Goddess isles boxed set, p.91
Goddess Isles Boxed Set, page 91
Drake’s applause filled my ears, his laughter sent sickness washing through me. “Thanks for proving my point, Jinx.” Snapping his fingers again, he barked, “Bring her back here. Don’t shoot my brother.”
It was the worst pain imaginable being torn from Sully’s body. Removed from his heat, his power, his love. Our eyes locked, even as I was dragged away and shoved back into my position in front of Drake.
Sully hadn’t spoken a word, almost as if he couldn’t remember how to articulate, too consumed with the feral savagery of ripping out his brother’s throat. His nostrils flared with every breath. He never surrendered even as the three guards once again dug their guns into the back of his head, making him fold over his knees.
Jealousy padded toward me and Drake, the only one of us with some margin of freedom. She stopped beside me, staring at Drake with a coldness I’d never seen on her. A familiar hate that said she’d known men like Drake before. That she’d endured her own torment and come out the other side intact.
Her voice snipped with disgust. “I’m tired. I’m hungry. I’m not feeling very well, and I’m sure I speak on behalf of both my master and my friend that no one wants any more bloodshed.”
“Jealousy...” Sully growled. “Shut up.”
She didn’t look at him, keeping her stare pinned on Drake. “Sullivan won’t be cooperative, no matter how many guns you point at him. He only cares about Eleanor, so unless you’ve figured out how to work Euphoria on your own, you need someone else to help you.”
“Jess!” Sully bellowed.
Oh, God, what is she doing?
Drake smirked. “And I suppose you know how his virtual reality works?”
Jealousy flicked me a look, hiding her loyalty or her deception, I didn’t know. “I do. Sullivan regularly trusted me to load a guest’s program and insert a goddess into his VR.”
My heart hammered as I whispered, “Jealousy, please...”
“I’ll show you. I’ll load you safely into any program already cyphered by Sullivan...if you promise to leave Jinx alive once you’ve had her.”
Sully stayed silent, his anger pulsing behind me.
Drake snickered. “And why would you do that? You’re in love with her too?”
“She’s my friend. I don’t want her to die just because you have a feud with your brother.”
“Jealousy...Jess.” I reached with my unbound hands, touching hers. “He’ll kill all of us, or make us wish he had. Don’t bargain with him—”
“Done,” Drake snapped. Reaching for Jealousy’s rope, he released her and smirked. “Show me.”
Jealousy swallowed hard and padded toward the cupboards hiding the trolleys stocked with sensors and reality distorters. Sully groaned under his breath as she wheeled one toward me and flicked me an unreadable look.
What the hell is she doing?
“Jinx...” Her voice cracked, but she arched her chin and cleared her throat. “Can you remove your dress...please?”
Sully snarled, “For fuck’s sake—”
“Quiet, unless you want another hole in your leg,” Drake yelled. He waved his hand at Jealousy. “Continue. I like where this is going.”
I shuddered as Jealousy moved toward me, resting her hands on my shoulders and plucking at the straps of my dress. Her lips touched my ear; her whisper slipped into my being. “Please...just trust me.”
Whipping back, I narrowed my eyes. I needed to know what she had planned. What was her end goal? What did she think this would achieve other than Sully’s last life force on the floor?
Her hazel gaze held no secrets or sins as she stared at me with imploring need, risking herself so I would risk accepting her help.
Slowly, I nodded and gathered the hem of my dress. Without a word, I pulled it over my head. I had nothing on underneath. I’d left Sully’s shores in this dress. And I’d returned within it. Now, I stood naked in front of too many men and a woman I didn’t entirely have faith in.
Drake sucked in a breath. All the men did.
Sully growled, and my nipples pebbled with nervousness.
Jealousy didn’t pause. Grabbing the earbud box, she quickly adorned me with the hearing deceptors. Her hands quick and feminine compared to Sully’s possessive paws.
