Enraptured

Chapter 16

Skyla should have been cold. She’d been up on this windy terrace for the last twenty minutes. But everything she’d learned tonight, coupled with what she’d already known, mixed together with the heat from the warrior at her back to fuel the fire in her veins.

She’d wanted him from the first. Before she’d known who he was. Before she’d realized their connection. Before she’d discovered his soul wasn’t black, as she’d been led to believe.

She’d wanted him the moment she’d seen him in that crowd. Had been attracted to the danger. To the unpredictability. To the way he said fuck you to the world as if he lived life with no boundaries. Yes, there were moments when she glimpsed Cynurus in him, but the man he’d been before wasn’t what called to her now. What called to her was the man he’d become, daemon and all. At some point over her long, carefully ordered years, she’d forgotten what it felt like to live. She’d forgotten what it felt like to want. He’d brought that back for her.

Orpheus.

Her heart skipped double time as she pressed her hips back against his groin again, teasing him with what she knew he’d been watching since they met. “Don’t have it in you daemon? Don’t tell me when it comes right down to it, you’re all talk.”

“You’re trying to seduce me again, Siren. Comes easy to you, especially when you’re in a bind.” His fingers grazed her breast. She drew in a breath as heat penetrated her skin. “But I’ve been teased enough. We both know you have no intention of following through.”

This time she did, though. This time it wasn’t about getting what Zeus wanted. It was about getting what she wanted. “Daemon—”

He grasped her shoulder and whipped her to face him. Before she caught her footing, he picked her up off the ground and tossed her over his shoulder.

She pressed her hands to the small of his back, tried to angle herself up. “Okay, put me down.”

His boots clanked as he crossed the veranda. “You want down?”

He tossed her from his shoulder. Chilled air swept up her spine. A gasp caught in her throat as she felt herself falling. Darkness surrounded her, and for a second she wasn’t sure he hadn’t thrown her over the side of the railing.

Then her back hit something crunchy soft and icy cold, and she realized he’d dropped her on one of the chaise lounges left up here in the weather. The thin layer of frigid snow matted her hair, sent shivers down her spine. She tried to push herself up, but he straddled her body before she found her feet and grasped both of her hands, yanking them high above her head against the back of the chair, pinning her in place.

He leaned close, his hot breath washing over her ear to heat her chilled skin, his thighs brushing the outside of her hips to send quivers of delight straight to her center. “I think maybe it’s time you took a turn on the other side. See what it’s like to be the prey instead of the hunter.”

Her blood heated at the image he painted, and any thought of fighting back quickly fled from her mind. “Planning on seducing me, daemon?”

His teeth closed over her earlobe. “And then leaving you hot and bothered.”

Oh, yesssss.

His kissed the sensitive skin behind her ear, worked his way down her throat. Anticipation curled in her stomach. There was just enough mean in the way he nipped at her flesh to tell her he was good and truly pissed, but it didn’t hurt. And if his plan was to get back at her, he was failing miserably. Because this was exactly what she wanted.

He captured both of her hands with one of his, slid the other down her torso to cup her breast. While his lips and teeth continued their assault on her throat, she arched her back, offering him whatever he wanted. His mouth stilled against her skin, his hand hesitated over her breast. Knowing she’d just surprised him, her lips curled in a self-satisfied smirk. Until, that is, he grasped her shirt at the neckline and yanked, ripping it in two all the way to her waist.

She gasped. Struggled beneath his hold. Icy air washed over her torso. In a move too quick to follow, he flicked the front clasp of her bra, freeing her breasts. Her nipples pebbled in the cool air and shivers raced over her flesh. “Orpheus…”

He let go of her bra, reached over the side of the chaise. When his hand came back she spotted the handful of snow and her eyes grew wide. “Orpheus—”

“Cold or turned on. Let’s see which it is.”

He balled the snow together. Her stomach caved in as he brought it toward her skin. Holding her breath, she flicked a look at his gray eyes and saw the flash of arousal hidden behind his wicked stare. No green. No daemon. Just an arousal that superheated her blood all over again.

