Enraptured (8 page)

Death hovered just out of his reach. His vision swam as the creature on his chest lifted its front two legs and waved them wildly in the air in front of his face. Its fangs loomed dangerously close.

Another stab somewhere on his leg. A gasp of pain he couldn’t inhale. Poison burning through his veins to mess with his mind.

“I have to get out of here.”

You’re not going anywhere.

“I don’t deserve this. It’s a mistake. It’s—”

That’s what they all say. But not all can be innocent. You sure aren’t.

“I can’t take it anymore.”

You
have
thousands, millions of years yet to suffer. This is only the beginning. Just a taste of what you’ve yet to experience.

“Please…”

Don’t beg. It’s so…un-Argonaut. Man up and take it like the hero you used to be.

“I’ll do anything.
Anything
…”

There
is
no
such
thing
as
anything. You should know that by now…

The voice faded to nothing. His mind fogged as unshed tears and unanswered prayers washed over him. Inside he felt his body liquefy, pool, begin to slowly ooze out through every single puncture wound. He no longer felt the thousands of feet crawling across his body, no longer saw the spiders. A thick, white haze descended, and he felt himself drifting downstream, heading for a black abyss as vast as an endless chasm.

“Yes, finally…”

“I can ease your pain, Argonaut.”

Gryphon’s eyes flew open at the sound of the voice somewhere close. His vision cleared to reveal hundreds of multicolored spiders undulating across the length of his naked body. Sensation returned to his skin, along with the pain in his flesh. But even through his poison-laden mind, he recognized the voice.

This one didn’t come from
inside
. It was female and deep. The sweet smell of candy wafted in the air nearby, mixing with the voice to tempt and tease and draw him back from the oblivion he needed.

“Yes, Argonaut. You know me well. Soon you will know me very well.”

Atalanta.

His gaze darted from side to side as he looked for the female. He didn’t care who she was. She was real. He wasn’t alone in this forgotten hell after all.

“Help me!”

“I can take you away from all this pain, Argonaut. Would you like that?”

“Yes, yes, please, yes.”

She chuckled.

A pale-skinned hand dropped down in his line of sight. Long tapered fingers lifted a giant spider from his chest and dangled the monster in front of his face. “Did you know there is a place within this realm where relief can be found? Where those who were sentenced long before you found refuge? Where the Elder Gods themselves rule a land more pleasurable than even Sodom and Gomorrah?”

Elder Gods. The Titans.

Gryphon’s foggy mind spun as the words sank in deep. Zeus had cast the Titans into Tartarus at the end of the Titanomachy, the war between the Titans and the Olympians. And they’d been locked in the lowest level ever since, awaiting the day they would one day be freed by the Orb of Krónos.

“I can take you there, Argonaut. I know where it lies. I can save you from this never-ending agony. With me you can leave this torture behind for good and become powerful again. Whole. The warrior you once were. All you have to do is join me.” Her voice dropped to a seductive whisper. “Be my
doulas
.”

Slave.

Some deep space inside screamed
No!
but it was drowned out by the thought of a world without pain. An end to this continuous torment.

The fact that Atalanta had been his bitter enemy in the living realm meant nothing. He wasn’t an Argonaut any longer. His prior life was over. And he was willing to do anything to make this suffering end. Even if that meant sacrificing everything he’d once believed in.

“Yes, yes, yes. Anything you want. Just take this all away.”

No!

A soft chuckle met his ears. “I knew I could count on you, Argonaut.”

A whoosh of air streamed across his bare skin, sending the spiders scattering. A rumble sounded somewhere close and blackness spiraled in, then exploded into a thousand colors, fading like a clearing mist until a face appeared through the fog. A face with skin like alabaster, lips as red as blood, eyes of coal black, and a fall of long straight onyx hair that looked as if it were made of silk.

“Follow me,
doulas
.”

