I remained where I was, mostly because my feet felt frozen to the floor, but also because I wanted my friends back. Movement from above caused all the ones closing in on us to take a step away. My gaze went to the staircase as a woman, dressed in a sheer, blood-red dress that did nothing to hide any aspect of her body, descended the stairs. The skirt swirled about her calves as she moved with the grace of a ballerina.
I couldn’t tear my gaze away from her when she stopped at the bottom of the stairs with one elegant hand resting upon the newel. Her blood-red, talon fingernails matched the color of her hair spilling about her shoulders and waving against the breasts exposed by her diaphanous dress. Sex oozed from every one of her pores, and she knew it as her tongue slid out to lick across her ruby-red lips. The woman’s emerald eyes surveyed us as if she were inspecting some bug and considering stomping it.
Beside me, as if under some spell, Vargas’s body swayed toward her. I grabbed his arm to hold him in place. Seeming to come back to himself, he shook his head and thrust back his shoulders. I held him for a minute longer before releasing him again. I had to have my hands free.
What could this woman do? Could she make him go to her against his will? I’d heard the legends of incubi and succubae, that they fed on humans during sex, but I had no idea what they were truly capable of.
It had been a big mistake to bring Vargas here. I hadn’t known what I’d expected from these demons, but I had mistakenly believed if we avoided their beds, we would be able to get away from them.
I’d never expected to come up against the pull these things possessed. I would 100 percent deserve Kobal’s I told you so, if we made it out of here, but first I had to make sure we made it out. Vargas had followed me into this place of the damned, and he would leave it again if I had to torch everything in here to ensure it.
Widening my stance, I focused on the dim pulse of life beneath my feet once more. It wasn’t much, but if I dug deeper, beneath the boards, I could feel the cool dirt of the earth as if it were slipping through my toes.
I could possibly feed off the life force of these things, but I’d prefer not to get close enough to them to try, and I had a feeling the pulse they radiated would be sickening. However, if push came to shove, I’d feast on these things if I had to.
The life of the earth seeped into me, but my fingers remained spark free as the woman took a step toward us. I preferred not to let any of these things know what I might be capable of unless it became absolutely necessary.
“This is a first, our prey coming to us,” the woman said in a husky voice that slid over my skin like silk.
She was a pit of iniquity and it radiated against us now. Beside me, Vargas swayed again and a dazed look filled his eyes as he lowered his head to stare at his feet.
I have to get him out of here!
Raising my chin, I held her gaze as I spoke. “You took some of our friends.”
She tossed a strand of hair behind her shoulder. “If we did, then they are ours now, as are you.”
“No, they aren’t and neither are we.”
“No?” She laughed as she practically glided across the floor toward us. “You have no idea what you walked into, dearie, but you’ll learn.”
Her fingers skimmed over Vargas’s arm, causing him to moan when she walked around him. The lascivious smile she gave me revealed two small fangs in the top of her mouth. “I could take him upstairs now, and he wouldn’t argue. He’d trip over himself to get there. And you,” she said to me. “The things I will do to you, the sounds I will cause you to emit, the pleas you will issue for me to stop even as you’re begging me to continue.”
My eyes narrowed on the woman as she stepped toward me. Then, her gaze latched onto my neck. With a ruthless shove, she pushed Vargas out of the way and came at me. He stumbled forward before regaining his balance and shaking his head as if trying to clear it from a fog.
Her hands clasped my shirt. She went to pull me forward, but I dug my feet in and grabbed hold of her wrists.
“You’ve been marked!” Her disbelief and fury beat against me.
“Let go of me!” I hissed, my hands constricting on her wrists.
One of her nails tore through my shirt. It scraped against my skin to leave small beads of blood on my flesh. She leaned closer to me, inhaling deeply. My heart thundered in my chest as she peered at me from under her thick fringe of red lashes. I would torch this bitch before I ever let her feed on me or my friends, but I didn’t want to start a fight when we were so outnumbered. Not if there was some small chance we could walk out of here without incident.