She bit her lip and watched as he grazed the ball of snow against the underside of her breast, then slowly circled her nipple. Icy-cold sensations sent gooseflesh all over her body. The snow was so cold, pinpricks of pain stabbed her flesh but quickly melted against her warmth, creating a river of liquid that dripped off her naked breast to splash cool and wet against her belly.

“I think you like that, Siren.”

She did. More than she would ever have expected. The circle grew smaller until the icy-cold wetness brushed across her nipple, sending shards of pleasure right to her core. She bit down harder on her lip to keep from moaning, dropped her head back against the chaise, and closed her eyes. Arched her back again. Offered even more.

He chuckled, moved the snowball to her other breast, repeated the circle, the tease, the wetness and heat. Caught between torment and ecstasy, Skyla lifted her hips and moaned when she felt his erection hovering just above her.

“Oh, no, no, no. You’re not in charge of this, Siren.”

He moved away. Let go of her hands. Fabric brushed her hip. Cool air washed over her thighs. She peered up to the twinkling sky above as he tugged her pants down her legs, exposing every last inch of her.

Yes.

She pushed up on her elbows, thankful her pants were stretchy so she could spread her thighs to make room for him. Moonlight washed over his thick hair and broad shoulders. He was still wearing the thin jacket from before, was probably warm and snug in his clothes, while she was out in the elements shivering, but she didn’t care. Because the desire rolling through his gaze was enough to heat whatever chill the night brought with it.

“I never used ice on you,” she pointed out.

“Are you cold? I figured for an ice princess like you, this’d be nothing new.”

A pinprick of hurt cut through her chest, but she pushed it aside, because again he was right. She had been an ice princess. For way too long. But that changed now.

He trailed the melting snow down her belly to the top of her mound. She sucked in a breath when the ice grazed the sensitive flesh between her legs. Frigid cold water dripped down her overheated skin to pool beneath her ass against the frozen cushion. And though she told herself his twisted torture shouldn’t be turning her on, she knew it was. Cold and hot warred with pleasure and torment as he ran the ice over her clit again and again and jolts of electricity lit up her groin with a heat she hadn’t realized she’d been missing.

She dropped her head back and closed her eyes, this time giving in to the sensations and moaning as she lifted her hips. He kept up the assault on her clit with the ice, but his warm fingers slid lower, against her quivering flesh, then finally inside her where she wanted him most.

“Oh, yesssss.” Her elbows went out from under her. Her back landed against the now-damp cushion. She groaned, turned herself over to him, all but begged for more. He stroked her clit with the ice, searched deeper with his fingers until all she wanted was more.

“Definitely enjoying.” He withdrew, pressed back in with a second finger. She gasped at the tight feel and pressed her hips against his strokes. At some point the ice must have melted because she felt his warm fingers against her clit, in stark contrast to the cold, but she was too gone to care how or with what he was touching her. The fiery edges of an orgasm she’d gone too long without hovered just beyond her reach.

Just before it crashed into her, he withdrew. Cool air washed over her skin again, and the cushion at her sides dipped. She opened her eyes, anticipating him climbing over her to take and taste, only when she looked up he was standing at her feet, staring down at her with a self-satisfied expression. One that reeked of victory and shone with distrust.

“You’re good, Siren, but you’re not that good.” He tugged the jacket from his arms, tossed it to her. “Get your stuff together and meet me back in the great hall. And you’d better hope Ghoul Girl’s exactly where she’s supposed to be.”

He made it two steps away before her iced-over brain clicked into gear and instinct took over where logic should reign.

She was on her feet in a flash, tugging her pants back up, her boots clicking on the cold stones beneath her heels as she threw his jacket on the ground. Her ripped shirt slapped open against her sides as she grabbed his arm, spun him back to face her. Surprise erupted in his gray eyes, followed by a shot of anger that tightened his face, but he didn’t intimidate her. She’d seen enough from him over the last few days to know that even with his daemon, he had too much honor to hurt a female. Even one who’d been sent to kill him.

She stepped close before he could block her, twisted around so her back was to his front, held tight to his forearm, and shifted her center of gravity back, lifting him off the ground and tossing him over her shoulder to land on the chaise he’d just had her pinned to.

He landed with a grunt. The legs of the chaise snapped beneath his weight and a splintering sound echoed across the veranda.