His arms moved. Excitement leaped in his chest. But before his mind could tell his limbs what to do, he felt a tug, right in the center of his chest. A tug controlling him. Pulling him forward like a bull being led by a nose ring. Toward her. Until there was nothing. No sound. No pain. Nothing but endless emptiness fanning out in every direction.

***

Maelea didn’t know what to make of her traveling companions. As she lay on the top berth of the stateroom they’d arranged in Bellingham and pretended to sleep, she listened to their quiet breathing and wondered if they were awake. Wondered also just how long until she could make a break for it.

She hadn’t dared try on the drive to Bellingham. Hadn’t tried when they’d stopped at that Walmart and Orpheus had dragged her in to buy a jacket and shoes so she’d blend in. Certainly hadn’t tried at the train station when he’d booked tickets, not with the way Skyla kept watching her as if her head were about to spin around. She wasn’t dumb. She knew Orpheus was right. Those hounds clearly had their scent, and if they stopped for any length of time, the monsters would be on them in a heartbeat. But that didn’t keep her from planning for a way out when they finally reached their destination. Wherever that might be.

They’d switched trains in Everett around noon, had gotten lunch and hung out in the dining car as long as possible, then retired to their stateroom to get some rest and—Maelea knew—to avoid curious eyes. It didn’t take a genius to see the three of them didn’t go together. Skyla with her model-perfect body, Orpheus’s sheer size and the dangerous air that seemed to hover around him, and Maelea, the quiet one who had a hard time looking either of the other two in the eye and wasn’t even sure what she was doing here.

The need to bolt overwhelmed her, but she calmed herself by thinking about the alternative. Hellhounds? No, thanks. She was
not
about to tangle with Hades. For the time being, she’d wait and watch and make tracks only when she was sure it was safe. She wasn’t wild about being with either of these two, but she sensed they didn’t have plans to harm her.

At least not yet.

No one had said much since they’d returned to the stateroom. There was tension among all three of them, especially between Orpheus and Skyla. Tension Maelea was curious about but didn’t dare question. Though she’d tried to doze as the train barrelled east toward the Rockies and dusk settled in, her mind was too full of images and sounds and the bitter reality that Orpheus was not the one she needed to kill after all.

The darkness she’d first sensed in him had diminished. How, she didn’t know, but during the last hour she knew for certain his death would not grant her the access to Olympus she wanted. And that realization pissed her off more than anything, because thanks to him she now couldn’t even go back to the sanctuary of her house in Seattle.

Stupid male. Stupid her for going to that concert in the first place. She was better off keeping to herself, but even knowing that, she couldn’t seem to stop looking. It was the one major malfunction in her brain—the light pushing her to seek out the dark when what she should be content with was slinking into the shadows.

“You’re staring at me, Siren,” Orpheus said in a low voice.

Maelea went still and listened. They definitely weren’t partners. He was marked with darkness from the Underworld; she was of Zeus’s light. Another irony that wasn’t lost on Maelea.

“I’m just trying to figure out which bones will be easiest to break when you try to take Maelea out of here without me,” Skyla said from the bottom bunk.

Now that was a fight Maelea would like to witness.

Orpheus chuckled. “So protective. One wouldn’t expect it, coming from you.”

“You don’t know me.”

“Not entirely. But I know way more than most. You’re thinking about it now, aren’t you? That’s why you can’t stop watching me.”

Skyla grew quiet. The air thickened. And Maelea’s unease at being in the same room with them jumped. Orpheus’s suddenly husky tone spoke of intimate knowledge, but she couldn’t imagine one of Zeus’s warriors lowering herself to have sex with a daemon.

Not that Maelea had a whole lot of experience with sex as of late. She’d pretty much given up on that whole part of her life as she couldn’t see the point in getting involved with a human when they’d eventually die. But she wasn’t a virgin. Or a prude. She had cable, after all.

Or did. Before Orpheus ruined that for her too.

“You’re full of yourself, daemon,” Skyla said from below.

“No,” he purred. “You were full of me. You’re wondering what that would be like again. You’re wishing you could have it right now. Admit it.”

