“You were planning to sell me all along. What’s changed?” I don’t need to ask to know the answer. He changed. I changed. We both changed together, and now it’s different.
“You’re mine, Pet. I’m not handing you over to Vladik. We’ll find another way to get Athena back.”
“In ten years, have you found a way?”
“Enough—”
“You know it’s the truth. It’s the reason your brother held a broken bottle to my jugular. There isn’t another way.”
“We’ll find one. I’ll have no more of this.”
I shake my head infinitesimally and lean back into his embrace when he pulls me, because what other choice do I have?
I know what I need to do, and Ares isn’t going to like it one little bit.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Pet
When Ares is fast asleep, I slide from the bed and throw on my robe. After softly padding downstairs, I search the house for Hermes. I find him by the indoor pool, getting high, or drunk, or both. He’s so different from the man I’d come to know in the house and at The Ranch. Gone are his tailored suits, his slicked back hair, and cleanly shaven face. Instead, he’s sporting scruff, his hair has been left to curl in an unruly state, and his face is hard in the moonlight.
I enter the room. The huge windows overlook the gardens, and moonlight spills through the stained-glass roof. The scent of weed hangs heavily in the air, and the sweet smell tickles my sinuses. I’ve don’t remember doing drugs. From what D told me, I hardly ever drank. My career never allowed for either, and I have no doubt I was ambitious enough to ensure that never happened.
“What the fuck do you want?”
“A minute.” My voice tremors. I clear it and take several steps closer. “That’s all.”
“You have thirty seconds.”
“I know about Athena. I know all about your plans to sell me to Vladik.”
“Don’t you know, little mouse,” he says through his teeth, “the best-laid plans are often ruined when your captive is set free and you’re betrayed by your own fucking brother.”
“I can’t speak for him. I still don’t know why exactly he put me through all of that only to let me go, and he’d probably punish me for being down here—”
“Ten seconds.” Hermes raises his arm and looks at his wristwatch, but it’s no longer attached to his arm. I follow his gaze and find the gold timepiece sitting at the bottom of the pool, along with his shoes.
I sit beside him, ignoring the way my skin prickles with the desire to run. “I want to help.”
He laughs humorlessly. “And how exactly do you plan to help, little mouse?”
“I want you to sell me to Vladik.”
This time he does laugh. He loses it. I take the joint from his hands and put it to my lips, drawing in a huge puff of smoke that burns my lungs. I cough and splutter, almost dropping the marijuana in the pool. He yanks on my arm and pulls me closer. I gasp. Hermes doesn’t let me go, he grips my bicep tightly. Too tight. My muscles ache and burn beneath his touch as he leans into my face. “I’m warning you right now, if you’re fucking with me so help me, Hades, I will drown you in this goddamn pool before you can blink.”
“I’m not fucking with you.”
“Bullshit.” He releases my arm but snatches the joint. “Why are you here?”
“I told you. I want to help.”
“You don’t even know her.” Hermes takes a long draw on the smoke, holding his breath. When he finally releases it, he says, “Why would you agree to be sold to help a woman you’ve never met?”
“Let’s just say I know something about being captive. People shouldn’t be locked in cages.” I glance up at the stained-glass throwing refracted light all around the room. “Even gilded ones.”
“If you hate it so much, then why did you come back?”
“Because I love him,” I answer without pause. “Because I had no choice, and even if I did, he would have taken me anyway.”
He hands me the smoke again, and I take a long, deep draw. It fills my lungs, setting them alight as surely as fire burns through dry leaves.
I cough and beat my chest. Hermes laughs again and snatches the spliff from me. “I still don’t know why you’d be willing to help me.”
“I’m not helping you. I’m not even doing it for Ares. I’m doing it for her.”
“You realize you’re going to get fucked, right? Every day, sometimes more than once, Vladik will shove his putrid Russian dick in your ass and rape you until you bleed.”
