The Darkest Torment

by Gena Showalter

  Defeat? I’ll introduce him.

  With a roar, Baden swung. Contact! Addictive... He swung again and again, his fist a jackhammer, brutal and unrelenting. William took the blows like a champ, miraculously remaining on his feet.

  I like this man...kind of. Hurting him hurts me.

  A glimmer of rational thought. Baden dropped his arm to his side and gripped his camo pants. “Sorry. I’m sorry,” he rasped.

  “Why?” William’s teeth were smeared with crimson. “Did you soil your panties while you were giving me those love taps?”

  Humor. He wasn’t in the mood. “Walk away. Before you have to crawl.”

  Already the beast pawed at Baden’s gray matter, ravenous for round two.

  “Don’t be silly.” William waved his fingers. “Hit me again. Only this time, try to do some real damage.”

  The warrior didn’t understand...wouldn’t understand until too late. “Go! I’m losing control.”

  “Then we’re making progress.” William jabbed Baden’s shoulder. “Hit me.”

  “Do you want to die?”

  “Hit.” Jab. “Me.” Jab.

  The beast snarled, and Baden...

  Baden detonated like a bomb, whaling on William, who made no effort to block or dodge the barrage of blows.

  “Fight back!” Baden shouted.

  “Since you suggested it...” William threw a punch of his own, a crack so powerful Baden reeled backward and slammed into the dresser.

  Books and decorations the female residents had given him rattled before toppling to the floor. Everything made of glass shattered at his feet. William stalked forward and, without a pause in his step, bent down to swipe up one of the books. He struck, pummeling Baden’s throat into his spine.

  Pain. His body bowed as the warrior slammed the book into his side. Once. Twice. More pain. His kidney was puréed.

  Opponent...even stronger than expected...cannot be allowed to live.

  Before William could deliver another blow, Baden jerked up a knee. The book flew across the room. He punched William in the jaw. As the warrior stumbled, Baden picked up a shard of glass.

  By the time he straightened, William had recovered. That fast. The warrior crushed a vase into the side of his head, new shards raining.

  Different voices suddenly penetrated his awareness.

  “Is that Baden? Duuude! That can’t be Baden. He’s three times his usual size!”

  “He’s going to make a retainer out of Willy’s teeth!”

  “I call dibs! On Baden, not the retainer. If my man ever kicks it, I get to hook up with Hulk-smash first!”

  In the back of his mind, he knew his friends and their mates had heard the commotion and come running, intending to break up the fight. To help him. The beast didn’t care.

  Kill...kill them all...they’re too strong, too much of a risk.

  Evil like the beast had no friends, only enemies.

  The group is dangerous to the rest of the world, but not to me. Never to me. These people would die for me.

  Die...yes, they must die...

  William kicked the door closed, blocking the others from Baden’s view. “You focus on me, Red. Understood? I’m the biggest threat, so do us both a favor, take your arthritis medication and hit me.”

  Yes. Biggest threat. Hit. Rage gave him added strength as he unleashed a new stream of punches. William blocked the first few, but couldn’t dodge the others. Baden failed to dodge his retaliation.

  The brutal fight propelled them around the room, bouncing off walls and furniture as if they were animals in the wild, vying for position of King of the Jungle.

  Pick up another piece of glass. Cut through the warrior’s ribs.

  Yes. The perfect finish. But as Baden swooped down, William flashed behind him—moving to a new location with only a thought—and punched him. He twisted as he stumbled, capturing the male’s hand when he attempted to deliver another strike.

  Baden purposely dropped, sinking to the floor, taking William with him. Midway down, he wound his legs around the bastard’s neck, applying enough pressure to choke a rhino. The moment they crash-landed, Baden tossed William over his head.

  Thud. His opponent smashed face-first into the pile of glass shards. He grinned and drew himself up to straddle Willy’s back.