I bit my lip as she ran the scent stick under my nose, stuck fingerprint pads into place and struggled to be as gentle as she could placing lenses into my eyes.
Sully made a noise as I bent my head back, permitting her to obscure my vision and prepare my sight to see a different world than this one. At least these lenses weren’t tampered with. At least I still saw, if through an unwanted film.
Drake crossed his arms as he studied everything Jealousy did. A student learning a topic he wanted to excel at so he could steal every original idea and copyrighted magic from his brother.
I stiffened as Jealousy tipped oil into her palms and caught my gaze. With our eyes locked, she rubbed the silky liquid into my chest, over my breasts, along the planes of my stomach and then ducked to rub over my hips, thighs, and legs.
I couldn’t help it.
I glanced over at Sully, jolting on the spot as I caught his hungry stare.
Even with disaster surrounding us and monsters threatening to ruin us, he still cherished me. He still thirsted for me, wanted me, and couldn’t prevent his body’s obsession with mine. He bit his bottom lip, his stare touching me in intimate places, his presence preparing me for sex even though it wouldn’t be with him.
I hate this!
I hated that I had no way to stop this. I hated that a woman stroked my skin and not him. I hated that, unlike the other times I’d been inserted into a fantasy...this time, it wouldn’t be Sully. It wouldn’t be the man I loved hiding behind a mask and lies.
I couldn’t look anymore.
Dropping my stare, I balled my hands as Jealousy finished coating my back in oil, then dropped the empty bottle on the trolley and wiped her hands with a cloth. “She’s ready.”
“Not quite.” Drake smiled a wolfish, rabies-infected grin. “My turn.”
Jealousy huffed but obediently opened fresh boxes of supplies.
“Not you,” Drake sniffed. “Her.” Taking my hands, he placed my palms against this chest.
I shivered with revulsion.
“Undress me, Goddess Jinx.”
“Christ, stop!” Sully fought the three guards blocking him in a blast of power and fury.
For a second, he won. He stood and shoved two men to the ground.
But his victory was short-lived, paying for his outburst with heavy punches to his head and kicks to his already injured body. Falling back to his knees, he groaned as Drake pinned his nasty stare on me. “Undress me, or I shoot him.”
Jealousy murmured, “I’ll do it—”
“No, she will.” Drake let my hands go, cocking his head to see what I’d do.
Jealousy’s hiss mimicked the one snaking around my chest—sick frustration that men could dictate our existence. Inhaling hard, I kept my chin high even though my heart was one giant mess of gristle and grief.
“Don’t be a martyr, Eleanor,” Drake murmured. “Don’t think you can cause mischief and stop this. Do as I say, and everyone stays alive tonight.” Planting his hands on my naked waist, he smiled. “You’ll prefer me, I guarantee it.”
“Doubt it. I find you repulsive.”
His eye twitched beneath the perfectionism of Botox. “You’ll change your mind. Now, undress me. Otherwise, Sully can have a few fingers removed. For every delay you cause, he’ll lose an appendage. I need him alive...not intact.”
Everything he said aimed to break me. Every part of him thought he could crush me into his control.
No.
Just no.
I didn’t just find him repulsive, I found him lacking in every way.
He’s nothing.
Just like those traffickers.
Just like Scott.
Nothing.
And he’s standing in the way of everything.
I didn’t beg.
I didn’t cry.
I didn’t run.
Sully...
I ripped off Drake’s t-shirt like he was a naughty toddler and I was his mother about to spank him.
Drake grinned like a bastard as I yanked at his belt and unzipped his jeans. “Like what you see, Sullivan? Her hands are fucking Viagra.”
Sully jerked and fought so hard, another guard found himself on his ass with a punch to his nose. The other two men leaped on Sully, once again beating him, striking him—
“Stop it!” I yelled.
The men stopped, leaving Sully breathing hard on his knees with his hands bound and blood soaking brighter through his bandage. “I’m fine, Sully.” I pulled down Drake’s trousers and boxer shorts with no emotion whatsoever. “He has the smallest cock I’ve ever seen.”
