Edge of Heaven

by Rhiannon Leith

  “Good, Lara,” said Asmodeus, stroking her hair as if she was a dog. “Make him come for us.”

  Micah strained against his chains, his eyes searching frantically for the pair he had seen, lost now in a sea of faces, in the red mist of arousal. Lara worked her throat along the length of his cock while her hands probed between his ass cheeks, forcing their way into the tight hole. He groaned. Sperm damned up in his balls and her tongue tickled the vein on the underside, teasing him to higher levels of arousal and blind need.

  “Not yet,” the Nameless commanded.

  Lara released him at once, but only long enough to force something down the length of his engorged shaft, a cold metal ring, as icy as the chamber in which he had first found himself. Then her mouth descended again, her fingers returned to their teasing penetration. The ring tightened around him, shrinking in contact with his body heat, blocking any hoped for release, trapping him as effectively as the chains that held him in place.

  “No,” he moaned, trying to force his lust-drugged eyes open, trying to fight the darkness swelling up inside him. The chains dragged his arms out further, and Asmodeus kissed him again, pouring more of the agony of arousal into him.

  Beyond them, beyond Asmodeus’s kisses and Lara’s devouring mouth, beyond the Nameless and his tender caresses of damnation, the crowd had turned on each other. Cries of ecstasy and torture, of lust and pain combined, echoed his own. And one other sound. One voice. A small sigh of dismay. Micah’s eyes snapped open and he found her.

  Lily stood in the midst of the damned, Sam’s hands travelling over her corseted stomach, dipping beneath the short leather skirt she wore, his mouth biting into her bare shoulder. She leaned back against her demon, her eyes almost blind with lust, their last sight only of him, of her fallen angel and the things they did to him. She cried out and began to shake, tears springing from her eyes like diamonds in the infernal light.

  “No,” Micah gasped. “Please no.”

  The Nameless slapped his hand hard into the small of Micah’s back, and the tattoo ignited like sodium in water, white hot and violent. Lara swallowed his endlessly pulsing cock, her throat working him, her wicked fingers teasing and probing. Asmodeus’s mouth devoured him.

  Micah tried to tear himself free, struggled against the tsunami of despair, desire and rage. Instead it surged up inside him and swept everything else that remained of his former self away to darkness at the roar of his release.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Sam’s firm touch encircling Lily’s body was comforting rather than arousing. She was certain that with the sight before her, the anguish on Micah’s face, nothing she saw would have aroused her. And yet her body had betrayed her, just as Micah believed she and Sam had betrayed him. She had seen the belief on his face, etched there amid the lust and the horror. And all the time her body had throbbed for Sam’s touch.

  With gentle hands hidden behind cruelty, Sam lifted her over his shoulder, carrying her out of the audience chamber, away from the surging mass of bodies which were even now leaving their first partners and searching for another. He strode as if he wanted to carry her away to fuck her in some darkened corner, but his fingers caressed the bare patches of her skin and she hid her face in his shoulder to hide her tears.

  Once the noise fell away behind them, Sam lowered her to the ground, letting her lean back against the wall to get her bearings. They stood in silence, neither looking at the other, the image of Micah strung up and tortured, of Micah sinking into damnation, still vivid in their minds.

  “Breathe,” Sam told her at last.

  She gulped in air, choked and doubled over, coughing and retching. She could still hear it, the noises of the chamber, running through the stone walls like distant thunder. Sam rubbed her back absently until the coughing subsided.

  “Better?” She nodded and he took the leash attached to her collar again. “We should get moving.”

  “Where, Master?” She could ask, if she was careful. He wouldn’t punish her for that, not if they were alone, so long as she kept the right tone, just in case.

  “Back home.”

  Lily planted her feet firmly on the stone, staring at him. Shock made her forget herself. “Not without him.”

  Anger flashed in Sam’s eyes but though his temper flared, he didn’t lose it. “You saw him. There’s nothing we can do now. We’re getting out of here.”

  She dropped to her knees, pressing her forehead to the ground. “Please, don’t. We can’t leave him like that.”

