Everything about that woman is miraculous. Sebastian sighed heavily and scrubbed his face with both hands. He'd been so worried that Drake would be the one to do something to Tilly's soul, and now Baz was worried he would be the one who did something terrible to her body.
"God, I feel so fucking bad for Asher and his pack," Bishop said.
"Aye, ‘tis a terrible thing. I canna imagine how Chess and Caydren are dealing with it. And for Tilly to recommend they give in and let Asher beat on them?" Valor bristled. “I canna tell if I agree or not, but if it were one of ye in that cage, I’d let ye throw fists at me all night if it brought ye back to the pack.”
Sebastian bit his tongue. Was it terrible that he felt like a lucky sonofabitch right now? According to the Devil, Asher couldn't control his wrath. He destroyed himself so he couldn't harm anyone else. Constantine, who they learned was gifted with healing, couldn't even penetrate Asher's aura to heal the damaged seed their enemy planted inside that Hell Hound. If lust was the demon that haunted Sebastian, he was lucky because he never wanted to be violent towards his pack. Ever. If the Paris pack survived this experiment, would Asher ever be able to forgive himself? Probably not.
Fuck Baz couldn’t think about that anymore. Time to change subjects.
Sebastian rubbed his forearm. Swear to Satan, it felt like he had a layer of scuzzy crud on him. "In the beginning, in… my first life… I wasn't allowed to shower." The confession came out quietly. Baz kept his eyes cast to the floor, locked on Drake's dirty black boots. So much for changing subjects to something less painful. But he needed to get this out. It was time. No more numbness. No more silence. No more.
"I'd have to sleep and eat with their fluids dried on me. Their scent clung in my nose."
"Sebastian," Drake warned.
He ignored it. "I can't understand how someone could degrade another human like they had me. And I was scared shitless they’d do the same to you, D."
"Sebastian."
Baz kept talking and ignored his twin's cautionary tone and the fact that he was standing right in front of him. "I would have done anything to Tills to get inside and own her," he placed a trembling hand over his mouth, as if to scoop the words back up and eat them. "I could have..."
"But you didn't," Drake growled. In a blink, Drake was all up in Baz’s face. "You fucking didn't, brother."
"Because you were there to stop me!" The twins stared at one another for several heart beats. "I would have been no better than those fuckers were to us."
"You wouldn't have raped her and we both know that."
"No we don't." Baz's heart pounded. "I couldn't think straight at all, D. If you didn't have a hold on me I," he choked on his words, "I don't know what I might have done." He scratched his arms, "I can still feel it, you know? I feel their cum on me. Their spit. Their drinks and piss." Fuck his eyes stung. "I was no better up there with Tilly. I was a fucking animal. I covered her in my –”
Oh shit, he was going to be sick. Baz backed away, holding a hand over his mouth. He didn't want to blow chunks all over the Devil's nice floor so he backed the fuck up, shut his eyes, and breathed through the nausea just like he always did when he went too far down one of his rabbit holes.
His pack kept their distance. He felt their eyes on him. He wanted to tell them to look away, but maybe they needed to see what kind of Hound they had in their pack. Instead of hiding his demons, Baz allowed them out. Displayed them for the pack to finally see.
Drake hid behind cold glares and a stone heart. Sebastian always hid behind fake smiles and an indescribable desire to never look like the mess he really fucking was. "I'm so broken I couldn’t even be the enemy's weapon."
Bishop stepped closer, "What the fuck does that mean?"
Baz looked up at him, "Maybe that’s why no spell they tried worked on me in the catacombs. I'm too busted to be used."
"Ahhhh, the busted ones always are the greatest finds," Lucifer stepped in, escorting Sara and Tilly on both his arms. "No one likes perfection, Hound. Makes you fucking boring. And as far as being broken, I’d like to meet someone who isn’t." He made sure to look at each Hound in the room, including Tilly and his darling Sara. “
Baz didn't have time to pull himself together. One look at Tilly on Lucifer's arm and he'd lost his train of thought. All he could do was focus on his woman and breathe through the pounding in his chest. I’ll never hurt you. But he didn’t have the balls to say it out loud. What if he fucked up one day? What if these wings on him made him evil and he fucked everything up? No. He wouldn’t let that happen. Ever. He’d die before he ever did something terrible to Tilly and the rest of his pack.
