Retribution, Devotion (21 page)

Cruel laughter bubbled out from the darkest corner of her being. She knew there were no gentle words that she could give him. She was just as furiously disturbed at it all as he was. So she let her hurt and the hate he spewed at her fuel her. The Medusa she was slowly bloomed into life and she hissed in spite of falling into playing the game.

“Oh, there will be another time, Calvinnnn, believe me there will. I'll be stalking you later, sweetie. Your dick was oh so sweet. Muah.”

With that, she turned to run faster than she ever had in her life. She had to get away now before she compromised herself more in this madness. As she ran the reverberating booming of his voice trailed behind her. “This ain't even what ya want, shawty. Show me love; show me evil but stay in your lane. I'm from an era and time where sometimes we move too fast for you to understand what I'm saying. Ya heard me?”

Her mind blazed with knowledge as hurt, fury, and burning desire sent her over the edge.
No, this bastard did not!
She wanted to turn around and make his whole existence turn into chaos but she did not have the time. She needed to feed. Needed to hide until his taint washed off and she needed to kill. She had lost her Nephilim target. The Medusa knew that she would hear about her weakness later, but as she ran, she was suddenly blindsided hard.

Darkness slowly swallowed her and the memories of what had just happened in the ruins in East St. Louis continued to play within her unconscious mind.

“
C'est si bon,
my man. It wasn't hard to get her here. After picking up Amara and Miya, gaining that intel then taking Amara to Uncle Bishop's grave everything else was straight, man.” Nydia held her breath listening to the world drum back to life around her. Cottonmouth made it severely difficult for her to swallow and the bastard who knocked her out but who also filled her body in affection drew her attention while his molasses deep voice ebbed on, “San is looking over what we found. Yo, look who's awake.”

An incessant piercing snap of fingers sounded near her ear causing her stomach to tighten in nauseating cramps while her ears rang in agony. “Sleep is for the wicked and you slept enough. Wake your ass up.”

Watery gloss covered her vision. Her head lolled around seeking out the jagged, deep voice that stirred something in her chest akin to fear. The shape of a dark masculine figure slowly came into the view of her sluggishly opening eyes. Shock caused her to jump backward from her space being threatened by the man she once called the Attacker but who she now knew as the Reaper. Awareness had her struggling to glance around to find out where she was at before realizing that she was tied down to a chair.

“Where am I?” she angrily screamed at the man who stood wide-legged, arms crossed over his broad chest with black locks that spilled over each shoulder. The bastard studied her in amusement and she wanted to spit on him. Past him, she noticed she was in a massive holding area. One that held several chairs, a table, and a large, flat TV monitor. Disbelief mixed with fury caused her nails to lengthen and she struggled to cut at the binds around her wrists but that only resulted in each nail breaking.

“The more you struggle, the tighter your binds become. We figured you'd like that shit so, yeah, welcome back to Chicago, Medusa. Been a long time coming.” The Reaper dispassionately clapped his hands together then moved around the room. From the far back of the room, he disappeared in a wall of darkness, only to come back with a thick manila folder. Never in a day of her life had she ever thought she'd be the one snared in the trap of the Light but here she was. The more she thought about it, the faster her chest thumped in rage.

“I know you are wondering how you got here. I'm sure you'll remember your meeting with my Mystic, Calvin, right? You really messed my brother up with your . . . confrontation.”

Recollection caused Nydia to spit out in anger at the memory of what had happened between her and Calvin. “Oh yes, I remember my meeting with Callllvinnnn. Did he tell you how we both fucked on holy land and I made his seed gush with just a touch?”

Malicious laughter fused with panic flowed from within while she tried to struggle. An invisible force caused a tightness at her throat bringing about a terror within to break her resolve. Memories from her past accosted her senses and she felt sick all over again.

The Reaper strolled to stop then crouch in front of her. His amber eyes appeared to glow like that of embers. His head tilted to the side while she noticed that a note of pity then edged anger glimmered then disappeared. She watched him tap the side of his solid jaw before speaking again. “Holy land . . . turn on the barrier.”

White light washed over everything in the room. Concrete walls and floors became radiant in pale energy. The smell of holy water, something humans are not able to detect but the Cursed could, choked her throat causing her to bow forward to empty her stomach. Water fell down the corner of her eyes. Only then did the Reaper nod his head. It shocked her when he reached up to wipe at her face as he stood. Everything around her went back to normal while the Reaper turned his back to her.

“Calvin was right,” he said.

Nydia watched the Reaper turn around, holding that thick folder again before addressing her. “Medusa. Let's get to the point of the matter. You are here on charges of the atrocities you have committed to my people and the human population. Unfortunately, death is too good of a sentence for you, so truth will be your punishment.”

Pushing in her chair, Nydia gritted her teeth pulling again. Flashes from being chained then taken by the Cursed on a massive wooden boat jabbed at her dome causing her to scream out, “You think I could care what you do to me! Torture is my ecstasy! Death means nothing!”

The low rumble of the Reaper's laughter sent chills down her sensitive spine. Chills she had only experienced in the face of the Dark Lord and Prince of Darkness.

“No, death by my hands always means something, which in fact you fear!” Jet-black wings erupted from the Reaper's broad back.

The air around her became thick and a trickle of piss would have run down her thighs in embarrassment, but she was better than that.

