12 DEN OF INIQUITY #2
Her gloved palms landed on his pecs, and he couldn’t stop the muscles from jumping at the feel of her touch. You’re a fucking dumbass. If she’d seen his scaled face, she’d probably think he was ugly as sin, and here he was getting all excited about her touching him.
Harder than was perhaps necessary, he smeared the ash up her forearms and then pulled her sleeves back down to hide her sparkling skin. He didn’t bother asking her to remove her gloves this time, since her hands seemed well covered.
He pocketed the bottle when he was finished. “We’re gonna go in there, make the buy, and get the fuck out as fast as possible, okay?”
She nodded.
“Let me do the talking. I don’t know what’s going to happen, but just go along with what I do.”
She nodded. “I trust you.”
He gritted his teeth. He hated when she said that. If she had any sense, she would know that a demon forced into service would seek any opportunity to spite the one who’d trapped him. She should be expecting him to stab her in the back at every corner.
“Who is the seller?” she asked.
“Naiamah, a Queen of Hell. A royal pain in the ass and a crazy-ass bitch.”
“That’s not very nice to say.”
He snorted. “Just wait until you meet her.”
Naiamah was one of the most powerful succubi in Hell. One didn’t earn the title of King or Queen of Hell without having serious cred. Raum didn’t know her personally, but he knew enough to know they needed to tread carefully.
A long time ago, she and Bel had had some on-again, off-again sexcapade-type relationship that was the height of dysfunction.
Bel had been nearly mindless with rage back then, blowing up at the slightest provocation, and Raum remembered Ash telling him that he suspected Naiamah deliberately tried to rile him up.
All that had been before the four of them teamed up and became brothers, before Raum’s three-hundred-year memory gap even, and he didn’t know the dirty details.
All he knew was that Bel hated her now, and hellfire would flicker in his eyes—the first sign of an oncoming temper tantrum—if anyone mentioned her name. So no one ever did.
And now here Raum was, waltzing right into her lair to do business.
To clarify: He was waltzing into a succubus’s lair, which was basically just a giant orgy, with an angel at his side, to buy a forbidden substance from someone who couldn’t recognize him or he’d be dead.
He was feeling really great about his life choices right about now.
Behind him, Sunshine sucked in a breath as they stepped into the dark structure and their eyes adjusted to the shadows.
It was set up like a club, with a dance floor, a stage, and a bar at the back of the room.
But it was so much more than that. The stage currently featured a train of a least a dozen people fucking, circling around another foursome in the center.
On either side of the stage, giant bird cages hung from the ceiling, full of still more people fucking.
The audience was either dancing to the throbbing music—which sounded more like disembodied war drums than club beats—watching the spectacle on the stage, or trying to imitate it themselves.
Around them, in every dark corner available, demons engaged in various sexual acts. Here, gender and sexual orientation were mostly irrelevant. Everyone fucked everyone. Sex was sex, and the potent energy coming from the queen of the establishment ensured all were equally enthralled.
Even Raum, who wanted to get out of here as soon as possible, felt his body responding to the atmosphere. His blood felt hot and his head spun, making it hard to focus.
“You good?” he whispered to Sunshine beside him.
She said nothing, so he leaned down, trying to see her face beneath her hood. He could just make out the shimmer of her dark eyes, wide with astonishment, as she stared at her surroundings. He could just bet she’d never seen anything like this before.
“Sunshine?’
“Mm?” Her gaze snapped to his. “Oh, yes.”
“Try to … focus. I know it’s hard in here.”
If he wasn’t mistaken, she was staring at his mouth. “Yes, very hard.”
Shit. Looked like it was up to him to be the sensible one.
Why do I always have to be the sensible one? From the day he’d met Meph in that tavern so long ago, he’d been filling that role, and it was starting to piss him off.
Tapping into that self-control he suddenly really resented, he tamped down the urges rising in him the longer the stared at her.
Bold of him to think Sunshine even wanted him like that anyway.
How many times did he need to remind himself that angels didn’t experience sexual desire before it sank in?
Grasping her hand, he pulled her into the crowd.
He pushed through various gyrating bodies, careful to ward off any groping hands that might inadvertently pull down their hoods and expose their faces.
