Hellish Fae: A Forbidden Fated Mates Reverse Harem Series (The Monsters and Miseries Series Book 1)

by A. K. Koonce

  These memories, they feel unobtainable, just out of reach, like a dream I’ll never be able to grasp the details of.

  Until his low, shaking laughter slashes right through the fog, and then too many sexy images of him caressing my body and wreaking delicious bliss all through me in a way that only he can or ever will.

  Krave Salvation.

  That fucking asshole.

  While I curse him, images of his body grinding against mine slip into my thoughts, and to make it worse, Damien’s there. And I’m kissing him. Moaning against the flicking of his tongue, clinging to him while I thrust against Krave.

  Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

  You did this to yourself, Catherine snarks.

  Oh, my God, go back to sleep.

  It’s too early for her. This is her fault, anyway.

  Really? she asks with so much attitude I roll my closed eyes at her.

  When my hands touch the heated blush stinging my cheeks, I realize I’m covered with a soft, warm blanket from head to toe. It’s my own personal cocoon to hide within.

  I don’t have to get up yet. I don’t have to face Krave or Damien. I can die of embarrassment all by myself for just a bit longer.

  “Good morning, love,” Krave says in that obnoxious voice he thinks is so damn charming.

  My eyes close harder.

  I’m forced to die of embarrassment with a full audience.

  The soft blanket fists into my palm, and I pull it down slowly to face the morning air and the bright, warm sunlight. And of course, his fucking taunting smile.

  “Did you miss me, love?”

  And you say I’m a cunt, Catherine whispers in the back of my mind. I can’t help but agree.

  “What are you doing here, Krave?” I fold my arms down tightly against my nudity to keep the blanket and my integrity intact.

  Well, what’s left of my integrity.

  “What am I doing here? You called out for me, don’t you remember? You needed me,” he says, his smile cruel.

  I cock an eyebrow at the incubus, but the man seated at his side on the platform has a more demanding gaze. Zaviar’s attention is a piercing thing that slices right into me, searching for all the secrets inside.

  “The only way to calm your demons is to fuck an incubus?” Zaviar asks with words as unkind as Krave’s but not nearly as amusing.

  “What I do and who I fuck are none of your business.” My jaw clenches as I hold his glare.

  “Except you’ll never fuck me. Isn’t that right, Aries,” Krave says.

  Every single time that explicit word echoes into the breeze, it presses more tension through my chest.

  “You can leave now.” My chin tilts up, but my confidence doesn’t deter his arrogant smirk.

  “Is that what you want?” Krave’s dark wings flash out, and the sunlight glitters across his wide wingspan in a way that’s mesmerizing.

  I used to think he was the most attractive man I’d ever laid eyes on.

  I used to trust him. I cared about him.

  Once upon a time.

  He soars for a brief moment and lands perfectly above me. Strong thighs straddle over my hips, and he stares down on me with a glinting gaze. The shit-eating smile I’m so used to from him isn’t in place, though. For one short moment, he bares himself to me with all the pain I know he hides inside.

  “If you really want me to leave, just say the words. But don’t tell me to go just because you can’t stand looking at the truth, love. The truth won’t change. You know that.” His words twist my stomach as if he just threatened me, but he’s entirely sincere. His sharp features are blank and waiting for the rejection he constantly puts himself through.

  It does hurt to look at him.

  He hurts me in a way he’ll never understand.

  But when he lifts his hand and trails one gentle finger coated in demon dust along my jaw, I don’t pull away from him. My lashes close as too many erotic sensations thrum through my body and drive right down to my core.

  I tremble but steel my spine against his alluring touch.

  “What the fuck is he doing?” Ryke whispers.

  Damien whispers something back about magical finger fucking, but for the most part, I can’t hear them.

  Krave’s head dips and his lips brush along my neck so slowly. He always knows the smallest touches and the heaviest breaths to make me want him.

  It’s just not enough.

  “Don’t make me go, Aries,” he whispers against my ear, those sinful fingers skimming up and down the length of my neck in a hypnotic way.

  I think I’d love him if I didn’t hate him so fucking much.

  “Leave me,” I say sternly.

  It’s a phrase he himself taught me. It’s spoken once, but I’ll say it two more times before he’s swept away by magic greater than himself.

  “Aries, don’t,” he pleads with too much emotion in his black, steely gaze.

  “Leave me,” I tell him through tightly clenched teeth.

  He shakes his head back and forth, the wind catching his messy dark hair.

  “Fine. Say whatever you want, but I’ll be seeing you again, love. Send me away a thousand times, but you’ll always pull me right back to you,” he rambles with a twisting smile that isn’t at all filled with happiness.

  My index finger lifts just slightly to trail along the outside of his clenched fist. His gaze drops to that insignificant caress, but I never look away.

  “Leave me,” I whisper one more time as if I’m not sure I’ll really be able to speak the words that hurt my heart to say.

  His lips part as if I fatally wounded him. Sadness shines in his beautiful eyes.

  Smoke drifts around him. It devours him. And then he’s swept away.

  The wind takes him away from me to the one person he’ll always be loyal to.

  My father.

