Who had they belonged to? What had happened to her? And why did Cynna suddenly feel like she was stealing from a ghost?
The relief she’d felt at being clean dissipated. And the need to find Nick grew even stronger.
She turned out of the salon and continued up several flights until she reached what she guessed was the top level. Double doors hung haphazardly off their hinges, and a strong breeze blew the hair back from her face. Shivering, she walked through the broken doors, stopped at the stone railing, and looked down.
She was on some kind of balcony. Her gaze skipped over the lake beyond, then dropped to a stone courtyard far below. Large black patches marred the stones. Gray ash swirled along the ground. And in the middle of what was clearly the remains of some kind of fire, facing away from her, stood Nick.
His hands were perched on his lean hips. His head was bowed so she couldn’t see his face. But the muscles in his back were tight and bunched beneath the thin black T-shirt he’d changed into, as if he carried the weight of the world there. And unease pressed down on her chest as she watched him look around the courtyard, lift one large hand and rake it through his shaggy blond hair. He dropped his arm to his side, hunched his shoulders, and knelt to the ground, lowering his head as if in defeat.
Cynna glanced across the empty balcony, then over the lake again, taking in every bit of destruction as if seeing it in a new light.
The half-breed colony. Her stomach pitched with the realization of where they were. She’d heard rumors of its existence when she’d been a child in Argolea. Her parents had even considered relocating to the colony instead of the Aegis Mountains with the witches. And she knew from her time with Zagreus that Hades, especially, had been searching for the colony for years because he suspected Maelea—the female he termed “the stain”—might be hiding out there.
This was Nick’s colony. His home. His people. And she knew without even asking that it hadn’t looked like this the last time he’d been here.
Emotions and her own gnarled memories of a scene much like this rolled through her chest, making her heart beat faster, making panic spread through her limbs. She turned quickly from the railing, found the stairs, and hurried to get down to the courtyard before he left. She was panting by the time she found a broken set of heavy wooden doors lying askew against a stone archway. Spotting Nick still kneeling in the middle of the blackened courtyard, she drew a breath of relief and stilled her feet to gather herself.
When she felt steady, she slowly made her way toward him. But her nerves kicked up again with every step. This hadn’t been just a fire. She could sense the remnants of souls still scattered in the wind. This was all that remained of a mass cremation.
She stopped feet from him. He had to have heard her but didn’t turn. Glancing around the blackened stones, she tried to think of something to say.
“Nick…” Condolences lingered on the tip of her tongue, but she couldn’t get them out. Not because she wasn’t sorry for what he’d lost, but because she knew no words could ease his suffering. Because they’d never eased hers.
“Three of my men took down a daemon there.” He nodded toward the corner of the courtyard where a charred section of rock stood out against the gray stones. “Five satyrs cornered them before they could get away.” He glanced to the right, where another blackened patch stained the ground, his shoulders tight, his eyes shadowed, a raspy tone to his voice. “Two daemons ripped apart a female trying to escape there. She had a child with her. I don’t know what happened to the boy.”
Oh gods… A fresh wave of trepidation washed over Cynna. “You…see them?”
“No, I feel them.”
She glanced around the empty courtyard again, and an eerie shiver rippled down her spine as visions swam in front of her eyes. People running in every direction. Satyrs and daemons bearing down with blades and maces and vile-looking weapons intended only to kill. Bone-chilling screams floating on the breeze. The clank of sword cracking against sword ricocheting off the stones as Nick’s men fought to battle them back. The crimson splatter of blood along the ground. And everywhere, fire and smoke. The night alive with angry red flames licking the sky under the dark shadows of Hades and Zagreus, watching from the hillside across the lake.
The vision cleared, and Cynna gasped and stumbled back. Sweat beaded her brow as she looked toward Nick with wide eyes. Over the months, she’d known he was growing stronger—Zagreus had sensed Nick’s powers were growing too, which was why he’d been so anxious to break him sooner rather than later—but until this moment, she hadn’t realized just how strong those powers had become. Whether or not he’d intended to show her that, he had. Every gruesome, horrific moment.
“They were my people. And I left them when I should have stayed and fought. I chose one life over…hundreds.” His voice dropped. “I left them to die.”
The anguish she heard, the misery… It cut to the heart of her. Because she knew what it was like to make that choice. To choose to live instead of fighting for those you loved. Knew because the same guilt still churned in the pit of her soul, every damn day.
Hand shaking, she took a step closer and gently touched his shoulder. “You didn’t know.”
He pushed to his feet and whirled on her. Surprised, she jerked her hand back. And saw then that his eyes weren’t just pained. They were enraged. And blazing with a vicious darkness she’d never seen before, not even when Zagreus had taunted and beaten and tortured him in his dungeon of horrors.
“I did know. I knew I was leaving them to this nightmare. And I did it anyway.”
She swallowed hard. Knew he was in a bad place. Knew the smartest thing for her right now was to walk away. He didn’t trust her. He still had no reason to trust her. But something deep inside wouldn’t let her leave. She’d had no one after her village had been destroyed. No one to lean on. No one to turn to for comfort. No one to help her pick up the broken pieces of a life in ruins. And that solitude had bred a hatred that had eventually pushed her toward Zagreus. She didn’t want Nick to take that same dark path. Didn’t want to look back on her life and regret one more thing she might have had the power to change. Didn’t want to know that a warrior like him had finally reached his breaking point.
