The Hunter’s Game: Blood for Blood: 01

by Fox, Logan

  I was abused. Now I’m some kind of sexual deviant. Is that normal? Is this how I cope? Or is my fetish someone else’s vanilla?

  Sexuality is such a fucked up subject, I wouldn’t even know how to begin a conversation about it.

  “What happens now?” He times those parroted words to another violent thrust into my cunt with his fingers. My world tilts as pleasure spreads tendrils through my entire body. “I’m going to fuck you.”

  Yes, well, obviously.

  I force my eyes open and stare at him in open challenge. “And then?”

  A flicker of confusion, swiftly replaced with defiance. “You want more than that?”

  Before I have a chance to a retort, he bucks his hips into mine. The crown of his dick presses against my cunt, and it’s only the width of my hand still gripping him that’s preventing his cock from burrowing into me.

  It’s a struggle to keep my eyes open. It’s a struggle to fucking breathe. I want him inside me so badly, I’m salivating.

  But this is a chess match. We’re competing for something, even though I don’t know what it is.

  Territory?

  Power?

  He knows so much about me, maybe he knows that I like to be on top. I dominate while my mates submit.

  But Hunter will never submit.

  He’s a traditionalist in the worst way. He fucks his women, they don’t fuck him.

  Guess what, Doctor Hill? You’ll have to fight to win this bitch.

  I refuse to let go of his cock. When his hips buck forward in an attempt to penetrate me, no more than his lubricated tip goes inside me.

  I’m wearing a victorious smile, and I know he’s going to have perform some fucking Copperfield magic trick to get me to stop, and the fucker does just that.

  He kisses me.

  His mouth is my undoing.

  My mind tears apart like cotton candy under greedy fingers. I can’t resist him, not when I want him this badly. Every inch of my body aches for him and the punishment he will bestow upon me.

  He wrenches my legs apart, sliding his knee against mine as a stopper. I’m spread open to him. Vulnerable. Exposed.

  And, for the first time, it doesn’t feel like an invasion.

  This is a parlay.

  We’re trading, him and I.

  My body, my mind. It’s his.

  In return, he won’t destroy me.

  Because I know he’s capable.

  I didn’t imagine the chase. His eyes on me. The bunny blood.

  He’s an animal at heart. A beast that hides under sheep’s clothing. Or, in this case, a suit that costs more than I can wrap my head around.

  He kisses me hard and deep, like he’s mining for gold and eager to excavate every ounce he can find. At the same time, he slips his hand around mine and forces me to pump his cock as if I’m a ten-dollar whore he’s paying for a hand job.

  I might not be a ten-dollar whore, but I’m definitely a thousand-dollar whore.

  Luckily, he has enough cash to go around.

  I comply merely because I don’t have a fucking choice. But as long as he’s kissing me, I don’t give a fuck about what he’s using my body for.

  So I jerk him off against my cunt, wishing he’d fuck me instead but enjoying the fact that—for the moment—I won’t allow it.

  He slides on top of me, and the chenille throw that probably cost more than a second-hand car ends up on the floor. We’re both naked now, gleaming orange in the cabin’s voracious firelight, while, outside, a storm rages. But this cabin doesn’t leak, and the only howl is the wind in utter despair at the fact that it can’t work its way inside.

  Because he made sure the cabin was clean. Warm. Safe.

  The bed is a firm, orthopedic mattress decked in linens that must be Egyptian cotton, because I have a feeling that’s how Dr. Hunter Hill rolls.

  A rich hippy. I never thought I’d see the day.

  The rustic wooden bed frame might have suited the rest of the cabin. But I suspect Hunter never settles for anything less than a reclaimed masterpiece which a very talented craftsman spent several weeks building with his bare hands up in the Colorado mountains somewhere.

  I’m sure what makes him happy is knowing that no one else in the world has the same house, the same bed, the same redhead under them.

