Page 27

Briar

Meet me at the body.

I stare at Flint’s text, my stomach dropping. Five words that chill me more than the fog pressing against my bedroom window.

Only an hour’s passed since I got home from The Vault. I’d just stepped out of the shower, hair still dripping onto my shoulders, when my phone lit up with Flint’s message.

My first instinct is to ignore it, pretend I’m asleep, that I never saw it. But the thought of that body in the maze, of what will happen if it’s discovered, won’t let me.

I pull on jeans and a black sweater, still warm from the dryer, and grab my boots. The clock on my nightstand reads 12:43 AM. The house is silent around me, Mrs. Fletcher having gone to bed hours ago.

The back stairs creak under my weight as I make my way down to the kitchen. Every sound seems amplified in the quiet house, my heartbeat loudest of all. I ease open the back door and slip outside.

The night air hits me like a slap—cold, damp, heavy with salt and mist. Classic Heathens Hollow.

The security lights cast eerie halos in the fog, barely illuminating the path ahead. I keep to the shadows, aware that Viktor’s men might still be watching the property.

My boots sink into the soft earth as I follow the narrow garden path that leads to the maze. Every few steps, I stop to listen, but there’s nothing except distant waves and the occasional owl.

What is Flint thinking, asking me to meet him there? At the site of a murder? Is this some kind of sick joke? This goes against everything he and Damiano have been lecturing me about. Stay home. Be careful. What were you thinking? Hypocrite.

The entrance to the maze looms ahead, a dark mouth opening into what feels like another world. I hesitate, remembering the last time I stood in this spot—running from Liam, terrified, desperate. I push away the memory and step inside.

The hedges rise on either side, blocking what little moonlight filters through the fog. I take out my phone, using its flashlight to guide my way, careful to keep the beam pointed downward. Even with the light, I make wrong turns, hit dead ends, double back.

“Lost? ”

I nearly scream at the voice behind me, spinning around to find Flint standing there, hands in his pockets, expression unreadable in the shadows.

“Jesus Christ,” I hiss, my heart hammering against my ribs. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

“A lot of things.” He takes the phone from my hand and switches off the flashlight. “But right now, I’m mostly wondering why you’re using a beacon that anyone watching the property could spot from a mile away.”

He’s right, but I’m too rattled to admit it. “Why did you text me to come here? In the middle of the night?”

“Follow me.”

He turns without waiting for a response, moving through the maze with the confidence of someone who’s walked it a hundred times. I have no choice but to follow, brushing my fingers along the hedge wall to keep my bearings in the near-total darkness.

After what feels like forever, the path opens into the clearing at the center. The gazebo sits in the middle like a ghost, its white paint glowing faintly in the diffused moonlight. Off to one side, barely visible in the darkness, is the patch of freshly turned earth where we buried Liam.

Flint stops at the edge of it, looking down. “Do you have any idea how close we came to this being discovered today?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Viktor had men searching the grounds while you were busy playing detective at The Vault. They were twenty feet from this spot when Mrs. Fletcher intercepted them, feeding them some bullshit about restricted areas of the property your father doesn’t allow anyone to access.”

A cold feeling spreads through my chest. “They were here? In the maze?”

“Three of them. For over an hour.” He gives me a hard look.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I only found out after you left.” There’s a sharpness to his voice that wasn’t there before.

I wrap my arms around myself, suddenly very aware of what happened between us just hours ago. What almost happened.

“You could have texted me sooner.”

“And said what? ‘By the way, while I had my fingers inside you, killers were twenty feet from finding your victim’?”

I flinch at his crudeness. “He wasn’t my victim.”

“Tell that to Viktor.” Flint kicks at the edge of the disturbed soil. “You think this is all going to go away, don’t you? That Daddy’s money or your family name will protect you.”

“That’s not fair.”

“No? Then why would you risk going to The Vault when you know Viktor’s looking for his brother?

When you know people saw you at the party where he was last seen?

” He looks at me with daggers in his eyes.

“I’m not going to let you fuck over Damiano.

