Page 9 of His to Hunt (The Owner’s Club #1)

Eight

LUNA

My pulse is a roar inside my head, drowning out everything else.

The world around me feels too quiet, too still. The women—the other Possessions—stand in their perfect lines, composed and unbothered, as if this is just another evening of champagne and silk and shadows. As if what's about to happen isn't going to change everything.

But I can't match their calm.

My chest is tight. My skin feels too hot.

Sweat clings to the back of my neck, trapped beneath the collar I didn't ask for.

My dress sticks to the curve of my spine.

The heels dig into the balls of my feet.

And no matter how hard I try to breathe, my lungs don't want to work the way they're supposed to.

The Hunt hasn't started yet.

But I'm already lightheaded.

Already fighting the rising pressure in my chest.

Because this time, I'm not just running for freedom.

I'm running to keep from losing what little I have left.

We're being led across the terrace now, toward the edge of the estate—toward the tree line. The grounds shift from manicured stone to soft grass, and just beyond that, the forest waits.

The women ahead of me move like they've done this before. Like they've already accepted what's coming.

I haven't.

I can't.

Because I never got the chance to choose.

Not like they did.

I was supposed to make it to dawn. I was supposed to survive the night and walk away. That was the deal I made with myself. The lie I convinced myself was enough.

But now I'm standing here in four-inch heels and a sheer designer dress I can't breathe in, wearing the collar of a man whose name is only whispered in powerful rooms, surrounded by women who probably think I belong to him.

They don't know I didn't say yes.

They don't know I didn't say anything at all.

And I don't know if he'll even be the one who finds me.

Because the men?

They've changed.

They've vanished behind closed doors and come back dressed in black—dark shirts, darker jeans, their faces obscured by skull masks that strip them of identity and humanity alike.

There are no names in the woods.

No rules.

Only the ones they enforce once they catch you.

And if the wrong man gets to me first?

I won't get to explain that I'm here for the money. I won't get to beg for something different. I'll be his.

Because once they catch you—you're claimed.

The collar doesn't protect me.

It marks me.

It tells them I was already wanted—and that makes me more valuable. More tempting. More of a challenge.

I press my shaking hand to my thigh and try to think. Try to plan.

I'll tear the hem. As soon as the trees take us, I'll reach down and rip it as high as I can without exposing more than I already have. I'll toss the shoes—I can't run in them anyway. They'll only slow me down, and I need to be fast. Faster than I've ever been. Faster than fear.

I'll move low. Keep off the main paths. Don't run in a straight line. Don't be obvious. Keep my head down, but my ears open. Listen for the breathing. The footsteps. The wind shifting against fabric or the snap of a twig beneath someone too sure of himself.

I'll survive this.

I have to.

Because if someone else catches me—and he's anything like the man I escaped from—It won't matter that I thought I could survive until dawn.

It won't matter at all.

Skull faces, bone-white against black clothing, materializing from shadow as if conjured by the darkness itself.

A dozen men step into the clearing, identical in their uniformity—same mask, same black t-shirts, same dark denim, same heavy boots.

Their identities obliterated by design, leaving only their size and stance to distinguish one from another.

But I know which one is him.

I can feel his eyes on me even now, tracking my movements from behind that expressionless skull facade. My heart hammers against my ribs, my palms slick with sweat as I stand among the other women, all of us waiting, poised between stillness and flight.

The clearing falls silent. Even the night creatures seem to hold their breath.

Then, a low, resonant tone cuts through the darkness—a bell, somewhere deep in the forest. It rings once, the sound vibrating through the clearing, through my bones, settling in my chest like a warning.

The men step forward in perfect unison, forming a semicircle before us. As one, they begin to speak, their voices blending into a single, ritualistic chant.

"Hunt what runs."

The women around me join in, their voices rising to meet the men's. "Keep what's caught."

Everyone together now, the words reverberating through the trees. "Control what's kept."