"Have a seat, Hounds." The Devil allowed Sara to sit first, then Tilly, before he plopped down in his chair. Constantine hadn’t returned. Lucifer slapped a bunch of papers onto the table and rubbed his thumb across his eyebrow. "Your girl is fucking incredible."
"We know," the pack said in unison.
Tilly’s face was pale and her hair stuck to her skin from being so sweaty. She ran the back of her hand across her forehead, and that’s when they saw how shaky she truly was.
“Tills,” Baz squatted down at her side and grabbed her hand. Was she scared? Nervous? Upset? Is it me you’re frightened of now? “What’s wrong?”
“I’m fine,” she whispered. “Just…” she shook her head fast, “Just a little off.”
“She needs to hunt, Hounds.” Lucifer placed a hand over the papers on the table. They were facedown so no one could see them. “So you have a decision to make. Take her home and go hunting, or stay and see where we begin to focus our revenge and take the enemy down one pawn at a time.”
Drake snarled, “Are you asking us to choose between saving the world or our woman?”
“I’m asking you to prioritize.”
“Home,” Valor ordered. “We take her home.”
If it came down to choosing between their girl or the world, of course they’d choose their girl.
She was their motherfucking world.
Chapter 19
“You guys,” Tilly kept trying to argue with them, dragging her feet while they escorted her out of there. “You’re being dramatic.”
“No, we’re not,” Valor kept a firm grip on her while he carried her out of Hell. “Whatever is on those papers can wait. If it couldn’t, Lucifer wouldn’t have given us a choice.”
“Free will is important,” she argued. “He needed you to make the choice instead of him barking orders at you.”
“We’d choose you no matter what,” Sebastian said from behind them. “And whatever is on those papers can be handled. The world won’t be saved in one day, and anything on those pages is from a memory. It’s done and over with.”
Tilly couldn’t argue with that, but still.
Jesus, what just happened in the Devil’s private room felt like a whirlwind…
Sara, Tilly, Constantine and Lucifer had spent the better part of six hours coming up with sketches of what Tilly remembered. Her photographic memory finally had a meaningful purpose: To help the Devil identify his enemy.
“Tell us everything you remember from the catacombs,” Lucifer had ordered. “Leave no detail unspoken, Matilda Jane. We can’t afford to overlook anything.”
While she described what she saw, down to the last broken fingernail on the ground, Sara had furiously sketched it all out. They asked her a lot of questions about sizes, shapes, positions of objects, lighting. Once Tilly described everything she could remember, she was rewarded with something she hadn’t expected to get just yet.
Part of the bargain Tilly made when becoming a Hell Hound was to know who the motherfucker was who cursed her family. “I want to know now,” Tilly pushed. “Before I tell you about the man with the tattooed hand, I want to know who put that motherfucking curse on my bloodline.”
The Devil’s expression never faltered as he leaned back in his seat and kept his blue eyes pinned on hers. A curve of his lips almost hinted at a s
mile forming. “Just in time,” he chuckled.
Gabriel and Uriel entered the room looking weary and pissed. “It fucking worked,” Uriel said with a busted lip. “Asher’s back to his senses and the wings have faded. He nearly beat the hell out of his pack to get there though… and they allowed it.”
“Too bad I can’t stick them in the fires to heal them faster.” Luce frowned.
“I’ll take care of what I can on them,” Constantine hopped up and went out the door, but not without saying, “Nice work, Matilda Jane. Sorry I’m going to miss this next part.”
“Miss what next part?” Gabriel sat down.
“Our new Hound has demanded to be told who put the curse on her family.” Lucifer leaned back in his chair and kept his gaze locked on hers.
Uriel growled from against the wall, “Now isn’t the best time for that.”
Tilly didn’t break her stare from the Devil, “No time like the present. You guys wanted to know everything I saw in the catacombs and I told you.”