Sully groaned.
Drake slapped me.
I spun to the side with his violence, wincing against his finger thorns and poisonous palm.
“You’ll regret that,” he hissed, kicking off his boots and stepping out of his jeans. He didn’t care four guards and his brother saw him naked. He didn’t care those same guards drooled as they looked at me, bulges in their pants disgustingly obvious.
What was his plan here?
Did he honestly think he could insert himself into Euphoria and the guards wouldn’t try to join in? That they would stand by like good little soldiers all while he fucked me?
My skin went snowy cold.
If he gave me elixir, I’d be a temptation too hard to ignore.
I wouldn’t care who joined.
Was that why Jealousy had been included?
To be the distraction while their boss got his kink on?
Drake grabbed my hair, dragging me closer and shaking me. “Sensors, Jinx. I’m sick of waiting.”
Every second I could prolong this gave more time for help to arrive.
Had the boat captain called the police? Had my dad done what I’d asked?
“Fuck it.” Drake grabbed the earbuds and stuffed them into his ears, followed by a quick slash of nasal scrambler under his nose. Fumbling with the lenses, he awkwardly plopped one over his right pupil and then his left. Squinting against the discomfort, he shoved a bottle of oil into my hands. “Do it.”
Jealousy glanced at me, her chest heaving in her black bikini. She seemed wound up, like a music box cranked too tight, the fragile ballerina about to dance into suicide.
Why did she look so tense?
What scenario ran through her mind while mine continued to fumble for a solution?
She nodded at me once, her eyes flaring with encouragement.
Ignoring the laceration in my heart, my stare found its way back to Sully. He’d been forced to bend deeper from three guns wedged against the back of his skull.
Dammit!
I wanted to drown Drake in the cursed oil. I wanted to pour it over his head and then set him alight.
“Fuck, you’re disobedient.” Snatching the bottle, Drake poured the entire contents into my hands then slapped my touch on his naked chest, forcing me to rub it in.
I recoiled.
Sully growled.
And Drake commanded the guard trapping Jealousy and me, “Grab the vials and my brother’s cell phone from my pocket.” He raised his eyebrow at the floor where his clothes were strewn.
The man ducked and fossicked through his pockets, coming up with a cell phone and three tiny vials of sorcery.
“Give them to her.” He pointed at Jealousy.
Jealousy took the offered gifts. The second her fingers curled around elixir, a darkness fell over her. A shadow that seemed to suck her down into whatever trickery she’d planned.
“Load a program,” Drake snapped.
“What do you want?” she asked quietly, carefully, her thumb flitting over the phone and bringing up the app I’d seen Sully use.
Sully’s growl filled the room. “You do this, Jess, and I’ll kill you myself.”
She ignored him, scrolling through fantasies. “Underwater? Flying? Sacrifice? Forbidden sibling? Abusive teacher? Shared woman? S and M club?”
“That one,” Drake nodded, licking his lips, his cock swelling with anticipation. “BDSM with as many toys as possible.”
Jealousy swallowed hard and nodded, pressing a line of code and flinching as a ‘Load’ button popped up. “It’s ready.”
Drake smiled like the devil. “Pass me the elixir.”
“Don’t you fucking dare!” Sully snarled. “Have Jealousy, the traitor. Fuck her. Take her however you want. Just leave Eleanor—”
Jealousy fisted all three vials, carefully placing one into Drake’s eager palm.
She caught my gaze.
I bared my teeth.
She shrugged slightly, but instead of apology, I saw fierce determination.
Had she hated me all along?
Had this been her plan?
To become indispensable to someone who would keep her? Who would put her in the position of power she’d told me she always wanted? The gatekeeper of hallucinations and madam of trapped goddesses.
