by Jen Ponce
She hacked into their files and I hacked into their bodies. We were a great team, a match made in … Hell, I supposed.
We’d met the summer before her family had been framed for consorting with demons and we hadn’t liked each other one bit. She’d been the nerdy girl with her nose buried in her keyboard and I’d been the rabble-rouser—shocking, I know. I hung out with the likes of Rollo and Bernie and other witch kids whose parents were fighting both secretly and openly against the magi. Poppy’s family had always wanted to blend in, wanted to keep their heads down and hope for the best. Poppy just wanted to get the Hell out of Bolger.
Then Kyle Klein came along. Slumming, as a lot of magi kids did before they graduated from the Academy and went on to live their asshole lives. He’d seen Poppy, started hitting on her, started making a nuisance of himself. One day he and his friends cornered her. Kyle pressured her for sex but she turned him down flat. He would have pushed the matter—raped her, more like—had she not had one of her runes with her that she’d slapped on his face. The rune caused rather explosive diarrhea which left Kyle incapacitated and humiliated. She’d gotten away, but Kyle never forgot it.
When Poppy’s parents found out she was being harassed by a magus, they had come to Daddy. Before Mama’s death, they had taken in witches who needed safe haven from magi and they worked with other witches to get people out of Bolger. After Mama died, Daddy disappeared into a bottle and wasn’t able to save himself let alone anyone else, but still people came to him. Unable to help, he’d called my grandmother and asked her to take me and “my friend” in for the summer.
I still don’t know why Grandmother said yes. Poppy was a witch and Grandmother a snob, but she did. It was what had saved Poppy from Kyle’s retribution, though sometimes I wondered if she wished she’d been killed along with her family.
After we graduated, we’d moved in together despite my Grandmother’s objections. Not because we wanted to spend more time together like normal friends, but because we’d started sharing our revenge wishes and one thing had led to another.
We’d become better friends through time and shared history, but sometimes I still wondered if she really liked me or just liked how I wielded a knife.
Perhaps it didn’t matter one way or the other. And perhaps I shouldn’t stand in my socks eating cold pizza by myself. That sort of thing tended to lend itself to uncomfortable self-reflection.
Trying not to feel too jealous that Poppy was most assuredly boffing Connor about now, I dropped the pizza box into the trash and poured myself some iced tea. It wasn’t like I necessarily wanted someone to boff, but I did feel an acute sense of loneliness when I saw everyone else around me hooking up. Even my daddy, for whom my mama was his oxygen, had started seeing someone, though he wouldn’t admit it. He thought I’d hate him if he dared find a little bit of happiness in another woman’s arms, but Mama had been dead for thirteen years now. It was time he moved on.
As for me?
“I am a psychotic loser,” I announced to the empty kitchen. Was it more or less pitiful that I was calling out my own fuckery? I wasn’t sure.
I pictured Oscar’s skin peeling away from his body, the feel of the knife in my hand as it sliced through his flesh. His screams. He wouldn’t ever lock up another innocent again. He wouldn’t ever enact an unfair judgment against a witch again. He wouldn’t haunt Poppy’s dreams anymore. I’d done that. I’d made that happen.
I just wished I’d caught his damned death spirit.
After changing into a nightie, I plopped onto the couch with my tea and turned the TV on, determined to lose myself in a horror movie or romcom, whichever I found first. The best thing would be to find a horror romcom, but either this delicious pairing didn’t exist, or I hadn’t paid enough money to my cable company to earn that sort of thing.
I settled on an oldie but a goodie, a slasher flick that always made me laugh, and snuggled up on the couch to watch. Halfway through, I heard a noise in the bedroom. I paused the show and grabbed the baseball bat I kept handy for just such occasions. I liked my neighborhood, but I wasn’t blind to its faults. The magi had worked hard to ensure that the witches were confined to the slummiest part of the city. Poverty encouraged crime. Not because poor people were inherently evil, but because desperation and a need for survival meant that sometimes the law had to be broken to get what you needed.
Food, for instance. Clean water. It was shitty and it sucked, but that was the reality.
My bat was rune-spelled, given to me by Poppy for my twenty-fifth birthday. It hit harder than a regular bat, with the added bonus of either a fire or ice attack.
Poppy played too many video games.
Either way, it was a cool fucking bat and I hoped I got to use it.
I crept down the hallway, silent in stocking feet, and pushed Poppy’s bedroom door with the tip. It was empty in there like I figured, but I had to check. I stopped at my door and listened, hearing what sounded like snuffling.
5
Snuffling?
I slammed open the door, swinging the bat up high and a blur of fur and Hell light rushed at me. I brought the bat down but too late and the damned hellhound was on top of me again. This time he opened his mouth in a doggy grin and licked his chops as if that was supposed disarm me. What did he think I’d do? Say, ‘Aw, cute doggie’ and give up the fight? “What the Hell do you want, you dumb mutt?”
