Ecstasy Unveiled

Eidolon stared, unable to believe what his brother had just said. “I agree with you about Kynan, but seriously? You don’t care if Lore dies?”

“Better him than Ky,” Wraith ground out.

“We’ll handle this.” Eidolon’s gaze flicked back and forth between Wraith and Shade. “We’ve got to give him a chance.”

Shade made a sound of disgust. “Like you did with Roag? Over and over?”

Gods, he was so sick of the Roag conversation. Yeah, Eidolon had fucked up. But he could only beg for forgiveness so many times. “You’re never going to let that go, are you?”

“Let it go?” Shade asked incredulously. “I lost Skulk because you kept giving Roag chances. Kept saying, ‘He’s our brother.’ Well, fuck that, E. If we’d taken care of him when we should have, Skulk wouldn’t be dead.”

Skulk had been Shade’s Umber demon sister, and they’d been close. So close that she’d worked as a paramedic at UG just so Shade could keep an eye on her. Eidolon missed her, and every day his heart squeezed with guilt at his unintentional role in her death.

“And you wouldn’t have a mate and kids if not for Roag.” It was the wrong thing to say, and Eidolon knew it. Knew it even as Shade’s fist slammed into his jaw.

Eidolon’s head rocked back and pain shot through his face, sparking his own anger. He returned fire with the power of his entire body behind the cross-punch. A crack rang out as Shade’s nose sprayed blood. Crimson swallowed the black in Shade’s eyes, no doubt matching E’s, and it was on.

They came together with the force of two bulls. Distantly, Eidolon heard furniture breaking and pictures coming off the walls, and then the crash of the television.

They went to the floor, pummeling the unholy hell out of each other in a no-holds-barred, who-can-hurt-who-the-most fight, something E and Shade had never done.

This was what Wraith and Shade did.

A particularly hard hammer-fist to the side of the head made Eidolon see stars and hear bells. Snarling, he jammed his knee up and into Shade’s gut. Shade slammed Eidolon’s skull into the floor, putting Eidolon’s fury onto a whole new tier of pissed.

“Stop it!” Tayla tore them apart, shoving Shade so hard he wheeled backward and tumbled over the back of the couch. Then she rounded on Wraith, who was propped against the doorway, arms crossed over his chest and ankles locked casually together.

“Thanks for the help, jerk. You couldn’t have stopped this before I had to?”

“Stop it?” Wraith cocked his thumb toward the kitchen. “Hell, I was about to go make popcorn to go with the Jerry Springer.”

Shade came around the couch, ready to go at it again. Once more, Tayla put herself between them, crouching in a defensive position, and E had to bite back a smile at her fierceness.

He was so going to make love to her the second he got his brothers out the door. Right now, though, he wasn’t going to let her fight his battles. Gently, he squeezed her shoulder and pulled her back. “Hey, it’s okay.”

“No, Eidolon, it’s not. It’s far from okay.” Blood ran in multiple streams from Shade’s nose and a nasty gash in his brow, and his bared teeth were streaked with crimson. Powering up his gift, Eidolon reached out to heal him, but Shade reared back. “Don’t fucking touch me.”

Shade had never been so pissed that he wouldn’t let Eidolon tend to his wounds.

“Shade, listen to me—”

Eidolon’s beeper went off. He ignored it, though he knew his plan to get Tayla naked would have to be put on hold. “We can’t let Lore die,” he finished.

Wraith pushed away from the wall. “We can’t let Kynan die either.”

“This isn’t an either-or,” Eidolon said, suddenly weary despite the adrenaline that was still rushing through his system. “No one dies. We’ll talk sense into Lore, and if that doesn’t work, we’ll contain him.”

Shade’s eyes flashed violently. “Do what you have to do. But know that if it comes down to a choice, I choose Kynan.”

“But if—”

Shade cut him off with a snarl. “You really don’t want to go there.”

With that, Shade stalked out of the apartment. Wraith shot E a don’t-say-a-word look and followed their brother out.

Releasing a frustrated breath, Eidolon dabbed blood off his split lip with the back of his hand,

Tay wrapped herself around him. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” he lied, even though she’d sense the truth through their mate-bond. And the truth was that when he’d told Lore that his staff had been on edge lately, that wasn’t the half of it. Everyone at UG was at each others’ throats, which had led to critical errors and slipshod patient care.

“You can’t lie to me, Hellboy,” Tay said.

“I know,” he sighed. “I’ve just never seen Shade so worked up. I seriously think he would let this tear us all apart.”

“That won’t happen. You guys have survived worse than this. Shade’s angry now, but the very thing he’s angry about, your loyalty to your brothers and family, is why he loves you. Give him a chance to cool off.”

