Chapter Twelve
Athens
The sun slashes across my face like a blade, too bright, too cheery, too fucking intrusive. But oddly, I don’t hate it. After days of shadow and silence, its heat feels earned. Like a bruise I get to keep.
I blink into the light, stretch…and immediately realize I’m not alone. I’m cocooned, pinned between two bodies that own me in very different ways.
Hard muscle. Scorching skin. The scent of sex and danger baked into the sheets.
Karter and Wyck.
They’ve made a habit of caging me like this. I haven’t protested once.
I tilt my head. Both of them are already awake, watching me like they’ve been doing it for hours.
“How long have you two been staring at me like creeps?” My voice is sandpaper and sleep.
Wyck smirks lazily. “Long enough to memorize every breath you take.”
I blink slower. His arms open. I fall into them without hesitation. His chest is a furnace I willingly burn inside.
Karter stretches behind me, voice thick with humor. “You snore when you’re knocked out, just so you know. It’s cute… annoying, but cute.”
“Liar.” I glare.
“Nope. Confirmed.” Wyck adds, brushing my hair back. “Now get up, Little Fox. The world’s still burning, and we’ve got things to torch today.”
His words make my chest flutter. I’ve been drowning in my own mind lately, but that spark, that spark feels like something I can chase.
“What if I said I just want to stay wrapped up in this bed with you two forever?” I tease, shifting slightly but not moving to rise.
“That can be arranged,” Karter growls, gripping my waist and dragging me back against him. The bed trembles beneath us.
Wyck sighs, the commander in the trio. “Karter.”
“I’m listening.”
“No, you’re not.”
“We all want to rot in this bed, Wyck. But someone’s gotta pull the trigger first.”
Wyck swings his legs out and stands, stretching like a wolf after a fresh kill. “Get dressed. Both of you. The day won’t wait, and neither will what’s coming.”
He disappears into the bathroom without another word.
Karter drags his hands up and down my spine, voice soft but loaded. “You up for more chaos, Brat?”
“I don’t know…” My voice trails. “I still have a thousand unanswered questions clawing at my throat.”
He tilts his head, studying me. “Then read the journals. Confront Josie. And you already know you need to deal with Gaia and her loud-ass opinions.”
I roll my eyes. “Do I have to?”
“Stop whining,” he bites. “And get your spoiled ass up.”
Instead, he yanks me into his arms, forcing my legs to wrap around his waist as he spins us in a slow, dizzying circle. I laugh, but it’s laced with something hungrier than joy.
When he finally stops, I kiss him. It’s sharp. Sweet. Laced with heat.
“Karter…” I purr, rolling my hips against the hard bulge between us. “Maybe we don’t have to leave just yet. Maybe you can take me somewhere else and fuck the answers out of me instead.”
His growl is a low, unholy sound. “Don’t tempt me, Brat.”
But I already am.
In a single, filthy motion, he drops his shorts, lines himself up, and sinks me down over the thick, pulsing length of him.
He doesn't wait for permission.
The moment the head of his cock breaches me, his head falls back. A groan rips through him like he’s been starved for centuries.
“Fuck, Athens.”
He lays me back down, doesn’t bother being gentle. One thrust. Two. And I’m unraveling. Screaming his name through gritted teeth as he fucks me straight into the mattress and into oblivion.
“Karter, Karter, Karter.” I gasp. My breath’s gone, but I still try to steal his when his mouth crashes into mine.
His arms cage me. “I could lose myself in you.”
I wish he would.
“I wish we could stay like this all day,” he whispers against my lips. “But we can’t. So get up before Wyck comes back and tries to bury me for touching you without him.”
I pout. “Let him catch us. Maybe then he’ll finally fuck me instead of just threatening to.”
He growls again. “Don’t pout unless you want that lip bitten clean off.” He rolls out of bed, dragging me with him like he owns my body, and maybe he does.
“Move, Brat.”
“Fine,” I mutter. “But I won’t like it.”
He grins. “You’ll learn to.”
They pamper me like I’m royalty.
Not the kind with a tiara and tea parties, no, the kind worshipped in blood and silk, held up on the altar of five Devils who’d destroy the world before letting anyone else have me.
The day starts slow. Lavish.
Karter hands me my coffee like it’s a chalice meant for sin. Iced venti oat milk brown sugar espresso. Cold, sweet, and addictive, like his tongue when he’s got it buried between my thighs.
He smirks as I sip. “Your favorite, Little Fox.”
He’s the only one with a drink as frilly as mine. Wyck glares at the whipped cream like it insulted his lineage. Black coffee for the rest. No sugar. No warmth. Just bitterness and burn, how they like their mornings.