  Hunter pushes between my thighs. He spreads his legs, opening me to him.

  Somehow, he got my hands pinned over my head.

  Firelight caresses every defined muscle on his chest, stomach, and thighs. His cock stands proud, a demon in its own right and ravenous to boot.

  I’m trapped.

  Whatever hedonistic thinking drove me to this point of abandonment evaporates.

  I don’t take orders—I give commands.

  But just like the other night, his eyes twinkle with sudden debaucherous victory.

  “When a girl screams in the woods and there’s no one to hear,” he croons, putting his mouth by my ear as the tip of his cock brushes my cunt, “does she actually make a sound?”

  Chapter Sixty-Six

  Hunter

  The analytical half of my brain acknowledges the fact that Clover Vos is crucial to my research and, on those grounds, I can’t yet release her back into the wild.

  The other half of my brain, the one operating my cock, knows I want to fuck her so bad I can taste it.

  I think it’s the first time they’ve ever agreed on something.

  The woman I thought a wretched creature of excess lies beneath me, her lithe body twisting in some pathetic excuse for struggle. The orange light paints her pale skin a fantastic hue. I studied color therapy—it’s one of the programs I put patients through during their treatment—so I know orange promotes appetite. That’s why so many fast-food joints have either red or orange in their branding, their shops, their wrappers.

  I could eat this girl whole.

  The weed plays a part. I limit my intake purely because I can empty my entire refrigerator after a joint.

  Clover’s struggles are tiring my arms. It’s as if she hasn’t been on the run for the past forty-eight hours. Where does she get the energy?

  “Enough.” My voice sounds strangely solemn in our sacred temple. Outside, the wind beats an impotent fist against the door.

  It doesn’t rattle, of course. When I rebuilt this cabin, I made sure that, despite all outward appearances, it was perfectly designed. No leaks, no drafts, no rattling doors or windows.

  I also made sure it looked as close to the original as I could manage.

  Call me sentimental, if you wish.

  Clover stills under me, but defiance drawls a spectacular scowl over her mouth.

  “Either you obey me, or you leave.”

  She scoffs at me, her mouth twisting into a sneer. On cue, a violent gust of wind drives a hard patter of raindrops against the window. And, obviously, she must remember how horrible it was for her out there. The dirt, the mud…

  Which she’s still covered in.

  I reel back from her, not because the filth disgusts me, but because I’d barely noticed. She looks like a wild woman—a female Tarzan—and all I can think to do is fuck her?

  I pull Clover up from the bed with the grip I have on her wrists. We’re close again, bodies touching in such inappropriate ways that I almost forget all logic and just fuck her anyway.

  But I must do this right.

  She deserves it.

  Chapter Sixty-Seven

  Clover

  Hunter jerks me up.

  Our lips are less than an inch away, his breath puffing warm air against mine. At first, I think this is how he wants to do me, but then he moves back, drawing me to my feet.

  The floor is unsteady.

  No, wait. That’s me.

  There’s a small rug in front of the fire, and he draws me over to it.

  “What’s going on?”

  “I’m doing this right.”

  I want to smile, but he’s wearing such a serious expression I
don’t dare. I sink to my knees, and he sets my hands on my knees, positioning me.

  The fight I had in me leeches out in the wake of whatever the fuck he’s up to now.

  I can’t get an angle on this guy. The minute I think one thing, he does another. It’s like he—

  “Can you read my mind?” The question’s out, somehow without passing through border control first. “Like…you can, can’t you?”

  He chuckles, but more to himself than in answer to my question.

  Suddenly, I’m convinced that’s exactly what’s going on here.

  Nothing else makes sense.

  A hot, rich, psychic hippy.

  …The fuck, right?

  He goes into one corner and comes back with a bucket. As he sets it down, the water inside splashes around like it’s all happy and shit.

  I recoil, but he catches my elbow and keeps me in place. He studies me and then begins to wash my body.

