by Helen Scott
It shocked me, but elation quickly took over, and a huge smile broke across my face. “Good.” I giggled. “Now that we’ve got that sorted, what do you say about some good old-fashioned shower sex?”
“Poppy, I’m already inside you. We are literally having shower sex right now.” His brows furrowed, but the light of his love still radiated out through him.
“Yeah, but you’re not moving.”
“Well, that’s easy to fix,” he said with an evil grin.
Then he did begin to move. His big cock repeatedly slid out of me and filled me to the brim while I did my best to hang on. Words tumbled out of my mouth as pleasure bounced around inside me. I felt lighter than air, ready to float away at any second if Shadow let go of me.
Faster than I wanted, I could feel his rhythm shift, his thrusts becoming uneven as he went over the edge into his own orgasm. His head fell against my shoulder.
“I’m sorry. Just give me a minute and we’ll go again,” he panted.
“You have nothing to be sorry for.” I stroked his hair as he pulled out of me and set me back down on the floor.
“That was way too fast. Don’t try to deny it.”
I sighed and folded my arms over my chest. “It was our first time together, and I’m not going to judge you on that. I enjoyed it, even if you didn’t, and you’re not going to change my mind.” I wanted to stick out my tongue at him, but that would take away from the serious vibe I was trying to put out, which was hard to do when I was soaking wet and naked.
Shadow’s eyes flicked up from my chest. “Sorry, did you say something?”
I glanced down and realized that by folding my arms over my chest in an effort to look serious, I had actually created a major distraction in the form of my squished boobs. My nipples had managed to escape and looked as if they were balancing on my forearms. After uncrossing my arms, I said, “I know you heard me.”
He looked up. “I did, but it’s hard to concentrate when it feels like most of my blood is in my dick.” Shadow gestured to his cock with a downward motion, drawing my eyes.
To my surprise, he was still rock hard. “I thought you finished?” I asked, now worried that maybe he hadn’t enjoyed himself as much as I’d thought.
“I did.”
“But . . .” I pointed to his cock.
“It takes more than one round for me to lose my hard on, love.” He grinned at me cheekily.
“You are infuriating sometimes, you know that?” I laughed as I spoke. “Let’s get clean, and then you can show me what you’re made of, hum?”
“As my lady wishes.” He bent down and captured my mouth with his own, kissing me so thoroughly, my head was spinning by the time he pulled away.
7
Cass
I could feel Poppy’s pleasure ripple through our bond. It didn’t help that I could hear her and Shadow going at it as well. I didn’t mind sharing her with the other guys. After all, I’d never been any good at relationships. A buzzing noise caught my ears, and since I couldn’t sleep due to the sex happening next door, I decided to investigate.
Exhaustion pulled at my limbs, making them feel like dead weight as I got out of bed and pulled some clothes on. The others might be totally comfortable with nudity or roaming around in their underwear, but I wasn’t. At least, not yet. Part of my brain reminded me that I had taken part in an orgy, for lack of a better word, and hadn’t been worried about my nudity then. The buzzing sound got louder as I made my way down the hall. Finally, I found Derek, clippers in hand as he cut his hair.
“Everything okay?” I asked cautiously. I knew that the experience with Alpha had left him feeling vulnerable, and I couldn’t deny that it made me feel the same way. For them to show up in the Underworld was more than unsettling.
“Yeah, just need to keep this short if we’re going to be fighting.” The blades sliced through his hair, which until now had been styled with curls coiled tightly on top of his head. I had seen him working them with a sponge a couple times, but when we left the hellhounds’ tower, or whatever it was, we hadn’t exactly had time to pack.
Derek was the quietest out of all of us, and although he seemed to want to keep to himself, I saw glimpses of him needing connection with everyone else. I wondered how Poppy’s current activities were making him feel.
The black curls slipped away from his head as the clippers ran over section after section of his hair. “Want me to get the back?” I asked, knowing how difficult it was to cut the back of my own hair. It was partially why I had decided to grow it out.
“Nah, I’ve got it, but thanks.” He paused for a moment and then looked at me in the mirror. “You want the clippers after me? I borrowed them from one of the fury dudes.”
“No, I’m good.”
“You better keep your hair up, then, ’cause one of those assholes got a good handle on my hair, and I’m not about to let that shit happen again.”
“You okay?” I asked, concern leaking into my voice. I was the smallest of all the guys, and with my long hair, it didn’t take a genius to figure out that they thought I was the weakest link.
“Yeah, I’m good.”
I ran a hand over my goatee as I watched him. We both had black eyes and split lips, among other injuries. They probably thought I wasn’t used to fighting, and that was where everyone underestimated me. I had fought all my life and was pretty good at it. “Were the furies in the bar area?”
Derek just nodded, and I headed out. Somebody had to want to hang out, and my fellow judge was making it perfectly clear that he wasn’t in the mood. I wasn’t about to push that and make someone who I was supposed to be spending eternity with dislike me.
I headed down the long hallway. Most of the doors to the other rooms were shut, probably trying to muffle some of the sounds or feelings from Poppy and Shadow. The opening on the left that Megaera had told us about drew my attention. It still seemed surreal that all this existed. Yet for some reason, the idea of the titans, the entities who existed before Zeus and his brothers and sisters took over, being imprisoned down there was just too much. It was the straw that would break my back to just believe it without proof.