The dumb mutt pushed himself off me and then the sounds of bones breaking fill the room. I scrambled out from under him as he shifted, fur being replaced with skin, fangs being replaced with regular ole choppers, doggy dick being replaced by … nice. “Who the fuck are you? And why do you keep tackling me? It’s not that sexy, dude.” But his cock was nice and the rest of him looked pretty damn good too. Muscles in all the right places, silky black hair, red eyes, sensual lips, scruff on his chin that would feel good between my thighs.
Probably it wasn’t a great idea to be lusting after a hellhound, even one who could shift to witch, especially one who’d been inside a crystal a Conventus Magus was carrying around but … well. I’d always been a ‘live life on the edge’ kinda gal.
“Do you talk?”
“Takes a minute,” he growled, still sounding more like hound than man.
Pretty sexy, in my opinion.
He grunted and stood, testing out his legs, stretching, his ab muscles tight enough to bounce quarters off. Was his ass that tight too? I wondered if he’d take offense if I asked him to do a little twirl.
Instead, I asked, “Why are you here?”
Power rose, a shit ton of it, and all from the guy who stood naked before me. The hairs on my arms stood at attention and goosebumps raced along my skin. Fuck. He was going to kill me but oh, what a way to go. It was practically orgasmic, that power and for a brief, delicious minute, it quelled the dark hunger inside me. “Oh, Hecate,” I said, fairly sure I was going to come if he didn’t knock off whatever the fuck he was doing.
His eyes narrowed as he watched me struggling to keep my rather inappropriate reaction to myself. “What are you?”
“I could ask you the same thing.” I could, but I already knew what he was, didn’t I? And who was I? A mongrel who didn’t quite fit in either my mother’s or my father’s world, though my father’s world accepted me in a way my mother’s never would. “Ease that off, would you? I’m about to embarrass myself here.”
His head cocked and, if anything, the power increased until my eyes watered with it. The heat built in my pussy until that was all I could think about. My head thunked back against the wall, my eyes closing, my fingers curling into my palm. Damn this guy, hound, whatever-the-hell he was. If he was going to get me started, then I’d better get to finish.
My hips bucked when the force of the orgasm tore through me. I cried out, hands clenching, womb clenching, muscles clenching. A shudder rolled through my body, lifting me to that moment when everything else fell away but sensation. He could have killed me right then
and I probably wouldn’t have noticed.
When I came back down, still shivering, still enjoying the aftershocks, the power abated. My pussy felt like it could go another hundred rounds though and to my interest and delight, he was aroused too.
“What the hell are you?” he asked again but made no move toward me.
Disappointing.
“Half witch, half magus. All crazy.” I rose to my feet since he hadn’t yet tackled me again—not an unpleasant prospect with the raging boner he had—and put a hand on my hip. “Why are you here? Do you often run around naked, diddling women with your power?”
He looked down at himself as if he was just realizing he was naked or had a hard-on or both, then he pressed me up against my wall, his dick poking into my belly. His head came in close and sniffed my neck. I wanted him to bite not sniff, but I tamped down my urges, unsure where they’d come from. Maybe his power was like an aphrodisiac; maybe that was his thing. Whatever was happening, I wanted more of it, even if I might get burned. It’d always been that way with me. I had to take risks, I had to ride out to the edge of the cliff and stare over. I had to touch the fire. It was who I’d been since the night grandfather died.
“What are you?” he murmured, and then he did bite, and he bit hard and my fingers curled up tight into his hair until he hissed, but that was all right. I was a quid pro quo kind of gal and I gave as good as I got.
“You keep asking that, I’m going to get a complex.” I moved and he growled, so I stilled, going tingly all over at the notion he was still more beast than man. “What?”
“Prey drive. You run and I’ll chase.” The words were tight, almost like he was ashamed. Would he think I was weird if I told him that would have made me cream a little in my panties had I been wearing any? Probably. I was such a perv.
“Well, I hate to tell you this big boy, but you either need to take me or let me go, because this is getting boring.” It was anything but boring, but I wasn’t telling him that. Let the implication that I was bored spark something inside him, something that wanted to take me right up against this wall. When his jaw slackened, I pulled myself free, then ducked under his arm. His growl stopped me in my tracks.
What exactly would he do if I ran? I wasn’t the running type, but there were exceptions to every rule. I glanced over my shoulder. His head was lowered, his lip curled, his cock … oh my, his cock. “Don’t. Move.”
“Or. What?” Chasing any kind of high was dangerous. I knew this.
I was also the girl who ran after danger. So.
I ran.
He tackled me, half on, half off my bed. My body hit so hard my teeth clacked and my boobs were not pleased with being squished. His fingers were hard as the rest of him and he pinned my arms by my wrists, his mouth on my neck again, teeth pinching oh, so hard. He was panting, trying to control himself and all I wanted was for him not to. I wiggled my ass like I was trying to get free, threw in a little squeal for him—prey squealed, right?
In seconds, he thrust his cock to the hilt inside me and I screamed with the red, hot pleasure of it.
I was loud when I had sex, no apologies. And this was the hottest thing to happen to me in a long time, too. He was feral as he plunged inside me, his hands still gripping my wrists tight. He had to let go of my neck, though, damn shame. Still, the nice tight yank he gave my arms as he fucked me made up for it.
I was all kinds of crazy for enjoying this, wasn’t I?
