Page 21 of Pounded in the Patch
My heart is pounding harder than it has all night, anticipation and nerves I’m trying to push down. This is it. This is the moment when everything comes together.
She's going to be mine.
She has to be mine.
Because I've already decided she's never leaving me.
"Time's up," I call through the fog, my voice echoing off the surrounding forest and carrying through the thick mist. "Start running."
I hear her gasp, then the sound of her feet hitting the soft earth as she bolts deeper into the field. Exactly as I predicted. Exactly as I planned.
My brilliant girl.
Running straight into my trap.
I count to thirty, then begin my final pursuit. But this isn't like the other chases. This time I'm not just hunting her—I'mherdingher, using my knowledge of the field’s layout to cut off every escape route except the one that leads to where I need her.
To the altar.
To our future.
The fog is thickest here, rolling in waves that make the jack-o'-lanterns appear and disappear like they’re from a fever dream. I can hear her ahead of me, stumbling through the vines, and every sound she makes sends electricity through my veins.
Soon.
So fucking soon.
I drive her left when she tries to go right, block her path when she attempts to double back, and use my superior knowledge of this place to eliminate every option except forward momentum.
Deeper into my web.
Closer to where this all ends.
Where this all begins.
She's getting tired—I can hear it in her breathing, in the way her footsteps are becoming less coordinated. Perfect. I want her exhausted when she reaches our final destination. I want her desperate and confused and completely dependent on me.
I want her to have no choice but to surrender to whatever I offer her.
The pathways are narrowing now, funneling her toward the single entrance that leads to the best part of it all. I can hear her starting to panic as she realizes she's being driven right where I want her.
It’s too late to turn back now, baby.
You can’t escape what we're going to become.
I emerge from the fog just close enough for her to see me, to know I'm right behind her, and hear her sob with exhaustion and terror and…
Anticipation.
Shewantsto see what's waiting for her at the end.
She wants to know what I've been building toward all night.
The entrance to the altar appears ahead of us through the fog—an archway made of intertwined pumpkin vines and late-autumn flowers, lit from within by dozens of candles and positioned so she'll have to stop and stare before she can enter.
Before she can see what I've prepared for her.
Before she can understand what this was always really about.