His voice drowned out even her own angry hissing as he continued, “Medusa, Protector to the Dark Lady. It's time you woke up. The bindings were supposed to do that, which I see they are, so let's get into the rest of this. Something your Cursed King hasn't told you or your Mistress is this: your name is Nydia Randal. You were one of the many first daughters of the Nephilim who were taken by the Cursed and created to be weapons of madness. You became a success for their side.”

Nydia had to laugh. How they got her name was something but the rest was comical to her. “Yeah, right. Let's keep this going; how did you get me knocked out anyway? Poison runs in my blood.”

Her captor shook his head. His thick lips formed a lopsided smile then he nodded his head again. Heavyset thumping of boots sounded in the chamber. Calvin stepped out of the wall of darkness before her, holding a neon yellow syringe. She studied the way his muscled body tensed in her presence. The way his eyes glanced briefly at her before looking away. He was still living in what they had shared and she intended to use that to her advantage.

“Poison runs in your blood, shawty. But each time we ran into your work, I've taken some of you and created my own venom that I knew would disrupt your chemistry. Mystic power combined with what you create gave me this. Fucked, ain't it, wodie?” Calvin chuckled holding up a murky, glowing vial.

If she could flick him off or flick her hair at him, she would have, so she resorted to using her words as weapons. “Actually it's not. What is fucked is how you had me on my back, legs over your shoulders as you drove your manhood in and out of me. Now that was fucked. Do you intend to do it again? Come, my pussy is open and ready, come show them what you really are about, Callllvinnnn.”

Nydia attempted to open her bound legs in a taunt. She watched, then cringed, the moment Calvin's irises darkened then sparked emerald green. His fists tightened at his sides. The jean hoodie jacket he wore, with the black crew shirt, stretched as his muscles doubled in size. Laughter made her smile in glee. The hard slap of a pair of women's hands around her skull caused her to scream.

“What was past will become present. What was lost will be found again,” was sung in Sanskrit to her. Static sparked from red-tipped fingers that dug into her temple. The beautiful brown sugar-toned face of a young woman came into her vision. Her kohl-lined deep oak eyes lit up with her power. Her black, brown highlighted hair spilled in waves over her as Nydia's third eye ripped open.

“Big bro, now,” the woman said. Nydia tried to look away from her, but the woman's pooling dark eyes held her in a trance, along with her glowing henna-lined hands.

Soft, spicy musk filled her nose, and then the familiar touch of the man she had recently shared her body with threw her over the edge of an abyss. His emotions, his thoughts, taste, sight, and sound became hers in his vision. She watched a Nephilim woman share her story with Calvin and the Gray Prince back in STL in perplexity.

Calvin watched the one he was told was a partial mute from a traumatizing event that went down with her old house shift on her feet before him. Her pain was palpable and he felt for her deeply. The scars with that one were deep, so much so that it read through her aura as she locked eyes with him then licked her lips attempting to work her never
-
used throat muscles.

“It's all good, shawty.
Soldat forte,
come sit and we listen.” He guided Sam to the couch. The pain from her was working his heart because while he sat her down, it was if she were a kid again and not the twenty
-
one
-
year
-
old she was right now.

“Twenty
-
one years ago back in Houston, Sam's father was taken out by his own team members in front of her. They were given a hit and were told to watch and protect a young Nephilim. A girl who was possibly going to be an oracle. Sam's father as captain set everything in order and hit up the house.”

“Dad always had me go with him, trained me from the womb. After my mom died in battle
. . .
anyway I always was with him. I helped be their ears, so this was nothing different. Like, but it was, you know? That whole night was off. First clue was I heard one of them call their boss, told them that they would get the target as long as they got the stuff. Found out that they were junkies and that's how the demons got to them.”

Both Calvin and Marco glanced at each other. Only way a Guardian team would be addicted to drugs was if they weren't full
-
blooded Guardians at all but humans with an active Nephilim gene. Although Calvin himself was an immortal, a human with a dominantly active gene, even he couldn't get addicted to drugs. However, if you were a human with a slight gift, like a psychic, then it was fair game.

“You all were a human team,
mamacita?”
Calvin heard Marco solemnly question, interrupting his thoughts.

“
Dios.
” Marco leaned back in his chair and ran a solitary hand over his waves. “Doesn't take much to get to a human if you want to, but those with slight active Nephilim DNA strains, it takes time. Which means the Dark had been working on your team for a while,
mami,
so you have an idea who brought the taint in?”

Samurai gave a sad sigh. “No, but I noticed how quickly they were becoming different, a little moodier. Anyway, we got word from Chicago that an oracle may have been born. I remember hearing Daddy talk about it and making plans, then, when we got to the house, they ambushed my daddy. I was in the car but I went inside because something told me to and I saw they had him gagged and bound. He was trying his best to get free to protect the oracle and her family but it didn't help. They shot him like an animal, right in the head, no remorse, and laughed about it. Then they kicked his fallen body. They beat the girl's parents and
. . .
the father saw me and he told me in my mind to stay back.”

The pain and images of her as a child flashed in Calvin's mind. He saw her hiding near the back of a Santa Fe
-
style ranch house, her little hands pressed against glass panels of the sliding doors, peering through an open crack of sheer curtains. Her little face was streaked with tears as she watched her family be tortured and later her father gunned down. Seven rounds had to be pumped into the man to keep him down before they aimed for his head. Shit was sickening to his soul as he watched the girl's memories in his own mind.