“Not everything.” Lucifer shook his head slowly, “You still need to tell us about the man who stabbed you in the leg.”
Tilly rubbed her face and tried to not cry. Sitting there in Hell with a pregnant woman and a bunch of hell-bent on revenge Angels was not as fun as one might have thought. She felt twisted on the inside. Her head was spinning and thumping and she was so damn overheated her stupid outfit was starting to suffocate her. “Just give me this bone, guys. It’s not like I can do anything about it anyways. What’s done is done. I just… I need to know.”
“And we need to know about everything you saw. You do understand that the world is in danger, right?”
“My telling you about the tattooed hand won’t bring you close to saving this shithole of a planet today, Satan.”
“And us telling you who cursed you won’t bring back your loved ones.” The Devil’s matter-of-fact tone spiked Tilly’s temper. Before she could say something she might regret, Lucifer pointed at Gabriel, “He’s the one who cursed you.”
You could have knocked her over with a feather. “You?” Tilly’s rage filled her veins with white hot fury. She stood and slowly walked over to the Angel, Gabriel, with his smug face and big wings.
He didn’t budge when she approached him, but he did say, “You’re such a fucker, Luce.”
“A deal’s a deal. She earned this and you know it,” Lucifer leaned back to watch the shit show.
Gabriel didn’t argue. He didn’t even deny it. Instead, he grinned at Tilly and sucked his teeth before saying, “Can’t say I regret it.”
She. Saw. Red.
Tilly attacked - Kicking, punching, and biting any part of him she could reach. Her lessons in martial arts and defense went down the drain. All she knew to do was take a lifetime’s worth of hurt and pain and lash out with punches and slaps and kicks and bites. To make it worse, Gabriel didn’t fight back. He fucking stood there and let her beat on him.
She felt wild. Unraveled. Insane.
Was she insane? Did the Devil finally push her over the edge and now she was certifiably crazy? Maybe, but oh-fucking-well.
It took both Angels to peel her off of Gabriel. In a final attempt to do some damage to the asshole, she jerked her body, kicked her feet out, used Lucifer and Uriel’s arms as leverage to kick Gabriel in the face before back-flipping out of their hold and landing on the ground with perfect balance. Her chest heaved and sweat trailed down her body with a fresh wave of rage. She walked over and spat in Gabe’s face. “I hate you. I fucking hate you.”
Gabriel didn’t wipe off her spit. He just glowered at her, “Like I already said, I don’t regret it. So if you’re looking for an apology, you won’t find it here, woman.”
Tears stung her eyes. “How could you be so heartless?” Weren’t Angels supposed to be good?
“It’s not about having a heart. It’s about having a purpose.” Gabriel’s calm demeanor was seriously pissing her off. She’d split his lip and caught him pretty good in his left eye, but he acted like he didn’t feel a thing.
“So that curse had a purpose? Is that the lie you tell yourself so you can sleep at night? You fuck with innocent lives and say it’s for a higher cause so that should make it okay? Well it’s not okay!” She went to lunge at him again and Lucifer held her back.
The Devil whispered in her ear, stroking the back of her neck while he purred, “Accept it.”
Fuck that. Fuck him. Fuck this. Tilly fought to free herself again, but there was no escaping Lucifer. And the more he held her, the calmer she became. Damn him for it. She didn’t want to be calm right now. She wanted to fight.
Kill, kill, kill.
“You need to hunt, little Hound. Your powers are lashing out for some attention.”
“Then let me go and I’ll hunt my ass right over to that bastard you call an Angel. Give me a knife while you’re at it.”
Lucifer gave a throaty chuckle. “Hear him out before you shred him.”
“I don’t want to hear his sorry ass excuses.”
“Didn’t you do things you weren’t proud of, Matilda Jane, all for the greater good of the world around you?”
Shit, she didn’t need a lesson in morality or ethics right now.
“You know,” Lucifer forced her to take another step back, “I never much cared for the bible, but that whole shtick about let he without sin cast the first stone is pretty handy. It basically means shut the fuck up because we’re all assholes sometimes.”