  I won’t lie—it’s the most sensual thing someone’s ever done to me. Perhaps because he’s so fixated on my skin. As his gaze slides over me, goosebumps break out everywhere. His gentle touch seems such a stark contrast to the night he pinned me to his mattress and claimed me as savagely as a wolf. Now, he caresses me with a damp cloth, ensuring every streak of dirt has been wiped away before moving to a new area.

  He doesn’t clean between my legs though. When I glance down at the cloth, I’m glad—it’s changed color.

  To think I was that filthy.

  Ugh.

  That’s what happens when you live off the land for two days.

  He lets the cloth fall into the water and takes it back into the corner. As he moves, the shadows swirl around him as if they’re made of smoke and not darkness. I sway, pressing my palms to the floor when I almost tip over.

  Ayahuasca. That’s what he said he gave me, right?

  The name’s familiar, but I have no idea what the hell it’s supposed to do. Is it like shrooms? I’ve never gotten off on that hippy shit.

  Hot, rich, psychic hippy.

  I laugh, because I can’t not.

  This whole thing is so fucking ridiculous.

  Or is it?

  I won’t say I feel clear headed but it’s as if I’ve just emptied my attic from a lifetime’s worth of hoarded junk, and I never considered myself a hoarder.

  I feel light. Calm, despite the fact that I’m out here in the middle of a forest with a stranger who forced me to drink some hallucinogenic substance and just finished washing me.

  He comes back with a compact toiletry bag and zips it open.

  Wet wipes.

  I won’t say I’m surprised by them, but when I realize what he wants to do I push myself up to my knees and attempt escape.

  He makes a cooing noise. But I’m not a fucking bird that’s flapping around like an idiot after he startled me. I’m a human being. My life has meaning.

  Where did that come from?

  He yanks on my wrist, and I go down. When he catches my face in his hand, I try to twist it away but he follows relentlessly with that damp wipe, trying to clean my face. When I realize I’m acting like a snotty toddler who’s an hour late for nap time, I burst out laughing. My spine turns to jelly, and I lean into him as he cleans my face.

  He spends time on my lips, and more around my eyes.

  The wipe comes back streaked with black and red. Was I still wearing makeup? Gail wasn’t shitting me when she said her stuff was waterproof.

  Make that river proof, forest proof, and rain proof.

  He puts the dirty wet wipe in a brown bag. Then he jerks another from the container, catches my chin between his fingers, and shoves his hand between my legs.

  It happens so fast that I’m still in the process of gasping when he swipes over me with that cool, damp cloth. I try to move away, but then his perfectly manicured nails bite into my flesh.

  His eyes bore into me, challenging me to maintain eye contact as he does his worst.

  Where he was gentle on my entire body, he’s rubbing my cunt so hard I’m getting wet.

  Which is probably what he wants. He’s a veritable gentleman until he touches my most intimate places, then he turns into a fucking animal.

  My eyes start to flutter closed—fuck, I’m clean already—but he wrenches my head forward an inch as if commanding me to pay attention.

  He has his boxers on, and I remember him taking them off, but when did he put them back on?

  Hunter tosses the wet wipe into the fire, which consumes it with a hungry pop.

  “Am I that filthy?” I manage, despite his fierce grip on my jaw.

  “Not anymore.”

  Fury boils my blood. I shove him away from me and scramble to my feet. The room dips and sways, and I reach for the first thing I can find to steady myself.

  The bed.

  This fucking place is so tiny. A cage.

  My cage.

  “Let me out.”

  “In the rain?” Hunter gets slowly to his feet. His hard on is so fucking blatant, he shouldn’t even be bothering with the boxers.

  He must have seen my gaze flicker down because he spreads his hands a little and gives me a dark smile. “If you run, I’ll just have to clean you again.”

  My body trembles at the thought, and I squeeze my thighs together as if that would somehow bring my cunt to order.

  It doesn’t.