  Sam growled a curse deep in his throat and somehow she knew she’d won, whether he liked it or not. He couldn’t stand to see Micah trapped here any more than she could.

  “Get up,” he told her. “Stay close and do exactly what I say.” She did as he told her, and as she stood before him, his hands closed on her upper arms, squeezing them so tightly that they bruised. “Exactly what I say, Lily. No arguments. Swear it.”

  “Yes, Master,” she chimed.

  But his grip tightened still further, his eyes blazing. She squirmed beneath his painful touch. “No. No games. Swear it.”

  He meant it. More than anything he had ever said to her, he meant this. She stilled, taking the pain, using to remind herself what they were doing and why. Using it to remind her that this was his love for her forging this determination. It had to be. The alternative was—

  She nodded, her expression solemn again. He needed to believe her. To be able to trust her as she trusted him. “I swear it, Sam.”

  He released her and the blood surged back into her arms, where scarlet bands stood out in the dim light. He breathed a little more easily and that made her own breathing calm.

  “Right then.” He shifted uncomfortably, his hands curling and uncurling. “We’ll go and see what we can do. But Lily…” She lifted her chin, ready to argue, ready to defy him. “Lily, really…” He exhaled, stretched out and threaded his fingers through hers, pulling her carefully against him, as if he feared to hurt her, or feared to let her go. “It might be far too late.”

  He led her down the narrow passages, trails which wound in and across each other. Several times she was sure they were doubling back on their path, but Sam didn’t waver. She followed dutifully in his wake, her eyes lowered, the leash in his hand drawing her on. Those they encountered chilled her to the core, eyes that trailed over her body, followed her hungrily. Her skin itched as if unclean, but she didn’t try to brush off the sensation. If she showed her discomfort, they would know. They would see it as a weakness and that would damn them both. And Micah.

  Micah… In spite of her resolution to be strong she shuddered at the thought of what she had seen, of Micah, of what they had done to him. When Sam stopped, she fell still behind him, never lifting her eyes to see the being to whom he talked. A blaze of heat washed over her, sweat prickling on her skin. But she didn’t care. All she could think of was Micah, the pain in his eyes, the anguish, and finally the insane lust. It hadn’t looked like him when Sam carried her away. It hadn’t looked like her angel at all.

  “They’re finished with him,” said a rasping voice. It trailed over Lily’s exposed skin like sandpaper and she knew his eyes were on her. “For now anyway. They plan to have some fun with him though, and for a long old time.” He laughed, a dreadful hiccoughing sound that jerked at her insides. “Damnation, we all do, Sammael. I’d say you’re high up in the line given you brought him here.”

  “Yeah, probably.” Sam’s voice had a smirk buried in it that made her shift her stance with discomfort. “But I want to see him first, Xaphan. He put me through some rings up there. I want to see that he knows it was me who put him here. And there’s her, of course. I want him to see her.”

  Xaphan snorted and that surge of arid heat flared around them again. “Aye, well, who wouldn’t want to see her? It’ll drive him over the edge, if Asmodeus and the Nameless haven’t done so already. They took him back to the ice cells. Give him some cooling-off time. He was wild by the time the
y finished. Damn near tore his way through that bitch Lara’s head.”

  A hand closed on Lily’s thigh, not Sam’s. This touch was cold and dry, like frozen suede. It squeezed and she flinched back, unwilling to cry out or make trouble for fear it would give them away.

  Sam’s fist moved in a blur, slamming down on Xaphan’s arm. There was an audible crack and Xaphan howled, staggering back from them.

  “You don’t touch what’s mine,” Sam snarled. He shoved Xaphan back against the wall. “Never!” Driving his fist into the demon’s stomach, Sam pounded the air from him. “Ever!” His knee crashed up and Xaphan doubled over with a curse and a rush of breath. “Touch what’s mine!”

  Xaphan slid down into a heap at their feet. Sam stepped over him and, with the leash drawing her forward, Lily had to follow, picking her way carefully so as not to brush against his slumped figure. Her heart was pounding, but she kept her head bowed and wished she had some way to reach out to Sam, to show him, what? That she appreciated his care? That she loved him?