“Smell so sweet, so ripe for the picking,” she murmured. “I smell demon on you though.” Her gaze went to the marks on my neck again. “Couldn’t be.”
My eyes held hers when she leaned away from me. Malice flashed within those emerald depths as her lips skimmed back to reveal those small fangs once more. “Couldn’t be!” she spat. “Not a human, he wouldn’t choose a human.”
Kobal had said demons would know I belonged to him, and apparently he’d been right, but the knowledge of who my Chosen was only seemed to infuriate this woman more. I somehow managed to keep it together as I gestured to the stage. “We came for our friends.”
“He may have marked you, but you walked into my nest. That means you are mine now as are your friends. I will have you wasted and wanting so badly you won’t remember your name or his.”
“Try it and I’ll have you screaming in agony. We don’t have to fight, just let us leave here with our friends.”
She laughed before releasing my shirt and sliding her hand suggestively over her breasts until her nipples puckered. “Silly human, there is no leaving a canagh demon.”
“If you know who has marked me, then you’ll know he’s on his way.”
“He’s not here now, which leads me to believe he’s realized his foolishness in marking a human. A male demon rarely allows his Chosen out of sight for long, and he would never allow her to come to me.”
I couldn’t explain to this woman what I’d done and I didn’t intend to try. The cloying scent of her engulfed me, threatening to gag me when she leaned toward me. Done with trying to play nice, I threw up my arms, knocking her back a step. She fairly spit with anger before she recovered. I thought she was going to fly at me and slice me apart with those talons, but she remained where she was, her eyes burning into mine as she ran her hand down the front of her gown.
Murmurs rippled through the crowd, and excitement pulsed from the other canagh demons as they moved closer to us.
CHAPTER 38
River
The woman’s countenance never changed when she lashed out at me, her talons whistling as they sliced through the air. I jumped back, barely managing to avoid their deadly arc at my throat. This wasn’t Kobal and training. This woman was out for blood, my blood. She swung at me again, this time an upper cut that would have broken my jaw and sliced my jugular open.
My leap to the side brought me up against Vargas, jarring him out of whatever strange stupor he’d been in. He blinked before pulling his gun free and pointing it at the woman. One of the other demons leapt forward. The demon smashed his arm down on Vargas’s, causing him to lose his grip on his gun. It clattered against the wood floor when it hit the ground. Vargas swung at him, but the demon had already stepped away to watch the woman as she circled me like a shark on the hunt for its prey.
She came at me again, swinging wildly in her growing frustration. Before she reached me, the world fell away to allow the battle to unfold in my head. It was only her and me now, and I saw every move she would make seconds before she made them. A strange sense of calm descended over me as I swung my forearms up, blocking each of her blows.
When she drew her arm back, I leaned against the beam behind me, lifted my leg, and drove it into her chest. Stunned gasps filled the room when the woman reeled backward and crashed into another beam.
Silence descended over the other demons. The pounding
of my heart resonated in my ears when her eyes lifted to mine. Hatred burned within their clear, green depths, but I also saw curiosity and disbelief there. Vargas looked between the two of us as the woman pulled herself away from the beam.
“What are you?” the woman hissed.
“We only came for our friends, let us take them and we’ll go,” I told her.
Her eyes traveled over me and for the briefest of seconds I almost believed she would agree to my terms. Then, she came at me so fast my mind barely had a chance to process her intentions until she was almost on top of me.
Before I had a chance to react to her new attack, the front door crashed open with so much force it flew off its hinges and across the room to smash against the stairs. The shattered wood of the doorframe rained down on the occupants of the room. The other canagh demons leapt back and threw their hands over their heads to protect themselves from the debris. They scattered out of the pathway of the seething demon who stepped inside.