She tugged off her ruined shirt, leaned over, and dropped it on his chest. “I am that good, daemon.” She moved to the door and paused with her fingers on the handle, glanced back over her shoulder with her best I dare you look. “And you’re wrong. This time I do intend to follow through. The question is whether or not you’re man enough to deal with it.”

The room was hexagonal. Four walls were solid—two on each end. The two long walls between were made only of glass, separated by thick, intricately carved wooden beams. A wide archway over each window rose to dramatic wooden trusses that lifted two stories to the roof’s peak.

There was more patio furniture in here, stacked against the far-end walls and what looked like a door. Mismatched cabinets and wooden tables were piled against one glass wall. A blackened fireplace and empty bookshelves took up space on the other side of the room, and a series of boxes that weren’t marked had been pushed up against the fireplace as if left there and forgotten.

“Follow-through, huh?” Orpheus’s voice echoed from the doorway. Tingles of anticipation raced down her spine as she turned. He stood in the shadows, a menacing mixture of heat and the need she’d known would follow. “You wouldn’t be playing me again, now would you, Siren?”

She rested her hands on her hips, stepped wider to form what she knew was a very attractive V with her lower body. The cool air tightened her nipples, the moonlight accentuated her curves. She cocked her head and pulled up her sexiest Cheshire Cat grin. “Me? I’m done playing. How about you, cowboy? You said when I was ready to ride to tell you. Well, I’m ready.”

For a heartbeat neither of them moved, and then before she could gasp he was across the floor, tugging her tight against his rock-hard chest, drawing her mouth up to his, and claiming her lips as if they were his own.

Heat replaced chill. Need circumvented want. Electricity jolted through her entire body, forcing out common sense. She grasped his thin henley in both hands, slid her tongue into his mouth to tangle with his, used her grip to lever herself up when his hands rushed down to her ass and he lifted her.

“Orpheus—”

“Wrap your legs around me.”

She did, hooked one arm around his shoulders, used the other to tug his face to hers and kiss him all over again. Her butt hit something cold. She didn’t realize he’d carried her across the room until he dropped her on a desk pushed up against the glass wall.

Why hadn’t she wanted to kiss him before? He tasted of mint and madness. Of desire and longing, all the things she knew she tasted of as well.

“Skin,” she mouthed against him as she clawed at his shirt. He broke the kiss long enough to let her drag it over his head, then took her mouth again in another hot, wet, mind-numbing kiss that drove her closer to the edge.

Gods, this was heaven. This was home. This was everything she’d been missing.

She fumbled with the button on his jeans, finally gave up, grasped the two halves of his waistband, and pulled hard. The button popped and flew across the floor. He tore his mouth from hers and looked down, his bare chest rising and falling with his labored breaths, that scruff on his cheeks from days without shaving so damn sexy, it was all she could do not to take a bite out of him. “Impatient?”

“Yes.” She pushed both hands inside his pants, slid them past his hips. “You. Naked. Now.”

Desire darkened his eyes. He growled, then his mouth was back on hers, this time with frantic kisses stealing her breath while she shoved his pants and boxers down to his thighs. His cock sprang up, hard and hot and pulsing. She wrapped her hand around the thickness, smiled against his lips when he groaned and pressed himself into her hand.

She hadn’t gotten to explore last time. She wanted that now. To find out for herself just what made him gasp. Which brush made him groan. How long it would take to make him come.

He fumbled with her pants again as she stroked him, pushing them down her hips. She lifted, wriggled so he could slide them down her ass. Grew frustrated when the fabric bunched against her boots.

He pulled his mouth from hers. “These have to go.”

He grasped her pants at the waistband and ripped them right down the middle as if they were nothing but paper.

A surprised laugh fell from her lips. “Now who’s impatient?”

“Me.” He wrapped his hand over hers, still covering his cock, guided it close to rub the head against her clit. She shivered, gasped in pleasure. “Is this what you want?”

“Yes.” She closed her eyes, let go with her hand to give him control. The head of his cock pressed against her opening, sending the first tendrils of pleasure pulsing through her core.

“Too bad, Siren.” He pulled away. Her eyes flew open in surprise. He stepped back, grasped her body, and flipped her over onto her stomach. “Not what I want.”

