Inferno-Kat 2 (2 page)

“Nemo is frustrating, as usual, but I convinced him to let me stay.” She chuckled and then sobered, as if laughing hurt too much. “Kele is healing. I’m sure it will be some time before she can truly forget what she went through at the hands of Baruch and his ghouls.”

Hades noticed that she lowered her gaze when she spoke Baruch’s name. Hades wondered if he still haunted her dreams as well.

“What about Leucothea? How is she?”

Kat smiled slightly when Hades mentioned the young Neried’s name. “A pain in the ass. She followed me around like a puppy.”

“I think the girl’s in awe of you. The mighty warrior Hell Kat.” Hades chuckled, remembering how the girl had eyed Kat with wonder and longing in her pale, innocent face when Leucothea had helped them after they had been discovered near death on the outskirts of the Wastelands.

The girl had sobbed something fierce when they had left the first time to travel to the Vanquished City.

“She even annoyed me enough to teach her some self-defense moves.” Kat met his gaze, something akin to sorrow swimming in her eyes. “I told her she needed to be prepared in case more Dwellers came to the village.” Kat smiled, but it was not a grin of happiness. “Dwellers are a nasty lot.”

Hades witnessed the pain in her face and could hear the edge in her voice. He couldn’t imagine the agony she suffered, knowing that the same thing that made these scavengers heartless, sadistic killers was the same thing that poisoned her blood.

Taking a step forward, Hades uncrossed his arms. “Kat, I…”

She smirked. “No worries, Hades. I’m a tough bitch, remember?”

“I remember more than that.”

She met his gaze and then, noticeably swallowing, lowered it. Putting her nose to the table, she took in a deep breath. “Who’s the woman?”

The change in conversation knocked him off guard. “What woman?”

Putting her feet on the table, she leaned back in the chair. “The woman you’re fucking.”

“I’m not fucking her.”

“But there is a woman.”

Hades sighed and leaned against the counter. It was obvious that Kat wanted to fight. Fighting had always been her way to deal with emotions she wasn’t used to dealing with. That particular personality trait obviously hadn’t changed.

“I can smell her,” she continued. “She usually sits here when she’s in your kitchen.”

“You can smell her?”

“Yeah,” Kat scoffed. “One of the many joys of turning DD.”

Hades drank the rest of his tea and turned to set it on the counter, giving her his back. Probably not the best idea, considering. “What does it matter, Kat? You left me, remember? We never made any vow of commitment.” He glanced over his shoulder at her.

She slid her feet off the table and sat forward. “You’re right, I did leave. But you knew why.”

Hades reeled around, anger and hurt fueling his movements. “Bullshit! You didn’t tell me anything when you split. I could only assume that you felt you needed to.”

“I had to leave, you dumbass,” she remarked. “With this…this virus running rampant in my veins, I would have killed you. Do you understand? You would have been my first victim.”

Hades had understood. He knew the reasons she had left, but still it had ripped him apart, knowing there was nothing he could have done about it. No way he could have aided her. In the end, he had felt useless and impotent. He hated that feeling and never wanted to feel that way again.

“So.” He lifted his lips in a mischievous grin. “You don’t want to kill me now?”

There was a long pause before her resolve broke and she laughed. “That’s debatable. Give me some time; I’ve been back only an hour.”

“Why are you here, Kat? I have a feeling it’s not because you want to play house with me.”

“I need you to get me someplace.”

“Uh-huh, I’m still listening.”

“Inferno City.”

Hades didn’t need to think about it. “Nope. You broke into the wrong house this morning, sweetheart. Inferno is a one-way ticket to hell.”

Kat rose from the chair, rounded the table, and sat on it in front of him. “Hey, we’ve been to hell, remember?”

“Shit, the Vanquished City was purgatory compared to Inferno.”

“I need to go, Hades. It’s my only chance.”

“Only chance at what?”

“To find a cure.”

He wanted to cross the distance between them and touch her. Grab her and cradle her in the security of his arms. He wanted to tell her it was OK, that he would do anything for her to help her. But he couldn’t make himself move.

“What if there isn’t one, Kat?”