  Punch. Punch. William’s skull cracked—and cracked Baden’s knuckles. Before he could deliver his next blow, the low-down-dirty-sneak flashed again—but it was too late to halt his fist. Punch. A wood panel on the floor splintered. Pain vibrated up his arm and pooled in his shoulder.

  William laughed with delight and, as if the sound opened a magical portal to calm, the beast quieted.

  “There.” Willy ruffled Baden’s hair. “You feel better now.” A kind statement rather than a smug question.

  He performed a danger-check, just to be sure, and nodded. “I do.” Even his throat had healed.

  “Now we can have a conversation without you eyeing my trachea like it’s a gummy worm.”

  “Conversation can wait.” He stood, grimacing as he noted the condition of his room. Holes in the wall, broken glass on the floor, furniture overturned and missing pieces. “I’ve got some cleaning to do.”

  “You’d choose a broom over information?”

  “Depends on the information being offered.”

  “If I said the serpentine wreaths and their side effects...?”

  “I’d turn your pretty face to pulp.” Baden loved the wreaths, but he also hated them. They were a gift from Hades, ancient and mystical, and they were responsible for his corporeal form.

  Hades and Keeley—the mate of Baden’s friend Torin—had come to him in what he’d thought was a dream. Through some kind of supernatural power, they’d removed the bands Lucifer, his jailer at the time, had forced on him and replaced them with bands that belonged to Hades.

  As long as you wear my wreaths, Hades had said, you will be seen...touched.

  The friendly gesture of an ally he supported in the war of the underworlds? He’d thought so in the beginning. Now he wondered... The trick of an underhanded foe?

  Soon after Baden had donned the gift, William had looked at him with pity and said, “Have you seen Pet Sematary? Sometimes dead is better.”

  William wasn’t wrong.

  By that point, Baden had already begun to change. Not physically—maybe physically—but definitely mentally. Once even-tempered, he struggled for control, and he despised anyone who might be stronger than him. As proved. Memories plagued him, but they weren’t his own. They couldn’t be. He’d never been a child, had been created fully formed, an immortal soldier tasked with protecting Zeus, and yet he clearly remembered being around ten years old, running through an ambrosia field set aflame, thick smoke choking him.

  A pack of hellhounds tracked him, fed on him and dragged him into a cold, dank dungeon, where he’d suffered, alone and starved, for centuries.

  With the first memory, a horrifying truth had struck Baden. The wreaths weren’t just an object, but a being. The beast. Not a demon, but worse. An immortal who’d once lived and now expected to continue living through Baden. A monster who always teetered on the brink of rage, violence and distrust.

  The irony of the situation wasn’t lost on Baden.

  “Well.” William pretended to be offended. “Try to do a man a favor.”

  Concentrate! “Yesterday you said you knew nothing about the wreaths.”

  A hike of his broad shoulders. “That was yesterday.”

  “And today you know...what, exactly?”

  “Only everything.”

  He waited for the warrior to say more. “Do you require another beating? Tell me!”

  “Beating is too strong a word for what transpired. I’d go with m
assage.” William buffed his nails. “Just so you know, the wreaths’ side effects are numerous and horrifying.”

  “I figured the horrifying part out on my own, thanks.” Removing the wreaths wasn’t an option. They were fused to him, and he would have to amputate his arms with a meat cleaver.

  Before his death, his arms would have grown back. Now? He wasn’t sure and wasn’t willing to experiment. Well, not on himself. His hands were his first line of defense.

  “Give me specifics,” he demanded.

  “For starters, if you want to keep your new temper tantrums at bay, you’ll need sex and a lot of it.”

  The pronouncement was a joke. Had to be.

  Baden arched a brow. “You offering, oh great and randy one?”

  William snorted. “As if you could handle me.”

  To be honest, he couldn’t handle anyone. When he wasn’t fighting, he avoided any kind of contact, the sensitivity of his skin too great. Every brush of flesh against flesh was excruciating, like a dagger being raked across exposed nerve endings.