Vargas threw himself to the floor and rolled across it to retrieve his gun. He bounced back up close to the ruined door. The wreckage and noise didn’t deter the woman as she swung at me again. I dodged the claws arcing toward my chest by ducking out of the way. They sliced into the beam behind me, tearing splinters from the wood and rending a bellow from Kobal that rattled the windows.
Shoving my hands into the woman’s chest, I pushed her away from me and scrambled low to avoid the lethal talons of her other arm descending on me. I hadn’t completely risen to my full height when an arm slid around my waist, pinning me against a much-loved chest. I would have breathed a sigh of relief if I hadn’t felt the fury vibrating the muscles beneath my touch.
Kobal thrust me behind him, bracing his feet apart as he faced the woman across from us. Vargas stood behind me, paler than normal but his eyes were clear once more, as whatever hold she’d had over him was broken.
Hatred no longer twisted the woman’s exquisite features. Her expression was now composed into the beautiful face that would make the angels weep once more. “Kobal,” she purred with a swish of her hip.
“Lilitu,” he grated.
She smiled as she fluffed back her blood-colored hair. “You know I would have welcomed you to join in the fun. There was no reason to destroy my door.”
“Not here for fun,” he replied, nudging me back another step.
I shot him a disgruntled look, but my protest died at the burning intensity and the harshness of his amber gaze sweeping over me. If I pushed him now, I had no idea what he would do. His lips skimmed back when he spotted the blood beading on my skin. His wrath blasted over me in a wave I swore blew the hair back from my face.
Lilitu’s eyes flickered between the two of us, and then she sneered at me. Before me, the marks on Kobal’s arms shifted in response to Lilitu’s hostility. I half expected the beasts to burst free of him, but they remained caged in preparation for a fight.
“You couldn’t have marked her on purpose,” Lilitu said in disbelief.
“I mark what is mine,” Kobal said flatly.
Around Lilitu, the other canagh demons murmured again. They shifted and moved back to allow more space down the center of the cavernous building. Shadows fell across the busted doorway, briefly blocking the little bit of light that had spilled in from outside. Turning, I watched as Corson and Bale slipped inside.
“Yours?” Lilitu scoffed. “Come now, Kobal, we both know you could never be satisfied with taking only one woman for the rest of your days.” Her talons trailed down the front of her dress. They slipped over her breasts before stroking over the flesh of her belly exposed by the cutouts in the sides of the gauzy material. “I can clearly recall what that taking was like, as I’m sure you can too.”
The blood drained from my face so fast I was amazed I didn’t pass out. I kept my face impassive as I tried not to let my distress show. Lilitu made beautiful look like the understatement of the year. She oozed sex, and I was certain she knew exactly what to do to please a man. I’d known Kobal was the exact opposite of a saint long before I’d started sleeping with him, but she was something I never could have imagined.
“Give us the others and we’ll leave,” Kobal replied, ignoring her words completely.
Lilitu’s hand stilled on its way back up her body in the valley between her breasts. “You could always share,” she suggested in a husky voice. “She must taste delicious.”
“No one else will ever touch her. If you try, Lilitu, it will be the last thing you do.”
“She’s so young, so inexperienced. I have more than a few here who would be eager to teach her how to make a man beg for more. I’m sure you recall the way I had you begging for more.”
This time I was unable to suppress a shudder at the hurt her words caused. I hated this place and these things.
“I don’t recall,” he replied.
I thought it might have been actual distress flitting over her perfect features before a smile curved her lips once more. “You’d appreciate her so much more after my men are done teaching her. I can guarantee it.”
Some of the eerily beautiful men stepped forward, their perfectly chiseled features looking almost fake. A few of them raked their eyes over me before licking their lips. One, with platinum blond hair took hold of his erect shaft and fondled himself as he stared at me.
With a swift step to the side, Kobal seized him by his neck and snapped his head to the side with a sharp thrust of his thumb to the man’s jaw. I could only stand and gawk as fire burst from Kobal’s hand to encompass the face of the screaming demon. The man’s eyes burned from his head as flames burst out of his eye sockets and rolled up to consume his blond hair.