Maelea’s skin warmed, and the realization that these two definitely had gotten busy hit her head-on.

Before she could stop it, her mind spun with images of their coupling. It would be fierce and rough. Both were warriors. No sweet lovemaking for these two. Judging by the power play between them before, it would be a fast, hard, animalistic struggle where one or both were eventually injured. And though she knew this was not a conversation she—or anyone—was meant to hear, for some reason she couldn’t stop listening. Couldn’t stop picturing them together. Couldn’t stop herself from craving something…just as hedonistic.

“I thought you said it wasn’t all that good,” Skyla tossed back.

The seat below creaked, and through half-lidded eyes, Maelea watched as Orpheus leaned forward to brace his elbows on his knees and clasp his hands while he stared toward the bottom bunk. “But it was for you, wasn’t it? I seem to remember you scoring my back with your nails and screaming for more. I felt it, when you came. Hard. All around me. I could make you come again, just as hard, right here, right now.”

No way. These two weren’t going to…Not with her in the room. Were they?

The chair creaked again as Orpheus moved forward until he disappeared from Maelea’s view. The bottom bunk groaned.

“Careful, daemon,” Skyla whispered.

“You don’t like it careful, though,” he whispered back. “You like it hard and rough. That’s how we’re the same.”

“We’re not the same.”

“We’re more similar than you know. Tell me you don’t want just a little.”

Skyla sucked in a breath that echoed through the car. Maelea’s skin grew warm as she pictured the scene: him touching her, her responding. And for just a second, she wished it was her he was talking to. Not because she was attracted to him, but because part of her would like to know what it felt like to be wanted again, even half that much.

Orpheus’s chuckle drifted up to Maelea’s ears. “I thought so, Siren. All you have to do is beg.”

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Skyla asked. “Me to beg. Well, I’m not going to. This isn’t happening again, daemon.”

“A challenge.” Amusement echoed in Orpheus’s husky voice. “Let’s make a little wager. I get you to come without using my hands, and you tell me just what kind of enchantment you’re casting on me.”

“I’m not casting an enchantment.”

“Then you’ll tell me whatever the hell this weird connection is we seem to have.”

Silence drew out through the car, mixed with the craving swirling in Maelea’s blood. A craving she hadn’t felt in years and didn’t want. What was the point of looking for someone special? Just to get her heart broken all over again?

No,
thank
you.

Olympus. That would be her relief. That was what she needed to stay focused on. Not silly relationships that would never amount to anything important. Look what sex had done for these two—created tension and distrust, two things Maelea didn’t need more of. The sooner she got away from Orpheus and Skyla and got serious about her goal, the better off she’d be. Because now more than ever, she was determined to make it to Olympus no matter what it took.

Once she was there…maybe then she’d think about sex and relationships and finding someone special again. When she was finally where she was supposed to be.

“I’m not having sex with you again,” Skyla said. “I already made that clear.”

“No sex,” Orpheus answered. “My clothes will stay firmly in place. So will yours, I promise. What do you say? Afraid I’m that good?”

“I
know
you’re not that good, daemon.”

“Then take the bet.”

“What if I win?” Skyla asked.

“Then I tell you whatever you want to know.”

“You’d answer my questions?”

Silence. And then, “Three,” he answered.

“Any three?”

“A bet’s a bet.”

For a heartbeat, no one spoke. And in the quiet, Maelea had a sinking suspicion they
were
going to go for it. Right here. Her stomach tightened with a mixture of anticipation and dread.

“Well?” Orpheus whispered.

Orpheus knew he was playing with fire. Just sitting across from the Siren in the confined sleeping car, he’d been juiced to the max. Now, seated next to her on the bottom bunk waiting for her answer, the heat from her body swirled in the air to mix with some sweet honeysuckle scent from her skin that left him light-headed and on the edge of control.

Gods, he wanted her. Wanted to taste her again. All of her this time. Even knowing who and what she was.

