Risking rolling my eyes at the feral Alpha, I turned and left the room before I jumped him, grabbing the dart gun on the way. No more surprises on the stairs, and I heard both Avery and Rylan talking in the kitchen. That must out of bounds.

Making my steps as quiet as possible, I kept going up the stairs, skipping the second floor entirely. Ben gave himself away. The tip of his shoe was visible behind the open door. That counted, right?

I took aim and landed a perfect shot, the dart sticking to the top of his sneaker.

“Fuck,” he said with a laugh. “You got me.”

“Three down, two to go.”

He kissed me on the forehead as he passed, and a gentle glow of happiness gathered in my chest. There was no animosity or anger that I’d taken him out early. Just enjoyment of the game.

Kade was somewhere below me. That I knew, but Luke? He was a mystery. I had no idea where he would hide.

In the end, it was easy to find him. He was in his bedroom, across from mine in the front, sitting on his couch. The dart gun sat beside him untouched, and he was sketching on a pad. I raised my gun and shot him in the chest before he could make a move.

Luke smiled, and his voice was filled with over the top emotion. “Oh, no. You got me! I’m so sad about it.”

“You didn’t want to play?”

“On the contrary, sweetheart. I love this game, and next time I’m determined to win.”

I raised an eyebrow and sat down beside him, looking at the stylistic swallow he was designing. “But?”

“But I already have my plans for you, and I know someone else wanted to win more this time.”

That had me intrigued. “What are your plans for me?”

“I’m going to feed you, maybe give you a massage so you’re as relaxed as possible, and then you and I are going to play and we’ll see how far down the control rabbit hole you want to go.”

I shivered. “And you didn’t want to win so you could do that?”

“I made a deal not to.”

“What kind of deal?”

Setting aside the sketchpad, he tugged me closer by the shirt and kissed me. “You’re too trusting, sweetheart. I’m the bait.”

I jumped back, but he already had a hold on me, pulling me down onto his lap and spinning me to face the door where Kade stepped in, a grin on his face. “Told you I would win.”

The last dart hit me in the stomach, but Luke didn’t let me go, holding me fast. “Isn’t making a deal to win cheating?”

“That depends,” Kade said. “There weren’t any rules against it.”