Megaera had made it perfectly clear from her tone that whatever was down there was not for the faint of heart, but I had seen more than a few things that would make most people lose their lunch. I turned down the walkway and immediately felt as if the air had been sucked out of me.
The whole pressure of the thing changed. It was like being in an airplane during takeoff; I kept waiting for my ears to pop. The path spiraled downward at a steep pace to the point that I even found myself leaning backward to make sure I didn’t fall.
When I reached the bottom, nothing could have prepared me for what I found. It was what I had always pictured the Underworld, or even hell, to look like. Giant stone pillars stood like mountains throughout, but they were nothing compared to the actual mountains that seemed to be sticking out from the ceiling of what must have been the most gigantic cavern I’d ever seen.
Some pillars had what looked like doors on them, with lights shining out into the dim light that encompassed the space. Even some of the ceiling mountains had lights coming out of them. It was one of the most bizarre things in the world. Although, I guess technically we weren’t in the normal world anymore, so maybe this was just how they rolled in the Underworld. Mountains coming from the ceiling and all.
I made a mistake by stepping into the cavern proper. If I would have turned around and gone back upstairs, then it wouldn’t have been as soul-wrenching as it was. But I didn’t do that. I walked into the cavern expecting . . . I didn’t know what, but what I got was my ears finally popping and then being filled with the gut-wrenching screams coming from behind some of those closed doors.
My feet carried me to the first lit doorway I could see. I knew I should turn back, go back to my room, but I was a man possessed, and I needed to see what was making these people, or whatever they were, scream. As I got closer, I real
ized the light coming from the door had a faint pink glow. Looking in through the small window, I could see why. The room was bright pink, and unicorns and princesses covered the walls. A TV in the corner played a kid’s movie, and from what I could see, it looked like one of the crappy direct to DVD ones that weren’t even remotely conscious of the fact that adults would probably have to watch it as well. A man was crouched in the corner, pulling the stuffing out of a doll.
I must have made some kind of noise, because he looked up and almost made eye contact with me. A second later, he stood and wandered over to the door, I expected him to beg for release or death or something, but all he did was straighten his clothes before he began to brush his hair. It wasn’t until that moment that I realized the window was a two-way mirror. He had no idea I was there. I watched in fascination as he calmly went about what must be his normal activities. It was only when the opening credits of a movie began playing that I saw a crack in his facade. The brush flew from his hand toward the TV and bounced off some kind of invisible wall around it. He screamed then, spittle flying from his mouth as his skin turned a blotchy red. I could barely hear it through the door, which was interesting considering I could hear it coming from other places.
As I backed away, I meant to go back upstairs, but I couldn’t stop my curiosity and ventured deeper into the cavern. The further I got, the darker the lights from the doors became. It wasn’t until I had been walking for a while that I realized I had been going downhill. It was such a gentle decline when compared with the pathway down here in general that I could barely notice. I didn’t know what it was, but something pulled me forward.
The ground became difficult to move over the further in I went, like the ripples on a lake. It was almost like hills, rolling up and down, and I found myself wishing I could turn back, but I knew I couldn’t until I had found whatever it was I needed to find.
When one of the hills I’d just finished crossing moved, I yelped like a frightened child. So manly of me, I know. The whole thing lifted, and suddenly I felt like a mouse who had accidentally wandered onto an alligator or something. I took off at a run, moving as fast as I could over the uneven terrain, but it was no good. Everything around me began to move.
Hill after hill lifted, and without warning, I found myself falling and the hill I’d just been standing on above me. I hit the ground like a sack of potatoes, knocking all the air out of me. I didn’t feel as if I’d hit my head, but the next thing I saw was a massive creature standing over me, looking like some kind of experiment gone wrong from the Island of Dr. Moreau.
Hands kept appearing out of nowhere, some even acting as feet to help support its weight, and when it turned around, I found myself staring down more sets of eyes than a spider had. At a rough glance, I counted well over twenty different pairs of eyes. All of which were looking for me. I scrambled off the floor and tried to find somewhere to hide.
There was nothing around except a couple pillars. Fortunately, one of them had a door. Without thinking, I threw myself into the pillar, trying to get the door open. The sound, faint as it must have been for the creature, was still enough to attract its attention. Sounds erupted from its mouth at such a deafening volume that I clapped my hands over my ears in an attempt to protect them. As its mouth kept moving and sound kept hitting me, I felt as if my bones were breaking. Rock around me shattered, and the door I had pressed myself against was even more visible. I tried the handle again, and this time, it opened. Moving as fast as I could, I threw myself inside and pulled the door shut. The noise was thankfully muffled. I knew the being was still out there screaming or whatever it was doing, but it didn’t feel as if it were shattering my bones anymore.
“Well, aren’t you a surprise?” a woman’s gravelly voice sounded behind me, and I almost jumped out of my skin.
