by Elena Monroe
She was chewing her lip, the only real clue to her still being alive in there. The rest of her body was a ragdoll under me.
She nodded her head yes—another sign of life.
Pushing my lips to her hip, I started kissing up her, slowly and carefully. I was worshiping her, on my knees, and pledging loyalty so that her insecurities about Arianna could evaporate.
Slipping my hand into her panties as my mouth caught hers and my tongue found hers immediately. She was already wet from the jealousy and me being pushed up against her.
I brought my two fingers up to my lips, coated in gold, with her watchful eye. I didn't care who was watching; I wanted to taste her.
The gold running through us didn't taste like metal at all. It tasted like a slice of Olympus on my fingers, begging me to go home.
Luna was home.
She was whimpering under me, and I could see her hips twisting with annoyance that my hands weren't on her. Oracle was working her insecurities, while I worked other parts of her.
Caellum didn't even knock when he rushed into the room. “We gotta talk.”
My palms pushed into my mattress, as I hovered over Luna’s pale milky body. I groaned in anger at his presence in my room. Luna’s hands were on either side of my face, when she whispered, “Ignore him. For me.”
I'd ignore the whole world for her.
“Caellum, you know we have a knocking policy. I'm busy.”
Her hands slipped down my bare chest and undid my pants with ease. Letting my forehead fall to her shoulder, I kissed her neck as her hand crept inside my open jeans.
“Bolton is gonna clean up your mess if you don't. Dorian. At Acadia. Got your attention yet?”
“Busy means busy, Caellum. I can't leave Luna like this.”
Luna’s hand didn't stop dragging her closed fist along my length as she spoke only to me: “Dorian? What's he talking about?”
I groaned again, wishing anything was closer that I could break instead of the girl I love.
“You love me… no matter what, right?”
She nodded her head up and down, while her bottom lip was bit down by her teeth.
“Dorian didn't go out of town... I kidnapped him after Kate told me he hurt you. He's at Arcadia.”
Her hand yanked out of my pants with a horrified look on her face—all the seduction fresh in the air now gone. “What?”
“He hurt you, and you didn't come to me. I handled it.” It seemed like a growl instead of words.
“You did that for me?” Her words cut right through me again, shocking me back into my normal silence. Her green and gold eyes went under water.
“You think I would let someone hurt you and get away with it?” I sat back on my heels, giving her space, suddenly aware of how all this sounded.
Caellum’s voice was still in the room: “Sure she doesn't mind. I read his journal while you two were... busy. I’m not against live porn, but can we actually figure shit out before Bolton fucks shit up.”
Bolton
C aellum always played the know it all. He was always going against me and trying to prove just how smart he was, even when he was pretending to be king, while everyone looked behind him at me for confirmation.
He should have never left Arcadia and buried his loyalty to the circle six feet deep in the process.
Caellum was kidding himself, wrapping up in some mystery that didn’t need solving. We needed answers to problems unfolding in front of us.
The ritual.
Luna.
Betrayal levels that yanked the sanity off my bones enough to make me contemplate killing everyone.
There’s a saying about secrets and dead people not talking.
Same went for mistrust; it’s easier done with no variables.
I was letting them all toy with humanity, a new life, a new place outside of Hell, constructed for us—specifically for us—without me questioning them.
After the failed ritual, I questioned everyone’s loyalty—except Arianna. Loyalty ran through her veins like air in her lungs.
Our history bound us; our present was shaping us; and the future looked pretty fucking royal to me.
The crown was going to sit perfectly on my head until further notice.
I wasn’t giving that up for anyone.
Nyx was a whole different story; he was trying to defy me. He was acting with purpose, and it was enough to make me remind everyone who was really king.
I didn’t need anyone mistaking my temperament for weakness.
He needed the extra reminder.
Caellum was solving a mystery I had already figured out: Omari was alive and well.
He was haunting everyone’s dreams into admitting the guilt of betrayal—the guilt of taking one of our own.
Pain and suffering was a high price to pay.
I only knew this, because I had been meeting up with Omari after all the dust settled and life got mundane again.
We all had been around Cheyanne enough to know some of her tricks. You just had to be paying attention.
Luckily, I didn’t have to resort that low.
Omari texted me, knowing we both wanted a kind of revenge only a king can truly demand.
I needed to know what he knew and to find out what went wrong.
Someone had to take the blame.
I had texted the number in my phone, without a name, to meet me at Arcadia to finally draw some conclusion to all this bullshit after Omari’s shadow play had gone on long enough.
Too many variables—the circle, Alba, Omari—the lines were a cluster fuck of knots at this point, but I was going to find the traitor.
Arcadia was still a dump compared to the castle we saw only a few months ago.
Shambles.
Piles of stones.
A beautiful damn illusion.
Headed for the back of the campus, I told him to meet me at the old abandoned building we used for blowing off steam and Arianna learning how to control her powers.
The only building still standing, really.
I was keeping Ari out of this—so far out of this I almost felt bad.
Refusing to feel soft, like Nyx’s new way of looking at me said, I buried that shit somewhere between anger and the urge to kill my best friend.