Betrayal burned through me. “How could you—”
“Time to play, Jinx.” Drake grabbed me, wrapping his hand around my nape and jerking me into him. Our bare flesh slicked together with oil. His hard cock pressed against my belly.
No!
I squirmed and fought.
It wasn’t enough.
He fed the nasty, abominable bottle past my lips.
I fought harder.
Fuck, I fought.
He tipped it upside down.
Elixir splashed onto my tongue with its nauseous takeover.
I turned wild.
I kicked and scratched, punched and struck.
“Christ!” Sully’s howl filled my ears.
I tried to spit out the fragrant sugary drug.
I hit him.
I kicked him.
I almost got free.
But he was Sully’s brother after all, and he did exactly what Sully had done to me at the beginning of our story.
His palm slapped over my mouth.
His fingers pinched my nose.
He suffocated me...
killed me...
destroyed me...
“Fuck this!” Sully’s roar bounced off the walls. A gunshot rang. A bang ricocheted.
Greyness drowned me.
Lungs clawed me.
I had no choice.
I gagged.
I moaned.
I swallowed.
Chapter Twenty-Five
I WAS A SCIENTIST—not because I’d been born into the lineage, but because I had an obsessive need to chase the impossible. I didn’t accept that a human body was at its full capacity in its current pathetic state.
I believed we were a battery—a machine working at thirty percent—and all we needed was a compound or chemical...something to trigger a new state of being. A stronger state, an invincible state.
Medical advances had gotten me closer to that goal.
Trials and failures had inched me closer to achieving what no one else had before.
But it was fury that shattered the threshold of evolution.
Seeing Drake touch her.
Drug her.
Rub his cock on her.
Yeah, it was the best narcotic, stimulant, and biological enhancement I fucking needed.
Three men were nothing.
Their weapons were nothing.
Life was fucking nothing if he hurt her.
My body moved of its own accord, sweeping from kneeling to standing and choreographing a war that I disassociated with.
My entire mind and whole heart were already across the room with Eleanor. I didn’t feel the crunch of my knuckles as they ploughed into someone’s face. I didn’t hear the crack of their bones as I kicked a man’s ribs and sent him sprawling to the floor.
I didn’t feel their retaliation or the stitches pulling my flesh, nor the hot gush of fresh blood.
My eyes had found their target.
Drake.
Motherfucking Drake.
He fought Eleanor as she turned into a cyclone in his arms. She scratched and clawed, she screamed and went crazed, knowing as well as I did that she had a few short minutes to get away. A few measly minutes to run before she’d spread her legs, welcome the devil, and fuck whichever man would have her.
No.
A simple word. A ruthless voice in my mind.
No!
She’s mine.
A bullet zinged past, missing me by a fraction.
I shoved my bound fists into a guard’s neck, making him gag for air.
I fell to my knees as two men landed on my back, crushing me.
My eyesight still flickered with black clouds and grey paint. Shadows danced over clarity, leaving my other senses working at maximum. My sight had returned in spurts, teasing me with slow recovery.
But even lacking vision, I was still dangerous.
Tritec licked through my blood, granting false power, making me otherworldly in my strength.
Shoving the two guards off me, I round-housed one and sucker-punched the other. I didn’t wait to see if they’d fall. I strode toward Drake holding my woman, snarls tumbling from my throat, sounding exactly like the wolf I was nicknamed for back in society.
Drake’s naked cock branded her back as she struggled in his embrace.
I would kill him slowly.
Painfully.
I crouched and prepared to attack, but Jealousy moved, inserting something into her ears, catching my sniper attention.
Crimson fog descended over my broken vision.
Her!
She betrayed me.
Betrayed Eleanor.
Betrayed Cal.
She deserves to die.
I ran for her instead.
A mercenary grappled me to the floor.
I spun onto my back and fought him, striking his nose and snapping gristle before he could wrap his hands around my throat. He choked on blood, and I kicked him away. I shot to my feet again; no injured leg or half sight would stop me from killing Jessica Long and making her pay.