Her breasts smashed into the solid wood. Her boots grappled to find their footing on the floor. He kicked her legs wider and leaned over her, pressing his hips up against her ass. And then she felt his cock brushing her folds all over again.

“Now this…this is what I want.” He thrust deep. She groaned at the hard length of him sliding into her. He dragged her back an inch as he withdrew. She dug her fingers into the edge of the table and groaned when he thrust again. Pleasure radiated outward from her center. He withdrew, drove deep again and again, jostling her against the table.

He brushed her hair over her shoulder as he continued to pound into her, leaned close to her ear. “This, Siren, is follow-through.” His fingers grazed the Siren marking on her shoulder blade. “I like this tattoo.”

She couldn’t answer. Was too focused on his wild plunge and release and plunge again. Her orgasm barreled closer. She closed her eyes, pressed back against him. Groaned for more. And then she felt his fingers slide beneath her hips and brush her clit.

That was it. All she could take. The orgasm he’d teased and taunted exploded, radiated through every cell in her body. She cried out as it swept through her. But unlike the last time they’d been together, this time it was all pleasure. No heartache, no pain, no bitter memories of the past spiraling in to ruin the moment.

His thrusts increased in speed. As the edges of her orgasm faded, she heard him grunt, realized he was close. She looked back over her shoulder, tightened around his length, trembled when he grew twice as hard inside her. She wanted to feel him come. Wanted to watch as he lost control the way he had before. Only this time she planned to enjoy it. Every last second. “Mm, yes, Orpheus. Hard. Just like that.”

“Tight. So tight.” His fingers shifted to her hips, dug into her skin. She pushed back against him as he drove again and again. “Ah, fuck, Siren.”

“Yes. That’s exactly what you’re doing. Mm…keep doing it. Don’t be gentle with me. Make me come again.”

Her words did exactly what she wanted. Made him harder, forced him deeper. On a long groan he shoved deep one last time and held still. His cock jerked and pulsed deep within her. His release triggered another in her, this one not quite as big as the last, but just as pleasurable. And so incredibly hot she knew she had to have it again.

He fell against her back and sucked in air. “Holy gods…”

A smile turned her lips. Not exactly. But she doubted a god could do it any better.

She pressed up on her hands, looked over her shoulder at his flushed face and tousled hair. Loved that she’d reduced him to a quivering mass of muscle and bone. “Follow-through?”

His heartbeat raced against her spine and his chest continued to rise and fall as if he was having trouble regulating his breathing. “Yeah, I guess that’s what you call it.”

“Not quite, daemon.” She shifted her weight back against him, pushing him off her. He slid from her body, stumbled back a step. Looked down with surprise. She flipped over, wriggled off the table. Stood in front of him.

“Siren—”

His pants were still around his thighs, which was perfect. She ran her hands down his chiseled abs, taking a good hard look at his body in the moonlight shining through the windows.

Just as she’d imagined, he was all corded muscle and gathered strength, covered in smooth, tight, enticing skin shades darker than her own. Keeping her eyes locked on his, she slid to her knees.

His cock, which seconds before had been at half-mast, sprang up thick and engorged and big. Bigger than she’d expected. “Not fair, daemon. Are you trying to make my job easier?”

“One of the few benefits of being an Argonaut.”

“Mm.” She closed her fingers around his shaft, loving the pulse and life she felt in her palm, the soft flesh sliding over the rock-hard center as she stroked him from base to tip, the musky smell of both of their releases radiating from his skin. “I can think of a few more. Tell me what you want me to do.”

“Skyla—”

Gods, she loved it when he said her name. “No more games, Orpheus. Not tonight. Tonight I just want you.” She licked her lips. Watched as his eyes grew wide in anticipation. Her sex throbbed all over again as she leaned in and licked the very tip of his erection. “Should I stop or keep going?”

The doubt she’d seen in his eyes melted away. He grasped the back of her head and his fingers slid into her hair, tightened around the long locks. “No, don’t stop. Don’t you dare stop now.”

She smiled. Trailed her tongue around the crown. “So what should I do instead?”

He tugged her head forward and a wicked grin turned his lips. “Why don’t you start by sucking my cock?”

