Hell's Phoenix (32 page)

Nix didn’t take the bait of her Sybil joke. She took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly. Sugar either worked, or she’d go to Zen and demand he put her out of her misery. She couldn’t live with the dark, erotic thoughts Usha spewed. Stronger now than before entering Hell, she wouldn’t be able to withstand the urges long.

Nix reached out and brushed his knuckles across her cheek. “I don’t ever want to hunt you, Mads.” Neither did she wish for that to happen. “Don’t know that I could.”

“I promise if I ever become a danger, I’ll do myself before I force you to make that decision.” And she would, too.

Nix kissed her palm. Madison had forgotten he still held it. Chills scattered across her body. She tugged her arm free and hoped he didn’t sense her physical reaction to his simple gesture. “Nice dressing, Dr. Nix,” she said with a cheeky grin.

“Yeah,” he agreed with a snort. “Award-winning Doctor Nix at your service.”

Silence descended, lengthened, and grew. They stared at one another. Regardless of their easy banter, his countenance didn’t map to amusement. The strength of his gaze was so severe she resisted the temptation to squirm in her seat. Whatever thoughts bothered him, she wished he’d just get them off his chest already.

Madison broke eye contact first because she couldn’t take the intensity any longer. She felt naked beneath his regard and she didn’t do well when vulnerable. She tapped the bottle of liquor with a fingernail and could still feel him watching her. She needed another drink.

A drink of him
, Lynx suggested.
Letting him go to waste is a criminal felony
.

Hand shaking, she lifted the bottle to pour a hefty amount into the glass, but Nix covered the goblet. “It’ll go straight to your head, Mads. I don’t think you need more.”

“I didn’t ask what you think I need.”

“You can’t feed your Lynx sugar forever.”

“Unless my bank account goes south sometime in the next two hundred years, I have plenty of money to buy all the sugar I need.”

“Don’t varnish the truth with lies, Mads.” Her breath caught in her throat, as he extracted the liquor from her hand and sat back in his chair, with the bottle resting on his thigh. “We both know the sugar only works so long before a succubus
must
partake of the flesh.” He half filled the crystal and set the bottle aside, out of her reach. “Micah punished a succubus while I was there. She was denied sex, fed only sugar, and in less than twenty-four hours, the sugar didn’t alleviate the shakes even minimally.”

Horrified, Madison gaped at him, praying her future didn’t hold the same fate. She waited to hear more, but couldn’t bring herself to ask.

“The succubus screamed and begged for leniency. Micah offered no clemency.” It bothered her that she wanted her husband’s seraph even knowing his lack of compassion. Nix’s eyes grew dark, glazed with memory, but she didn’t encourage him to share what he withheld. “She cut herself into ribbons with her fingernails just to experience the pain. I watched that creature do other things to herself….” He shook his head, and his attention refocused on her. “It wasn’t a pretty sight, Mads. I don’t want that for you.”

Madison gulped, but what could she say? She wouldn’t be going dick-hunting to put herself out of misery. She didn’t have an unlimited supply of seraph. And she wouldn’t ask for his messian. “When I can’t deny my demon’s…needs.” She almost choked on the final word. “I’ll get Zen to put me down.”
If I can’t do it myself
.

“When Zen puts you down, I’m going after him.” He drank half the spirits from the glass and handed her the rest. “Finish it, but no more.”

“Yes, Daddy.” She smiled sweetly and he shivered. Madison accepted the glass and leaned back to drain the contents. Her head spun from the sudden movement. Maybe Nix was right and she didn’t need more. Liquor on an empty stomach never ended well.

She felt Nix shift to the front of his chair and encase the outside of her legs with the inside of his thighs. Before she could tilt her head forward to determine what he intended, he planted his mouth on her neck. A kiss in the hollow of her throat, his tongue dragged to the side where he nipped the curve between her shoulder and neck. And stubble, dear God, his whiskers electrified her flesh with erotic prickles and created pulsations in the burned sigil that couldn’t be normal.

Chapter Forty-one

Every part of Micah’s body burned, seared in a fire hotter than Hell’s inferno. Each touch, every breath, ignited freshly abraded nerves. His brother, Lucifer, prodded the hole in his chest and Micah clenched his teeth to halt his screams.

