Hardest Fall (Dominion series)

by Juliette Cross

  Xander ushered me farther up the stairs and stopped a server—a demon-eyed servant girl wearing a ridiculously short and low-cut maid’s costume. She was carrying a silver tray of flute glasses, brimmed with bubbly champagne.

  “The Obsidian Gallery?” he asked.

  She pointed up the right staircase. “Last door on the left, my lord.” She licked her lips and asked breathily, tilting forward to give him a good look at her ample breasts. “Would you like a personal escort, my lord?”

  “That won’t be necessary.” He swiped a glass and drank it down in one swallow as he tugged me up the staircase on the right.

  As we reached the top, he set his empty glass on the tray of another passing servant, pulling me down the darkened hallway. There were two more burly bouncers at the door, checking the special invitation cards for authenticity. Xander pulled ours from his pocket, keeping me close to his side.

  “Here we go, darling,” he whispered.

  The doorman checked our card and waved us through. The room was large. Perhaps it had formerly been a library or large sitting parlor. Now, it was nothing of the sort. Completely immersed in black from the drapes covering the windows to the brocade chairs to the satin-finished walls and the black marble floors beneath us, we were drenched in obsidian. It truly earned its name. The only point of light was a small, theatrical-looking stage, erected with plush, white curtains as the backdrop. A stark contrast to the rest of the decor.

  We settled inconspicuously in the corner.

  “I suppose we’re going to see a show of some kind.”

  “It appears so.”

  Though my voice remained calm, my stomach fluttered and burned like a flock of butterflies with barbed-wire wings had taken flight. I glanced over at Xander, and my heart nearly stopped altogether. He was ghostly white, sweat dotting his forehead.

  “Are you all right?” I whispered, leaning in close and draping myself against him as if we were simply being amorous. “Was there something in the drink? Sometimes they lace it with demon intoxicants.”

  He shook his head and licked his dry lips, turning to me. His eyes, as black as every feature in this room, glinted with sharp rage.

  “I know what this room is for,” he whispered.

  “How do you know?”

  He swallowed hard, seeming to struggle to keep his voice steady. “Because I’ve been here before.” He squeezed my hand in his lap. “In another life. With another demon prince.”

  “When?” I asked softly. “When did this happen?”

  He made a sound in his throat that should’ve been a laugh but sounded like a choked sob.

  “The day I nearly died when I was human.” He turned to me, the rage in his dark gaze gone brittle-cold. “And nearly damned my soul to hell.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Xander

  A wave of stabbing pain nearly swallowed me whole. This scenario, demons in attendance watching a stage, was far, far too familiar. When I was a foolish, pleasure-chasing human, I’d fallen in thrall to the demon prince Damas. He’d taken me to many hellfire clubs where beautiful women were sold to the highest bidder for the night. That wasn’t the only nefarious activity taking place at such clubs. This entire party reeked of those days. A stain on my soul as black as this room.

  But it was when Damas took me to one underground auction of an unwilling lady that my whole life changed. My whole world. The lady? Katherine Blakely, who would one day become Kat, my colleague and friend as a Dominus Daemonum. I’d done Damas’s bidding, thinking we were saving her from a horrible fate. And so we were. Under his orders, I’d attacked George, not knowing he was my own kin, and helped that demon prince abduct Kat and take her to a place where she would return a damaged and bitter shell of the lady she was. That night, I almost died fighting the wrong side and nearly lost my soul to hell.

  And here I was, sitting in a similar room with the same seductive evil resonating all around, bitterness crawling up my throat like a poisonous serpent. I clenched the fist resting on my knee, reining in my tight control, but losing the battle. Only Carowyn’s soft presence kept my brain from unhinging. Yes, soft. Who would’ve thought that hard-ass woman could be the sweet, inviting temptation at my side, whispering tenderness and touching me with soothing strokes to quell the storm brewing inside.

  I knew. I knew all along.

  The room, full of quiet murmuring, silenced at once when Rook stepped on the stage.