  “You’re going to leave Budapest today,” William said. “You’ll go...somewhere else. You’ll collect a harem of immortal women, and you’ll spend the next decade or two concerned only with pleasure.”

  Leave his friends? After they’d only just been reunited? No. He was here to help them, to guard their backs the way he’d longed to do for centuries. “I’m going to pass.”

  “And I’m going to insist. You can’t beat the darkness.”

  “I am the darkness.”

  The warrior canted his head in agreement. “Here’s the rub. Maddox and Ashlyn have children. Both Gideon and Kane have a pregnant wife. Not to mention the other females living in the house. And what about the traumatized Legion? The vulnerable Gillian?” His voice roughened with her name. “You go after any of the females the way you went after me, and your brothers-by-choice will gut you. No matter how much they love you. I will gut you.”

  “I would never—”

  “Oh, princess. You so would.”

  A new rage sparked. He slammed a fist through the wall and cursed, proving William right. The beast took advantage of him at every opportunity. “All right. I’ll leave.” The words pained him, but he even added, “Today.”

  “Your IQ just jacked to the next level.” William beamed at him. “Any idea where you’ll go?”

  “No.” He had very little experience with the modern world.

  A sigh. “I’ll probably regret this later,” the warrior said, stroking two fingers over his jaw, “but what the hell. We only live twice, right?”

  Baden waved a hand, a silent command to carry on.

  “For the bargain price of a favor to be named later, I’ll give you one of my homes and even set up a carnal buffet for you. And don’t worry. By the time I’m done, even a man with your lack of game will be able to score a ten.”

  * * *

  As the rapid beat of rock music blasted from surround-sound speakers, a pair of double Ds hit Baden in the face. He hissed in pain, not that—whatever her name—noticed as she gyrated on his lap.

  She reached out to cup his nape, clearly intending to draw him closer.

  Every man needs to motorboat at least once in his life, William had told her earlier. Make sure Red gets his chance.

  Baden batted her hand away as gently as possible.

  She grinned at him, though there wasn’t a single hint of amusement in her eyes. “Performance anxiety, sugar? I know the perfect cure.” She hopped off and spun, shoving her ass in his face.

  “Twerking is the best, isn’t it?” William said now.

  Baden turned to glare at him. They were the only males in the room, and the prick was certainly living up to his original playboy reputation as he stuffed a hundred-dollar bill in the G-string of his own stripper. A blonde bumping and grinding on him with absolute abandon.

  “Even though you should be paying me, I’m feeling generous.” William gave her another hundred. “Don’t think I failed to notice your orgasm. The first or the second.”

  She was too busy having a third to respond.

  “This isn’t helping me,” Baden snapped.

  William leaned forward to lick the blonde’s collarbone. A practiced move he seemed to perform by rote. “Don’t doubt my pimposity just yet. This is only the appetizer.”

  Pimposity?

  “Listen to him.” Miss Twerk faced Baden, brushing her fingertip along the curve of his jaw. “You’re supposed to eat me up.”

  The pain! He endured it a few seconds more, but only to clasp her by the hips and set her away from him once and for all. “No touching. Ever.”

  His unintentionally harsh tone made her tremble.

  “Go.” Disgusted with himself as much as the circumstances, he motioned to the door. “Now.”

  As she raced from the room, he settled more comfortably on the couch and closed his eyes. He needed sex—supposedly—but he couldn’t bring himself to have it. What kind of future awaited him? One dark rage constantly bleeding into another? Like before...

  Another memory he’d never lived played through his mind.

  He stood outside the dungeon he’d occupied for a torturous eternity, a sea of bodies and body parts all around him. Blood soaked his hands...hands tipped by sharp claws, bits of flesh and other things.

  Footsteps thumped in a nearby hallway. A survivor?

  Not for long.

  Grinning with anticipation, he climbed through the debris and—

  The music cut off abruptly, drawing Baden back to the present. He opened his eyes in time to see the last stripper exit the room.

  William tsk-tsked at him before flashing away...and returning with two glasses and a bottle of ambrosia-laced whiskey.

