“Places like this are in these days. We should go, though, we’re not safe here. They enjoy witches a little too much in places like this.”
“You think?” I hissed, marching for the door and opening it wide.
Spyder looked pissed. His eyes looked me up and down for injury before he grabbed my arm and started towards the front door.
“I found her,” I announced briskly with a tilt of my head in her direction.
“I don’t care if you found her, we’re leaving, now,” he snapped.
I took in the bedlam of the club. Clothes were coming off, and couples were fucking right out in the open. I kept my gaze on Spyder’s back until Sweet Dreams started playing and my blood ran cold. I pulled against Spyder’s arm as an illusion of wings caught my eye. One minute he was there a few feet from us, then the next he vanished like a mirage, only to reappear a little closer to us without wings.
A man with black hair and vivid indigo eyes watched me with a knowing look in his sinful gaze. I felt my body heating up as he moved towards us in a brisk pace. Spyder yanked on my arm, swiveling to see why I’d stalled.
“Bloody hell,” he growled as he shoved me behind him, but it was too late.
Lucifer moved in a way that hurt my head. One moment he was across the crowded room, and the next he had a hold on my arm and was yanking me towards himself. Pain shot through me as his fingers curled around my arm, biting into my flesh. Black, skeletal wings exploded from his back as barbed vines shot from his fingers, wrapping themselves around and through my arm. I screamed and tried to pull myself away from him as I struggled to remain in Spyder’s arms.
“She is mine!” Lucifer growled coldly.
“Fucking try to take her from me, asshole,” Spyder returned with a dangerous glint sparkling in his eyes.
One moment I was being ripped in two directions with demons descending on us. The next, Spyder detonated with power—raw, uncut power that slammed the air out of my lungs as if he’d pulled the air from the room itself. The runes which covered his arms lit from within and his hair lifted in the air as he let out an earsplitting howl as demons exploded into black clouds of ash around him.
He had power glowing from his fingers that must have been holding Lucifer to the ground. I gawked as I gasped for air, afraid I’d pass out from the lack of it. Lightning flashed and zigzagged around the club as thunder rattled it. Lucifer on the ground shook with it; blood oozed from his nose and eyes as Spyder held him there with his power.
I struggled to get up, but I couldn’t move. No one could. Whatever the fuck Spyder was, he had brought the entire club to the ground with ease. My hand lifted, touching his leg as darkness threatened to consume me.
Silver eyes looked down at me, blue flecks mixed in the mercury depths. His hair was bluish white, as if someone had stolen the pigment from it and given him some hellish, stylish highlights. I dropped my hand, my head flopped to the floor, and my eyes drifted to Lucifer’s. He no longer actually had eyes, just blood oozing from where they should have been.
What. The. Fuck.
Spyder reached down and yanked me up as he moved. I pointed at Tiffany, who looked like she was also about to pass out from the power in the room. He grabbed her hand and dragged her with us into the dark night. Once outside, I greedily sucked in air. Tiffany sputtered, wheezed, and coughed as she sucked in her own.
Spyder set me down carefully, holding onto me as he pulled his phone from his jacket and punched the buttons with his thumb. “Now,” he demanded, his voice mixed in layers of anger and unease. I looked back at the doors of the club, noting that even those outside hadn’t been spared. Spyder pushed his phone back into his pocket. Tires squealed, and I watched as a black Land Rover pulled up and someone got out. Spyder tossed the Audi keys to whoever was in the Rover, and pushed me to the passenger side of the Rover, opening the door and lifting me into the seat.
I watched in numb horror as he pulled the barbed vines from my skin, and pressed his mouth to the damaged flesh as he sucked against it. I closed my eyes against the imagery as black pus oozed from where he’d pulled the first one out.
“Fuck, fuck!” he shouted as he pulled several more out. Brilliant light flashed and blinded me for a moment. Once my eyes adjusted, I could see the light was emanating from his hands as he slid them over my torn skin, healing it as he methodically touched every injury. The light dissipated, and he returned to the normal dark, angry Spyder I was used to. He pulled back, and slammed the door closed. Bags were tossed into the Land Rover from the Audi before it sped out of the parking lot.