The easy move—the
smart
move—would have been to ditch her ass in Seattle. But he hadn’t. Partly because he needed to know what this weird connection was between them. Partly because she was no real threat until he actually had the Orb. And partly because seducing her in the meantime was a way to screw with Zeus. If there was one god Orpheus didn’t mind screwing with, it was the King of the Gods.

“Well, Siren?”

Her eyes lifted to his, held. Brilliant violet eyes, the color so unusual he wondered if they were real. The color so familiar he was sure he’d looked into them before.

She pushed her hand against his chest. “You’re radiating heat, daemon.”

So was she. And her touch only amped the fire in his blood to lava-hot levels. Her hand flat against his sternum sent a shot of wicked heat through his chest. A hand that wasn’t moving or forcing him back farther. “I’ll take that as a yes.”

A crash sounded outside in the hall. Skyla jumped to her feet. Before he could reach for her, she was out the door and into the narrow hallway.

“Sonofabitch.” Frustrated, he pushed off the bench, looked out to see a steward picking up plates from the floor.

“Excuse me,” the steward said when he caught sight of them. “Sorry for the disruption.”

The steward quickly swooped up the dropped utensils, set them back on the tray, then disappeared down the corridor.

Orpheus looked at Skyla, a good foot away from him. The door between this car and the one behind clanged shut as the waiter left. With a one-sided grin, Orpheus stepped toward her. “Where were we?”

She held out her hand and eased away. “We weren’t anywhere.”

“Yes, we were.”

He moved closer. She moved back again. Damn, he liked this nervous side of her. Way more than the seductive one. What would she do if he kissed her? Like he’d wanted to kiss her in the hallway of her apartment? Those lips were made for kissing. Plump, tender, so damn sweet, he was sure they’d taste like candy.

“We were right about…” He maneuvered her around until her back hit the wall, slapped a hand against the surface to trap her between it and him. “Here. Weren’t we?”

She pushed against his chest. Didn’t budge him. He leaned close, stared at her enchanting lips, and imagined them opening to take him in. Her mouth would be warm and wet and, he bet, just as slick as her sex. The need to taste her overwhelmed his senses. He moved in, saw her eyes widen in surprise.

He liked that he threw her off-kilter. Liked that she was remembering all too well how they’d fit together. He wanted that fit again, this time with her mouth locked tight to his as he drove inside her.

“Yeah,” he said, staring at her lips, “we were right here.”

Just as he moved to kiss her, she turned her head, offering her neck instead. “Maelea is just inside.”

He focused on the pulse beneath her skin, remembered how sensitive she was there. “Ghoul Girl’s asleep, trust me.”

“That’s like asking a mouse to trust a starving lion.”

“With you, sweetheart, I am a lion. An insatiable lion.”

She tensed when he nuzzled her ear. And he smiled at her nervousness. It meant that whatever this was, it wasn’t the same thing she had with all her marks. He wasn’t stupid enough to think she was tagging along with him and Maelea because of
him
—or even Maelea, as she wanted him to think. She was here because Zeus had sent her to get the Orb. And still that didn’t stop him. Not yet. He was having way too much fun tempting her.

Her hand rested against his chest but she didn’t push, and the way she tipped her head farther away told him she liked what he was doing.

He kissed the soft, soft skin beneath her ear. So it wasn’t her mouth. He’d take her mouth later. When he slid inside her.

She drew a deep breath, let it out slowly. Her body relaxed against him. “I…uh…thought there was to be no touching.”

“With my hands. You never said anything about other body parts.”

Her throat worked as she swallowed. He followed the movement with his eyes and brushed the tip of his nose across her jaw again, barely scraped his lips over her neck.

“Someone could walk by.”

His lips curled as he pressed them to a mole at the base of her throat. “That makes it more exciting. And I don’t remember you objecting in that apartment.”

“I obviously wasn’t thinking clearly then. I seem to have that problem when you’re around.”

His chest expanded. He liked that. Liked it a lot.

He nudged her knees apart with his leg, pressed his thigh between hers as he kissed her neck again, as he pressed his lips to the electric skin just behind her earlobe. A tremor ran through her body, one that made his jeans even tighter.