  They rounded another corner and she stumbled. Strong arms caught her, Sam turning so fast that he moved between moments. He said nothing, just stopped her fall, and raised her up onto her feet, pausing only to brush a strand of her hair back behind her ear.

  But he said nothing. Just turned away and led her on, down into the depths of Hell, down into the cold.

  The temperature dropped steadily as they descended, ice creeping up the surface of the stairs. With Sam ahead of her, Lily doubted she would fall far, but the heels were high enough that she was certain she might take out an ankle before he saved her. But there again, barefoot wasn’t an option here.

  At the foot of the stairs, the dungeon walls sparkled with frost. Snow piled up against the walls, and the only light came from flickering torches, pallid against the darkness and the cold.

  “Stay quiet,” Sam ordered and she nodded.

  The corridor opened out to a round chamber, doors leading off in every direction. In the centre, hunched over a brazier, was the most repulsive-looking little man Lily had ever seen. His skin was the colour of corpses, mottled with liver spots and stretched so tightly over his frame that it looked thin as paper. His eyes loomed out of the face, far too large.

  “Sammael, is it?” he wheezed, peering at them. “Been a long time since I had you down here, Sammael.” He rubbed his hands together, the knuckles cracking as he did so. Then he turned his gaze on Lily, his eyes turning piercing. “Brought me another treasure, have you?”

  Sam folded his arms and the leash tugged Lily closer to him. For that she was grateful. “No. I want to see the angel.”

  The old demon laughed. “Not much of an angel left about him now, boy.”

  Sam grinned, showing all his teeth. “Just the same. I need some time. Alone.”

  “Alone? Ah, Sam, that’d be more than my job’s worth. Now maybe if your friend here would care to distract me for a time…”

  Lily swallowed hard, trying to figure out how she could bring herself to let that thing touch her, but swearing that if it helped Micah, she would do it. Sam, however, had different ideas.

  “I’ll let her entertain you with a knife, perhaps? But certainly not by herself. I thought all of Hell knows I’m training her for the Nameless. Even Asmodeus has more sense than you do, Charus. Get out and give me room.”

  Grumbling, the old demon shuffled off, leaving them alone. Sam grabbed the key hanging by the cell door and fitted it to the lock.

  “Remember, Lily, do what I tell you. If I say get out, you run, understand?”

  “Yes, but—it’s Micah…”

  Sam levelled his gaze at her, his mouth a hard and unyielding line. “Did you see him back there? It’ll be worse by now. Much worse.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Sam swung the door open and stood there like an escort, waiting for her to enter ahead of him. Lily stepped into the ice-encrusted room, and her feet came to a halt as if frozen to the spot.

  Something growled from out of the shadows. Something hungry. Cold speared through her and only the flat of Sam’s hand coming to rest against the small of her back propelled her forward.

  “I can’t see,” she whispered.

  “I can see.”

  The voice clawed its way through her, Micah’s voice. His voice and yet not his voice. Nothing like it.

  He growled again and the sound of his chains accompanied the sound. She flinched back but Sam stopped her, his body firm against hers, determined.

  “He can’t hurt you. Not chained up.” Sam took a step forward and Lily was forced to do the same.

  “Micah?” she asked, her whole body trembling.

  As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she picked out his body, his arms stretched above him, chained to a stake in the centre of the room. His feet were similarly restrained at the base. For a moment, she pictured Saint Sebastian as seen in countless portraits, bound to a tree, shot with arrows. Of course that wasn’t how he died. They beat him to death.

  Micah’s eyes gleamed in the dim light and then, as they fixed on her, blazed red. His nostrils flared. “I can smell you.”

  “Micah?” She couldn’t make herself reach out to him. Never in a million years had she dreamed she would hesitate now.

  “I can smell your fear.” He jerked forward, the chains wrenching his muscles, straining to contain him.

  Sam’s body hardened and his stance changed, subtly shifting his hip around her so he stood in front, partially shielding her.

  “And you, Sammael,” said Micah. “Don’t think I’ll forget what you did. You brought us here. You damned us.”