From there, it’s a shopping spree no sane woman would survive. But I’m no ordinary woman. And these men? They dress me like a doll they plan to ruin.
Each of them takes their time picking out what they want to see me in, what they want to rip off.
Wyck’s choice is predictable. Blood-red.
Conservative from behind, deviant in front.
A long, sleeveless dress that grazes my knees but plunges at the neckline.
My breasts are practically begging to fall out.
He doesn’t want anyone seeing my skin… unless it's my tits, and then? That’s his personal billboard.
His silent way of saying, touch her and die screaming.
Karter, always the exhibitionist, chooses a pleated pink mini skirt and a tight white blouse that clings to my chest like a second skin. He throws in hot pink heels just to fuck with me. “You’ve got legs that could strangle a man,” he growls in my ear. “Let them try.”
Wells? He’s a contradiction. A pale blue romper, soft and innocent…
until you notice the cut so deep you can see the swell of my nipples beneath.
He kneels in the dressing room, slides his hand beneath the hem and says, “No panties with this one.” His fingers brush my folds and then stop.
“Just enough to drive you crazy.” He walks out with a smirk, leaving me wrecked. Classic orgasm denial. Sadistic fuck.
Dash keeps it casual, black shorts, a Sleep Token tee, and worn-in black Chucks. Simple. But when I try it on, he pulls me into the mirror, his fingers splayed across my ass. “Comfort’s dangerous on a girl like you. Makes it easier to let your guard down. Makes it easier for me to devour you.”
Onyx, quiet chaos that he is, mirrors Dash’s energy with his own twist, tiny, frayed denim shorts and a faded Harry Potter tank top.
Yellow flip-flops. The outfit screams innocence.
The look in his eyes when he hands it to me says otherwise.
He doesn’t talk much, but when he does, it’s to command.
“Bend over in this and I’ll forget we’re in public. ”
They’re all leg men, clearly. But mostly, they’re mine.
I fucking hate shopping, but somehow they make it feel like foreplay, each outfit tailored not for the world, but for their hands. Their eyes. Their ownership.
Afterward, they take me to a nail salon.
A damn nail salon.
I expect them to drop me off, maybe lurk outside like predators on a leash. But no, they file in behind me, black-clad and dangerous, like the salon’s just another battlefield.
I sit. They sit. No one dares say a word to us.
The silence is golden. Sacred. And laced with tension.
When I tear up, just a little, they pretend not to see it. But Karter does more than pretend. He slides into the seat beside me and says, “Hot pink. For both of us.” And he means it.
The technician’s hand trembles.
Dash stares at Karter’s toes like they’ve betrayed him. “Seriously?”
Karter shrugs, smug as hell. “If she wants it, she gets it.”
I can barely breathe. “Thank you, Karter.”
He pulls my face toward him, presses a kiss to my lips like it’s a brand. “Always, Brat.”
“Anybody hungry?” he asks, like he didn’t just make every soul in the salon shift uncomfortably.
“Hell yeah,” the others echo.
Because even Devils need to eat.
And right now?
So do I.
The day’s winding down. Sun low, shadows long. But just when I think we’re headed home, Wyck veers the truck off the main road and into the parking lot of IKEA like he’s chasing a target.
“What are we doing here?” I ask, watching the sharp jerk of his wrists as he swings into a spot on two wheels. The engine dies, and the silence that follows is louder than the music that had been playing seconds ago.
“Furniture,” he says. That one word is all I get before he’s out, slamming the driver’s side door shut like a statement.
Furniture? From IKEA?
He rounds the truck with that hungry look he wears too well, yanks my door open, and unbuckles my seatbelt like I’m his to command, which, I guess, I am. Not that I fight it. Not tonight. I let him pull me out and steady me on my feet before I’ve even caught up to the decision.
If he says we need furniture, then I guess we do.
And for once, I don’t push back. No sarcasm. No fight. Just me, surrendering to the moment, to him. Maybe it’s exhaustion. Maybe it's relief. Or maybe I’ve just stopped pretending I’m not enjoying this, being wanted like a possession. Protected like a queen. Owned like a secret.
Fuck the consequences.
If this is wrong, I don’t want right.
“You hear that?” Karter’s voice cuts in, sharp and slick with amusement as he slides in on my other side. “Silence. Goddamn, that’s sexy.”
He offers his hand, grinning like the devil he is. “You listening to us? Letting us take care of shit without a fight? Total fucking turn-on.”
“Cool it,” Wyck growls, his hand already gripping mine like he owns the bones beneath my skin. “We’ve got shit to do.”