Periculum: Unus (Devil's Playground Book 1)

by Natalie Bennett

  “Because you needed it.” There was a silent duh at the end of his response.

  I swung my legs over the side of the bed, wincing as I stood. “Have you been in here with me the entire time?” I asked, examining myself. There was barely any skin he hadn’t made sure to mark. “Jesus, Ciaran.”

  “Just Ciaran,” he corrected.

  I pulled his shirt over my head and gathered up my clothes. Leaving him on the bed, I slipped out into the hall and made a dash to the bathroom so that I could clean myself up. Before I could shut the door, Ciaran was entering behind me, shutting it once he was inside.

  He stepped into my bubble and removed my clothes from my arms, leaving them to fall to the floor. From the predatory look in his eyes, I knew what he wanted.

  “We don’t have time for any more,” I objected weakly.

  His hand slipped beneath his shirt, grabbing two handfuls of ass and lifting me up.

  “I need ten minutes to make you come—twice.”

  “Ciaran,” I implored, wrapping my arms around his neck as he carried me over to the sink. “Fine,” I sighed.

  “Good girl,” he teased, pushing my knees apart.

  It was inexplicably strange to see the sun shining brightly on a city full of death and darkness. The silence seemed louder than it had when we had the moon above us.

  Ciaran was ahead of us, as per usual, leading the way to our next destination: Cerberus Hall.

  I lingered with the girls and Margo, quietly filling them in.

  “Are you all right, though?” Gracelyn asked when I finished.

  “Why wouldn’t I be? There isn’t anything to be bothered about, not right now.” And I meant that.

  We knew that this was more than likely the case, that these guys were from another one of the other founding families.

  I’d slept with him anyway.

  I didn’t have any regrets about it. I also refused to consider all the motives he could have for fucking me since admitting from his own mouth that we shouldn’t have done it.

  “He has to be from one of families at the top to know who you are without ever meeting you before,” Mel pointed out.

  This was true.

  I had no way to narrow down which one he came from, though. There were fifty original members, and then they all had their expanded bloodlines and various betrothals, which equated to a ridiculously long list of people, more than half of whom I’d never met before. Unless Ciaran came out and told me himself, I wouldn’t know who he was until we were out of here.

  Regardless, I had to assume his family wasn’t on good terms with mine, which still didn’t help me narrow things down. I rubbed the back of my neck, inhaling a breath of warm summer air.

  Unintentionally, I wound up by Ciaran’s side again. I was convinced that there had to be some invisible chain with a ball weighing it down that kept ensuring I found my way to him. We walked together like it was the most natural thing in the world.

  When we reached the next place we needed to be, it wasn’t anything like I’d been expecting. Or I should say, when we almost got to where we were supposed to go. There were signs staked in the ground to point us in the direction of Cerberus Hall. That was a very underworld-ish name to use. I could only imagine what awaited us.

  To get there, though, it was obvious we had to travel through this place.

  There was another sign with a tape recorder a few feet ahead, a green light attached to the top part of it.

  “Whatcha think?” he asked, staring straight ahead.

  “It looks like a disaster waiting to happen.”

  “I was talking about me and you.”

  I glanced up at him. “There isn’t a me and you, but if there was, my answer would remain the same.”

  “Damn, that’s brutal,” Maverick laughed from Ciaran’s other side.

  “I almost believed you, puppet. Almost…” he trailed off, still not looking at me.

  “This doesn’t look like it belongs here,” Margo said, walking up to the fence so she could get a better look inside. Thank god for her; I needed to stay focused.

  And she was right.

  We were essentially standing at the entrance of a junkyard. Someone had deemed the place Cerberus Crossing. It looked like a small stretch of wasteland. The area was enclosed by a high brick wall topped with broken glass and razor wire. Two gates hung open—gates I knew would shut behind us as soon as stepping past them.

  From where we were standing, we could see a shed with a security window and various piles of rusted car carcasses.

  They were placed in such a way that the path ahead reminded me of an obstacle course.

  It ruined the whole aesthetic of the meticulous city we’d been wandering through.

  “Can we just get this over with?” Mel asked, resting her head on my shoulder.

  “Might as well,” Charon replied, walking through the entrance.

  We all followed in after him. As soon as the last of us crossed the threshold, the gate shut and the green light on the sign turned red.

  “What do you think that means?” Gracelyn asked.

  “Someone’s about to die,” Ciaran replied casually.

  “I think we should be open-minded about that,” Selena said. “So far we’ve lost someone with each riddle.”

  She was right. They both were. I doubted we would all make it past this part alive… whatever this part even was.

  I looked over at the guard shack, but the window was way too dark for me to see through. My gut said someone was in there.

  “Think there’s anyone watching?” I asked Ciaran.

  He reached for my hand and followed my line of sight. “Someone’s always watching, puppet.”

  We gathered around the sign indicating to go straight for Cerberus Hall.

  “If we know we have to go that way, why do we need this?” Mel asked.

  “Have they made anything simple since we’ve been here?” Kyrous countered.

  “I’ll do the honors this time,” Margo said, hitting play on the tape deck. There was a familiar whir, and then the rhythmic voice began speaking.