“I know how to ease that problem.” He skimmed his nose across her earlobe again, inhaling a deep whiff of her sweet scent that went right to his head like a drug, pressed his leg just high enough so his thigh rubbed against her mound.

Her chest rose and fell with her deep breaths. She was definitely aroused. Probably already wet.

Gods knew
he
was aroused. Ever since she’d shown up at Maelea’s house, he hadn’t been able to stop thinking of her. Shit, that was a lie. He hadn’t stopped thinking of her since he’d seen her at that concert. It didn’t matter that he’d already had her. He wanted her again. Here. Now. However he could get her.

He breathed hot against her neck, watched as the pulse in her throat picked up speed. Her fingers drifted down his side to rest on his hip, dangerously close to the bulge in his jeans. And his blood heated to near boiling at the thought of her fingers so close to his cock.

Her gaze followed her hand to his hip, hesitated. She swallowed, as if she was imagining taking her own delicious sample.

He swelled harder against his zipper, imagined her mouth around his shaft. He didn’t dare move his hand away from the wall for fear he’d forget all common sense and take her, losing their bet before it even got started. “You’re teasing me, Siren.”

Her dark, spiky lashes lifted to reveal amethyst eyes heavy with desire. “I was just wondering what happens if you come first. We didn’t factor that into our bet.”

He nearly came right then, just from the possibility in her words. It was his turn to swallow. “That won’t happen.”

“Why not?”

“Because I learned to master control long ago.”

She raised her right thigh, slid it up over his hip so his erection sank in the vee of her body until he felt the heat of her sex through the denim and cloth separating their skin. Her hands roamed up his chest to rest against his pecs and squeeze ever so gently. Ripples of sensation flowed from that spot, through his abdomen and lower. “I saw your control in my apartment, daemon. Something tells me you don’t have quite the control you think you do.”

When she pressed her hips forward and his cock rubbed against the cleft between her legs, he knew she was right. If he wasn’t careful, he’d explode long before she even warmed up.

He glanced down at her chest, at her luscious breasts lifting and falling beneath her thin black shirt. Thankfully, she’d taken off the breastplate and arm guards in their stateroom, but he liked the fact she was still wearing those stripper boots. He wouldn’t mind if she wore those and nothing else as she wrapped her legs around his waist and screamed his name.

“So, what do you say, daemon?” She pressed forward, stroked his erection with the heat between her legs. “Why don’t we make the bet a little more interesting?”

He was vaguely aware their power positions had reversed, that she was trained thoroughly in the art of seduction and knew how to strip a male of every thought so she could get what she wanted, but this wasn’t about him. It was about her. And giving her a little of the lust-drenched mind she’d drugged him with the last few days.

He pressed his cock against her heat, rubbed until she sucked in a breath. Yeah, she was wet. He could feel it. “What do you have in mind?”

She pressed back. “Let’s say if you come first, you walk away from Maelea and leave the poor girl alone.”

His hips stilled. He focused on her determined yet very aroused eyes. Eyes that set off a tremor of déjà vu deep in his chest. “Why would a Siren care about someone like Maelea?”

“I don’t.”

For a second he thought she was lying, then he realized she wasn’t. “So this little bet is a way to make sure I don’t use her to get what I want.” When she didn’t answer that thought, another crept into his mind. “Which prompts the question, why would a Siren try to
stop
her mark? There’s something you’re not telling me.”

She focused on his shoulder. And in her silence he knew she didn’t have an answer. At least not one she could voice. But it was there, hiding behind her familiar and entrancing eyes. An answer that explained what their connection was and why she was all he’d been able to think about since the moment they’d met. Even to the detriment of his one clear goal.

The door at the end of the hall creaked open. Skyla’s head darted that way and her hands pressed hard against his chest, pushing him away from her succulent body.

