Pandora's Box (29 page)

Fury hit his features, bracketing his mouth with dark lines of anger.

“Mads, seriously, just let me go with him. There’s no point in pissing him off, too.”

“Shut up, Nix!” she said and Micah growled a warning.

“I’m already pissed. At you. At her.”

She kicked, striking Micah in the kneecap with the ball of her foot. He went down hard, his elbow cracking on the tile, and he let lose a bloodcurdling bellow, promising retribution.

“You wanted a fighter and a demon whore for a wife, well, you got one.” She jumped up and kicked him in the balls.

He threw his head back with such force his back arched off the floor, and he shrieked loud enough to crack the mirror over the dresser.

“I allow no one to take advantage of me or shove me around. And that includes you, husband.” She toed his balls, turned her sneaker into them, and he hissed, tried to roll away from her torture. “In the fucking family jewels, you’re just as weak as any mortal man, huh, Micah?”

“Mads, come on.” Nix tried to pull her away from her husband, but she resisted, wrenched her arm and broke his hold. “Have you lost your fucking mind?”

Pretty damn close. She’d never been this furious. Never felt this used or this betrayed, either.

Micah lifted his head and met her eyes, his glowing with the flames of Hell. Staring him in the eyes, she smiled and punted into his crotch again. His screams rocked the earth, literally, with the power of a level five earthquake.

Nix stumbled, caught himself on the bed. Micah grabbed her foot and jerked her feet out from under her. Madison went down as the earth’s grumbling settled.

“You bitch,” Micah growled in his raspy, demon voice, massaging his abused balls.

She kicked his hand off her ankle and crab-walked backward. “That’s Queen Bitch to you, asshole.”

Throwing caution to the wind, too desperate to think straight, she flung open the lid to Pandora’s Box. The hinges creaked, screaming in protest as they snapped in two from the mental force she applied. There’d be no putting the lid back.

Unchecked power flooded her nervous system. Black tributaries channeled her vision before bursting into prisms of blinding light, the agony of staring into the sun without blinking. She jerked, rose to her knees, and fell face first onto the floor, screaming as what felt like crushed glass moved through her veins.

Micah laughed, but the sound turned into a choked groan. Even though her vision grew foggy, she could make out his wince and more rubbing of his balls.

Nix ran to her, and Micah called his cat back to attention, “Come, Vkuya.” The Neko’s translated name was Grace? Madison’s freaking middle name! He’d named his ugly ass Neko after her! “Guide Phoenix to Hell.”

“No!” Madison screamed and forced herself up on her hands and knees. “Touch him, and I’ll kill your beast a moment later.”

The Neko growled low in her throat and slung her three heads between Madison and Micah. Madison realized the cat held more intelligence than any feline she’d ever known. Micah stepped around the Neko and yanked Madison into his arms, her back to his chest. She tried to focus the untamed power of Pandora’s Box. Instead the alien force vandalized her neurons and jerked her in his arms like a Mexican jumping bean.

Zen wouldn’t be happy. An ironic giggle erupted at the back of her throat, and she clamped her teeth against its release. Zen’s happiness mattered little if she felled earth because of her folly.

“Either Vkuya or the Skeletons will take him,” Micah whispered, his lips moving against her ear. Hot tears hit her cheeks as her gaze connected with Nix’s. Micah’s hand slapped between her thighs, rubbed hard, and she cringed. “Maybe I can make you come while he watches.”

“Please, Micah, don’t. Take me, instead. Leave Nix out of this.”

“How noble.” He licked the back of her ear. “You already vowed yourself to me, kitten. And I need Phoenix.”

“Get your hands off of her, you sick fuck!” Nix demanded.

Micah’s throaty laugh vibrated against her ear. “She’s joining us in Hell. I’ll let you watch me screw her when we get there. Wonder how you’ll feel when she screams out my name in an orgasm and not yours.”

The Neko snuck up behind Nix and, tail swishing fast, nudged him in the calf. Nix dropped and kicked one of the heads—a mixture of hissing and low-throated growling ensued.

“Skeletons…take him,” Micah said. Five swarmed into the hotel room, wearing nothing except their smoky bodies with the outlines of skeletons.

They circled Nix, and he swung punches, all going through their vaporous bodies.