I flinch, swallow hard, and stare daggers at Hermes. And suddenly, Ares’ disinterest in fucking my pussy during the first few months of my training makes sense. He was preparing me for a man who only enjoys anal, and if Hermes is right, he only enjoys rough anal. God, what Athena must have been through. Assuming she’s even still alive.
“I know.”
“So how is it that my brother is agreeing to this, especially after he fought so hard to keep you from this exact fate?”
“He’s not. In fact, his exact words were ‘absolutely fucking not.’”
He chuckles darkly, so much like his twin. “And the little mouse came scurrying to me.”
“You said there was no other way to get her back. Is that true?”
“If there was, she’d be sitting beside me right now, instead of my brother’s fuck toy.”
“Ares said she’s your adopted sister?”
“She would have been, had our father given a shit and actually adopted her. She was relative by marriage only, his second wife.”
It dawns on me then, something I didn’t see yesterday. The reason Hermes is willing to risk everything, and why Ares is not. “You love her.”
He looks at me, studying my face. For what—disgust? Horror? I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel a pinch of both, but I understand too, because I know something about wanting what you shouldn’t, craving it, and being so far gone you can’t tell the difference between right and wrong.
“We had a fucked-up childhood. Our mother was dead, and our father cared more about his drugs and weapons than he did his children. One day, this Mexican bitch shows up with a little girl in tow. Dad tells us the woman is his new wife, our new mother, and the kid is our responsibility now. We were eight fucking years’ old. She was six. We named her Athena because it’s what our mother would have named the baby girl she was carrying in her womb when she died.”
“I’m so sorry.”
He shrugs and hands me the joint. “Her mother OD’d on coke in the master suite. He didn’t even fucking bury her in a plot. Just had one of his men make her disappear with the rest of the bodies that wound up on the compound.” Hermes looks up at the ceiling, his expression turning from hard to wistful in a heartbeat. “The three of us were inseparable. We dreamed about running away, about hitchhiking to the border. We wouldn’t have even made it off the compound before someone reported us missing.”
“So, you and her . . . how did that come about?”
“Athena wasn’t just our adopted sister; she was the only girl we had any contact with. She was our first.”
Jealousy twists in my gut, hot and cruel. “Your first?”
“Our father shared our proclivities. It wasn’t unusual for us to see a naked sub crawling on hands and knees through the living room.”
“Explains why Ares is so comfortable at The Ranch.”
“Oh, you have no idea. Ares at The Ranch before his precious little Pet came along? Comfortable has nothing to do with it. He owned every single slave in that house, and everyone knew it.”
Ice prickles my spine. I don’t want to know this. I don’t want to picture him dominating other women, or men. The kiss with Israel comes back to me, and I hate him all over again. “Did he . . . did he send Israel to live with Texas because he couldn’t stand to see him sold to Vladik either?”
“Oh, little mouse, you’re so delusional.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
I frown. “Because he enjoys it.”
“He does, but that’s not the only reason.”
I take another puff of the smoke, and exhale a shaky breath. The drug is quick to mess with my head. “He won’t tell me anything. He never does.”
“Ares doesn’t really believe that Athena is alive. He’ll never say as much, but I know he thinks she’s dead.”
“Then why take me? Why train me, and plan to sell me off?”
“He took you because he wanted you.”
I shake my head, but Hermes levels me with a dark glare.
“I saw you dance once. The Colonel had given us tickets, and we had a plan: a ballerina so enchanting she’d bring Vladik to the party. But I saw my twin’s face as he watched you on that stage. I knew the second he saw you his dick was hard, and he was itching to have you on your knees. Even if only for a little while. What I didn’t realize, is that I lost him that night . . . to you.”
“That’s why he let me go? Because he didn’t think Athena was alive.”
“That, and because if he couldn’t have you, he didn’t want anyone else to either. My brother has only ever thought of himself.”
