Chapter 40
FORTY
GEMMA
So this was the Underworld—not the glamour they sold to my friends for a thousand dollars a bottle or the illusion that had girls and boys lining up at the bottom of the stairs—the real Underworld.
Everyone was in black tie, wearing inky, muted colors like scales.
I glanced down at my pink dress.
You look like bait.
I followed Grim with Lock and Raze at my back. I didn’t know where Wraith had gone—this place was almost entirely shadows—he could’ve been anywhere.
The Underworld—the real Underworld, apparently—was a wicked Greek bacchanal, complete with dancing on pedestals next to ancient columns sweeping up to the skeleton vault ceilings.
It was shirtless men adorned with golden black horns, and girls with only diamonds covering their breasts, rubbing against each other as they danced.
Every movement was sensual, leaden, like a silk scarf caught on a breeze.
Grim wound through bodies, and something overcame me. I began to feel leaden as well. I blinked, trying to steady myself. The flames blurred and slowed, and in front of me, Lock seemed to grow taller, more shadowy.
You okay, princess?
“Did you say something?” My voice sounded underwater.
Lock didn’t turn around.
Dancing stilled, heads turning to watch us as we walked by. In the shadows, thick-lashed cat eyes stared, illuminated by the burn of a cigarette.
At first I thought they were watching the Horsemen, but no, they were looking at me. Hair pricked the back of my neck. I was used to being watched—I was a Crowne, after all—but this was something else. There was a glimmering in their eyes I couldn’t decipher.
But the feeling, yeah, I caught that. I was a cow walking into a slaughterhouse.
We turned left—right into a naked woman arching on a black chaise. Over her curved belly, the tips of golden black horns were visible. As we continued to pass, I saw why. A demon had buried his face between her thighs. She gripped his horns, pressing him deeper into her.
But right before he was to obey and bury himself into her, he jerked his head to the side and locked eyes with me. His eyes were white—no black at all.
Lock yanked me forward into his blue glare. “What did we say about looking?”
He didn’t let me answer.
Every society has a hierarchy—a caste. It wasn’t hard to see where people fell if you took a moment to look. Even in the Underworld, people betrayed themselves.
The important people, whoever they were, stuck to the balconies, veiled and much less crowded.
And then there were doors, stuck behind massive Grecian pillars. Those were guarded. The very important people must be behind those.
The Horsemen walked through the doors, and we entered a circular room featuring a raised floor with an ornate, black wingback.
“Stay here and don’t move.” Before I could say anything to that, Grim gripped my neck, forcing my eyes to his. “If you don’t act like you’re mine, I’ll have to show that you’re mine. Got it?”
“Am I?” It slipped out before I could stop it. “Yours, that is.”
He thumbed my tattoo, his brush sending a shiver of sweet pain. His eyes softened slightly, and I saw something in his eyes, a glimpse of the boy behind Grim. As quickly as the softness came, it vanished back into iron.
They left, disappearing back into the party.
Not after Vander?
As I sat against the wall with nothing to do, Zabby’s words came front and center.
And why did Grim still have my book?
The room was packed, but no one was mingling. In fact, it was eerily silent. The sensual music from outside muffled. I heard something, though—moans. They seemed to seep from the walls.
In the center of the room was an empty chair.
That wasn’t quite right—a throne. It was breathtaking, ghostly, and ornate.
It was made of black scales. Onyx snakes wound up the arms, arching over the cresting back, their eyes a brilliant white.
There was also something written along the back crest in gold, but I couldn’t read it from so far away.
“How’s that tattoo treating you?”
I turned at the familiar voice.
Prince HSOG—who, I realized, I still didn’t know his actual name—leaned casually on his arm against the wall, like this was normal.
“Isn’t it obvious?” I tilted my head. “It’s great. I’m getting out, meeting new people.”
He smiled. But it was like he knew something I didn’t. I wanted to ask him so badly what he knew, but I worried that if I did, I would give up all my cards.
So I kept playing pretend.
“Are you going to tell me how someone like you keeps showing up in a world like this?”