  Ambrosia, the drug of choice for immortals.

  The warrior filled the cups to the brim. “Here. Lubricate your brain.”

  The sweet scent wafted to Baden, causing his stomach to churn. For a moment he was a child again, trapped in the burning field, running...running...his heart galloping like a horse at a race.

  Not me. The beast.

  Trembling, he drained the cup. A tide of warmth spread through him quickly, calming him despite the adverse association, grounding him deeper in the here and now.

  “There. Isn’t that better?” William reclined at his end of the white couch, the only piece of furniture in a room of white.

  White walls, white floor tiles. White dais with a trio of mirrors in back. Baden’s reflection—the only real source of color—glared at him in challenge. He’d become a soldier he no longer recognized, with shaggy red waves in desperate need of a trim. Dark eyes once filled with welcome only offered silent threats. A mouth that used to quirk up in amusement only ever curved down in anger. Laugh lines had been replaced by scowl lines.

  No, not better. “I’m ready to leave.”

  “Too bad. I won’t remember how to flash you somewhere else until you’ve gotten laid. And as soon as you appear less murdery, you will get laid. The girls will love you.” William drained the contents of his glass in a single gulp. “Just do me a solid and inform your face this is supposed to be a good time.”

  “Skin-to-skin contact is painful.”

  The beast snarled at him for daring to voice such a damning vulnerability, even to one of Hades’s children.

  William frowned at him. “If you think the wreaths are responsible—”

  “I don’t.”

  “—think again. They’re not. So grin and bear it or you won’t live through your transition.”

  Transition? “Appearing less murdery, as you say, is the true challenge. I’ve forgotten how to smile.”

  “Are you whining?” William set his cup aside and traced a fingertip down his cheeks, m
imicking tears. “Your new life sucks. So what? Do you think you’re the only one with problems?”

  “Certainly not.” His friends were currently hunting for Pandora’s box, determined to find it before someone—anyone—else. It could kill them in an instant. Just boom...gone...dead, their demons removed. Normally a good thing. But evil so entrenched had to be cleansed first and replaced by its opposite. Like with Haidee, Hate for Love. Otherwise rot set in. Which was why the Lords were also hunting for the Morning Star—a supernatural being still trapped inside the box, capable of granting any wish. Capable of freeing the demons without killing the warriors.

  Lucifer had mounted a search for the Morning Star, as well, though he had no plans to spare the Lords. He was at war with Hades and determined to win whatever the cost. He’d made no secret of his desire to eliminate his father’s allies: William, Baden and all the others. And as the master of Harbingers—messengers of death—he might just be powerful enough to succeed.

  “That’s right,” William said. “You’re not. In fact, my life makes yours look like a picnic hosted by naked forest nymphs.”

  “Now you’re exaggerating.”

  “Under-exaggerating, perhaps. In a matter of days, Gillian will celebrate her eighteenth birthday.”

  “So?” Baden wanted the guy to say the words aloud—to admit to a vulnerability of his own. Tit for tat. “She’ll be an adult. Old enough to handle you.” He couldn’t help but add, “Or any other man she wants.”

  “Me,” William snapped. He’d never been able to mask the intensity of his emotions for the girl. “Old enough to handle me. Only me. But I can’t have her.”

  When the guy said no more, Baden prodded him. “Because you’re cursed?”

  A pause. A stiff nod. “The woman who wins me will kill me.”

  Wins. As if he were the prize. The same can’t be said about me. “Well, boohoo for you.” Survival first, matters of the heart second—if at all. “You’ve been warned. You can be proactive.”

  What. The. Hell. Had he just suggested William kill sweet, innocent Gilly before she had the opportunity to kill him?

  His hands fisted. He needed to put a tighter leash on the beast. So. He would pick a girl, have sex with as little bodily contact as possible, and maybe, for a little while, his head would clear. He would be able to think, to figure out a way to remove the wreaths, and the beast, keep all his body parts and remain tangible.