Veils of Rivalry Chapter 47

POV Cole

She hangs up on me, and my Bluetooth reconnects and music starts playing, filling the silence.

Fuck.

How the hell does she know?

The rest of the drive is a blur, until I reach the house. Parking, I narrow my eyes on all the people standing outside.

Keith walks out the house and closes the front door, locking it, and I go straight to him. “What’s going on?”

He grins and shows me the iPad screen, red and green lights dotted around what looks like the digital blueprints of his house. “I have trackers in all the masks now. Was part of a project I was doing for school, but thought it would be a great idea to use them for this game. Neat, right?”

My eyes flicker around the screen. “The initials are their names?”

“Yeah. Here, there’s your little bro.” He points at a red dot on the screen. It’s moving quickly through the kitchen area and into the dining room. Four green dots are gaining on him.

I spot the initials on one of them. “Allie is playing?”

“Yeah, man. Is that alright? She’s been all over J all night. He said you were good with them.”

I don’t give a fuck about them. I’m not surprised either.

But then I see another two green dots join them, and they follow Blaise.

“J said he wants payback for Blaise taking his spot on the team. You ready to see your baby bro get fucked up?”

I’m shouldering past him before he can finish his shitty question. “Unlock the door.”

“What?”

“Unlock the fucking door!”

Keith laughs. “You’re kidding? You hate the prick as much as we all do. He deserves this.”

I grab his collar and yank him to me, so my forehead slams into his. “Unlock. The fucking. Door.”

“Blaise Rowle stole our friend’s spot on the team because he spiraled. You’re going to stand there and watch him get beaten to a pulp, because you hate him too.”

I grit my teeth and shove him. Backing away, I shake my head at my supposed friend, and turn, looking at the windows and how thick they are. Music pounds from inside the house. Blaise probably can’t hear himself think, never mind the fact the entire opposite team is hunting for him.

Mia grabs my arm. “I found a way in. Follow me.”

She runs in her heels and short dress around the side of the house, and I stay on her tail. No one comes with us. Keith is too busy drinking his beer and cheering when another red dot gets eliminated.

She slides on a flowerbed, and I grab her hips to keep her up. Snatching my wrist, she pulls me along. “Right over here. One of the windows on the first floor is open.”

We reach a drainpipe, and she looks up. I follow her gaze and see the partially cracked open window. “Can you climb up there?”

I nod. “Yeah. Go back to my car and wait for us.” I hand her my keys, and she takes them, hesitating. I glance down at her when she doesn’t move. “What happened the other day…” She chews her lip. “You only let it happen because it was with Blaise, right?”

I stay silent.

She nods a few times. “Does he feel the same way?”

“I don’t know.”

Her eyes glaze over, and she wipes under them. “I hope it works out.”

Me too. Me fucking too.

She gives me a flat smile and vanishes back to the front of the house.

By the time I climb up and manage to slip through the window into the pitch-black house, I wince with how loud the music is. It’s intentional. I remember Keith saying he wanted to set up some amusement park for this type of stuff. To have music so loud, you can’t hear your pulse throbbing in your ears, and the fear mixes with the adrenaline as the heavy beats of the songs play.

I faintly see from the moon and streetlights shining into the house. I listen for the running feet, but I can’t hear anything but Sleep Token nearly blowing my eardrums.

Making my way through Keith’s bedroom, I check the other rooms on this floor, swearing to myself when I realize it’s been twenty minutes since the game started, and they could’ve easily have caught Blaise by now. I know he can hold himself in a fight. He’s solid, and it fucking hurts when he hits me, but when there’s multiple people after him?

I run up the stairway before I’m thrown to the side by someone tackling into my ribs, knocking me onto the ground. They get to their feet, and I grab their ankle so they fall. I crawl over them, groaning when I see long blonde hair. I tug off the black mask to see some chick nearly crying beneath me.

“They have bats, and one has a gun,” she cries. “Please help me.”

“Go hide,” I snarl and drag us both off the ground. “Stay out of sight.”

She nods erratically and runs down the hallway. I brush my hands through my hair, sweat clinging to my skin as I look left and right. One of them has a gun? What the fuck?

And bats.

Blaise.

I rush down the staircase, then down again to the ground floor, tripping over someone lying unconscious on the ground. They’re covered in blood, gasping for breath. I don’t breathe until I yank off the mask and see it’s not Blaise. One of the guys from college. He’s in Blaise’s business class. He’s just busted up, not dying.

Turning a corner, I stop in the dining area to see Jackson and Allie. He’s bending her over the table and fucking her from behind, grabbing her hair and holding the barrel of the gun to her temple. Three others are behind him. As if they’re waiting for their turn.

In another world, I’d get jealous and run at him. I’d rip him off my ex and beat the living shit out of him. But instead, I back away, let her get the railing she obviously wants.

Bypassing the downstairs bathroom, I see someone running, but they have brown hair down their back, so I know it isn’t Blaise.

Another runner, and I shake my head. Where the fuck is he?

I shove open a door and the fist that snaps into my face knocks me back on my ass, momentarily dazed as the person crouches through my blurry vision.

He slides off the mask, tousled hair falling on his forehead.

“Cole?” I think he says, going by the way his lips move. “What the fuck are you doing?”

He grabs my arm and drags me into the room, slamming the door shut. Crouching again, he slaps my face so I focus.

I blink away the haziness and scowl at him.

“You fucking hit me,” I grit.

I want to yell at him, but I pause at the blood on his face, the busted-up lip and swollen eye.

“Who the fuck did that?”

“It doesn’t matter. Why are you here? How did you get in?”

“Mia,” I say, breathless from running around the house for the last half an hour. “She called me. She knows I love you.”

Blaise goes to speak, and his lips slam shut. His brows furrow.