Omari was already waiting, hands in his hoodie pockets and the hood covering most of his dark features. His skin had highlights naturally, and in the dim light, it seemed like he was glowing.
“Omari, any news?”
I stood a safe distance from him anyways. Truth wasn’t something I was doing these days.
“Besides the toy chained up over there?” His finger pointed to one of the buildings completely torn down, except one wall barely hanging on.
Walking over to the building, I carefully stepped over the rubble, even though I could see him from here.
Dorian.
Ropes were tightly over his chest, pulling him back flush against the pole.
His ankles were crossed, and he didn’t look uncomfortable at all. He looked like he was in his element.
Who the fuck’s element is trapped?
Mine.
Arcadia or not.
“Well, this is new. Here to torture or feed me? Nyx busy?”
Too comfortable.
“Watch how you’re talking to me. You’re the one tied up.” I folded my arms against my chest, peering down at him.
“Oh, you must be the demigod. Always trying to prove something.”
Squatting down, I captured his eyes with mine, trying to figure out how Dorian, Luna’s older boyfriend, knew that about me. “Who are you, really? How did you know that?”
He laughed, like he had an upper hand, and he kind of did. An upper hand on me was a death sentence. I would kill him if I didn’t need to know which idiot did this.
“Nyx keeping secrets? Always so chatty with me…” Shrugging, he uncrossed and crossed his ankles the opposite way.
Standing up, I pulled my phone out to snap a p
hoto of the hostage all tied up, and the motherfucker actually smiled at the camera before I attached it to a group message to the guys only.
Kate, Arianna, even Luna… wouldn’t be capable of this.
This wasn’t a crime of passion.
I typed under the photo: What the actual fuck.
No question mark.
No threats.
Just enough to make whoever did this squirm. Enough to confess.
Turning my back to Dorian, I threw up a peace sign and jumped over the loose rocks again, leaving him calling out for me not to go.
I wasn’t his saving grace, but if he wanted to leak out some information, I was good with that. I paused, waiting. “You gonna tell me how you knew who I was?”
He grunted, like his boredom had hit a limit and telling me was his only light of hope in this. “Remember who you pissed off in the 1600’s?” He bit out the words, and I was immediately flooded with images of Arianna in my mind.
Arianna was all I could think of when it came to the 1600’s. I lost her, found her, lost her again, only to have her dropped into my lap at Arcadia—literally.
“What is that supposed to mean?” I choked out against the anger brewing inside me at Dorian even insinuating Arianna was the catalyst to anything but kickstarting my heart.
He smirked, like he could see through my stoic stance as king, at my irritation from his words.
Fucker.
“You and the other Devil’s children set all of this into motion. Now you suffer the consequences… Do you really think I’m the only one coming for you? You don’t belong here.”
“Easy to say when you are home already. Our gods are dead, who’s supposed to help us leave, huh?” Kneeling back down, I grabbed his fucking perfectly sprinkled salt and pepper hair, which make him look older than he was, and I forced him to meet my angry stare.
No one liked the truth.
No one liked being told what they didn’t want to hear.
No one except Arianna. She could take it, hand it out, and make it seem like something you even desired… when you didn’t.
“That’s what I thought. Have fun convincing Nyx to spare you. If you know us, then you know he’s the most evil out of us all. He’ll slit your throat for what you did to Luna and not even flinch.”
Leaving for good this time, I jumped over the rubble, leaving Dorian for Nyx’s wild punishments that I could only imagine in the darkest parts of my mind. Omari was standing outside, blending into the dark, with his shadow tricks in full effect.
“You handling that?”
I mumbled a quick, “No.” I kept walking, letting him jog to catch up to my side, “Did you figure out who helped Alba with the ritual from Hell? I have some promising leads.”
I stayed silent, letting him fill the gaps with more talking—useless talking.
His shadow play was supposed to get me answers, not more fucking questions.
Pulling the door to my truck open, Omari’s hand pushed it closed. “You aren’t looking at what is right in front of you. How did Nyx’s pet tied up there even get that close to the circle?”
My hands pushed against his chest creating space between us. No one got this close to a king except Arianna, and Omari wasn’t nearly as pretty.
“Go sneak back into the shadows before I announce your presence to the wrong people.”
The rest of the circle was paranoid and anxious, waiting to know where Omari went, where he was, what he was waiting for, what kind of revenge would be on his mind, and who it would be aimed for when we were all to blame for not standing between the God Killer and his twin.
Climbing into the driver’s seat against the satin leather, almost slipping along it into place, I yanked the door closed and felt the truck purr to a throaty roar. Looking at my phone before taking off, I saw all the missed texts from Arianna, wondering where I was at this hour.
She was already riddled with fear of missing out when I told her I had to throw my reign around, making sure people knew I was still king.
There was too much being held behind everyone’s back and lurking in their eyes.
I didn’t bother texting Arianna back. I was on my way back, and she could wait a few minutes until I walked through the door.
Now that she had her memories, that also came with the privilege she used to flaunt around as future queen and daughter of Zeus. That privilege morphed into needing to control almost everything (me sometimes included) and being the pain in my ass she always was.