One grabbed an arm, another seized a leg. They elevated him into the air as the remaining three nabbed him with restraining hands and carried him toward the door. Madison struggled to get free and stop their exit. Between the untapped entity of Pandora swigging through her system and Micah restraining her, she remained powerless.

Or…am I?

“Ichnay, hura tep ulx xea zc pc tulx,”
Ichnay, take him and die by my hand
, she whispered. The words, not the whisper, possessed the effect of a shriek.

The Skeleton’s scattered, releasing Nix midair. He landed on his back with a hard thud.

“Fuck!” Micah screamed in her ear. He flung her to the floor and uttered a demonic command of his own. “Imal.”

Open? What did he want opened?

A black, swirling hole opened up four feet from Nix. Oh, shit! Micah had opened a direct portal to Hell. A bubble of putrid stench twisted from the gaping wound in the floor, and the screams of souls wafted out.

She crawled toward Nix. Pandora’s power raping her nervous system, she executed the forearm-drag and foot-shove crawl, as graceless as a newborn baby in the beginning stages of the technique. The incessant, nonstop screaming of Pandora—
Freedom! Freedom! Freedom!
—in her head, detailed how badly she had screwed up. She’d blamed Nix for making a covenant? No question, her error was the bigger transgression.

Retribution is coming your way, Yahweh
. Pandora’s promise of revenge flavored hot and violent against her thoughts.

Nix rolled to his side and saw her inching in his direction. He scrambled to her, sat on the floor, and pulled her into a seated position with her back against his chest. He brushed her hair out of her face as she turned her head toward him. Their gazes touched and she interlaced their fingers. The coolness of the ring on his middle finger glanced at the edge of her consciousness.

“Phoenix, it’s time for you to submit to your partnership.” Micah moved to stand beside them. They ignored him.

“Nix, break the freaking deal,” she pleaded.

“I can’t. Too many will suffer.”

“Including you, kitten,” Micah said. His words stung like salt rubbed into raw wounds.

“Nix….” she breathed, overwhelmed by the sacrifice he made for her. “I’d rather suffer than know you’ve partnered with Micah.”

“That’s rude, Madison,” Micah whined, the inflection of humor in his voice contradicting his outrage. “When I’m finished with him, he’ll be godlike. You’ll both thank me.”
Only in his dreams
. “It’s time to go, Phoenix.”

Nix tilted her head back and kissed her, a soft touch of his lips against hers as she removed the ring from his finger. Their embrace was a painful parting of friends shrouded by the knowledge fate claimed its victim. A devastating crack of anguish and defeat carved through her soul.

Mmm…I like the taste of this one
, Pandora said silkily in her head.

Madison wiggled the ring onto her thumb and held up her hand to show it to him when he leaned back. Her left eye twitched from a Pandora influx. The entity would have her basic cells imprinted into its consciousness soon. When that happened, she suspected Pandora would control her.

“Htc Noaal mkihayhj htaa el Taqq.”
Thy Queen protects thee in Hell
.

“Bitch!” Micah slurred and dragged her out of Nix’s arms.

“What does that mean?” Nix asked, rolling to his feet.

“She protected you from everything but me and my brother Kings. Smart move. You impress me, kitten.”

“Yay fucking me!” She cringed as Pandora punished her for the remark with a stab of power to her temple. “It protected you from the baseborn demons sniping at you, Nix.”

A slight smile curled her husband’s lips, pride glowing from his eyes. She hated his satisfaction. “Phoenix, step into the doorway to Hell.”

Nix hesitated, and she smirked at Micah. “He second guesses his commitment.”

“Phoenix, step through the doorway now, or….” Micah tapped his finger between her eyes, placed another rap above it and a third pat a smidge higher than the second. Madison seized uncontrollably on the third one, her teeth clenched, and her muscles spasmed worse than Pandora’s rancid deluge coursing through her nervous system. “An infinitesimal taste of what breaking the covenant will do to her,” Micah said as she went limp in his arms, her fingers twitching in the aftermath. “Your choice, Phoenix. Which one of you will suffer?”

Oh, Sumerian’s delight…that was good
, Pandora cooed over Madison’s pain.

Nix responded by stepping through the doorway. He chose his misery over hers. Madison choked on a sob. She couldn’t believe it. Couldn’t believe she’d come to find a way to help Nix and ended up damning him faster.

Her!