I spun around to get a good look at whoever had spoken and found a woman whose skin was as pale as alabaster while her hair was as dark as night. She didn’t look threatening, but I wasn’t sure what to expect after the ground had turned out to be a giant multi-armed monster. I waited for something to happen, some freaky thing to emerge, another eye to become visible, snakes to appear in her hair, anything to indicate that I should be wary. Nothing happened. The woman’s quiet expression gave nothing away as she watched me cling to the door I had just come through. After a moment or two, amusement flickered in her dark eyes, as though she had concluded I wasn’t a threat.
“Hello,” I said, finding my voice after staring at her for far too long.
“And who might you be?”
“Cassian, and yourself?”
“Pandora,” she said with a smile, and my heart faltered. It couldn’t be the Pandora, could it? I wanted to slap myself for even thinking the question, but then, I had just met one of the original furies, so I knew I needed to accept that anything was possible. Only two questions remained as I tried to decide what to say next. First, why the hell was Pandora in Tartarus? And second, how the hell was I going to get out and back to Poppy?
8
Poppy
Fear rushed over me like an arctic wind. One of my guys was in trouble. I couldn’t explain it. I couldn’t even understand how I knew, but I was completely sure. I looked inside myself to find my bonds with the guys and located them one after the other. Most of them were somewhat close by, but I couldn’t sense Cass at all. I was out of bed and moving before I had decided where I was going. A few of them had congregated in one area, so I headed in that direction.
“What’s wrong?” Knox asked, meeting me at the entrance to the bar area.
“Cass is missing.” The three words fell from my mouth like bombs. There was a beat of silence in the room before the word vomit started streaming from my mouth. “I can’t sense him anywhere. Is there somewhere he could have been attacked? Would I have felt it if he died? How can I track him through th—”
“Easy,” Knox said, placing his heavy hands on my shoulders. “We’ll find him. Just take a breath and come sit down.”
I nodded and followed Knox to the sitting area.
“Em, can you get Poppy a drink?”
“I don’t need a drink,” I said. Were they even taking this seriously? The thought raced around my head as Emmett poured some bubbly amber liquid into a glass.
“Here you are, my queen.” He placed the glass in front of me, and I took a sip. It tasted like summer. I felt as if I should be on a beach under the pounding rays of the sun.
“Thanks,” I said finally.
Knox had somehow called all the men to us and waited until they were all sitting before he spoke. “Cass is missing. Poppy can’t sense her bond with him anymore, so that could mean a few things. We’ve never experimented with range to see how far the bond can stretch before you don’t sense it anymore,” he said, looking at me before addressing the rest of the room. “It could factor into it. He could be injured and his life signs too weak for Poppy to sense them. He could even be somewhere that the magic is blocked.”
“Do you know of any areas around here that could do something like that?” Nolan asked.
I took a long pull from my glass, letting the mixed drink work its own kind of magic.
Emmett shook his head. “We don’t know a ton about the areas within the Underworld, just that they exist. Our main concern has always been the gates and protecting against people entering without Charon’s permission or trying to leave, which, obviously, isn’t allowed.”
“There could be a thousand different areas where all magic is blocked, but we have no way of knowing.”
“Sure we do. We just need to ask one of the furies and see what they know,” Hunter butted in before everything could get too doom and gloomy.
“I’ll text Cin,” Derek said.
I was surprised that out of all of them, he was the one with her number. A jealous side of me reared up and demanded to know why he had her phone number and what he had been planning to do with it. I knew logically that he wouldn’t do anything to inju
re our bond, but I also hadn’t formed any kind of emotional connection with him yet. Sure, there was sexual tension between us, but we hadn’t exactly had a bunch of free time to act on it.
“You cut your hair,” I blurted.
Derek blushed slightly, the tinge of pink visible beneath his umber skin. “Yeah, a zombie grabbed it when we were fighting, so I figured it’d be best to chop it off.” He shrugged and ran a hand over his now almost bald head before finishing his text to Cin. I had loved the way his hair looked, like short dreadlocks, but there was something sexy about it now as well. Basically Derek was just sexy as hell.
A moment later, a wind seemed to whisper through the cavern-like area, and a man appeared as the shadows around him faded away. My guys were on their feet a moment later, surrounding me, hiding me from his sight.
“Woah,” an unfamiliar voice said. “I’m a fury. My name’s Ben. Cin sent me.”
The tension receded slightly, but they were all still on guard.
“How come we’ve never met?” Knox asked, clearly not willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.
“I’ve been wrapped up in a case that Hades sent me on. Plus, I live in the human realm, so I’m not really down here all that much.”
Knox grunted some noncommittal noise in response.
“Hi,” I said, pushing my way through the guys. “I’m Poppy.”
“Shit, you’re the new queen, aren’t you?”
I nodded.
“That explains your territorial hounds.” He smiled at me for a moment, and it was dazzling, and then he held his hand up and pointed to his ring finger while looking each of my guys in the eye. “I’m taken. Not trying to steal your girl or offend the future queen. Just trying to help.”
“Thank you,” I said quietly before glaring over my shoulder at them. “Apparently we don’t know as much about the Underworld as we need to right now. One of my guys has gone missing, and I can’t sense him through the bond. I can’t even feel the bond. Can you help us track him down?”