I turned, looking at Tiffany, who appeared calm, as if we hadn’t just almost died. She looked too calm, and I wondered who the hell she was, and how my grandmother had found her. I spun back around to watch Spyder as he climbed into the driver’s seat and slammed his door.
We sped off, tires squealing as the club doors exploded outward. I struggled to turn and look behind us as Lucifer stood in front of the club, watching as we drove away.
My heart hammered as his eyes bored into mine; even in the distance, I knew it was me who he was looking at. I swallowed, unable to break eye contact until Spyder pushed me back and touched the side of my face.
“He can’t follow us,” he muttered. He glanced in the rearview mirror to check on Tiffany. “You better explain what the fuck you were doing there, or you can get out and wait for the fucking demons to find you. Now,” he demanded. “What the fuck were you doing in outer levels of Hell with the devil?”
I felt my blood turn to ice as images from the dream came flooding back. That club. I’d been in that club before, on stage. I’d been fucked there! Tears burned my eyes and I stared at Spyder, knowing he’d just saved my life.
“Hell?” I whispered. “Mortals can’t enter Hell,” I continued, watching him. “Only souls can, right?”
“They can if they are invited, or if they remain on the outskirts of the Hell Gate, but that one wasn’t normal. It’s been altered.”
“I wasn’t invited, I was taken there.” Tiffany licked her lips nervously. “I sent a distress call through the leylines. I had to get out of there; you have no idea what they do to witches in that place.” She sat back and closed her eyes. “I am a witch of the original bloodlines; your coven had no choice but to heed my call.”
“Fuck your blood, and fuck you,” he snapped; fury seemed to emanate from him. “And you, you scryed for it. Witches can’t find Hell Gates. They’re hidden from your kind for good reason.”
“Well, I found it,” I bit back angrily. “I only scryed for her, not the Gates of Hell, Spyder!”
He had been about to say something, but he paused, and pulled his phone out of his pocket. He held it up to his ear for a moment, then shouted, “What? Yeah, I know you fucking felt it, we all fucking felt it… No, fuck you. She took me there, you can fucking ask her why we were there… No, it’s not my fucking problem. You can ask her when she gets to you. I didn’t want to babysit her in the first fucking place. No, of course I didn’t, it was wide fucking open. Yeah, I know it’s a fucking problem, this entire fucking situation is one big fucking problem, but who’s fucking fault is it?” He turned, looking at me before he snorted into the phone. “Yeah, I’ll bring her to you.” He hung the phone up and we drove the rest of the way in silence until a few miles out of town.
“I need to go to the abbey,” Tiffany said softly as she smoothed out her skirt. “I must reach it before the solar eclipse today.”
Today? I looked at the clock on the dashboard that said it was five in the morning. What the fuck? I turned and looked at Spyder, who glared at me.
“Hell moves differently than this world. One minute in there can be a week out here, depending on what is occurring in it.”
“That’s insane,” I said hesitantly. “We weren’t in there that long!”
“We were—it just doesn’t feel like it. You were inside the bathroom a while, plus, it took us a few to work through the crowd, among other things we did. There’s no perception of time in Hell. If you’re sentenced to an eternity in Hell, you are sentenced to their time, not this world’s.”
We pulled up to the abbey around ten in the morning, and I watched the doors open as my mother stepped through them. Her eyes skimmed over me and went to the witch in the backseat as she exhaled a sigh of relief. I frowned as Tiffany exited the car and rushed towards the group of witches who came out to welcome her.
The SUV started down the driveway and I looked back, locking eyes with my mother as we sped off towards Club Chaos.
Chapter 16
We pulled up at the club and saw a crowd of people milling around outside, which was weird considering what time it was. I must have had a confused expression on my face, as I caught Spyder gazing at me oddly.