  One head in the past.

  One in the future.

  One leading the pack just around the corner.

  Four legs, sharp teeth, guardians of the manor.

  Servatis A Periculum, save yourselves from danger.

  Before the voice finished speaking, they were there. They’d arrived in silence, making their presence known with feral growls, massive blurs of black fur and gnashing teeth. Six of them came from different directions, bodies darting around the rusted cars with trained agility. I had hardly registered what I was looking at when Ciaran pulled me forward and started to run.

  Not one person delayed in doing the same, screams and curses rising in the air. The terrain had purposely been muddied, causing our feet to slip and slide.

  We struggled to put distance between us and the canines.

  “Oh, fuck!” Charon yelled.

  From my peripheral, I saw him splitting away from us to save his ass from being chomped on, pursued by one of the furry beasts and now alone.

  We could hardly relax though, not when plenty more were right behind us. There was a building a few yards away, the illuminated bubble letters a beacon for temporary safety.

  Running for it, my breath came in small spurts.

  Having pulled free to run, my hands curled into fists, pumping at my sides as if it would make me run faster. Behind us, I could hear the snarls and howls of the dogs, could practically feel their rancid, heated breath.

  At first sight of a familiar masked figure, my brain wanted to draw back. I threw myself forward, knowing that wasn’t an option. And he wasn’t alone.

  Four of them stood on either side of exactly where we needed to go, all watching us get closer and closer but making no attempt to come towards us.

  “Guys,” I gasped, the warning painfully ripping from lungs searching for air.

  “Keep going,” Maverick
rasped, as if we had any other options.

  An anguished scream carried from behind us not a second later. I dared to look back already knowing who it had come from.

  Leonard was down on the ground, clawing through the mud on all fours, screaming like no man should as he was mauled.

  I couldn’t watch and run, but I’d seen enough. His arms and face were torn into by teeth, body smothered by masses of black fur.

  Three dogs remained on our heels, their excited yips and snarls seeming to heighten now that someone had been successfully hunted.

  I veered as close to the center of the path as I could, racing past the masked figures without incident, Ciaran right by my side. When the girls and the remainder of his friends all made it, I thought they’d been standing there as nothing more than a scare tactic.

  We were stride away from the Hall when Margo went down. Her cry of pain was what alerted me that something had happened.

  Unlike with Leonard, I turned back for her, seeing an arrow sticking out of her right shoulder.

  Before I could dare to run to her aid, Ciaran’s arms were wrapping around my middle and dragging me the rest of the way to the door. Margo never stood a chance.

  One of the dogs plowed into her chest, slamming her onto her back. The action caused the arrow to shove clean through, and the tip poked out of her, dripping blood.

  The dog—now on top of her—buried its snout in her neck as the rest latched onto whatever they could, shaking their heads as if she were a toy to be fought over.

  Maverick weaved around us and burst through the heavy wooden door, holding it open for the rest of us. We spilled in behind him, practically a tangled web of limbs and sweaty skin landing on a marbled floor.

  The door slammed shut and a lock clicked into place.

  As we stared at one another, trying to catch our breath and process what had just happened, I slowly realized another person was missing.

  Charon had never made it back to us.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Sixty minutes.

  That’s all the time we had before we needed to move on. By the look of the map, we were practically standing in front of the next place we had to go.

  Maze of Mayhem.

  It was the last part of the map before we reached where a checkered flag had appeared: Diablos Manor.

  I scrubbed at my grime-covered face, trying not to let emotions get the best of me. For the first time since we’d gotten here, I was afraid. Not for myself but for the others. There were only eight of us left. How did we decide who got to live and who would die?

  I couldn’t lose Mel or Grace, but I also refused to offer up Ciaran or his friends as sacrificial lambs. Him for obvious reasons, them because they’d started to grow on me.

  As if I conjured him by thought, Ciaran stepped up beside me, slipping an arm around my waist. He’d gone with Kyrous and Maverick immediately after we realized Charon was gone. I didn’t have words of comfort to offer him, and not because I didn’t give a fuck; I just knew there wasn’t anything to say that would make it better or okay.

  He wasn’t showing any emotional pain or anger, but I didn’t ever expect him to. That wasn’t him, at all.

  Still, I knew inside he had to be hurting. If the tables were turned, I’d be a hot mess, quite honestly.

  “We’re almost there,” he said quietly.

  I leaned my head on his chest, listening to his heart.

  “Are we?”

  “Don’t do that. You’re so close to making it to…”

  I waited for him to finish, but he simply left the sentence hanging.

  “I don’t need false hopes, Cici. I need to know why this is happening. I need some explanation as to what caused someone to do something this elaborate…I—”

  “Belair,” he suddenly said, cutting me off.

  I straightened and turned into him, confused. “What is that? Does it mean something?” I glanced at the map in case I’d overlooked that somewhere.

  “It’s my last name.”

  Time didn’t exist here, yet it still came to a standstill with that abrupt as hell revelation. And he’d said it so… casually. I started to laugh, pulling away from him. Of course, that would be who he was related to. Because my life wasn’t already a circus or anything.