His half-demon form gave him a height advantage over the shorter demons and put him at equal height with the taller ones.
If anyone wondered about the cloaks, they’d probably just assume it was some freaky role-play.
Sunshine stayed pressed against his side, and it was hard not to imagine what sort of role-play she’d be into. Probably “We’re both holy, pure angels who hold hands and sing. And practice abstinence.”
What felt like a hundred years later, they reached the back of the club, and Raum steered them toward the double doors he saw guarded by two gargoyles.
“Private access only,” one grunted at him as he approached, just loud enough to be heard over the music.
“I have business with Naiamah,” Raum said.
“The mistress won’t see unscheduled customers. Make an appointment and come back then.”
“I have an appointment,” he lied. “I’m her biggest buyer for the night, and she’ll rip your dicks off if she finds out you wouldn’t let me through.”
The guards exchanged looks. Naiamah may have her people wrapped around her finger, but she couldn’t create intelligence where there wasn’t any to begin with.
Sure enough, they stepped aside. Raum pushed through the doors like he had every right to be there, Sunshine at his side. Ahead, a black staircase twisted out of sight, and they climbed up, the sound of their footsteps buried beneath the deadened music.
They found themselves in an open room with a black ceiling and floor, the walls decorated with thick red drapes.
All around, naked bodies writhed in the throes of pleasure.
At one end of the room, a curved wall of floor-to-ceiling windows overlooked the activities of the club below.
On the other, an intricate black throne sat atop a dais.
Atop it, sprawled with catlike grace, was the Queen of Hell herself.
Here, surrounded by sex, she was at her most powerful.
Her pale skin reflected the glow of candlelight, and her silky black curtain of hair was swept over one shoulder.
She wore a dress of chains and strips of leather so thin, it could hardly be called clothing.
Her claws were painted blood red to match her lips, but that was the only part of her in demon form.
She leaned on one arm of the throne, chin propped up in her hand, expression betraying no surprise at her unexpected visitors.
Raum and Sunshine walked up to the dais. No one spoke for several moments.
“Well?” Naiamah finally said, flicking her claws in their direction. “What do you want? I don’t recall scheduling any business for this evening, so you obviously had to trick my guards to get up here.”
“I need a spell to get past necromancy perimeter wards,” Raum said, throwing caution to the wind.
Naiamah blinked and went very still before suddenly snapping, “Everyone out!”
In an instant, all the demons stopped and turned their attention to their mistress upon her throne. She flicked her claws toward the exit impatiently.
In less than a minute, the room was empty. Raum didn’t know if this was a good or bad thing, so he said nothing.
“Necromancy wards, you say?”
He nodded.
Her eyes narrowed. “I don’t normally do business with those who won’t show their faces.”
Raum didn’t respond. He wasn’t going to take his hood off, and he figured she was lying about that anyway.
There were plenty of hooded strangers in Hell.
Nobody liked to broadcast their business when everyone was competing against one another.
Loyalty was a fickle thing and could change with the drop of a hat.
She seemed to accept this from his silence and let the matter go. “I can get what you need, but it’ll cost you.”
“I have gold.” Stepping forward, he dropped the sack over his shoulder onto the dais, at her feet. He bent, loosening the tie so the contents were visible, and then went back to Sunshine’s side.
“Hm.” She did a good job of looking unimpressed. “I’m unfathomably rich already. What makes your gold special?”
Raum ground his teeth. There was nothing “special” about gold. Gold was gold, and he already knew she accepted it for her services. She was fucking with him for some reason, and he didn’t like that he didn’t know why.
Naiamah stood, the leather straps and chains of her dress falling to the floor in a dramatic sweep. Two thin strips of fabric across her breasts and a slightly larger triangle between her thighs were the only things that made the garment decent.
She was already tall, but the heels of her boots were so high, they added nearly a foot to her height, and that wasn’t counting the elevation of the dais. If Raum had been in human form, she would have been taller than him, which made him extra glad he’d chosen to shift.
She crouched in front of the bag and rifled around. Her fingers closed around the metal bodice and she stood again, holding it up. “Now this I like.” She held it in front of her body, blood-red lips curving. “Oh, this is fab.”