“There has to be, because I refuse to become one of them. I refuse to become a vampyre.”

Her gaze was piercing, and he had the unsettling urge to turn and run. He could see in her eyes the rage and violence of the alien blood racing through her system, contorted in her beautiful, haunted face.

He didn’t know how long it took for the virus to possess a person, but he knew Kat had been fighting it fiercely since being bitten seven months ago. He wondered if she had taken blood lately. If she had finally succumbed to the insatiable lust for it.

“What’s your plan?”

“To find a man named Onyx, a scientist who I hear has an antidote to the DD virus.”

“Okay, let’s say you find this man. Then what? What are you planning to do with him?”

“Take him out of the city, and help him distribute the antidote, starting with me.”

Hades laughed. “No one walks out of Inferno. Not without paying Satarah first.”

“I’ve got money.” She motioned to the pack sitting under the table.

“You can’t bargain with Satarah. You think Baruch was bad…Satarah makes him look like a spoiled indignant boy in need of a spanking.” Shaking his head, he continued. “She’s ruthless, sadistic, and has…” He paused.

“Has what?”

He shook his head. “Nothing.”

“No, go ahead. Say what you were going to say.”

“It’s said she has magical powers.”

Kat laughed. It was a hoarse barking sound and not her usual deep, sexy giggle. “Magic? Please, don’t tell me you believe that.”

He rubbed a hand over his face. “Hey, a year ago I would’ve said ‘bullshit.’ But with what I’ve seen Baruch do…” His voice trailed off. “I don’t know what to believe anymore.”

“Mutations, Hades. Mutations and diseases. That is all it is. The fucking war fucked us up for a long time.” She lifted her arms and turned them over, revealing black lines on her wrists and forearms in which the DD virus flowed rampantly. “I should know.”

Hades didn’t want to see what had happened to her, what was still happening. Her pain reminded him of his failure. Failure to protect her.

He sighed. “What you’re planning is impossible, Kat.”

“Well, then, it’s a good thing I came to you. If there’s anyone who can get around impossible, it’s you.” She pursed her full lips into a sexy pout, one he was sure she knew could unravel the tightest knot.

Hades couldn’t resist any longer.

Closing the distance between them, he gathered her in his arms and crushed his mouth to hers.

With his tongue and teeth, he took her. She tasted as he remembered. Like a cool breeze on a hot day. Something he longed for on a daily basis.

She responded in kind and wrapped her arms around his waist, digging her fingers into his back as she met and matched every nip and tug of his teeth and tongue. She moaned into him as he deepened the kiss and ran his hands through the silky spikes of her hair.

She was everything he remembered. Strong, rough, sexy, and infuriating. She made every single emotion he had respond, and almost at the same time. Damn, the woman made him weak with desire.
Weak
. Something he vowed never to feel again.

Hades broke the kiss and took a distancing step back, his heart racing like his motorcycle, and sweat trickling down his back. Trying to control his breathing, he closed his eyes and sighed.

“I don’t know, Kat. My life has changed.” He motioned around him at his cabin. The one he had built with his own hands while the anger and pain of her abandonment ate at him from the inside out. “I’m not the same man.”

She slid off the table and stood defiantly in front of him. “Like hell you aren’t. I know the man I…” She paused, took in a ragged breath, and continued. “I know you, Hades. You’re here, standing in front of me, the same man I traveled to Van with, the same man I survived death with, the same man I fucked. You’re standing right in front of me. I could be blind and still see that.”

She reached under the table, grabbed her pack, and slung it over her shoulder. “Think about it.

I’ll be back tonight.”

The moment she moved toward the door, he could feel the warmth in the cabin drop a few degrees. He didn’t realize how much heat she had been radiating until she no longer stood near him.

Once again, emotion clamped around his heart and squeezed. He wondered if it would always be that way with Kat. If he would crave her with such intensity that it knocked the breath from him.

He wasn’t sure he wanted to find out, but at the same time, he couldn’t stand to see her leave again.

“Wait.”

She paused, her hand on the doorknob.

“You can stay here.”

She turned and met his gaze.

“My bed’s comfortable. And there’s only one window, so…there won’t be much light to bother you.”

“Are you sure?” she asked.