  When he said we shouldn’t have ended up in bed together, that had been the understatement of the fucking century. He and I shouldn’t have been breathing the same air. Yet, he fucked me anyway.

  I wanted to know why, but I couldn’t deal with this right now.

  I didn’t want to.

  I wasn’t going to bother trying.

  “I need to get cleaned up,” I said calmly, turning away from him.

  Weaving around the small sitting area, I headed for the bathroom, deciding to check on the girls on my way.

  This place wasn’t like the Sanctuaries—the luxurious interior was about three steps up. Shame I couldn’t concentrate enough to give a flying fuck about any of it.

  I sought out Mel and Selena first, having not seen either since they’d gone off to do what I was now. This place wasn’t very big, so the task wasn’t too difficult.

  They were sitting on the floor near a mini fridge, backs against the wall, heads leaned on Maverick’s shoulders.

  I wanted to rush over and spill what I’d just discovered, but logic had me hesitating. If Ciaran was a Belair, what were his friends? I gnawed my lower lip, unsure how to handle this. I didn’t want to be the reason for a divide or added tension. I wasn’t the only person here with problems or mental battles to face down.

  At the last second, I darted towards the bathroom. Gracelyn and Kyrous were still shut away behind the door adjacent to it.

  Grace being the sweetest of the three of us, I’m sure she was in there offering him the comfort none of the rest of us could.

  I didn’t want to bother them either, mainly because I couldn’t look at his face without thinking of Charon.

  I already had to contend with my mind presenting all the possible things that could have happened to him. Alone.

  He’d been all alone.

  And then there was Margo. I didn’t know her well at all, but she’d been one of the few individuals we were stuck with whom I wanted to live.

  Moving into the bathroom, I shut the door and promptly flattened myself against it, pulling in a lungful of air in place of screaming like a homicidal maniac.

  That’s where I was at right now.

  I wanted whoever was responsible for this dead—in the most gruesome, slow, and torturous manner there was.

  All those masked freaks would join them one by one. Someone was toying with us; it was only natural to want to toy with them back.

  The door began to open behind me, nearly causing my body to pitch forward. I caught myself and whirled around, coming face to face with my blue-eyed demon.

  “No,” I snapped, attempting to slam the door on him.

  He laughed and shouldered his way in, slamming it himself. “I didn’t come in here for that. I came to check on you.”

  His words seemed honest enough. Genuine, I suppose. I didn’t trust his ass, though. Not even a little bit.

  “Why have you spent this whole time trying to keep me alive?” The question popped out before I could tell myself to shut the fuck up. That this wasn’t important right now. But it was, wasn’t it?

  Because I had no idea what would be waiting at the manor we had to get to.

  “Because maybe I love you,” he replied flippantly, brandishing a grin.

  I rolled my eyes. “Ciaran, if you don’t get the fuck out.” I pointed to the door, indicating for him to leave.

  “I’m not going anywhere, puppet. We can fuck, though. I think we could both use a distraction.”

  The nerve of him. I crossed my arms and regarded his demeanor. Slowly realizing something was off, the hairs on the back of my neck started to rise. I created ample space between us, pretending all was perfectly fine even as alarm bells
told me to get the hell out of dodge.

  I wasn’t afraid of him. Quite the opposite, which was way worse—much worse. “So, now you’re someone who uses sex as a crutch?”

  “I use you. To fuck. To toy with. To make myself feel better.”

  “Your psycho is showing.”

  “And you fucking love it, don’t you? Tell me how wet that makes your pussy, puppet. Tell me how badly you want to feel my dick inside you.”

  With every word he came closer, not making a noise. Each step was as predatory as the look in his beautiful blue eyes.

  “This isn’t the time for this. Not to mention I know who you are now.”

  “You don’t know anything,” he countered, now right in front of me.

  “I know we need to forget what we did and never let it happen again.”

  “Forget?” he mocked, laughing lowly. “We haven’t even begun yet. This,” his hand motioned in the small space between us. “You and I are never going to be done.”

  “Say we do get out of here… what are you going to do, Ciaran? Fight my family to the death just to be able to lie between my legs?”

  “You think I have an issue getting pussy? That I’m doing this just to know I’m the only man who will ever give you want you want?”

  His hand snaked around to the back of my head, grabbing hold of my neck.

  “You’re more than some random dirty fuck, puppet. I’ll kill as many people as I have to if it means I get to keep you.”

  “Why?” I breathed, thoroughly confused. What the hell did he want me for? I was a fucking basket case he had yet to see unravel.

  He didn’t answer me. His mouth pressed to mine, the kiss he delivered brutal and carnal—a kiss meant to stake a claim regardless of my protests. I melted into him with hardly any resistance, winding my arms around his neck, burning for his touch even as soreness plagued me from only hours before.

  I hadn’t regretted it then, but I knew I would regret this.

  I couldn’t bring myself to care right now.

  He was every dirty, terrible, and forbidden thing I wasn’t allowed to have. My family—his family—would never let this happen.

  There was too much bad blood, too much trauma. I should have been pushing him away and tearing his throat out, and that’s exactly why I pulled him closer.