  The fast pounding of my heart fills the silence as emotions crush into me, and I simply sit there before the three watchful fallen. I can feel their judgmental gazes assessing every little part of me.

  It’s Damien who breaks the quiet.

  “If you hate him, why do you summon him? Why do you cling to him? Why do you trust him?” The rage in his voice is evident.

  I’m such a fucking idiot. Why did I kiss him? Why . . . why am I so bad at figuring out my own emotions?

  “Why?” He echoes my own thoughts with impatience.

  “Because!” I shriek with a shaking breath that I can’t seem to catch. The hurt in his amber eyes stings into me like a knife. But I force myself to finish my sentence. “Because he’s my mate.”

  All three of them stare at me with shocked, dazed expressions.

  I guess I’m more fucked up than they realized.

  10

  The Demonic Fae

  Aries

  I spend several days avoiding the men living in this house. Maybe I should find my own treehouse and put us all out of our misery.

  The only person I haven’t pissed off is Corva.

  And that’s just because she’s too oblivious with her own life to notice mine.

  Her wafting, smoky dress drifts around Damien in her living room/laboratory. She’s jotting down notes about his changes and the new runes she wants to try on him.

  I sit curled up at the opposite end of the hard wooden couch with my blanket and pillow like I’m a fly on the wall during their testing.

  I’ve done well to hide here. Sleep here and just dwell on what I’ve done with my life.

  And what I’ll do with my life.

  I thought what I needed to do was kill my brother to keep people safe. Now, I don’t think that’s my responsibility. I’m already carrying around an entire poltergeist for people. Maybe that’s enough? Maybe I should just live out my long life somewhere in the woods like my sister and let the Shadow Guard take care of the rest.

  “Any changes this week? Scarring? Vomiting? Has your heart stopped again?” Corva asks Damien with big watchful eyes.

  Has h
is heart stopped again? What the fuck, Corva.

  “No. I’m still stable.” His voice is quiet and it sounds so gravelly, it’s like he forced the syllables out of his mouth.

  I peer at him from behind my curtain of silver hair. I regret it instantly when my gaze collides with his.

  Why can’t I just forget what happened in the bathroom? I can’t even go pee without feeling like a trash fae for what I did to him. Why can’t embarrassment amnesia be a thing right now?

  But to be fair, he could have just left. This isn’t only my fault. He stayed. He kissed me back. No one twisted his dick and forced him to join in on the world’s most regrettable threesome.

  It wasn’t even a threesome! It wasn’t! It was like . . . a play party. A naked play party. Where his fingers most definitely touched my clit, and I didn’t even ask him to.

  I’m not the only guilty one here . . .

  I’m not!

  Stop arguing with yourself. It’s a pathetic debate of ill wits that does not justify your actions at all, Catherine cuts in like the cunt that she is.

  I force a heavy breath from my lungs, blowing my long hair out in front of my face. I try my hardest to keep Damien off my mind while sitting three feet away from him.

  “Why did you want her here?” Damien asks, catching my attention and pulling my mind off of the carousel of bad decisions.

  Corva looks up from her notebook and little carved pencil. Her translucent smoky hair skims around her pale face, but it never disrupts her intense gaze.

  “I wanted Aries here because she’s my sister. Sisters should stick together,” she answers in the eerie way that she always does.

  Damien doesn’t buy it. I don’t either, but I’m apparently better at problem solving than he is.

  “Corva was exiled to the edge of the fae realm. I was exiled to the Bin. We are, however, both still princesses. And she knows that when I left, I wanted Nathiale dead more than I wanted anything else for the position he put me in. I can’t do that from the human realm. By bringing me here, she fuels my poor choices in wanting to execute my brother. If I succeed, because she’s the eldest, she will be granted a pardon and brought back to my father’s kingdom, where she will wait in line to be the next Queen of Roses.”

  Corva smiles like broken glass waiting to slice me open.

  I smile back.

  Because I know that father will never let any of that happen. She can sit back and wait for me to kill our brother for her but she’ll never get what she wants.

  Father will breed a hundred more children in his lifetime rather than let his mistress’s child sit on his throne.

  You see, what dear sweet daddy doesn’t tell people is that Corva is the creation of demons and fae procreating. This is a dark secret of course, since demons and fae are forbidden by the gods to procreate. Centuries ago, the King had a wild streak though. Maybe it was just one night or maybe he was enchanted by a succubus. Maybe he has many excuses.

  But Corva is living proof that for a brief moment, my father didn’t entirely despise demons.

  Her smile stays permanently on her face as she slides her notes into a handsewn satchel and drapes a black cloak over her shoulders.

  She never explains where she goes. She’s gone a lot, and I rather prefer it that way, but she’s either leaving because she can’t stand being around men who are nearly demons, or she’s conspiring with others. She’ll need allies once the throne is open to her after all.

  None of that involve me though.

  I’m starting to realize that none of this involves me.

  Tonight, I’m going to leave. I don’t know where I’ll go, but I’ll find my own little isolated spot, just as she has. My life will be my own, without care about kings and princes and mutilated monsters trying to hold off becoming what they’re meant to be.

  You can’t fight destiny.

  And I’m officially done trying.