Another steward came down the corridor toward them, a tray in his hands. He stopped when he caught sight of them, looked from face to face. Understanding dawned in his eyes just before he coughed and a rush of pink spread up his cheeks. “Um. Sorry. I just need to get through.”

Orpheus stepped back against the opposite wall to make room, but he knew his irritation reflected in his eyes. Only…they didn’t flash green the way they normally did when he was irritated.

The man ducked his head and was out the opposite door in a flash.

Skyla stepped away and cleared her throat. “I need some air.”

“Hold on.” He reached for her but wasn’t quick enough to grasp her.

“Thanks, but no. I think we both need a good shot of distance right now. I know I sure do.”

She disappeared out the door before he could think of a reason to make her stay. For a brief moment he considered following, then remembered Maelea in the stateroom. He couldn’t leave Ghoul Girl alone. She was waiting for the first opportunity to run, and contrary to what Skyla thought, he didn’t intend to harm the waif. But he would use her to get what he wanted.

And what he wanted…It was time he remembered his goal and stopped screwing around with the Siren who’d obviously been sent here to get rid of him. She was a distraction he didn’t need. And though he didn’t know why, he had the strangest feeling that being close to her was messing with his daemon.

She was right. They did need distance. Distance so he could call back that part of him he both hated and needed at the same time. Once they got to the half-breed colony, he’d ditch her ass. Because without his daemon…he’d never get what he wanted most.

***

There were benefits to being the Lord of the Underworld. Chief among those benefits was that souls weren’t just scared of you, they cowered. And though Hades ruled Hell in all its glory, everything that happened within his domain eventually found its way back to his ears, no matter how secret.

Which was how he’d learned Atalanta once again roamed his realm.

He stared at the relief in front of him, carved from the purest marble in the human world. The image of him and his two brothers, Zeus and Poseidon, immortalized as they stood on the top of Mount Othrys, the home of the Elder Gods, after they’d defeated Krónos and the Titans and locked them deep within the bowels of Tartarus.

Their victory in the Titanomachy had been long fought and hard-won. And in that moment when he’d stood there with his kin, the strength of everything they’d accomplished had flowed as rich as wine through Hades’s veins. But it had been fleeting. For as soon as Zeus had locked their father, Krónos, in Tartarus, he’d taken command of the heavens, bestowed the oceans on Poseidon, and left the afterthought to Hades.

The same bitter resentment he’d held for thousands of years rushed through him, heated his blood, and burned his eyes. He’d wanted the human realm, had
deserved
it. But the Fates had fucked him there, hadn’t they? According to them, the human realm was subject to free will. No god could rule it. No god, that is, except the one who possessed the Orb of Krónos, the magical medallion that held the four chthonic elements—earth, air, water, and fire—and granted the owner powers never seen before, not by any god.

He’d waited long years to find the Orb. Had come so close to controlling the human realm when he’d held it in his hands, thanks to his power-hungry wife. The irony that the daemon hybrid Orpheus had been the one to find the Orb in the realm of the blessed heroes wasn’t lost on him. Orpheus was more than anyone knew. More than a daemon, more than a witch, more even than the Argonaut he’d recently been branded. Only one being truly knew what he was. One Fate he couldn’t wait to destroy when he finally had that Orb in his hands for good.

The air stirred at his back and without looking he knew his wife stood behind him, waiting for his attention.

“I take it you’ve returned with news.”

“Yes, my lord,” she said in a sickeningly sweet tone. A tone he knew was meant to placate and deceive. “You were right. She went after the Argonaut in Tartarus.”

He turned Persephone’s way. She stood five feet from him, her fall of silky black hair framing her powerful shoulders to hit near her narrow waist. As a god herself, she was near his height at close to seven feet, and her flawless skin and ruby red lips drew his attention as they always did. The daughter of Demeter, the goddess of fertility, Persephone was every god’s—and human’s—wet dream. His included. Even after all these long thousands of years, she was still the only female he desired day after long, miserable day. Not that he didn’t occasionally want—or take—others, but when it came down to it, she was his. In every sense of the word.