Oh, he was a naughty, naughty daemon. And she loved that about him.

She opened her mouth, closed her lips around his length. Drew him all the way to the back of her throat. Grew hot and achy and wet all over again when he hardened against her tongue.

Follow-through had its benefits too. And before this night was over, she planned to prove to him just what those were. Every single one.

Even if doing so left her wondering…where the hell she now fit in the world.

Gryphon wasn’t sure what Atalanta could want with Krónos, but just being in the Elder God’s lair left a sick and horrific feeling in the pit of his stomach.

“Don’t fidget, doulas.” Atalanta sent him a hard look as they waited outside Krónos’s private quarters.

Gryphon turned away from the fifteen-foot-high black iron doors to look at the wallpaper in the sitting area, patterned in swirls that looked like droplets of blood, and the naked pictures of bodies entwined hanging on every wall. He tried to ignore the horrifying moans coming from the other side of that door, but he couldn’t ignore them completely. Dread coursed through his veins.

To distract himself, he stared at the drawings. Found one he could focus on without being sick. The image of two bodies locked in a heated kiss. As he studied the lines and swirls, he scratched at his thigh, tried to ease the tightness of the leathers Atalanta made him wear. This image—unlike all the others—wasn’t pornographic in nature. It could be any two lovers anywhere in the world. It might have even been him once.

Had he had a lover like that? Did he know what it was to be connected to someone on such a primal level? Not sex for sex’s sake but the joining of hearts? He searched his feelings, tried to find any ghost of a memory that told him he’d once been loved, that he’d experienced what he was seeing in the picture, but came up empty.

Maybe he hadn’t deserved it. Maybe he’d been so awful in the living realm this was as much as he could hope for. Maybe this new hell was more than he deserved.

He waited for a voice—any voice—to tell him he was wrong, but there was none. Only the echoing moans from the other side of that door.

“Doulas? It’s time.”

The double doors opened, and he followed Atalanta into an ornate room. Leather couches, arching windows that looked out over Sin City, Grecian pillars, and richly colored rugs. A wall of books covered one whole side of the two-story room, but what captured his attention was the man—no, god—standing to the right. Unhooking a female from a metal contraption mounted into the cement wall with hooks and chains and restraints.

The female’s nakedness was quickly covered with a blanket, but Gryphon didn’t miss the lines of blood running down her skin or the whip that lay on the floor at Krónos’s feet. As two servants escorted the weeping female through a door to the right, Krónos dried his hands on a towel and turned to greet Atalanta.

“Well, well, well. I heard a rumor the wicked witch of the west was back in the Underworld. I just never expected to see her with my own eyes.”

The Elder God wasn’t what Gryphon had pictured. Sure, he was tall—over seven feet at least—but he didn’t look a day over forty. His hair was short and dark, with only a smattering of gray at the temples. His body was strong and lean, covered in jeans and a short-sleeved button-down. He was muscular as most gods were, but it didn’t seem he could smite one with a look. There was no indication he could overthrow the world if he escaped from this prison. If anything, he looked like a normal, albeit tall, human.

Atalanta, dressed in her curve-hugging, cleavage-baring emerald gown, smiled and pursed her plump, fiery red lips. “When I heard what you’d done with the place, I just had to see it for myself.”

“You lie so well, Atalanta. It’s obvious you’ve honed those god qualities you wrangled from my son. Do you like what you’ve seen so far?”

She slanted a look toward the door the girl had been taken through, excitement lighting her dark eyes. “So far, I do.”

Krónos leaned a hip against a long mahogany desk set near the windows. “No wonder Hades was tempted by you. Now why have you disturbed me during my…playtime?”

She slinked toward him, ran her fingertip down his shoulder to stop at his bicep. “I’ve come to make you an offer.”

“There’s not much you can offer me that I don’t already have. Look around you.”

“How about freedom?”

When he didn’t answer, she turned back to Gryphon, where he still stood near the doors. “Do you see my doulas over there? He’s not just man candy. He’s an Argonaut.”

Argonaut. The word revolved in Gryphon’s mind but meant nothing to him.

Krónos slanted him a look. “I’d not heard an Argonaut had been killed and banished to Tartarus.”

