The fucking jungle was all around me, and I couldn’t make head or tails of any of it. I could see an occasional broken branch where someone had crashed through, but that was the extent of my tracking ability. It certainly wasn’t easy, and the spongy floor covered with dying and dead vegetation did a surprisingly poor job of maintaining shoe prints. It was frustrating and maddening as hell, but at least I wasn’t bored.

I stumbled down what could’ve been a path in front of me, but it was hard to tell. There was slightly less vegetation growing here, but there were no formal trails, and there sure weren’t any markers to help us find where we were or discover our prey. I could hear other men crashing around me in the bush, and they were making enough noise to scare away any prey animal—especially an intelligent woman.

That was good though, because I didn’t want anybody finding Anya before I did. I had a name now, having looked her up last night in the paperwork we received when we got off the boat the previous afternoon. The program provided only scant details, but I now knew she was twenty years old, and there was a gold star beside her picture. Foster had helpfully explained that symbol—it designated her as a virgin. She was the only one in the current round of women running, and my brother seemed to think that would make her a popular target.

The idea made my stomach twist and anger course through me. If I found anyone with her, I’d break them in half. The rules said I couldn’t take a woman from another hunter if they were in a cottage, but anything before that was fair game. I wasn’t sure if I’d let a little thing like their rules stop me from rescuing her from another so-called hunter if I knew she was in a cottage with one.

Rescue might be a subjective term, since I wasn’t about to let her go merrily on her way. There was no scenario I could imagine where Anya left this island a virgin, and the only acceptable option for her losing it was to me.

If I could just find her in this fucking place. I’d been stumbling around for almost an hour now, and that’s exactly what it felt like–stumbling. I had no clue how to proceed, so I just walked ever forward and hoped I would stumble across her before someone else did. It was an inefficient way to play, especially since none of this felt like a game while immersed in it.

My brother and Nash had split up, taking different directions, so I was on my own. I walked for another few minutes until a familiar face appeared in front of me, seeming to have reached the same destination from a different route. I frowned at my brother. “This is the stupidest thing ever. How are we supposed to find anyone in this jungle?”

My brother grinned at me. “I guess if you want it bad enough, you’ll find it.”

“Her,” I said coldly. “It’s not it. She’s a her.”

Foster put up a hand. “Easy there. I didn’t mean to denigrate the women we’re chasing. That’s part of the challenge of this though, and doesn’t it make you feel alive?”

I snorted. “I feel stupid and frustrated, but I don’t think that’s the same thing as feeling alive.”

“Your problem is you have no patience, and you’re not used to having to wait for anything.” He said it with paternal air, as though he was my father rather than my younger brother.

I rolled my eyes. “I’ve had to wait for plenty of things.”

Foster crossed his arms over his chest. “Name one.”

I opened my mouth, certain I could come up with a whole list, but drew a blank. Finally, I offered a lame, “I had to wait to get my driver’s license.”

“Until the day you turned sixteen, which is the norm. Doesn’t really count. Name something you desperately wanted and had to wait for, or had to fight for. Something you’ve earned rather than been given?”

I shifted, uncomfortable with the question because it was so accurate. I honestly couldn’t think of anything I’d had to wait or work for. School came easy to me, even my exclusive Ivy League university, where I got an MBA. Sports were also second nature, though I hadn’t been on a rugby or polo field for a few years. Women were the least challenging of all. All I had to do was look sideways at one, and she was ready to fuck me. I let out a low sigh. “Okay, I concede you might have a point. I’m not used to waiting, and I’m sure as hell not used to forging my way through the jungle, so how am I supposed to find her?”

“Since you’re not a subscriber, you probably don’t know there’re advantages you can buy.” As he spoke, Foster removed something from his pocket and held it out to me.

I look down at it doubtfully. “What is it?” It was roughly the size of a candy bar and didn’t feel much heavier than one when I took it from him a moment later as he shook it gently in my direction.

“A GPS tracker. All their backpacks have one, so the staff can keep track of them, but for an additional fee, you can buy a device with your chosen prey’s coordinates programmed in. That way, you always know where to find her.”

I grimaced. “That seems pretty low. I don’t like the idea of cheating.”

Andrew shrugged and reached for it again. “Suit yourself, but don’t blame me if someone else finds her first.”

Before he could snatch back the tracker, I closed my hand around it and pulled it toward my body. “No one else is going to have her.”

He grinned at me. “I figured you’d feel that way. If you catch her, you can reimburse me the thirty-five thousand dollars I paid for the tracker.”

As I stuffed it in my pocket I managed a small smile of my own. “The weekend’s on you, remember?”

With a good-natured laugh, Foster flipped me off and turned to disappear the opposite direction he’d come, away from me.

Once it was just me again, I paused and leaned against a nearby tree to remove the tracker. It took less than a minute to figure out how it worked, and I quickly realized I was the blue dot, because I was unmoving. The red dot was moving farther away from me every second, and the device handily plotted the course for me.

I still wasn’t convinced it was fair to have such a device to start with, and I was certain the producers of the show had never bothered to enlighten the women that they could be specifically tracked for an extra payment, but the idea of someone else getting to her before me was unacceptable. I didn’t want to hurt her, but I didn’t want any other hands on her except mine. She belonged to me, and I was just as convinced of that as I had been at the first sight of her last night.