.
She threw her hands over her head to cover herself, racing away as the paintballs shot from all directions, striking her again and again.
CHAPTER 18
BRETT
“So good news, Broskies.” Enzo snapped his fingers for the others to follow him. “I may or may not have gotten tipped off about tonight’s festivities by my older brother.”
“You’re shitting me!” Nick slapped him five in the same way he’d just slapped Brett.
“Fuck yeah!” a few others shouted. Brett made a mental note that joining a fraternity meant shrinking his vocabulary to only a few necessary words. All of them four letters.
“Follow me. I’ve got all the essentials we need.”
A brigade of boxer-clad boys jumped on Enzo, pounding him on the back. The boys weaved in and out of thick trees, disappearing into darkness for a few seconds before moonlight seeped through the leaves. Twigs scraped against Brett’s arms, tangling in his hair. His bare feet plodded o
ver knobby roots and the tickle of moss. Pain exploded in Brett’s soles. After only ten seconds of following the brigade, he was panting and sweaty.
Several minutes and far too many sharp branches later, Enzo stopped short in front of a formation of three trees, their heavy branches drooping like awnings. He stepped aside to reveal a white cooler behind him, flourishing at it with his palms. He bent down, flipped it open, and plucked out a six-pack dripping with icy water. He held it above his head in Circle-of-Life victory. The other guys cheered.
Lines cupped the edges of Brett’s eyes and streaked across his brow. This was his “essentials?” Booze? Not something that would help them survive? A flashlight. A fully charged cell phone. Hell, Brett would even settle for a freaking compass. Anything that might make it easier to navigate the woods and the hours long walk back to campus so he could find his sister and complete ShadowGirl’s scavenger hunt.
The guys passed the beers around, the pops and fizzes curling into the air. Brett veered off to the side with his head ducked, waiting for it all to go to hell like it always did. With the last can hitting someone else’s hands and not his. But then cold aluminum brushing his wrist snapped him out of his trance. He glanced up to find Nick holding out a beer toward him like a peace offering.
“Thank you,” Brett whispered, not necessarily for the beer but for everything else. He clutched the cold can in his palms, took a deep breath, and then popped the top. At parties with Poe and Harper, he always volunteered to be the designated driver. Beer was never his vice; that honor belonged to the few quick hits from a joint while his friends weren’t looking. He patted his pants for his stash in his pocket and cursed under his breath when his palms only grazed boxers. So Brett tilted his head back and sucked down a big gulp, trying not to cringe at the after taste.
“So, man.” Nick pushed a low hanging branch aside and sidled up next to him. He smiled, all perfect teeth lined in a row like corn on the cob. “You really thinking of coming here?”