  The door closes behind my sister with a quiet click. I sit there waiting for the fallen angel at my side to leave my little safe haven.

  Seconds slip by without sound.

  I’m suddenly aware of how often I’m breathing, and for faefucking sake, just leave already.

  My head turns slowly, and I find him staring at me with his honest amber eyes.

  “You don’t really trust her, do you?”

  “Not as much as you trust everyone around you, Damien.” It’s a biting remark but a true one.

  He’s too trusting.

  He should learn to be more like his brother. Then uncomfortable situations like the bathroom fiasco wouldn’t happen.

  I shake my head at him. Instead of sitting through another moment of unending tension, I stand, since it’s clear he won’t leave anytime soon.

  But the moment I stand, he does, too.

  “You think I’m too nice?” He steps in front of me and corners me against the hard edge of the couch. His warmth bleeds into me, and I shift against him as my breasts press into his chest.

  “You’re definitely too nice.” I stare up at him unflinchingly, even though he has a good ten inches on me heightwise. “If you had a backbone at all, you wouldn’t be caught up with my sister. You wouldn’t take her word that she’s helping you when she clearly just wants to see the mutilated outcome of mixing fae magic and demon magic. She wants what my father fears.” When he just gives me a confused look, I answer for him. “Monsters.”

  His lips part as if I just slapped him instead of speaking honestly.

  “Why would she do that?” he asks, astounded.

  He really is just too fucking trusting.

  “Because she is the result of mixing fae magic and demon magic. And you three, you three are the only things that might be more repulsive to the fae world than she is. She’s creating creatures just like herself because there is safety in numbers. And you’re too stupid to see that.”

  His big palm strikes out fast, and I react as soon as he grips my wrist. But pathetically, I don’t react the way I should. Instead of kicking him in the balls or slamming my fist into his pretty face, my lungs instinctively release the most desperate breath. It’s a pathetic little gasp of lust. To make matters worse, my back arches until my hard nipples skim firmly against the planes of his chest.

  His brows lift at my body’s ridiculously weak reaction to his tight hold on me. I, too, feel surprised at the moment.

  What. Is. Wrong. With. Me?

  Am I possessed by stupidity as well as a demonic spirit?

  I straighten and pull back until there’s a healthy amount of space between us. I clear my dry throat, but he still hasn’t released my wrist.

  His face lowers, and I feel the growl of his words before he speaks them.

  But when he opens his mouth, it’s a groan of pain that comes out.

  He’s no longer gripping me but clinging to me. His big body stumbles into mine. His face twists in pain, and all I can think about is how this strong man is being taken to his knees, and I’m lowering right down with him. He hunches over. His hand is in mine now, and he squeezes it hard as a whimpering growl shakes through his clenched teeth.

  “What’s wrong? What’s happening?” My palms skim all over his chest and arms. Every part of him is burning up with heat.

  His only reply is harsh sounds of agony. It makes my heart pump harder, my hands fumble faster, to find a wound of some kind.

  When he turns away from me, I see it.

  Sharp black spikes pierces through his shoulder blades where soft white wings probably once were.

  “Oh no,” I whisper as my body tenses with hard realization.

  Blood slides down his skin where the talons of something large and jagged presses beneath his flesh.

  They’re demon wings.

  11

  The Pain of Demons

  Aries

  The screams of torment are a sound that you never want to hear in your entire life. It’s a ripping pain that tears viciously right from the chest without mercy, and some
how the person’s still whole.

  Still whole but bitterly broken.

  Zaviar and Ryke came storming downstairs as soon as Damien’s groans turned to violent pleas of helplessness. I followed numbly behind them as they flew him up the winding stairs and into their nest at the top floor.

  Shivers and sweat control Damien’s massive, strong body. All I want to do is cuddle him and tell him everything’s going to be alright.

  But it’s been hours, and the wings are still caught within him. Only a couple of inches of black talons protrude from his tattered, bloody shoulder blades.

  “Shouldn’t they have formed by now? Why is it taking so long?” I can’t help the way my voice catches like I might cry for him, since he hasn’t shed a single tear through all of this torture.

  “Takes longer,” Ryke whispers as he stands at the edge of the platform looking down on his friend with concern in his eyes. “The runes slow the demon process. Something that should take seconds might take hours.” His large arms fold sternly over his scarred chest, and I can’t help but wonder if he’s remembering how he went through this very same thing.

  Except he was alone then.

  And Damien is surrounded by people who just want to help him.

  Even me.

  His brother covers the wounds on his back with a warm, wet washcloth, and Damien’s spine tenses hard the moment the cloth covers his talons. He flinches and groans through it all, trying to keep his agony inside himself.

  I can’t stand it.

  Finally, I make the haphazard trek from the platform and over the netting to where he lies curled in a ball on his side. My legs wobble beneath me, and when I’m only a few feet away, my foot slips through a small hole, and I fall completely. My palms splay out in front of me, and unfortunately, Damien’s slick body catches my fall. I’m sprawled over him, my hands braced against his side while my leg stays caught in the thin strings.

  Zaviar looks at me with a hard glare like he just cannot fathom how someone like me ever made it twenty-three years without getting herself killed.