I came hard against him and still he thrust into me, his cock feeling like it was growing, which was silly. Oo, but what if it was another of his talents?
He fucked me hard, harder and then his grip tightened, painfully, deliciously. He shuddered, I shuddered. He filled me with his hot, wet sperm as I came again because his power was still prodding me, arousing me.
He was behind me, panting, his sweat dripping onto my bare ass.
Holy Hell, I just fucked a perfect stranger in my apartment. Not just a stranger, a demon. A shape-shifting hellhound.
I’d loved every second of it … and it had somehow chased away the hunger.
“I told you not to run.”
“I know.” I wiggled a little, wanting to talk with him but he hadn’t moved, hadn’t withdrawn his dick, hadn’t lost any bit of his erection. If anything, he felt even fuller and when I tried to move, he wrapped an arm around my waist to still me.
“It’ll be a while,” he said in that same growly voice.
“Why?” I craned my head to look over my shoulder at him, feeling a renewed sense of lust as I saw him behind me, knowing he was still inside me, this stranger from the depths of Hell.
“Because we’re knotted.”
I blinked. “We’re what now?”
He bumped me with his hips and I felt it, his cock, bunched like a fist inside me. The thought of it made me shudder. The thought of me being trapped here with him inside me made me shudder harder and I came again like some kind of ridiculous sex fiend and I didn’t care.
What went on in my head was half the fun. Knowing he was watching me orgasm at his words, knowing he could stare down at my ass, at the place where we were joined, made me even hotter. He was stuck inside me and I fucking loved it.
“Can we move onto the bed then, so I don’t get dents in my knees?”
“Carefully.” He grunted as he lifted me, pushing me onto the bed, still so tight against me, lifting me with a hand on my belly. The pressure made everything below throb, and I couldn’t stop thinking about him taking me so quickly, so forcefully. I already wanted him to do it again and we weren’t yet done with the first time.
We laid there like that for a full two minutes before he asked, “Why did you kill him?”
“Who? The magus? He deserved it.”
He grunted and when he did, everything moved, including his cock. It was wedged so tight it wasn’t coming out, but it still moved inside me. “And me? Why’d you let me out?”
“I didn’t know I was letting anyone out,” I said, breathlessly, trying hard to concentrate on the conversation and not my over-filled pussy. “I thought the damned medallion was some sort of … I don’t know what. Inherited power? A battery?”
“Inherited,” he snarled. “I’ve been trapped in that fucking thing for centuries. Forced to do magic for them, their bidding.”
I twisted, felt the sharp twinge of pain as everything pressed the wrong way, saw him wince. “Sorry.” I tried to hide the fact that I liked it, that pain. Not everyone was as strange as I was. “You’ve been enslaved for two centuries? No wonder you were so horny.”
He snorted. “I wasn’t horny until I smelled you. You have an … unusual scent.”
“Thank you?”
He put his hand around my throat and pulled me toward him, sniffing again. He clamped down on me with his teeth in the same spot he bit before and, because it was still tender from the last time, it hurt even more.
Oh yeah.
His hand tightened on my throat as his other came under me to squeeze my breast. When he finally eased up on the bite, I came again. It was crazy. If he wasn’t putting out some sort of horny juju, I’d eat my boots. “Does this mean there’s a hellhound trapped in every crystal those assholes wear?” I finally managed to ask after the orgasm trembled away.
“Not just hellhounds. Demons of all sorts. It’s how they power their magic. They say they pray to their god, yeah? Bullshit. Their god and they are a bunch of bullshitting liars.”
The implications hit me hard enough I forgot, for a moment, that I was naked with a demon. “So, all I’d have to do is expose their dirty little secret and I could bring down the Lodge?” It seemed too simple. “What am I missing?”
“They have power. They have princes and kings of Hell at their beck and call. You’d be dead before you finished your sentence and then they’d bury the truth.”
I’d be dead but someone would hear the truth. And … they’d probably end up dead, too. “Any way to protect from demon magic?”
&
nbsp; “From a hellhound like me? You’d need a coven, a strong, experienced one. For a general, prince, or king? You’d need an army.”
Well fuck. I guess I’d have to continue bringing the magi down, one asshole at a time. And now I could also release the trapped demons.
Speaking of trapped demons. I wiggled but we were as tightly stuck as ever. And, of course, merely thinking of it set off all my lust alarms. Would he hold me here if I tried to get away? I kind of wanted to try, kind of wanted him to grab me and hold on tight.
Kind of wondered what the hell was wrong with me.
Kind of didn’t care.
“Stop,” he said, gripping me hard when I attempted to move again. “It won’t help to try to get away.”
Oh, but it did help, because his hand tightened on my throat, the other on my belly as he held me in place. “Just let me try …” I pushed, then he squeezed and when he did, every nerve lit up with pleasure.
After I came again, he growled, “Are you doing that on purpose?”
“Maybe,” I confessed. Had to get my thrills where I could and anyway, this was completely distracting me from my fuck up in not grabbing Oscar’s death spirit. Hell, this was as good as or better than the feeling I got when sucking the spirit down after a kill.