Kobal tossed his flaming body aside, letting it fall to the floor as if it were no more than a mosquito he’d swatted from the air. “Look at her again, and I’ll burn you all to the ground,” he snarled at the others. Their mouths gaped open as their eyes remained locked on the burning body of their fallen companion.
Whatever interest any of the men had been showing toward me vanished in a heartbeat. They all glanced at me before focusing on Lilitu once more. The amusement and lust had vanished from Lilitu’s gaze. Now the pupils of her eyes had become pinpricks as they focused on Kobal with murderous intent.
CHAPTER 39
Kobal
“That was my servant!” Lilitu spat.
“You have others,” I replied calmly, though I was tempted to engulf this place in flames, grab River, and drag her from here. I wanted to kiss her as badly as I wanted to throttle her. She’d walked herself straight into the hands of our enemies.
Lilitu had broken off from some of the other canagh demons over a thousand years ago. She’d enslaved some of them with her powerful, ancient blood before aligning herself with Lucifer after I’d climbed from her bed, never to return. Now all I could hope was to get River out of here without Lilitu poisoning her with her words and actions, but I knew she wouldn’t leave her friends without a fight.
“I’ll have you begging at my feet!” Lilitu yelled.
“Let’s not become delusional about this. Simply give us the men and woman you took earlier and no one else has to die.”
“I’ll tear her to pieces,” Lilitu vowed.
I bared my fangs at her as beneath my flesh the hounds surged toward my fingers. They also recognized River as theirs, and any threat toward her was one they’d gladly take down. Lilitu’s eyes darted toward my arms as the marks pulsed with life and fire danced over my fingers. As soon as we were out of this building, I would destroy everything within it.
I gave a pointed look at the hounds before focusing on her again. “Who will tear whom to pieces?”
Lilitu smiled seductively as she pushed aside her fury to fall back on who she innately was, a seductress.
“Come now, Kobal, we had a lot of fun before. We can have it again.” She moved forward, gliding across the floor so smoothly it seemed her feet didn’t touch the boards. River stiffened behind m
e. “You would like to watch me with the girl, no?”
“No. Bring our people to us or I am going to start torching every one of your servants. I’m out of patience, Lilitu.”
“You harm another one of my servants, and I will feast on her until she’s nothing but a shriveled husk.”
“Lilitu,” I growled.
She stopped five feet away from me and thrust out her hip. “We were good once—”
“Once!” I barked. “And I never returned. Your lure is not as powerful as you believe it to be.”
Shocked murmurs from the canaghs followed my statement. To this group, she was their queen, their most powerful, and the words I’d uttered were the ultimate insult to her. All returned once they were satisfied by a canagh demon; once was never enough. It was believed their drugging kiss would forever ensnare someone, making them out of their mind with lust and unable to think of anything else as their bodies fed the canaghs need for sexual energy while they wasted away to nothing.
I’d made sure not to kiss Lilitu the night we were together. It had been playing with fire to risk lying with her, but after all the talk of the canagh, and especially Lilitu herself, I’d been determined to try my hand at her. I’d been younger and dumber then, fresh off a lost battle to Lucifer and determined to conquer something. It had been a rash decision and a forgettable experience.
“Bring them to me, especially her,” Lilitu commanded the other canaghs as she pointed a finger at River. “Now!”
Around me, the canaghs shifted and shuffled their feet as they glanced between me and Lilitu. They were lovers not fighters, but this group of canaghs were also caught up by their need for her blood and the power she held over them. Lilitu was exceptionally strong due to the sexual energy she’d drained from countless demons and humans over her many years, but she was no match for me. If she came at me, she would die. Her followers knew this, but they would do as she commanded and their numbers far outweighed ours.
“This does not have to be a battle,” Corson said from the doorway.
Carved (The Road to Hell Series, Book 2) Page 27