He’s not taking the fall for you if that’s your ultimate plan. ”

“Wait… what? I would never?—”

“Then why are you not taking this seriously? Because that’s how I feel. Like this isn’t real to you.”

I don’t have a good answer—at least, not one I’m willing to share, that I needed to see him, needed answers about The Hunt, needed something to make me feel alive after being trapped in the sterile safety of my father’s world for so long.

I don’t want to feel weak. I don’t want to feel like I need to heroes to swoop in and fix it…

“I want my own fucking agency.”

“Agency?” His laugh is harsh in the quiet night.

“I don’t want to need help. I don’t want to be a damsel in distress. I’ve been that my whole life, and well… I’m trying to take control and make sure I fix this. On my terms.”

“You walked into the most gossip-filled place on the island, looking like the princess of Windward Estate come to mingle with the commoners. That’s not taking control. That’s fucking stupid.”

The anger in his accusation makes me take a step back. “I don’t need a lecture from you.”

“No? Then let me remind you of something.”

He grabs my arm, pulling me to stand directly over the freshly turned earth.

“Look down,” he says. “There’s a rotting corpse under our feet. Liam Bastian’s body is decomposing six feet below us while his brother tears the island apart looking for him.”

I stare at the ground, suddenly hyperaware of what—who—lies beneath the dirt.

“If Mrs. Fletcher hadn’t intercepted them, they would have found this disturbed soil. Then you’d be explaining to Viktor Bastian why his brother is buried in your garden.”

The reality of how close we came to disaster hits me like a physical blow. “What would he really do? If he found out?”

Flint’s eyes meet mine in the darkness. “You really want to know?”

I nod, even though I’m not sure I do.

“Viktor doesn’t go to the police. He handles things himself.” He steps closer. “Last guy who crossed him disappeared for three days. When he turned up, both his hands were broken so badly they had to be wired back together. And that was for shorting him on a drug deal.”

My throat goes dry. “My intent was never to kill. I only wanted him to stop.”

“You think he cares?” Flint grabs my shoulders, forcing me to look at him.

“Viktor won’t see a scared woman defending herself.

He’ll see the rich bitch who killed his little brother and tried to hide it.

And if he finds out that Damiano or I had anything to do with this…

well, let’s just say thing won’t end well. ”

I wrench myself from his grip. “I didn’t ask for this. Any of it. ”

“No, but here we are. And every time you pull a stunt like tonight, you put all of us at risk.”

“Then why help me?” I demand, anger rising to match his. “Why not just walk away now? Let me deal with this on my own?”

“Because I’m already in too deep.” Something shifts in his expression. “With the body. With Damiano. With you.”

The last part catches me off guard. “What is that supposed to mean?”

He doesn’t answer. Instead, he closes the distance between us, his hand sliding behind my neck, pulling me toward him. His mouth crashes against mine, nothing gentle about it. Pure frustration, anger, need.

I should push him away. I have every reason to. Instead, I’m kissing him back with equal force, fisting in his jacket, pulling him closer.

It’s different than at The Vault. This isn’t anger and passion. This is raw, immediate, fueled by fear and adrenaline.

His hands are rough as he shoves them under my sweater, fingers digging into my skin hard enough to bruise. I hiss at the pain but press closer, some dark part of me wanting it to hurt, needing the sharp edges of this to cut through everything else.

“There’s a dead man by us,” I breathe against his mouth, even as I’m yanking at his jacket.

“Yes.” He bites my lower lip hard enough to draw blood, the metallic taste spreading between us. “ Fucking face what you did. Maybe if you do, you’ll stop being so fucking careless.”

“Stop,” I say, testing him, testing myself.

“Make me.” His eyes challenge mine in the darkness, daring me to push him away, knowing I won’t.

I answer by digging my nails into the back of his neck, dragging him closer, turning the kiss violent.

In the back of my mind, I can’t escape the sickness of what we’re doing—rutting like animals on top of Liam’s decomposing corpse, the man I killed, whose blood is probably still crusted under my fingernails despite how hard I scrubbed.

His body rotting beneath our feet while we use his grave as a stage for our fucked-up desires.