Madison hadn’t enjoyed wounding him, that’d been obvious. She’d cried. A beautiful sight, since those tears were for him. Victory teased his fingers, if only he lived to grasp it.

There’d been a time he’d speculated Madison would always remain the docile, Southern church-mouse he nurtured throughout life and then married. Supreme arm candy, yes, but she’d been obedient and never questioned his authority. Even when she should have. Not the type of Queen he’d wanted for his kingdom, but he loved her still. He adored her imperfections, even as they had frustrated him.

But a woman that could look her husband in the eye and ram a knife into his heart and twist for maximum damage…that
was
the Queen he’d envisioned. And she’d done it only to prove she could defeat him.

“Where’d she get the dragon blade?” Lucifer stuffed his finger to the knuckle inside the injury.

“Kur!” Micah rasped out, biting his cheek. Fuck! Did Luke have to do that? He swore his eviscerated heart pumped around the digit.

“Micah, if you die, I’m going after the bitch.” Elias’s upper lip curled at the depth of his hatred.

“No!” Micah fisted his brother’s shirt, panic twisting his gut more painfully than the hole in his chest. “I love her. Fucking proud of her. She didn’t wish to harm me; we were fighting only to see who would be the victor.”

“That what she said?” He nodded at Elias’s question. “That shit was spewed so she could defeat you. You fell for the oldest routine in history,
zkihtak
.”

Micah choked, spit up blood, and reiterated. “I love her beyond immortality. Vow to me you’ll leave her be, Elias.”

“How did Kur escape the cage?” Lucifer’s tone remained bland, unconcerned with Madison’s survival.

“Madison released the dragons,” Elias snarled.

No doubt with Zennyo Ryuo’s aid
. Micah groaned and couldn’t believe he would die on a slab of granite in a domain of his making. He wouldn’t tell his brothers Madison wore one of the Scrolls of Cursed Souls. That’d be her secret if he died. If he survived…he strangled on laughter.

“Be still,” Lucifer commanded.

Micah coughed up more blood and its thick wetness spewed all over his face and neck. Lucifer held him against the ceremonial slab with a hand to his shoulder. If he survived her attempt to murder him, his Queen was primed with power to assist him in dominating the world. She’d murdered Pandora without a stitch of remorse and held command over Zennyo Ryuo’s pet dragons. Not to mention the Lynx she’d become. Colossal power at her fingertips and he’d bet his kingdom
her
pet immortal wouldn’t offer to train her to use them. Zennyo Ryuo’s mistake would be Micah’s gain.

“I vow to you, brother.” Elias reminded him of their conversation as he pried Micah’s hand off his shirt. Micah sighed with relief, but Elias finished with, “If you die, the bitch will suffer at my hands for a long fucking time.”

A vow among them served as a blood covenant.

Helpless to stop Elias if he died, he turned to the only brother who might offer assistance. “Luke, you understand how perfect she’s become.”

“Indeed. Madison’s a polished gem among unrefined stones. A woman that possesses the audacity to do what she’s done could force a world to its knees without suffering a hangnail. That hinges upon your success of altering her stance, of course. But….” Lucifer ripped Micah’s shirt open. “Eliel made you a vow. I won’t stand in the way of what’s in his heart.”

Always their real names fell from Lucifer’s lips.

Tears blurred his vision and siphoned along his cheeks. “She’ll die anyway, Elias.” He hiccupped and gasped as the jarring motion ripped a new string of fire from his chest straight to his head. “Our marriage covenant guarantees that outcome.”

A hazy blackness narrowed his vision, but he focused on Elias’s face.

“That won’t be enough suffering for what she’s done to you.”

With the level of hatred reflected on Elias’s face, there would be no altering his mind.

Lucifer slammed his hand over the wound on his chest. Micah grunted, but realized no pain came that time. “Welcome to the power of prayers, brother.” Lucifer launched power into his chest so fast Micah could have believed a cannonball struck him. Another jolt of supersonic energy jerked him on the granite slab as if he were hooked to jumper cables.

His heart flatlined. Silence boomed so loud his eardrums vibrated. The two together coupled for the strangest feeling he’d ever encountered.

He greeted the final moments of his life with little care to his outcome. It bothered him that he had no idea what would happen to Madison when she passed.