Jingling my keys, I was trying to match up the mechanics of unlocking the door, when it swung open, and my furious queen stood with a scowl on her face. “Do you know what time it is, Bolton?”
She was seriously scolding me, like I was a child who missed curfew or showing up under the influence underage.
I wasn’t anything other than pissed off, and now I was even more annoyed that yet another person was acting like I wasn’t king. Slipping past her, I walked over to the couch sitting against the wall, and I slumped down, trying to figure out how all the pieces fit together, because I still wasn’t seeing it, despite Omari’s comments.
I was looking, pretty damn hard, and seeing nothing that made sense.
Arianna stood between my legs, anger still under the surface, but fading. “What happened? Talk to me.”
Sitting up, I pulled the back of her thighs towards me and forced her on my lap, straddling me. I grunted out my words feeling her hips already grind down into me, “Just because you sit on me like a throne doesn’t make me anything less than your king.”
“Just because I like when you hate fuck me doesn’t mean I don’t actually love you, Bolton.” Her hips swayed on top of my lap, and my groin lit up with heat.
I fished round my pockets, looking for my pocketknife that had become our whole sense of foreplay now that toying with her lack of memories wasn’t something I could tease her with anymore.
Holding up my knife, she whispered against my lips, “Looking for this?”
The blade sprung out with a snapping sound, as she pushed it lightly against my throat without any real pressure. “Next time, don’t keep secrets from your queen. Don’t you know feminism is on the rise and bad bitches can bring even the strongest men to their knees?”
My Adam’s apple bobbed as I chuckled against the small blade of my butterfly knife that she swiped from me. I sat up against the blade enough to crash our lips together. She could cut through my skin all she wanted; she had already cut through all my vital organs and stole my goddamn heart.
Nyx
“C aellum, get out. I’ll find you when I’m ready to make moves.” My eyes didn’t leave Luna below me. Her legs fell even more open for me, and her eyes were wild with lust, even after my confession.
Luna was high, and I was making the stars in her eyes even worse by being her knight in shining fucking armor instead of who I know I am: the Prince of the Underworld, meant to balance death and sex.
I was giving her the wrong idea, all the wrong ideas, about who I would be, even for her.
“What are you going to do with him?” Her small voice spoke, when I heard the door close from behind us.
Finally alone.
Between the stolen moments and grief from the rest of the circle, all I wanted was to be alone with Luna.
“Kill him.” My voice was unforgiving, just like it should be.
Her hands were pressed against my chest lightly, and her legs closed around me pushing me further into her heat. “What if I wanna watch?”
My dick jumped at the thought of looking Luna in the eyes while I made Dorian pay the ultimate price. How erotic and dirty.
I sat back on my heels, looking down at her whimpering and wiggling at my absence. I wanted to give her exactly what I wanted, pushing all eight inches of me between her legs, but I knew how much sweeter it would be after getting my hands dirty.
“Come on, Little Lamb. We have some killing to do.” Standing up, I tossed her a pair of my sweats for he
r to put on. I had enough of her black satin dress that fell right below her ass. Dorian didn’t deserve any more of her.
She thought I didn’t see the smirk spread like wildfire across her face when she bit it away, hoping to make her excitement die down, as she slipped into my sweats and tucked her dress into them.
“What if I don’t like it?”
“You can cover your eyes. He’s dying either way, babe. No one gets away with hurting you… except me.”
Taking her hand, I led her down to the car. The rest of the way, Luna fell silent, and I suddenly understood her problem with it when I did it to the world.
I had zero idea what she was thinking, and it was driving me just as crazy as thinking about her on a pole earlier. My groin ached wildly, dick still hard and uncomfortable, as I sped to Arcadia.
We weren’t on the clock, but I wasn’t willingly giving Bolton the opportunity to do something stupid or reckless. Dorian was my problem, my kill, my trophy.
The sky was pitch black with grey hues of smoke for clouds, covering the stars up, as they moved freely. The moon was our only source of light, besides our phones, to navigate in the dark of Arcadia.
With all the buildings knocked over, it was easier to misstep into a trap. Opening Luna’s door, I offered a hand, before fishing my phone out and turning it on the flashlight mode so we could see down the sidewalk path to where I left him.
Luna shivered next to me, hand in mine, trailing behind me. I knew it wasn’t from the crisp air; Hades, it was still sixty degrees out.
The summer heat was sweltering and begging you to sweat with each step.
Stepping over the rocks, I bit my phone between my teeth and pushed my hands under her armpits, lifting her over the pile. To my actual surprise, Dorian didn’t say a word. He had a slick mouth when he wanted to, and now was a gleaming moment for him to put Luna in her place—to show her his true colors.
Luna’s fists were balled up by her sides, while I dragged a metal chair over to the pole and undid his ropes. I didn’t need Luna kneeling down to him or getting too close to danger.
Forcing his wrists backwards, I lifted him up and aggressively forced him down in a few quick moves. “A chair? Food? Uninvited guests? Some real hospitality there, Nyx.”