  “Greetings, lovely guests,” he crooned. “I’m so pleased to see so many of you. As I promised your Lord Vladek, I have a special crop for your pleasure.” With a flick of his hand, a tuxedo-wearing demon stepped across the stage and opened the white curtain, through which three human women stepped. Each of them wore golden torques about their necks. Carowyn squeezed my arm as we noted it at the same time.

  The women were young. Quite young. Perhaps twenty or thereabouts. They wore sheer white wrappers on their bodies and fearful obedience upon their faces. Their eyes were clouded with swirling mist, the demon essence keeping them biddable, even as they likely screamed inside their heads.

  Rook snapped his fingers. The first, a curvy blonde, stepped forward, her face painted like a glamorous cover model. She looked vaguely familiar. Rook pulled the bow tied at her waist and flicked the wrapper to the ground, leaving her naked before the crowd. All except the golden torque.

  “All of our wares are well-trained in the art of pleasure. That is guaranteed. Olivia, take a walk, my sweet.” She did, walking the length of the stage, one hand on her bare hip. “Olivia was a member of the infamous Twelfth Night.”

  A few hisses from the audience. Carowyn clenched my arm. I must’ve made some automatic move as if to rise, for she held me hard in the seat. That’s when I recognized her. She was one of the fighters we’d lost a few months ago in London, when Rook and Simian’s red priests attacked and had stolen away with the humans we’d been trying to protect. Dommiel and Anya had helped me save as many as we could during the fighting. Olivia was among those we’d lost, now being sold as a sex slave to one of these creatures.

  “You’ll note she has the toned body of a fine warrior. She has great stamina and endurance.”

  A few salacious chuckles from the crowd.

  “Bidding will start at one hundred drakuls.”

  And so, the bidding commenced. As the numbers climbed quickly, I noticed a distinct trait in those bidding and most of those present. They bore the severe, pale, and angular features of the demons under Vladek’s domain. I studied the young women being sold, particularly the slave collars they wore, for that is what they were.

  “Sold! To the lord in the wolf mask on the front row. Payment will be accepted in the red room next door. And you may keep the golden collar as a gift of House Rook and Simian.”

  The fair-haired demon in the wolf mask rose with a slight nod and strode toward the exit.

  The pieces fell into place almost at once. As Rook snapped his fingers for the next girl to step forward, my fury and frustration warred within, finally prompting me to stand and exit when Rook’s back was turned. Carowyn rushed to my side, wrapping herself against me again.

  The sickening nausea intensified while I fought to keep my emotions in check. No one could read them behind my mask, but the hunter in me trembled with rage and the need to impale and slash and burn. The residue of the demons I’d slain in mass numbers last night so that my aura radiated with the inky black of their damned souls, so that I might blend in with these infernal creatures, now washed me with a fresh darkness. A darkness that beckoned me to follow my impulse to crack and maim. To punish. To kill.

  “Careful,” Carowyn urged as I stalked too quickly from the room, catching the alert attention of one of the beefy bouncers at the door.

  Staring ahead, I put an arm around her waist, pausing at the open door of a red room to see the exchange of money for human lives. Their operation was well in place, then. They would use the captured humans to gain more wealth and, m
ore importantly, to get one of these slaves into the enemy’s house wearing those seemingly innocuous collars. But one of them would be soon wearing an essence-imbued collar. Surely, one who was sold to the House of Vladek.

  The demon in the wolf mask glanced over, observing us watching in the door. His new property—Olivia, a former rebel, a young woman, a human fucking being—stared submissively at the floor, awaiting her foul fate. Carowyn ushered me along back toward the staircase.

  I whispered on a guttural growl. “I’m going to destroy them. All.” I wasn’t speaking to her or to myself but to the universe. So much pain inflicted upon innocents. The use and abuse and sheer torture by the powerful for the simple reason that they had the ability to do so, to inflict their profane, sadistic will upon the helpless. It burned a hole right through my gut, lancing a piece of me away, but it did nothing to rid me of the reminder that once…that was me. Once upon a time, I was the bloody villain.