“It’s the solar eclipse. Lucian’s clubs tend to draw in those who believe in the supernatural powers of these events,” he explained to my unasked question. “There are mysteries around the eclipses that not even your coven or the Gods themselves can start to understand.”
“So they come to Lucian’s club because they’re crazy?” I laughed nervously.
“Even witches believe that the solar eclipse holds powers beyond their comprehension. Then again, life is full of mysteries that aren’t ours to understand.”
“That’s deep, Spyder,” I murmured as his icy blue eyes narrowed on me.
“Let’s go, now,” he growled as he opened his door and stepped out, ignoring the gawking girls who walked by us, fixated on him as he opened my door. He was a gentleman, at least. I got out of the car slowly, trying to brush off the curious glances from the crowd wandering around the club as he grabbed our bags out of the trunk. “Don’t piss him off when we get inside, kitty. He’s already bent out of shape as it is that we walked into a pocket of Hell.”
“We didn’t know it was,” I said defensively.
“No, but I should have known better,” he snapped angrily and slammed the trunk closed. It seemed more like he was mad at himself and not at me.
“I don’t see why he’s upset at all.” I tried to walk a little faster to keep up with his long strides. “We didn’t get hurt, we got Tiffany out of there, and we all lived.”
Spyder gawked at me incredulously. “Are you out of your ever-loving mind?” he almost bellowed at me. “We went into a shit-show and you got hurt. Yeah, we got that fucking witch, and we were just fucking lucky to get out of there.” He scrubbed his face angrily and took a deep breath trying to reel his temper in. “Just keep going.” He motioned towards the doors, where Bane waited for us.
“Here come’s trouble,” he mocked with a smile as we got closer, and held the doors open for us to pass through. “He’s waiting for you in his office.”
“Come on.” Spyder pushed a couple of guys who got too close to us out of the way. I followed close behind him until a hand snaked out and grabbed my arm. I spun around and before I could even take a breath to yell at the guy Spyder was already in action.
With one hand on the huge man’s throat, Spyder pinned him to the wall. The man’s feet kicked at air as Spyder’s nose hovered dangerously close to the man’s. “Do not fucking touch her again or you die, understand?” he growled coldly, sending a wave of chills rushing down my spine. “Leave this place, now.” Spyder shoved the sputtering man away as he gasped for air and nodded his agreement to leave the club immediately.
“I can handle myself,” I whispered, wishing I could hide from all the curious glances.
“A lady shouldn’t have to handle anything when she has someone willing to protect her,” he said softly as we resumed our trek through the crowd towards the stairway that led to the offices overlooking the club.
I followed his stiff back up the stairs and down the long hallway until we were in front of Lucian’s office. The thick wooden door was cracked open already, so Spyder pushed it open as I straightened my shoulders and prepared to face the storm.
Soft, classical music greeted us as we made our way into the office; Lucian faced away from the door, standing at the wall-to-wall window at the back of his office as he gazed down at the club below.
Once Spyder had set our bags down, Lucian turned and his eyes glittered dangerously at me. I swallowed as his eyes slowly slid down the length of me, as if he was looking for a single scratch or hair out of place. They stopped at my painted toenails and roamed back up until they zeroed in on my neck.
“You fucking collared her?” he snarled, looking over my shoulder at Spyder.
“We thought we were going to a sex club, Lucian. I sure as shit wasn’t letting her waltz in there unclaimed,” he scoffed.
“What the fuck were you thinking?” he demanded, aiming those sinful blue-black eyes at me with enough fire in them to burn my clothes off.
“I didn’t know it was that club,” I sputtered. “I scryed for that witch just like my mother told me to, rather than hopping all over Portland for the next few weeks, and believe it or not, it didn’t say Hell on the map, or common sense would have kicked in and I would have skipped it. As soon as I found where she was, I gave the location to Spyder and we headed out.”
“After charging a few items to my card?” he bit out.
“That wasn’t my idea,” I huffed. “And you know what? You’re not my father. You don’t get to bitch at me because you feel like it. I’m a big girl, and I can handle myself!”
