The Darkest Night

'Maddox!' Why do you want him? He might have done this to you. 'Maddox.' She couldn't stop his name from leaving her lips. 'Maddox.'

Black cobwebs snaked around her vision, constricting it, blanketing the too-bright rainbow. 'Maddox.' Her voice was a hoarse whisper now, a trembling entreaty.

Her stomach cramped; her throat was swelling, closing off. And then, suddenly, she couldn't breathe. Every cell in her body screamed and screamed and screamed. Need air. Need to breathe. She fell to the floor, unable to support her own weight any longer. Need to get the spiders off. No strength, no energy.

The bottle of wine toppled as if in sympathy, the remaining red liquid spilling around her. She lost focus completely, the world crumbling, then disappearing altogether, leaving only darkness.

Maddox could not believe what he was seeing. 'This is… this is… not possible.' He scrubbed a callused hand over his eyes, but the sight did not change.

'Obviously, it wasn't Ashlyn I smelled.' Reyes slammed a fist into the wall. Dust puffed into the air, bits of rough stone tumbling to the floor.

Torin merely laughed.

Paris sucked in a reverent breath. 'Come to daddy.'

There, in the far corner of Lucien's bedroom, were four women. Holding hands, they huddled together for strength and support. Each trembled in fear, gazing at the men through wide, panicked eyes.

No, Maddox realized. Not all of them trembled. A pretty blonde with freckles regarded them with fury in her green eyes. Her jaw was clenched, as if she were biting her tongue to keep from shouting obscenities.

'What are they doing here?' he demanded.

'Do not take that tone,' Aeron snapped. 'You started it with your pretty piece of Bait.'

Growling low, Maddox closed the distance between them. One of the women whimpered. 'I thought we had covered this,' he said. 'You watch what you say about her or you suffer.'

Aeron did not back down. 'You've known her, what? A few hours? You've barely spoken to her. She should be begging for mercy right now, and we should know all her secrets and what the Hunters., if there are more out there, are planning.'

'She tried to save me when I was stabbed. She tried to save me from you only a few minutes ago.'

'An act.'

Probably. He'd told himself that very thing, but he couldn't seem to make it matter. Not then, not now. Frustrated with himself rather than Aeron, he backed down this time. He faced Lucien. 'Why are they here?' he asked, composed but no less disbelieving.

Or rather, as composed as he was capable of being at the moment.

Lucien glanced at Aeron, who motioned to the hall with a tilt of his chin. Understanding, the warriors filed out. Each hummed with expectation. Lucien was the last to exit and was quick to close and lock the door.

Maddox peered at his friends, most projecting the same disbelief he felt. Nothing like this had ever happened before. None of them had ever brought a woman here, even Paris (that he knew of), and now there were almost as many females on the premises as warriors. It was surreal.

'Well?' he prompted.

Aeron explained how the Greeks had been overthrown by the Titans, those leaders from thousands of years ago, and that these new sovereigns wanted—no, commanded—him to execute those four innocent women. Were he to resist, he would be driven mad with bloodlust. Were he to ask to be released from the deed, he would be cursed as Maddox was cursed.

Maddox listened, stunned. Shock and dread washed through him, all but swimming laps in his bloodstream.

'But why would the new king of gods tell Aeron to—' The answer slid into place and he pressed his lips together. I did this, he realized. I'm responsible. I dared the gods yesterday evening, insulted them, even. This had to be their way of retaliating.

He flicked Torin a dismayed glance. The warrior was staring at him with a hard glint in his green eyes. Then he turned away and flattened his gloved hands on the mirror hanging just above his head. His reflection was bleak. Only yesterday, the two of them had claimed they didn't care if the gods punished them. They'd thought nothing could be worse than their current situation.

They'd been wrong.

'We cannot allow Aeron to do this deed,' Lucien said, interrupting Maddox's dark thoughts. 'He's at the breaking point already. We all are.'

Reyes once again punched the wall, grunting from the force. There were angry red cuts on each of his forearms and they burst open on impact, splattering flecks of blood onto the silver stone. 'These Titans had to know what would happen if Aeron obeyed.' He bared his teeth in a scowl. 'They had to know what a precarious edge of good and evil we're all balanced on. Why would they do this?'

'I know why,' Maddox replied grimly.

All eyes flew to him.

Shame weighed heavily on his shoulders as he recounted what he'd done. 'I never expected this to happen,' he finished lamely. 'I didn't know the Titans had escaped, much less that they had taken over.'

'I don't even know what to say.' Aeron.

'I do. Fuck.' Paris.

Maddox's head fell back and he stared up at the ceiling. I thought I was goading the Greeks, he wanted to shout. They would have done nothing. They would have continued to ignore him.

'Do you think Ashlyn is a punishment from the Titans, as well?' Lucien asked.

His jaw clenched. 'Yes.' Of course she was a punishment. He'd thought so earlier—the timing of her arrival, the way she'd haunted his mind and fanned his desires—but he'd assumed the Greeks had been responsible. 'The Titans must have led the Hunters straight to us, knowing they would use Ashlyn and how she would affect me.'

'You did not curse the gods until after Aeron was summoned. What's more, you hadn't yet cursed them when Ashlyn first appeared on my cameras,' Torin pointed out. 'They could not have known what we would later do and say.'

'Couldn't they? Perhaps they didn't send her, but they must be using her somehow.' Nothing else explained the intensity of his feelings for her. 'I'll take care of her,' he added darkly, but every muscle in his body stiffened, begging him to snatch the words back. He didn't. 'I'll take care of all of them.'

Paris leveled him with a frown. 'How?'

Grim, he said, 'I'll kill them.' He'd done worse. Why not add this to the list? Because I am not a beast. If he did it, he would be Violence. He would be no better than the spirit inside him, reduced to only one reason for existence: causing pain.

Yet he'd brought this plague upon their house; he needed to fix it. Could he destroy Ashlyn, though? He found he didn't want to know the answer.

'You can't kill the four inside Lucien's room,' Aeron said, just as grim. 'The Titans commanded me to do it. Who knows how they'll react if their orders are not followed exactly.'

'I can hear you, you sick bastards,' a female voice cried from behind the door. 'You kill us, and I swear to God I'll kill every one of you.'

There was another temporary halt to movement and speech.

Reyes's lips curled in a wry grin. 'An impossible feat, but I would almost like to see her try.'

Feminine fists beat against the frame. 'Let us go! Let us go, do you hear me?'

'We hear you, woman,' Reyes said. 'I'm sure the dead hear you, as well.'

That Reyes, the most serious of the bunch, had cracked a joke was disturbing. Only when circumstances were dire did he resort to humor.

This was a nightmare. After centuries of rigid routine, Maddox suddenly had a woman to interrogate, then destroy before she could be further used against him. He had a friend to save from an unthinkable command. And