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The forest is behind us,but I can still feel it. Still taste the moss on my tongue, still smell the river, the air. In the backseat, sitting next to the compound bow, are our shoes, dirty and covered with mud. Much like my dress that Damon picked up off the ground and lowered over my head. While he disappeared behind a tree, I tried to brush off the green streak of moss on my dress, and the little pieces of dried leaves. It wasn’t until I heard a heavy grunt and saw him zipping up his pants that I realized what he was doing.

“I could have done that,” I told him, feeling guilty.

“It’s getting dark,” he said, then flashed me a smile. “When your mouth is on me, sister, I don’t want to rush.”

The walk back to the car seemed shorter than the way up, and now that we’re in the car I’m too tired to think straight. Orgasm-sore. Mind-wrecked. That trembling kind of raw where my body doesn’t feel like it belongs to me anymore. Except it does, because he reminded me. Claimed me again in the trees. I ache in the best, weirdest, way.

By the time Damon gets behind the wheel of the car and cranks the engine, I’m shivering, the cool night air settling in my bones.

“Here,” he says, shrugging out of his jacket, and then hoodie. The sweatshirt is warm, and when I pull it over my dirty dress I press the sleeve to my nose, inhaling his scent. Pulling off the side of the road, he drives with one hand on the wheel, the other messing with the GPS. We don’t talk and the silence stretches into something uncomfortable. That’s the hardest part of all of this: being thrust into the role of Baroness, being owned by men I don’t know. The silence. I was raised to know how to make small talk, but with a man like Damon…I don’t think he’d want to talk about the weather or gardening tips.

Thankfully, he flicks the radio on just as we hit the main road. Static fuzz, then Hunter, smooth, slow, serpent-soft.

"…and if you’re out there, listening, and you’ve seen anything–anything at all–you call me. You don’t wait for the cops. You don’t wait for your conscience to kick in. Forsyth doesn't have time for silence."

My chest tightens.

Damon takes a left at a four-way stop, in the direction of a town called Northridge. We’re still miles away from Forsyth. He drives cautiously, keeping an eye out for deer, their glassy eyes reflecting in the headlights, a reminder that we’re never alone.

The sound of deep inhalation persists through the speakers. I sniff, like I can smell the lingering smoke on Hunter’s clothes. I’ve never seen him smoke before, but I’ve smelled it.

“And now we’re taking callers. You’ve got something to say? Speak up, Forsyth. We’re listening.”

There’s a click of a line connecting, then a woman’s voice crackling in.

“I… I don’t know if it’s anything, but a girl used to live next door to me. College-age. Real quiet. I thought she moved out,but… I still see her car parked sometimes. Same place, same angle, like it hasn’t moved in weeks. Something’s not right.”

Hunter hums. “Did you report it?”

“No,”she admits, voice cracking. “Didn’t seem like my business.”

Damon exhales through his nose. Disgusted. I don’t blame him.

Hunter must be too, because he puts on a song, moody music that seems to fit all of our moods. Up ahead are lights focused on a large brick sign angled toward the highway. Gold letters shine back, “Preston Preparatory School,” I read aloud, wondering what kind of students go there. I crane my neck as we zip by, and I think I catch the pointed peak of a bell tower.

“Those guys are the worst,” Damon says, as if I asked the question out loud. “I came to a few parties up here during high school. They were fun, I guess, but I learned pretty fast that each and every one of them is a fuckboy suckling at the rich teat of generational wealth. At least in Forsyth the guys get their hands dirty.” He shoots me a look and a wink. “Well, maybe not the Princes.”

There are so many places I haven’t been–haven’t seen. Missed out on parties, traditions, rites of passage. I have questions, more than I know how to even articulate. Too many years holed up in the Manor.Watching,but not living.

The SUV slows as we enter a small town, and without a word he pulls into the drive-thru of some place glowing with neon pink and blue. I blink at both the sudden color and the fact that the parking lot is surprisingly full of both cars and teenagers.

“Sugar,” he says, without preamble. “You need something sweet. Ice cream?”

I nod, because I do. I need something soft. Safe. Warm. Something that’s not the dark behind my eyes when I close them.

“What flavor?” he asks, once it’s our turn at the window.

“Chocolate.”

He gets me a single, pressing the cone in my hands. He gets two scoops, a mix of chocolate and vanilla. I hold the cone with both hands, licking slowly. Creamy and cold, trying to shock the ache away with a new sensation.

Hunter’s voice floats through the speakers again, talking about the girl found down by the river. About how the town needs to wake the fuck up.

I press the cone into the napkin and let it melt.

My mouth is cold. I want heat again, any way that I can get it.

Shifting, I reach for him, like I’ve done this a hundred times before. Maybe I have in my head. Damon doesn't flinch. Just spreads his legs a little wider.