I stumble through the chant, my voice a beat behind, unfamiliar with the words that everyone else seems to know by heart. This is a ritual. A tradition. A game with rules I don't understand, but must somehow navigate.

The bell tolls again, louder this time. Final.

And then we move.

There's no spoken cue. No one shouts for us to run. But the women around me break into motion as if pulled by the same invisible thread, and I'm already tearing at the hem of my dress before I can second guess it.

The fabric rips high up my thigh, the sound harsh and intimate in the quiet. My fingers fumble with the straps of my heels, slick with sweat, shaking as I kick them off into the grass without looking back.

The ground is cold beneath my feet.

Cold and soft and real .

I bolt.

Not a stumble. Not a graceful jog.

A full, desperate sprint into the trees like I'm being chased already.

And maybe I am.

The forest swallows me quickly, the air colder here, heavier. My gown catches on low branches. My lungs burn. The collar around my neck presses tighter with every ragged breath, a silent reminder that I'm not just running for myself anymore.

I'm marked.

I'm hunted.

Every step deeper into the woods feels like a step away from the girl who thought she could control this.

That version of me died the moment he fastened this choker.

Now?

Now I don't know who I'm running from.

I don't know who's behind me. I don't know whose breath I'll feel at my neck when I'm finally caught. And I don't know if it will be him—the one who claimed me before the rules allowed it. Or someone else. Someone worse.

I don't scream. I don't cry. I don't look back.

I keep running.

Because if I stop, even for a second, I know what I'll hear.

The sound of footsteps that don't belong to me.

The forest grows denser as I push deeper into its blackness. The fabric of my dress catches on low-hanging branches, each snag threatening to slow me down. I don't hesitate—I reach down and tear the fabric higher, the expensive material giving way with a satisfying rip .

My thighs are exposed now, but modesty is a luxury I can't afford. Not that this dress offered any in the first place.

Speed is all that matters.

My discarded heels are long behind me, abandoned in those first crucial moments of flight.

The earth feels alive beneath my bare feet—cold, damp, uneven.

Each step sends shocks of sensation up my legs, awakening instincts I didn't know I possessed.

My toes grip roots and soil, finding purchase where polished shoes would have failed me.

Moonlight filters weakly through the canopy, breaking across the forest floor in uneven streaks of silver. I stay low, slipping between pockets of darkness, shrinking myself into the landscape. The torn hem of my dress flutters around my thighs as I move, no longer restricting my stride.

My breath comes in controlled bursts now.

The panic has dulled, replaced by something steadier.

Sharper. My lungs burn with every breath, my calves scream with each step, and the collar at my throat never lets me forget what's waiting at the end of this run.

It pulses against my skin, synced with the beat of something I'm not ready to name.

I adjust my path, veering away from the obvious trail. The beaten track is a trap, too easily followed. Instead, I forge my way through underbrush and between tightly clustered trunks, leaving as little trace as possible.

The forest floor begins to slope upward. I push harder, using my hands to pull myself higher when the incline steepens. Elevation means advantage with the ability to see what pursues me, to plan my next move rather than simply react.

But the higher ground offers no comfort. In the distance, through gaps in the trees, I catch glimpses of other women. Some running, some already caught. Their fear isn't like mine. There's a rhythm to it, a choreography they understand. They know the steps to this dance.

I don't.

The only certainty I have is movement. As long as I keep moving, I'm still free. As long as I don't stop, I still have choices.

So I run. Through the moonlight. Over stone and root. Past ancient trees that have witnessed a hundred Hunts before mine and will stand sentinel for a hundred more after I'm gone.

I don't look back. Don't waste breath on prayers or pleas. I simply run, my bare feet finding their own wisdom in the dark.

But deep down, beneath the pounding of my heart and the rush of blood in my ears, I know the truth. No matter how fast I run, no matter how clever my path, the forest has already chosen its victor. And it isn't me.