I look into eyes so foreign and yet so familiar. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Because you . . .” He pokes my chest, right between my breasts. “You have a heart. You’ll sacrifice yourself to save a complete stranger, and maybe you’ll find a way to save yourself from my brother or maybe you won’t, but you’ll bring Athena back to me, or I will murder you in your sleep.”
I search his gaze, and I see the truth in his words. “You’ll try. Ares won’t let you within three feet of me.”
“You know, it’s not hard to see why my brother likes to punish you. You’re such a fucking spoiled little brat.”
“Says the man smoking pot in his multi-million-dollar mansion.”
“You know he’s never going to agree to this, don’t you?”
I nod, and stare down into the rippling water. “I know.”
“He’s going to beat your ass bloody for even suggesting it.”
“I know that too.”
“Then I hope he lets me watch.”
I rise, my head feeling buzzier than I expected, and I almost trip and fall into the pool, but Hermes grabs hold of both my legs. His face is pressed to my thighs, and he rubs his jaw along my skin. It scratches. I rest my hand on the soft curls, so much like Ares’. He presses his nose to my thigh, and breathes deeply.
I don’t know how to respond, so I just stand there, with a man I hate wrapped around me as if I’m his salvation. He’s my Master’s brother. He’s a monster, but just like my Master, at his core, he’s a man too. One who lost everything. One who’s relying on me to get her back.
I shift away, out of his embrace, and his arms fall to his lap. “I need to get back. Sir will be waiting.”
He laughs, but it’s without humor. “You better pray he’s not, little mouse, or you’ll pay in a pound of flesh.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Pet
I hurry through the door, and to the quiet house beyond. The top stair creaks beneath my foot. I pause, cringe, and pad softly to the door at the end of the hall. When I open it, Ares is still asleep, and I let out a silent sigh of relief, disrobe, and carefully climb into bed. He doesn’t stir, but a beat later, realization crawls over my skin. He’s not breathing as heavily as he normally would in sleep.
I squeeze my eyelids tightly closed. I’m just about to roll over and face the wall when he moves like a thunderstorm, full of rage and lightning. His body pins me to the mattress, and his hand wraps around my throat. He squeezes, not hard enough to do real damage, but just enough to let me know my Sir is in control, and I’m a naughty little Pet for wandering.
“Where have you been, little one?”
“I couldn’t sleep. I took a walk around the grounds.”
“Around the grounds? Really?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“And the reason you smell like pot would be?”
“I-I ran into Hermes, sir.”
“Last night you were trying to kill one another. Now you’re enjoying smoke sessions together?”
“Please, Sir. I didn’t touch it.”
He grabs my finger and thrusts it in his mouth, sucking hard. “You’re a fucking liar, Pet. I can smell it on you, taste it on your breath. I bet if I turned on the light right now your eyes would be bloodshot, and you’d be high as a fucking kite.”
“No, Sir.”
“You’re still fucking lying. Did he touch you while you were bonging on, little one?”
“No.”
“Bullshit.” He slides a hand between us and cups my pussy, delving two fingers deep inside. I cry out with the pain, the abruptness, and forcefulness of it. “You’re wet.”
“Yes, Sir. Only for you. I swear.”
“Why were you talking to my brother?”
I swallow hard. My throat bobs against his hand. I try to shake my head, but his grip prevents me from moving at all.
“Why?”
“I-I can’t breathe.”
“You can breathe just fine, Pet. In through your nose, deep and slow, just the way I taught you.” His fingers work inside me, fucking me hard and fast, mercilessly, so I can’t draw breath the way he instructs. I can’t do anything but feel, need, and finally come. As a violent orgasm slams into me, Ares tightens his hold on my neck. I gasp for breath. My whole body shudders and darkness, warm and inviting, beckons at the edges of my vision. I’m weightless. Strung out on sensation, pleasure, and starved of oxygen.
“Oh, you’re going to pay for that, little one.” Ares sneers. He releases me, and I gasp, sucking in air too fast. It burns like Hermes’ smoke. Tears stream from my eyes and wet the pillow. Great sobs rack my body. Ares hovers above me, his face in shadow, moonlight bounces off his hair, making it shine like a ghostly halo.