Tayla was young—compared to Eidolon—but she’d been around the block, and she understood people. And demons… in part because she was half Soulshredder, and she could see scars most couldn’t.

But in this case, Eidolon had his doubts about Tayla’s prediction. Where Roag had failed to tear them apart, Lore just might succeed.

* * *

The rage was like drowning in an ocean of boiling blood. It wrapped around Lore and squeezed so that every breath was an agonizing struggle.

He’d come to chained to a bed in a frilly bedroom, his head pounding and still engaged in fight mode. He didn’t know where he was, who had taken him, and he burned with the need to kill.

Every second he fought against the chains made him angrier, and that, combined with the jackhammer in the brain and a lack of a recent release, was putting him on a tightrope where the slightest nudge would plunge him right into Noreturnsville Avenue’s hard pavement.

No net in sight.

Adrenaline surged through him as if a dam had burst. He yanked on the restraints. No good. He yanked harder, until he felt the pop of his elbow and shoulder sockets. Pain exploded in a flash of light behind his eyes.

His groin throbbed, and fuck, if he could just reach his cock, he could end this before it went too far…

A warm trickle ran down his wrist. Blood. The feel, sight, the smell… it triggered his need to slaughter as if someone had flipped a switch and turned on his inner Jason Voorhees.

He roared as the only thread keeping his sanity in check snapped.

At least he was restrained, so he couldn’t run rampant. Couldn’t kill innocents.

No, this rage would kill him.

Six

The bloodcurdling snarl reached Idess’s ears before she’d fully materialized in her living room. Exhausted but fueled by fear, she sprinted to the bedroom, skidding to a shocked halt at the doorway. Lore was alone. No one was trying to kill him.

But… he’d transformed. His eyes, burning like coal embers, bored into her, and his skin had darkened to a deep, dusky red shot through with dark veins on top of bulging muscle. He bared his teeth, as if he wanted to take a bite out of her. He was beautiful and terrifying, and a tremor ran through her as she stepped into the bedroom.

What in the world had happened to him? Whatever it was, it threatened his life. The heraldi on her arm still burned, hurting much more than the dagger wound. She’d heard that some species could become uncontrollably enraged to the point of permanence.

Or, apparently, death.

“Lore—”

His violent roar shook the house’s very foundation. Blood dripped from his wrists, which he’d worn raw beneath the shackles. The soles of his boots had shredded the bedspread and sheets, all the way to the mattress.

“What can I do?”

“Release. Me.” His words were distorted by rage and hatred.

Steeling herself, she said, “That’s not possible.”

A torrent of f-word-spiced curses ripped from his mouth. “Damn you and the bitch who whelped you!”

She inched toward him. “I can’t release you. What else can ease you?”

He went mad, his flailings so violent that a crack rang out as her bed frame broke. Red flecks danced in eyes that had gone fully black, swallowing the whites, the demon behind the handsome face coming through like some sort of transparent overlay.

She halted beside his hip, a huge mistake, because although his wrists were bound above his head, his legs were free, and he kicked out at her, catching her in the ribs and slamming her into the door to the bathroom.

Rubbing her aching chest, she went back to him, this time easing next to his shoulders and out of range of those huge, booted feet. Still, he whipped his knees back and nearly brained her. The boy was remarkably flexible.

He was hurting himself, and it was only going to get worse. “Tell me what will make this better.”

He clenched his teeth so hard his jaw popped. “Fuck.”

She really hated demons and their foul mouths. “Tell me,” she repeated.

“Fuck,” he snarled. “Sex.”

“Sex?” She laughed. “If you think I’m falling for that, you’re beyond stupid.”

Punching his head back with such force that he left a dent in the plaster, he let loose an agonized roar that rattled through her insides. A blast of heat rolled off him, a wave of need she felt as a loosening of her muscles and a sudden liquid rush between her legs. A dark, sinful scent wrapped around her, filling her lungs and making her sway toward him. She caught herself, took an awkward, stumbling step back. She’d been around long enough to know incubi could throw off pheromones to attract partners, but she’d never experienced it… until now.

Her gaze flickered involuntarily to his hips, where, sure enough, a massive erection was straining against the fly of his pants. No way. Nuh-uh. There had to be another way. Any way.

“Just… hold still.” She took another lungful of that delicious scent into her. “I’ll release you or something—”

“No!” His head snapped forward, and his eyes, glowing with an eerie luminosity, fastened on her. “I… can’t… control… myself.” Every word was delivered between clenched teeth. “Not safe… I’ll