Was the Devil telling her to shut the fuck up? That wasn’t going to help her anger issues.
“You need to accept that the curse was part of your fate,” Gabriel finally said. “Good always comes with bad, Tilly. Your curse was no different. I might have cursed you, but I blessed you too.”
Shut the fuck up. Shut the fuck up.
“Every woman in your family had a gift. Your sister could dance circles around even the best in the Russian ballet. Your mother’s IQ was off the charts. Every female in your bloodline was a savant or made history in some circle. And you?” Gabriel stalked over and got in her face. “Who the fuck do you think gave you the photographic memory? Me. It was me. And before you start spitting in my face like a feral fucking animal again, ask yourself if you wished to be different. Ever.”
Tilly’s nostrils flared with every exhale she made.
“That’s what I thought,” Gabriel said smugly.
She wouldn’t be where she was right now, without having been cursed first.
“All roads lead to salvation,” Sara said from the table. Her head never looked away from the graphite sketch she was still working on, “Trust me, I should know. All our paths are treacherous and damning in some way. It’s what we choose at the crossroads that defines us – not how battered we become while getting there.”
Lucifer’s grip eased up on Tilly’s torso. She was so hot, she thought she was going to pass out.
“Fine,” Tilly snarled. Taking a seat, she dove right into the man with the tattoo on his hand. Sara grew paler with every detail Tilly described. When they were finished, the Angels looked over everything before going into yet another room and left Sara and Tilly alone for a few moments.
“You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Tilly said.
Sara didn’t reply. That was the end of the meeting…
And now, being escorted by her pack, Tilly was heading home.
“Are ye alright, lass?”
Nope. “I’m fine.”
“If by fine, you mean pissed and looking for a target, then yeah, you look fine.” Drake opened the door to get out of Hell and back to their house.
Tilly had a new appreciation for the old saying, Be careful what you wish for. She could have gone her whole life with hate and resentment. But now that she knew a damned Angel had placed that curse on her family, and for a greater purpose no less, it made her too confused to even talk about it with her pack.
Because the end result was: No. She wouldn’t change it. She wa
s glad to be where she was right now.
Tilly grew up with a disconnected family, no friends, few lovers, and zero future. That curse was worse than the one Gabriel put on her. And that lonely curse was one she’d put on her damned self.
Gabriel’s voice rang in her ears... I might have cursed you, but I blessed you too. If she hadn’t had the curse, the twins would have never been drawn to her, she’d have never developed an obsession with magic or the catacombs for that matter. She’d have never made a bucket list or gone to the Blue Lizard that night. Without her amazing memory, she’d have never made it this far.
Yes, she died. Everyone does. But now? Now Tilly had a family. Friends. Four lovers…. And a future to protect.
She should probably thank Gabriel later for what he did. Maybe… ugh.
Valor’s big arms were still locked around her as he cradled and carried her up the steps of their mansion. She could have walked, but if he wanted to carry her, that was cool too. Valor made her feel precious and she could use a little something sweet like that right about now.
When he sat her down, he kept his hands on her shoulders and massaged them. His blue eyes looked half-worried and half-excited. “Get weapons, Hounds. Tonight, we’re going to teach our woman how it’s done.”
“We’re hunting?” Tilly couldn’t contain her excitement. “Like, right now?”
“Aye, lass. The sooner we do, the sooner you’ll be better balanced. Then we can go after whoever Lucifer wishes to sic us on next.”
While everyone dispersed to arm up, Tilly ran to her room to get ready.
“Is it your killer?” Bishop asked from the doorway.
“What?”
He stepped in, holding a holster for her to put on. “Those drawings you made with Sara. Were any of them of the night you were murdered?”
“No.”
His disappointment was obvious. “Do you know who it was?”
“Yes.”
“Then… why not just tell us?”
“I made a deal with the Devil. I can’t tell you just yet.”
“Why?”
Tilly tucked the gun Bishop handed her next into the holster. “Some things are more important than revenge.”
Hard to Kill (Hell Hounds Harem Book 6) Page 16