“You should have had a father who cared enough to yell at you!” he roared, and my spine straightened as my eyes narrowed on him. “Instead, you had that piece-of-shit excuse of a father that couldn’t even stand up for you.”
“Excuse me?” I glared at him as his breathing grew labored.
“Get out,” he snapped over my shoulder, and I heard Spyder leaving the room, the door closing after his retreating footsteps.
“What the fuck would you know about my father?” I asked carefully.
“More than you, it would seem,” he snapped. “You could have died.” He smoothly changed the subject so fast I almost didn’t catch the shift.
“But we didn’t, did we?” I retorted angrily. “You have no right to shout at me. My loyalty is first and foremost to the coven; they sent me there to get something, and I did it! My loyalty isn’t to you, nor have I ever pretended otherwise, Blackstone.”
“You’re done taking chances with your life, little Witch,” he growled, and I blinked as my head started to hurt. “Do you have any idea how fucking helpless it felt to feel his hands touching you, knowing that I could do nothing to protect you?” He stepped closer, trailing his fingers around my throat as he unclasped the collar, then twisted it into an unrecognizable sparkly lump.
“Would you have cared?” I snapped as his eyes burned with liquid blue flames. “You sent Spyder with me. Alone. You knew we were connected and yet you sent us there together, anyway.”
“You think I don’t care? You think I wanted to send you with him? I didn’t, nor should I care about you, and yet I find myself stuck between wanting to kiss you or strangle you. I was busy here, dealing with matters that needed my immediate attention, so yes, I sent you with him. I should wring your fucking neck and wash my hands of you. But it wouldn’t be that easy, now would it?”
“Fuck you,” I swore as I stared up at him. “You have more mood swings than anyone else on this planet!”
“Maybe if you’d stop throwing yourself into Lucifer’s arms, I wouldn’t!” he shouted as he grabbed my arm and moved us towards the couch.
“What are you doing?” I demanded as he dragged me unwillingly along with him.
“Teaching you a fucking lesson,” he snarled as he sat on the couch and pulled me over his knees. I blinked and turned my hea
d to look up at him as I felt the air on my ass as he lifted my dress. His hand cracked sharply against my ass before I fully guessed his intentions, and I screamed as pain burned across my derrière. I twisted, but he held me there, locked onto his lap as his hand slapped my ass over and over again. Tears slipped from my eyes as I cried out with each punishing slap of his hand against my rear.
“You motherfucker!” I shrieked as anger pushed through me, outrage riding on its heels.
The moment he stopped, I was up, moving away from him to the other side of the office. “You have no fucking right!” I tried to ignore the pain that shot through me with every step. “You son of a bitch!” I picked up a vase and hurled it at him. It shattered against the wall too far away from his head. I picked up another missile and threw it at him as he took long strides towards me.
“Little girl,” he warned.
“Screw you!” I flung the glass paperweight on his desk at him as I rounded it, remaining just out of arm’s length. “No one spanks me!”
“I just fucking did!” he roared as he pushed the desk aside and grabbed my arms. “You have no right to take chances like you did. Lucifer would take you to the darkest pits of Hell and do what he does best. Do you understand me? He’d ruin you and then, when he’d had his fill of you, he’d send you to me in pieces!”
“How the fuck was I supposed to know it was Hell? Do you think that if I’d known what that place really was that I would have gone? I’m not fucking stupid and I don’t think Spyder would have deliberately served me up, either!” I shirked as I tried to yank my arms free.
He slammed me against the wall and pressed his forehead against mine. His lips touched it so softly that I wasn’t sure I hadn’t imagined it.
“I hate you,” I whimpered as I closed my eyes.
“You can hate me, because you have to be alive to hate me,” he murmured as his hands released my arms and slowly moved to the V of the bodice of my dress. The fabric ripped right down the middle with the force of his hands. I pushed him away as I glared at him with tears swimming in my vision.
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