She lifted her hand to his cheek.
He closed his big hand around her wrist in a tight grip before she could touch him, his inflamed amber eyes growing wide with disbelief. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
He was closer to the edge than she’d thought, but she wasn’t backing down. “Helping you. The way I did before. Only…more.”
His gaze raked her features, so intense, so calculating, she felt as if he were seeing past every barrier, deep into her soul. But she didn’t recoil as she once had with Zagreus. Didn’t try to hide what he was seeing. Because she needed him to know he wasn’t alone.
“You never helped me,” he sneered. “You’re as responsible for all this as your master. Had it not been for you, I might have been able to break free of that hell and come back to stop this.” He lifted his chin, indicating the destruction. “I might have been able to save them.”
He was blaming her because she was an easy target. She recognized that, but his words still stung because a place inside knew he was right.
Her heart beat fast against her ribs. “If I’d known—”
“Don’t even say it.” He flung her arm away in disgust, and his eyes grew dark. As dark as her heart. “Get as far from me as possible, because right now I want you as dead as the Prince of Fucking Darkness you chose to serve.”
He turned for the crumbling archway that led back into the castle. “Run hard, female. Run fast. This is the only chance I’m going to give you.”
Energy tingled in the tips of Nick’s fingers, fed by a darkness he only just held back. Skipping steps, he quickly dropped to the lowest level of the colony and headed for the tunnels that fanned out beneath the massive structure.
The twisting maze was a point of
entry, designed to disorient and confuse any enemies who managed to get close, but Nick knew every turn, every corner, and today he needed the solace the tunnels had always given him. Needed the break from responsibility. Needed the freedom.
Only there was no freedom to be found here. Not when visions of what his people had endured played behind his eyelids like a movie set on repeat, every agonizing scream for help booming like cannon fire in his ears.
He bypassed bent, broken lockers with doors hanging askew in the anteroom, didn’t even stop to see if any weaponry had been left behind, and stepped over the mangled steel door that had once formed a barrier between the castle and the cavern beneath. Moving on memory, he walked deeper into the tunnels and didn’t stop until he reached the wide room where a myriad of corridors opened in all different directions.
The cries grew louder. The visions spun faster. He pressed his hands against his ears, hoping to drown out the sounds, slammed his eyes shut, and ground his teeth against the darkness.
He was breaking. He could feel Krónos’s energy inside feeding off his anger and hatred and pain. Churning in his chest. Rushing through his limbs with an all-encompassing power. A power just waiting to command and destroy and annihilate.
He fought the pull. Pressed harder against his ears. Opened his mouth. And roared.
His body trembled. The sound of his scream echoed in the caverns.
“Nick.” Cynna’s soft, warm fingers brushed his shoulder.
He dropped his hands and whipped around. This deep in the tunnels, there was no light, but his senses were so heightened right now from Krónos’s energy churning inside that he didn’t need any illumination to see her standing a foot from him, her silky hair falling to her shoulders, her wide chocolate eyes alight with sadness and…pity.
The pity pushed him right to the edge. Who was she to pity him? Who the fuck was she to care?
“Don’t let them win.” She moved closer. “Fight it. The way you fought it these last few months.”
Those months spun in his memory. Reverberated in his ears. Rushed through his veins. The crack of a whip snapping in the darkness. The sting of the leather slicing into his flesh. The cold metal of the shackles tightening against his wrists. The chains jerking his arms high over his head. The hot, wicked sensation of those nymphs’ fingers gliding along his overheated skin. And a release he hadn’t known he’d craved hovering out of his grasp, impossible to reach. All thanks to her.
Blood pounded in his veins. Anger and rage and desperation coalesced. That energy snapped and sizzled in his hands until he couldn’t hold it back anymore. “Stupid move, female.” He closed his hand around her wrist and yanked. “I warned you.”
She gasped and fell into him. But before she could pull away, he turned and dragged her behind him.
“Nick…”
He headed for the tunnel on the left, wrapped his fingers around the first set of steel bars he came to, and threw the door open.
He flung her into the dark holding cell and stepped in after her.
She hit the stone wall, turned quickly, and looked back, her wide eyes searching the darkness, trying to find him. “Wh—what is this place?”
“Our version of a drunk tank. Never used until now. Fucking poetic, if you ask me.”
She sucked in a breath as he drew close, but didn’t struggle when he grasped her arm, yanked it upward, and snapped a metal cuff high on the wall over her wrist. Didn’t once turn away while he reached for her left arm, jerked that one up as well, and snapped the second cuff over her other wrist.
That shadow energy hummed and rolled inside as he stepped back. Thanks to his enhanced senses, he could see her. See her well, even in utter darkness. His gaze slid over her newly dark hair, the white, almost angelic sweater falling open at her chest, the tips of her breasts pressing against the soft cotton, and her slim hips and long legs encased in the formfitting jeans. Arousal stirred in his belly, mixed with the darkness, then slinked downward until he was hard as stone.