With toes and fingers stinging, he expected death to be harder to endure than the irritation of his flesh. The tickling spread to his elbows and knees as Lucifer jammed him with another blast. He didn’t flinch from the second detonation, but his entire body went numb in an instant.

Not working, brother
. He didn’t try to speak the words, Lucifer would realize his failure soon enough.

A final breath exited his lungs, like the eerie scream of a ghoul.
Breath of death
. Blood bubbled over his mouth, ran down his cheeks and chin. Micah closed his eyes, not wishing to see the hatred in Eliel’s gaze for the woman he still adored.

His final vow before death claimed him:
I love you beyond time, kitten
.

Chapter Forty-two

Her self-control on the verge of meltdown, Madison blindly set the empty glass on the table. In her haste, she must have missed because it hit the floor. Made from high-quality crystal, the goblet didn’t shatter, but rent a high-pitched scream of protest.

Madison tangled her fingers in Nix’s hair, forced her body to cooperate and pull his head back instead of anchor it to her. She couldn’t sputter any words out, and only scant breaths entered her lungs. The erotic press of his palms inched along the tops of her thighs, and her fingers tightened in his hair. Thankfully, she wore jeans so she didn’t suffer skin-on-skin contact.

He kissed her chin and slowly his gaze dragged up to meet hers. “I wanted to see if you tasted as good as the tequila.”

The first question that snagged in her mind was, ‘
And
?’, but she didn’t dare utter the word aloud. Suicide to make such a brazen query.

Nix must have read the question in her eyes, however, because he responded. “You taste better. More intoxicating.” That did
not
help calm the desires burning inside her. “I wonder….” he said.

“
Don’t
wonder.”

Not an invitation, but a plea for him to take a different path. Had the words come out stronger than a whisper, Nix might not have interpreted them as an enticement. The sudden connection of his lips against hers was a lethal cocktail of skimming flesh and mingled breaths. Eyes open, he watched her and the boundary lines of needs too long deprived shattered inside her.

Madison’s lids fluttered shut, longing for him to increase the tempo of the breathy embrace. He didn’t. Instead he left her white-knuckling the cliff of desire.

Want more, need more of him
, the succubus chimed.

Just one kiss can’t go bad, right
? she replied.

Succubus laughed a throaty sound as Madison leaned into him, mashing her lips against his with a sigh. Her response must have been what he waited for because he groaned, and deepened their connection immediately, parting her mouth and plunging his tongue inside.

Dueling desperation twisted through her. She wanted him to stop, but needed him to continue. She gripped his hair tighter and indulged in the forbidden embrace as if it were stolen manna from Heaven. She tasted the liquor on his tongue, but the man affected her libido more. Jesus, Nix tasted so much better than any sugar-high she could induce.

“Nix.” Her heart rammed against her ribs painfully. If she died from overexertion, it would be his fault.

He must have been encouraged by her reaction because his hands scrubbed upward and clamped on her hips. He snatched her out of her chair and dragged her across his lap.

Nix guided her until she straddled his pelvis, with her feet flat against the floor. The dynamic contact of his jean-clad erection against her pussy fucked up her demon in a bad, bad way.

Desperate to put some distance between their intimate poses, Madison slammed her hands down on the back of his chair and tried to gain liftoff with her feet. Nix must have realized her intent, because his hands shifted over her buttocks and curled around the backs of her thighs. He lifted her knees upward, forcing her to remain seated against his erection as he settled fully into his chair.

A rush of wetness hit the pocket that cradled Nix’s pelvis. Usha whimpered, begged for more, and Madison held onto her demonic subterfuge by a weak thread of control. Frantic to end the potency of his kiss, she twisted her head to the side and squeezed the chair until her fingertips tingled.

No…no…no
…. She tried to utter the words aloud, but only a hoarse unidentifiable groan came out.

His fingers weeded into her hair, his palm cupped the back of her head, and he turned her face toward him. He caught her gaze for a dozen heartbeats. Holding her eyes, he lowered his mouth to hers again. Once more his lips parted hers with ease and his tongue aggressively sought hers out of hiding. If she hadn’t been so weak, she could’ve resisted.

Madison groaned into his mouth. He kissed so much better than chocolate tasted. His hips rotated with a languid move that rolled the hard length of his shaft against her, a delightful tease to her succubus that was full-on ready to play.