It’s depraved.

Sacrilegious.

The kind of thing that marks your soul. Yet instead of making me stop, the wrongness of it drives me further, like I’m already damned so why not embrace it?

There’s something broken in me now, something that craves this destruction, and I can tell by the hunger in Flint’s eyes that he’s just as damaged.

He pushes me backward until I’m standing directly over the freshly turned earth.

Then he forces me down onto my knees, right on top of the grave, before following me down.

The damp soil soaks through my jeans immediately.

He grips my thighs, fingers digging in hard enough to leave marks as he positions himself between my legs.

I should be revolted—we’re literally about to fuck on top of a dead man—but all I feel is desperate need.

“This is what you want?” he growls. “Right here on your victim?”

I twist my fingers in his hair, yanking his head back painfully. “Shut up and do it.”

The weight of us both presses me deeper into the loose soil covering Liam’s body.

What follows is nothing like the careful, almost reverent way Damiano touched me. Flint takes what he wants, and I give just as fiercely. Clothes are pushed aside rather than removed. His fingers find me wet and ready, and I don’t even try to muffle my moan when he pushes them inside me.

“You need this,” he says in a low growl in my ear. “Need someone who doesn’t treat you like you’ll break.”

I should be insulted. Instead, I’m arching against him, guiding his touch where I want it most.

“Shut up and fuck me.”

His eyes darken at my words. In one swift movement, he’s unfastening his jeans and positioning himself between my legs.

He takes me in one brutal thrust, knocking the breath from my lungs.

I gasp at the force of it, at the delicious intrusion that sends shock waves through my body.

Pain and pleasure bleed into each other until I can’t tell where one ends and the other begins.

He covers my mouth with his hand as I cry out, stifling the sound, but the more he muffles me, the louder I get, until he’s the one gritting his teeth and groaning with the effort of it.

He sets a punishing rhythm, driving into me with no regard for anything but his own savage need—and mine.

I rake my nails down his back, desperate for him to go harder, deeper, to make me feel every inch of him.

The earth beneath us shifts with our movement, the soil caving in as I dig my fingers into it, as if to claw my way down to the corpse below.

I shouldn’t want this.

I should be sickened, horrified.

Instead, I’m rising to meet Flint’s every brutal stroke, mouth open in something between a moan and a scream. This is punishment, pleasure; this is being claimed, devoured. It’s a savage, frenzied act, and we’re both lost to it.

The grave and the horror of it surrounds us. It makes me wilder, more frantic, wanting it to hurt so it’s real—wanting him to tear me open so the guilt and fear spill out along with everything else.

“Don’t stop,” I gasp, my breath coming in ragged pants. “Don’t you fucking stop.”

He doesn’t slow, doesn’t hold back. He moves his hand from my mouth to my throat, a silent threat that only makes my body respond more urgently.

I arch into his grip, daring him to tighten his hold, to take me right to the edge of danger.

He squeezes, just enough to send my pulse racing, then releases, sliding his fingers back down to where we’re joined.

He circles his thumb, pressing against me in time with his thrusts.

It’s too much. Not enough.

My vision blurs, the world narrowing to the pressure building inside me, to the raw, violent pleasure that has me thrashing beneath him until it finally shatters, taking me with it.

I come with a cry, every muscle tightening, the darkness around me exploding into brilliant white.

He follows an instant later, his mouth crashing against mine in a feral, bruising kiss that tastes like sweat and salt and leftover blood from his bite.

Even then, he doesn’t stop moving, driving into me again and again until there’s nothing left but the ragged sound of our breathing, the dirt streaked across my skin, and the terrible satisfaction of what we’ve done.

He collapses beside me, his chest rising and falling like he’s been sprinting, and for a long moment, neither of us speaks.

I shiver, chilled now that the heat of our bodies has dissipated. My jeans are soaked through, my sweater streaked with dirt. I feel myself breaking apart, unraveling at the seams.

“Everything about this is fucked.” Flint props himself up on one elbow, watching me. “You have no idea who I am. Who Damiano is. Who we are. The we … is fucked.”