“Nick. Listen to me.” Her hands curled into fists. “I—”
“What did you say to me in that cell when you brought those nymphs to me?” Power rippled in his veins as he braced his hands on the stones beside her head and moved in so close his body was a breath from hers.
“I—”
He brushed the tip of his nose against her ear and lowered his voice to a menacing whisper. “I think it was something along the lines of…this isn’t a game.”
She swallowed hard.
He drew in a deep whiff of jasmine that supercharged his blood. And when she shivered at the slight brush of his nose against her neck, that arousal grew inside until it was a roar in his ears, blocking out everything else but her.
“But it is,” he whispered, letting the edge of his lips skim her lobe. “The gods fuck with our lives because to them we’re nothing more than a game. And I’m finally ready to play along. I wonder, how long will you be able to hold out? When will you break? How long do I get to torment you before you give in and beg me to finish you for good?”
She swallowed again, then shifted her weight, standing more upright against the rocks at her back. “You can do whatever you want to me. We both know I deserve it.”
She did. She was right. But the fact she’d admitted it drew him back, just enough so he could see her eyes. So he could see the lies brewing in the depths of her soul.
They weren’t there, though. What lingered in her unfocused gaze as it darted around the darkness was excitement. And determination. And just a hint of fear.
The excitement and fear aroused him even more. She wanted this. She liked being manhandled. But her defiance confused him. And his inability to read her set off an odd tingle in the center of his chest.
He pushed away from the wall. Gave his head a swift shake and reminded himself she’d chosen to be with Zagreus. She’d directed torture. She’d kept him from his people. She was at the root of every bit of pain and misery swirling inside him.
He reached for the hem of her sweater, jerked it up her arms, and yanked it over her head, letting it bunch between her shoulder blades. She held her breath but didn’t move. And as his gaze ran over her once more, his body pulsed with a wicked thrill while he took in every delectable inch of her caramel skin contrasting against her stark white bra and the waistband of her fitted jeans.
“You do deserve this.” Shifting his legs to the outside of both of hers, he placed his fingers on the soft skin of her belly. Her muscles jerked, and her stomach caved in. He wrapped his hands around her rib cage, lowered his nose back to her neck, and drew in a deep breath. “I just wonder how much you can take.”
He bent his head, blew hot against her sensitive flesh as he trailed his nose along the length of her neck, over her collarbone, then down into the valley between her breasts. A tiny tremor ran through her. Opening his mouth, he bit into her bra and ripped the fabric with his teeth.
She gasped, but he was too caught up in the succulent globes of her breasts falling free of their confines to care. Brushing his nose over the inside of her left breast, he worked his way toward the straining tip. When she swallowed hard, he drew his nose over her areola, extended his tongue, and dragged it across the hard nub of her nipple.
A moan rumbled from her throat. Glancing up, he did it again and watched as her eyelids drifted closed, her hands fisted in the cuffs, and her head fell back.
“You like that.” He laved his tongue all around the tip, cupped her other breast, and skimmed his thumb over the other nipple.
She groaned again, and her hips pushed forward, seeking his, but he angled his body away so she couldn’t reach him. “Tell me you like it, Cynna.”
“I…I like it.”
“I bet you do.” He breathed hot over her, then captured the other nipple between his thumb and forefinger and pinched. Hard.
She jerked in the restraints and cried out.
“How about now? Still like it?”
She shifte
d her feet back until they hit the wall, as if trying to get away. The movement only gave him resistance, and he scooted in closer, until the length of his body brushed hers and his cock pressed into her belly.
He released the pressure. Pinched again. “Tell me. Still like it?”
“Yes. I still like it. Don’t…don’t stop.”
Either she was lying or she was as twisted as he was. The second revolved in his mind as he scraped his teeth over her nipple then shifted to her other breast, drawing the tip into his mouth to taunt and torment while he rolled and played with the first.
She groaned. Rested her head back against the rocks. Lifted her hips, trying to rub against him.
“Eager, aren’t you?” He rolled her left nipple in his fingers, damp from his mouth. “Tell me how badly you want to come.”
She bit her lip, rocked into him. Her body trembled and jolted with every touch of his skin against hers, every pinch of his fingers, every scrape of his teeth. Not from pain anymore, he was sure, but from pleasure. Wicked, white-hot, forbidden pleasure.
She was every man’s sex fantasy. Gods knew, she’d been his for months. But it was way past time she suffered the way he had.
Releasing her breasts, he skimmed his hands down her slim rib cage, over the indent of her belly button, then flicked the clasp on her jeans. “I bet you’re wet.”
Her breaths grew heavy as he placed his palm against her belly and slid his fingers beneath her waistband. Moving slowly, he inched his way into the silky soft hair at the apex of her legs.
“Wet and aching. Are you wet, Cynna?”
She pressed her ass back against the rocks, giving him more room in her jeans. Bit down on her lip to keep from groaning. He watched her carefully as he slid his fingers lower, between the soft lips of her pussy, and into a river of arousal.