The succubus whore of a King, the favorite prey of Sherlocks. Several wanted her dead—now they would laser-lock on her. Their commitment to her takedown mattered little when she couldn’t handle the guilt of causing Nix’s fall from grace.

One tiny flaw could assist her rescue. Nix’s living body stepped through the portal. Whether alive or dead made a difference, a huge difference. Few knew a living body could be resurrected from Hell–a soul couldn’t. A slim chance to free him. First she must figure out a way to get him out of Hell with the covenant voided or traded to someone else. The odds were against them, yet she couldn’t give up. Not on Nix.

Micah placed her on the floor, straddled her hips, and smoothed her hair off her sweat dampened face.

“Protect him, will you?” He slapped her openhanded and gripped her cheeks between his fingers and thumbs. “You conniving bitch! I love it, even though I abhor the stench of your emotions for him. I will punish him for finger banging you today. I’ll make you watch every second of it.” Madison cringed. “Remember, kitten, he’s generally fucked, all because of you!”

Madison managed to knock his hand aside. “You’re a selfish bastard.”

“News flash, Madison. I’m a demon!”

“Fallen angel,” she corrected.

“Yeah, let’s get technical. Fallen angel. I fell because Father wanted me to bow to your ancestors. I will never bow to creatures as fragile and morally screwed up as humans. Mankind kills and mutilates each other! Demons stick together, kitten. We’re a loyal lot and never backstab one another. Never forget, I fell and created a resting spot for corrupted souls, which makes me a sick motherfucker. Sicker than the demons I’ve spawned because I was born out of goodness and perfection.”

Madison fought to control her wobbly arms and smacked her hands against his cheeks. She dug her nails into the flesh near his ears and dragged them down across his face, leaving bleeding gouges behind.

Micah laughed and dragged her arms above her head. “You want my blood, kitten?” He released her hands and gripped the edges of her shirt. A tug and the material ripped down the center. She swatted at his hands. A newborn baby owned more dexterity.

“I must confess, Madison, I couldn’t be prouder of the deceptive, fighting bitch you’ve become.” A claw sliced through her bra, and he cut a design into the top of her left breast with the razor-sharp edge. “Every decision you make is for my benefit. Our benefit. You will learn to obey me. In everything!”

“No,” she whispered, shaking her head, weakened from the relentless alien power pummeling her nervous system. “I promise you’ll regret taking Nix.”

“I’m confident I’ll enjoy your efforts. I promise you’ll fail.” He dragged a claw across his wrist, a wide wound splitting open. Thick, black blood oozed out as he wrapped his fingers in her hair and held her head motionless.

“You wanted my blood, drink me,” he said, pressing his wound against her mouth. Hair pulled from the roots as she tried to turn away from his dark offering. Her attempts were useless with his clutch on the strands. The dark taste of licorice and bitter spices hit her tongue and slid down her throat. “Drink my power, kitten. Become what I intended.”

Madison coughed and choked on the thick brew. As she ingested the demonic hemoglobin, her limbs grew hot, her nipples hardened, and lust pulsed between her thighs. She tried to pull away, but remained too weak. He continued to restrain her with one arm and apparently little effort.

Wings arched over his shoulders, as blue as his eyes, reminding her of clear, summer skies. Not feathery or fuzzy, they reminded her of phosphorescent jellyfish—long, wispy, corkscrews of fiber-optic beauty. The grandeur of his wings belonged on depictions of fairies and other ethereal beings intended for good, not on a demonic spawn of Hell.

His skin altered into a luminescent blue color. A blue angel, able to fly the heavens without being noted. Only his hair remained its shade of perfect, golden blond.

Glorious. Yet, perverted for someone so rotten to possess such a stellar appearance.

Madison cringed, and her back bowed up off the floor as a climax slammed into her with such force she screamed against his wrist. His blood, the catalyst of her release, fed her dark, succubus side. Shame hit her fast and hard, humiliation blinding her as tears leaked from the corners of her eyes and spread into her hair.

“Keeping sucking me, Madison.” Erotic words laced with demonic subterfuge. He nudged her thighs apart and moved between them. His free hand moved to his jeans, released the button. The sudden rumbling of the Neko’s purr startled her as he said, “Suck me, wife, while I fuck you to your first real orgasm.”

Whimpering, Madison tried to push him away. Painful electricity spiked through her system, shaking her limbs as if she’d stuck her finger in a light socket.