Ares. My captor. My savior. My angel of death.
Sometimes I wish he had made good on his promise to kill me, because I die every time he touches me, every time he punishes me.
“I didn’t say you could come, Pet. I didn’t say you could leave my bed, and I definitely didn’t permit you to find my brother and get high with him as if the two of you were college fuck buddies. Now get your ass up out of my bed and bend at the fucking waist like all naughty girls should.”
“Yes, Sir.” I sniff back my tears and scramble off the bed. I stand in the middle of the room, my legs spread, my body bent the way he ordered.
Ares stands behind me. His palm comes down on my ass. I register the sound before the pain, but I hold completely still. My pussy clenches, anticipating his touch, but it doesn’t come.
Ares walks away. I know better than to turn and try to see what he’s doing, so I wait like a good little whore, with my gaze on the floor in front of me. When he returns, several bundles of rope are dropped at my feet. I clench my inner muscles in excitement and his hand slaps my sex. I gasps, squeezing my eyes shut and stamping my heels on the ground because it’s the only thing I can do to ease the pain. It’s the only thing I can do that won’t earn me another spanking.
Cold liquid pours down the seam of my ass and a smooth metal plug pushes against my opening. “Time to get crowned, Princess.”
I grasp my knees with my hands and breathe deeply.
“That’s it, just like I taught you.” Sir’s free hand squeezes my ass as the plug slips inside and its heavy weight adds just the right amount of pressure. “Good girl.”
I preen at his words.
“Now, it’s late.” He pulls a paddle from the armoire. This one is peppered with flat metal studs on one side. He tests its weight in his hands, and his smile tells me he’s satisfied with the result. “I don’t want to have to gag you, so I need you to be perfectly still and not make a sound, little one.”
Ares takes a bundle of rope
and unties the knot. The length unravels, brushing my legs as the ends fall to the floor. He has me rest my arms by my side as he wraps the silken red cord around my chest, creating a different type of harness this time, one where both my breasts are pinched painfully between the twines and bound individually with coils of rope so that they ache and pulse with the lack of blood flow. Ares lowers me to the floor, and orders me to lie on my back. From there, he trusses me up, tethering my left leg over the right at a 45-degree angle. My arms are now bound behind me, my legs splayed, and my pussy exposed to him.
With more rope, he fixes me to the rings in the ceiling from the harness around my chest and the ties around my legs. He pulls tightly. I jerk off the ground, rising higher and higher until I reach hip-height. He runs the line to the wall and secures if off with a series of complicated knots. Then Ares takes hold of my free leg, stretching it back at an angle that I’m sure would be uncomfortable for anyone else, but that my body should be used to thanks to ballet. I’m not back to my dancing prime though, and my muscles twinge with pain as he wraps the rope around my neck and tethers it to the leg rope. I wriggle, the cord pinching my skin, my breasts heavy with the lack of blood.
Ares stands back and studies his handiwork. “Jesus Christ, if only they’d let me hang you in the Louvre.”
He runs his hands over my body, squeezing my already tortured breasts. His fingers trail a path over my pubic mound, and then they slip inside. Three at once, right to the last knuckle. I moan and buck my hips, forgetting his instructions to stay perfectly still and perfectly silent.
Thwack. The studded paddle meets my ass. I scream. Ares rakes his blunt fingernails over my skin. My flesh smarts, but beyond that I feel the blow the of the paddle the whole way through my rump. I’m going to be black and blue tomorrow, and I love every second of it.
“I thought I told you to be quiet. Looks like I will have to gag you after all.” He chooses a ball gag from the drawer and returns to my side. “Open wide.”
I do as instructed, opening my mouth to allow him room to slip the ball inside. He buckles it behind my head. “Good girl.”
In the Land of Gods and Monsters, Part II (Gods & Monsters, #2) Page 12