“How do you know it’s not the other way around? Maybe someone like me keeps showing up in your world.” He stepped closer, my back against the wall. Over his shoulder I saw heads had turned, watching us.
“I don’t think you’re allowed to touch me,” I said.
He put his hand beside my head. “That so—”
“This looks cozy.”
From behind the prince Grim’s smoky voice edged. The prince stared at me a long time, too long for when someone like Grim is at your back. He gave me a wolfish smile, then stood up.
“Grim.” The prince turned to face him, all playful humor gone.
I slid along the side of the wall, trying to put distance between me and HSOG. I braced for whatever Grim was going to do. He’d nearly killed someone for just speaking to me.
Instead, Grim just smiled, a deeply vicious and terrifying smile. “I’m trying to figure out what part of off fucking limits wasn’t clear.”
“Funny thing about prey, Grim,” Prince HSOG said, taking a step to Grim. “Leave it alone too long and someone else takes the first bite.”
“Someone will crack their teeth on that bite.”
A weird tension threaded between them. I wasn’t an idiot. I knew I was the prey in this metaphor.
The prince threw a look over his shoulder, giving me a smile. “See you next time, Gemma.”
I watched him walk into the crowd, and then it was just me and Grim…well, me, Grim, and a mansion full of people. Though they were just feet away from us, they didn’t look in our direction.
Grim stepped to me, caging me against the wall.
“I warned you, Gemma.” He slid down my body, eyes locked on mine. Hungry.
I barely had a second to register Grim on his knees before the meaning of what he said hit me.
I’ll have to prove you’re mine.
He was going to eat me out, here, in public. I put my hands on his shoulders, trying to move him.
“I didn’t do anything,” I said. “He talked to me.”
I fisted his hair, pulling him off me, and a vicious, inhuman sound escaped him. His eyes flashed to mine, determined. In this moment, it wasn’t about proving something, he just wanted this.
Hands slid around the backs of my thighs, up to my ass. Grim fisted and kneaded the flesh, pressing a hot kiss to the inside of my thigh.
“People will see,” I whispered, fight draining from my body.
“No one will dare look at you,” he said against my flesh.
I looked back out to the sea of people. They still weren’t watching, but it felt like they were fully paying attention, even as they spoke to their neighbor.
Grim slowly peeled off my panties. All care in the world. As if it were just the two of us and not whatever the fuck this place was.
A different kind of panic hit me. The kind reserved for being a perfect, beautiful doll.
I gripped his shoulder. “I haven’t showered yet.”
“Good,” he growled, and then his lips were on my flesh.
I almost buckled at the sensation. As if sensing that, his hands tightened on my ass.
“You taste so fucking good,” he groaned against me.
He grazed his teeth along my lips and lightly tugged. This time I did buckle, but his tight grip held me up. I looked over his head, to the crowd. In the middle of hundreds of heads studiously avoiding us, the prince stood.
“He’s looking,” I gasped.
For a brief second, Grim tensed. Then his fingers flexed on my ass, pulling me closer to his mouth. I gasped, completely enveloped by him. Sliding one hand down my ass, to my pussy, Grim fingered me as he sucked.
I shouldn’t like this. But my body disagreed. I was so wet. So achy. Grim’s tongue disappeared briefly from my cunt to lick up the evidence on my inner thighs.
I was boneless. Jelly. Grim’s grip the only thing keeping me from sliding to the floor.
“I want you to come, Rich Girl.” His words vibrated deep in my pussy. “Show people who you belong to.”
I wanted to. I was so fucking close. But that little, annoying voice was still in my head. Pointing out the people. Pointing out that America’s Princess didn’t do this—
Grim’s teeth enclosed the tender flesh of my inner thigh.
For a moment the world was bright and blinding, my heart slamming against my chest.
Then it all melted away into something soft and hazy. I disappeared into his mouth. Licking and sucking. Biting and thrusting. Devouring me, marking me internally.
Anyone could have been staring at me and I wouldn’t know or care. All I knew was Grim.
I fell apart to him speaking worshipping words against my pussy.