“He wasn’t killed. He was sent here by magic. His body remains in the human realm, where a warlock possesses it. But the soul and body could be easily reunited if one wished it.”

“A warlock, you say?”

“Mm-hmm.” She moved closer to the Elder God, rubbing her breast against his arm in a move Gryphon knew was as calculated as this meeting. “They’ll come for him, Krónos. I guarantee they’re hatching a plan as we speak. You know how loyal and heroic those Argonauts can be.”

Krónos studied Gryphon a long beat, then looked back to Atalanta. “What does this have to do with me?”

“I want you to gift him the darkness of the Underworld.”

Gryphon tensed near the door. He didn’t know what that meant, but it couldn’t be good. And he didn’t want anyone to rescue him. He remembered the torture he’d endured in Tartarus. Sin City, as gruesome as it could be, was a thousand times better than what lay beyond its gates.

“You want me to make him a god?”

“No.” Atalanta laughed, running her fingers up Krónos’s chest. “I want you to give him just enough darkness so he belongs to me.”

Krónos tipped his chin down. “Why?”

Her voice hardened. “Because the Argonauts stole from me what was rightfully mine. And because with him, I’ll have a better chance of finding the Orb. Your Orb. And then I’ll be able to release you from this prison your sons locked you into.” She leaned into him and whispered, “Imagine being free of this city. Of this realm. Imagine the two of us, ruling the world.”

He stopped her from kissing him with two hands on her arms. “Why do I need you?”

“Because I can leave the Underworld anytime I want. You can’t.”

He studied her so long Gryphon wasn’t sure if the Elder God was going to kiss her or tear her limb from limb. And the word Argonaut kept spinning in his head. Something about it struck him as familiar, but he couldn’t remember why.

“How do I know you won’t fuck me when you’re free?” Krónos asked.

A licentious grin curled her mouth. “I never said I wouldn’t fuck you.”

“Answer the question, Atalanta.”

“You don’t,” she said, sobering. “You’ll just have to trust me.”

“I learned not to trust a long time ago.” He let go of her, leaned back. “However, I am willing to make you a deal.”

“What kind of deal?”

He nodded toward Gryphon. “I’ll gift your doulas there with what you ask and give you six months to find the Orb and all the elements so you can free me from Tartarus. If you don’t, I’ll drag that sonofabitch back here and I’ll program that darkness inside him to drag your ass back as well. And that girl you saw in here earlier?” He leaned close. “If you don’t get me the fuck out of here, you’ll be her.”

Atalanta’s face blanched. “Six months isn’t long enough to—”

“Tantalus, come in here,” Krónos called.

A male dressed all in white with scars running down both cheeks emerged from the door to the right. “Yes, my king?”

“Bring me my glass.”

The male disappeared, then reemerged with a flat object covered with a velvet cloth. He handed the object to Krónos, bowed, and retreated through the door.

Atalanta watched with wide eyes as Krónos removed the cloth and tossed it on the desk behind him. “You have a looking glass?”

“All the better to see you with, my dear.” He waved his hand over the glass. “Show me my heart’s desire.”

Atalanta looked down at the glass and gasped. Her gaze shot toward Gryphon, then back to the glass again. “How…? I thought—”

“I had a feeling our warlock was one and the same.” He set the glass on the table behind him. “Six months. You can either take the deal, or we can strap you to the wall now.”

She shot a look at the shackles and chains mounted behind him. And for a minute, Gryphon’s chest warmed at the idea of Atalanta bound to that wall. Then the warmth dimmed, because he knew if she was strapped up there, he would be too.

Take the deal, take the deal, take the deal…

He didn’t know what the deal really was, but something inside told him it was infinitely better than letting Krónos have his way with them.

Atalanta held her hand out to the Elder God. “I accept.”

Krónos’s lips curled in a malicious grin. He closed his hand around Atalanta’s and dragged her close, trapping her between his legs. As she sucked in a surprised breath, he looked over her shoulder to where Gryphon stood, hoping—praying—to be sent from the room.

“Tell your slave to get his ass over here,” Krónos said in a low voice, his soulless eyes fixed on Gryphon. “We’re going to have a little fun, just the three of us, to seal the deal before I tether you together.”