  “Xander.” Carowyn’s voice, soft and close to my ear. “You’re shaking.” She jerked me into motion, trailing her gloved fingers flirtatiously along my neck. “And we’re being watched.”

  I didn’t need to glance behind us to know that one of the doormen followed us down the hall. I gripped her hand in mine, weaving my fingers between hers, and tugged her swiftly toward the staircase. Descending, I caught a glimpse of George and Kat whirling around the dancefloor. Rather than fill me with the solid security these two had always given me, the sight reminded me yet again of a scene so long ago.

  Lady Katherine dancing in a small room in an underground den of infamy while the audience of demons leered and lusted and waited to bid for possession of her.

  And whose side was I on that night? The one who’d bought her and spirited her away, the one George hunted for decades upon decades until he’d caught him—and saved Kat.

  “Xander.” A tremor in her voice, now.

  “We have to get out of here.”

  “No.” We stepped down from the grand staircase, but she ushered me toward other rooms of entertainment, not the exit.

  A single flicker over my shoulder told me why. Two of the guards under Rook’s employ were hard on our heels, crimson eyes glaring. If we went for the exit now, we’d be stopped for a not-so-friendly interrogation. And while I could easily expel a handful of these bastards back to hell, there were hellhounds, furies, and red priests crawling the grounds between us and the gate.

  And Carowyn.

  I squeezed her hand tighter. I’d not let Rook have her. I’d take out his entrails and die in a fountain of his blood before I let that happen.

  Music—hard and grinding—pounded loud from an open ballroom door at the end of the hall. Leave it to Rook and Simian to provide entertainment for all tastes. I knew what we’d find before she pulled me through the doorway. Pitched in black, the strobe lighting painted scenes of flesh on flesh in erotic ecstasy. This was a room to fulfill all hungers. The sadists, the masochists, the voyeurs—every kink, every dark desire, every carnal craving—was delivered on velvet cushions, Lycra benches, and leather swings for the guests’ enjoyment.

  Cries and moans of passion and pleasure-pain underscored the vibrating voice of Marilyn Manson’s “Tainted Love.” The murderous fury riding me morphed into something more lascivious as I fixed on my siren, luring me deeper, weaving us through and around each little orgy. I saw none of it. Only her. The dark whispers in my head didn’t want blood anymore. No. The scintillating murmurs filtering through my mind spoke to me of my ultimate desire.

  To have her. To take her. To spread her out on the nearest surface or press her up against the closest wall and pound my maddening lust into her until I’d wrung us both out, until she understood what was between us. I’d been tightening my leash, jerking on my own chain to give her time to adjust to a lover like me. A selfish one who would demand all and allow no other after.

  She led me deeper, glancing back at me and over my shoulder, the crease in her brow easing. She reached back and plucked my mask off my face, tossed it to the floor, and lifted another, a red-horned creature of some kind, that had been carelessly tossed aside by its owner. Probably the man naked on all fours being whipped by a dominatrix. She handed me the mask, and I kept it in my hand, mesmerized by her determined yet sensual stride through the maze of hedonism.

  Tossing her cloak aside, she lifted another cast-off mask. I wanted to snatch the cloak back off the ground. She’d need it once we headed out of here. I knew what she was doing, changing our appearance to lose those assholes somewhere behind us. She slipped on the purple satin mask that thinly covered her eyes, leaving the perfection of her face clearly visible.

  Weaving us between and around writhing bodies and the watchers of each scene, she tugged me toward a corner where other, less bold couples and threesomes enjoyed one another. She dropped my hand to pull off her gloves. She didn’t discard them, but simply carried them in her hand with yet another meaningful glance back to me.

  Yes. I followed her intentions. We had to blend in. Entirely. I didn’t want to fuck her here, not in this den of hell, but the ravenous need driving me toward her was crippling. The wicked whisperers crooned yes in anticipation. I was losing the battle to the aura of darkness that kept residence inside my head. It had never happened before, and I was powerless against the magnetic pull toward my goddess of night.