“No.”

“Good.” She chuckled. “At least I know I still keep you on your toes.”

“That you do, Hell Kat. That you do.” He motioned toward the open door leading to his bedroom.

With her pack still slung over her shoulder, she strode past him and into the room. She gripped the door, but before she shut it, she looked at him. “I…” She paused. “Thank you.”

He said nothing as she shut the door behind her. He didn’t know how long he stood there watching the closed door, expecting her to come out again. By the time he turned to finish preparations for his breakfast, the sun was streaming through the kitchen window, and birds were twittering on the branches of the apple tree just outside his door.

T
he moment Kat opened her eyes, she knew it was late in the afternoon, possibly nearing the time when most people ate their dinner. After several months of keenly observing the rise and fall of the sun, she knew when to stay asleep in the safety the indoors provided. On one occasion she had made the mistake of stepping outside too soon and paid for it. The brutal rays of the unforgiving sun had given her a sunburn that lasted a month.

Sun glare had been brutal before, especially out on the outer rims and in the Wastelands, but now with the Dark Dweller virus encompassing her body, the sun was like acid to her retinas. She had to wear her tinted goggles even at sunset.

Tossing back the bedcovers, Kat yawned lazily. Hades had been right about his bed and the room. She had slept peacefully. A rare occurrence, and one she hadn’t experienced since she had left him all those months ago, sated from sex in her run-down hovel.

Dangling her legs over the mattress, she stood and stretched. Her back was sore from the long ride north. During the day, she camped, hiding out in her flimsy nylon tent. However, at night she drove her bike until the sun would start to pinken the sky. Her night vision was superior, and she never feared going off the road or running into anything. And if she did run into anything, be it human or beast, she came well prepared. She never went anywhere without her sawed-off shotgun, knives strapped to her legs, or the throwing stars attached to her belt.

And if that didn’t work, because of the virus invading her system, she possessed the inhuman strength to rip off a man’s arm without blinking.

Straightening, Kat looked around the room. It was small and meager, with only a bed and a small table beside it. She scanned the surface of the table and noticed a small lantern and a book.

Interest cocked her brow, and she reached for the suede-covered, thick volume. She never imagined Hades as a reader. The title read
Dracula
by Bram Stoker. As she thumbed through the worn, aged pages, a floral aroma floated from between the sheets of paper. A
gift from the
woman.

Kat set down the book and wondered how serious the relationship with this other woman really was. Before she had fallen asleep, Kat had smelled the mattress and the covers. If Hades was sleeping with the woman, it wasn’t in his bed. Ethically Kat knew she had no claim on him.

Leaving him had revoked any entitlement to him.

But she never professed to have any ethics anyway. Hades was hers. He belonged to her, and if he forced the issue, she would grudgingly admit to belonging to him. She wouldn’t be leaving this place without him.

Damn anyone that got in her way.

Stifling a shiver, Kat picked up her jacket from the floor, where she had tossed it earlier, and slipped it on. She wished she would’ve heeded Nemo’s advice and packed heavier clothing.

She’d forgotten that there were four actual seasons up north. Winter did follow autumn. In the outer rims, it was one season. Summer. Dry, hot, and miserable. Three things a person could depend on 365 days of the year.

Zipping up her leather, she paused. A melodious voice sounded through the closed bedroom door. Hades had company, and Kat didn’t have to guess who that person could be.

After running a hand through her hair and patting down the pieces she was certain stuck up in haphazard directions, Kat reached for the door and opened it. Her eyes met Hades’ as she stepped over the threshold and into the kitchen. They were having dinner, it looked like. Or had just finished, as both their plates had only bits and crumbs left. Kat took a quick intake of air.

Smelled like stew and fresh-baked bread.
Who knew Hades could cook?

“I would think that—” The woman’s voice halted midsentence.

Kat turned and met the woman’s gaze. She sat in the exact spot Kat had predicted, chestnut-brown hair pulled back in a simple ponytail, slim hands resting primly on the table, her doe-brown eyes wide with shock.

Hades pushed back his chair but didn’t stand. “How did you sleep?”

“Good. Your bed’s comfy.” She smiled.