  The body wants what the body wants, and my body wants his cock.

  Chapter Sixty-Eight

  Hunter

  Clover watches me with a disgusted sneer on her face. She has every right to feel that; my self control is non-existent of late.

  It could be the cabin. Its memories.

  Or the strange poison she’s intoxicated me with.

  Unless I’ve reached some point where I can no longer deny my own nature.

  That shouldn’t have been possible.

  I have made so many difficult—impossible—choices to become the person I am now. I gave up friends, lovers, life. How could a sacrifice so great not have been enough?

  My hands are in fists, and I struggle to force them open.

  All I wanted to do was clean her and look how that turned out. I wanted to fuck her the other night and just look how that turned out. I wanted to guide her, to show her the light.

  Instead, I’ve dragged her down into hell with me.

  This wasn’t supposed to happen.

  I’m not this man anymore.

  He died. Violently, and at my own hands.

  He’s in hell where he belongs.

  Or did it just take him this long to claw his way back from the Devil’s lap?

  * * *

  Life is a maze with an infinite number of dead ends, and just as many exits. Very few ever reach the prize in the middle, and those that do, don’t always want to accept it for what it is.

  I had ample opportunities to change my life. If my choices had been black and white, I always chose gray. Eventually, the gray turned darker and darker, until my only options were two paths, both black as night.

  The brute was one of those black paths. I didn’t see the brute again after my first ayahuasca experience.

  Kane was another of those black paths.

  Kane and I met at a time in our lives when we were meaningless to anyone but ourselves and each other.

  More specifically—I had money, and I needed heroin. He had heroin, and he needed money.

  Sympatico.

  It was so easy to believe that our first meeting was serendipitous because back then, I still believed in shit like that. When Hunter Senior threatened to kick me out for the fifteenth time, I left on my own instead.

  Kane had a place for me up in the mountains. A farm where I would be surrounded by fellow-minded purveyors of the good life twenty-four-fucking seven.

  That first year was idyllic.

  Just a few guys, ten weed gardens hidden between the red woods, and all the weed we could smoke.

  I grew my hair out. I never wor
e shoes. I almost never bathed, except in the small lake close to one of the marijuana gardens we tended.

  Weeks went by. The girls came and went. The compound slowly began to change. Other outlaws were moving into the mountains to start their own illegal grow ops, putting pressure on our supply and driving down the price per pound.

  That was before I knew our little farm was a drug smuggling compound. Before I knew anything about The Father. Before I had any idea who—what—we were actually working for. That would all come later, and all at once.

  A year after living with Kane and the rest of the crew in the mountains, we were told to start hiring trimmers to help us during the harvest months.

  All girls.

  The reasoning being that they ate less, drank less, and cost less.

  One of the first girls we hired had taken an Ayahuasca trip a month before she’d arrived in Mallhaven. In fact, her guide had told her it was her path to walk.

  We smoked a lot of weed the first week they arrived. The story about my own experience came out, and for some reason, Kane latched onto it.

  Especially the brute.

  I thought nothing about it at the time.

  Kane discovered a DMT supplier.

  Now, although Ayahuasca tea has DMT in it, mixed with all the other vines and plants, it’s not the potent shit you buy off the streets.

  It’s not the DMT you smoke like crack, flip out, and come clawing back—if it all—half an hour later with only shreds of your sanity still remaining.

  I did it once, and it almost broke me. After that, I stuck with heroin.

  Kane would do DMT once, sometimes twice, a day.

  Once, he disappeared for a week. When he came back to the compound, he was covered in soot and the stench of charcoal.

  There was blood under his fingernails, too. A hank of long, matted hair in his pocket. Hair too long to be any mammals but a homo sapiens.

  I left the compound a few days later. The Father let me leave—surprising, since he never let anyone leave—but I can’t recall why. In fact, I don’t quite recall much of what happened in that time. I was shooting up every day. Blacking out more often than not.