  Sam opened his mouth as if to protest, but then closed it again. Lily glanced up just in time to see his Adam’s apple lift and fall as his throat worked.

  “She’s mine,” said Micah, and his voice dipped to ripple across her skin. “Always has been. Always will be. And now, Lily—” She shivered, as if he touched her, as if he trailed his fingers up the nape of her neck. “—now I don’t have to behave anymore.”

  Closing her eyes didn’t help. Neither did concentrating on Sam, his warmth, his body pressed against hers. Her pulse made her ache. She wanted him, wanted them both.

  “Touch her for me, Sam. Let me hear her gasp in pleasure. Let me hear her moan.”

  “Micah,” Sam said, his voice thick with arousal. “We’re here to help you. To free you.”

  “And what would I do if I was free? To her, to you. What would I do?” He laughed, a low and dangerous sound that echoed off the ceiling and walls. “Touch her for me. Run your hand up those long legs and let me see her quiver.”

  Sam moved slowly, as if only reluctantly obeying. His hand closed on her thigh, sliding up to the edge of the skirt, to the curve of her ass. So intimate a touch made her damp for him, for them both.

  Micah inhaled, nostrils flaring again, and the red light in his eyes grew intense. His lips drew back from his teeth in a rictus smile and his face, stark in the shadows, beautiful and yet skeletal, strained closer.

  “Make her come for me, Sam. I want to see her come. I want to see you come.”

  The chains groaned under the pressure, the metal grinding together. And behind him, the wood creaked.

  “Sam,” Lily said. His eyes were closed, his face strained in ecstasy, like a man enchanted. She tried to pull back, but his hand closed on her skin, digging into her buttocks to hold her against him. “Sam!”

  “Take her,” Micah commanded, writhing towards them. “Throw her down and fuck her for me, Sam. Make her scream. Make her come. And then give her to me.”

  Sam turned with a snarl, pulling her towards him. Lily cried out in alarm and Micah groaned. Sam’s grip hurt. His mouth when it closed on hers bruised, his teeth grazed her lips. This wasn’t like him, wasn’t like either of them. She knew them, knew their hearts, their souls. She’d felt their love, their minds touching hers, entwining about hers to carry her through the darkness. And here they were, consumed,
defiled.

  Tears stung her eyes like acid and she tried to fight her way free. But Sam was too strong, too powerful. And Micah’s laughter goaded him on, each command he gave more violent. Pain lanced up her arms as Sam twisted them behind her back and forced her to bend forward, so her sex was bared to him. She sobbed his name.

  And abruptly everything went still.

  Sam let out a ragged breath and released her. Staggering forward, Lily landed on her knees by the door, the ice biting into her skin.

  “You bound me.” Sam’s voice grated on harsh breaths. His hands spread wide on either side of his hips, the fingers flexing as if he wanted to curl them into fists, but restrained himself. “You bound me to her so I wouldn’t hurt her.” His chest heaved as he regained his self-control. Lily struggled to her feet, watching them, her whole body shaking. “How could you ask me to do so now, Micah? How could you, of all people, ask—”

  The wood crashed as Micah pulled the chains free.

  “Lily! Get out!” Sam yelled. “Shut the door. Get out now!”

  Micah took him in a single leap and the pair of them crashed to the floor, grappling together. Lily backed out, gripping the door, her knuckles white. She’d promised Sam to obey. But Sam was in danger. Micah forced him down, his body stronger, wilder, his hands tearing at her demon. Sam twisted beneath him, and their mouths met. Violent, needy, animal, they kissed.

  Mesmerised by what she saw, Lily didn’t realise anyone was behind her until a hand fell on her shoulder, another closed on her mouth, and the door slammed shut.

  Sam’s body betrayed him. Micah was strong, always had been, but the newborn demonic Micah was more than that. He was ravenous. His mouth consumed, his hands raked Sam’s skin, their legs entangled.

  “I know you want me, Sam,” Micah snarled. “You did from the start. Now say it. Tell me.”

  “Yes, I want you.”

  Micah flinched as if struck. Hadn’t expected that, had he? Looking to dominate, to force himself on another, but when the other was willing, however unexpected…