  She turned sharply, pressing her back to the wall, ready for my mouth when I crushed it against hers. For there was no mistaking the primal desire she must’ve seen in my eyes. Pressing my body to hers, my palms on the wall, I kissed the fuck out of her, bruising, wet, and biting. I growled my need into her mouth, falling into an abyss I wasn’t sure I could crawl out of. She met my need, stroke for stroke, bite for bite, all the while humming softly and petting my arms and shoulders. Did she truly think she could calm the beast clawing its way out of me? I needed to be inside her. Now.

  She curled a fist into my hair and jerked my mouth away, needing to exert violence to get me off of her for even a second. “We’re not one of them,” she whispered into my ear, a low hum vibrating from her body.

  Seraph song.

  What did she say? We’re not one of them?

  Her hand in my hair tightened. “We won’t fuck like them, either.”

  Christ. I curled my fingers, my knuckles whitening, fists against the wall, willing myself not to become another viper in this nest. Not to turn her around, rip open her dress, and take her against the wall.

  “No,” I grated out finally. Gratefully. “We. Are. Not,” I enunciated with great difficulty, clamping my jaw till something cracked.

  Her humming song rippled from her chest into mine, pushing some of the darkness back. The need, the hunger, however, was still there. Always there. Even as she tried to cool me with her seraph song, it only dulled the inferno already burning out of control. If I didn’t do something, I was quite sure we’d treat these freaks to a show of spontaneous combustion.

  She edged to the side, peering beyond me to the room, looking for our followers. Without further explanation, she plucked the mask I’d dropped on the floor—a bull’s head—and slipped the strap over my head, affixing it to completely cover my face. She then twisted us around, backed me against the wall, and sank to her knees. Swiftly unbuckling my belt, she peered up at me, heat in her golden gaze behind the purple mask.

  “Carowyn,” I mouthed, unable to make any other sound, my chest heaving in great gulps of air. I was hyperventilating at what she was about to do.

  When her cool fingers wrapped around my cock, I hissed in a breath, her touch a painful, lovely torture. Keeping her eyes on mine, she opened her mouth and took the head inside, swirling her tongue with excruciating slow swipes till she wet it good. I froze, holding my breath in my lungs, unable to move at all as I watched my goddess go to work. Yes, she was the goddess, and yet she was on her knees. I should be the one down on the floor worshipping her. I swore to everything holy and unholy that I would be before l
ong.

  She slid her free hand up under my shirt, dragging her nails softly down my ridged abdomen. I nearly choked on the agonizing pleasure she wreaked on my body. I was only half aware of one of Rook’s henchmen passing nearby, casting a glance over the lot of us in the dark corner before moving on. I didn’t give a bloody fuck. I’d have ripped him to pieces if he’d recognized us and tried to interrupt this moment. This beautiful, intimate, blindingly paralyzing moment. If my siren had wanted to pull me into the dark depths and toss me up as a sacrifice to the demons—those creatures she was supposed to be loyal to—she certainly could have. But no, she was there on her knees, gazing up at me with the sexiest fucking eyes and sliding me deeper down her throat.

  I never lost my control. Ever. But that was before I’d met her, before her siren song, before she’d seduced my body, serenaded my heart, and entranced my soul. How did that happen? When this started, I was the one leading this show, guiding her to realize she needed to choose our side and fight for us. To fight with me. To be with me. Somewhere in there, I’d handed her the reins. Or maybe she’d just taken them. Hell, that’s what she was doing now, taking complete control of me. The deviant smile in her eyes told me she was well aware of it.

  “Take me then,” I murmured, unsure and not caring if she could hear me over the pounding music. “Do what you will.”

  She pulled her mouth free, pumping her hand slowly, slicking me good. Desire darkened her gaze, dilating her irises. I wanted to reach down and pull her to me so I could give her some of what she was giving. Shaking her head as if she could read my thoughts—fuck, maybe she was psychic, too—she took me inside again and used her magic on me, in more ways than one, sweeping the black voices away and replacing them with deep sensuality of a shade only my siren could make. Despite the many fornicating bodies in the room, I saw only her, felt only her, enraptured in a web of intimacy of her making. She surged forward, taking more than half of me deep into her throat.