Chapter 19

“Trouble!” Cain’s breathy voice sounds in my ear, and I jump, spinning around with my heart beating a mile a minute.

“You scared the daylights out of me,” I scold, attempting to calm my wayward organ before it sends me into cardiac arrest. I sit on the uncomfortable cot in the cell we have taken to using. Bronson was in the cell beside mine before he explained he had to check on Logan, who they are still keeping prisoner, and told me someone would be here shortly to look after me. I wanted to be offended that the guys thought I needed a babysitter twenty-four-seven, but I know they’re doing it out of a place of love. As Bronson eloquently told me when I confronted him, I’m “precious cargo” and they would all be “lost” without me.

My heart turns to goo whenever I think about his words. Love for him, for all of my men, floods my system like fire. I always heard that fire, at some point or another, hisses and sizzles, before petering out, while other fires continue raging, growing and growing until the flames consume entire towns and forests. My love for them falls firmly in the latter category. Nothing can douse my love for them and theirs for me.

I don’t need sight to know that Cain is giving me an impish smirk, one more suited for his brother than my normally surly demon.

“Maybe you should work on your reaction time,” Cain comments, only half teasing. “If I were a murderer…”

“But you’re not,” I defend immediately, and silence stretches between us, pulled taut like a rubber band seconds from snapping and pelting one of us in the face. I bite down on my lip when I realize how my words could be construed. Because, truth be told, Cain is a murderer. His past is full of dark shadows and secrets and horrors that I hate that he had to face. I don’t blame him for the people he killed to save himself and his brother. How can I, when I would’ve done the exact same thing to save any of the men I love? Plus, I havekilled before—Alyssa.

My birth mother.

And the woman who enslaved me for years, experimented on me, and then attempted to breed me like a broodmare.

A pulse of lightning skitters down my spine as I shove those memories away in a tidal wave of anger. Now isn’t the time to focus on me, not when I can so keenly sense how much Cain is hurting.

But then that anger shifts from what happened with Alyssa, to what Cain endured at Boris’s club, where he was paraded around as a sex toy and not a human being. Where he was raped by men and women alike, his body used for their sick, sadistic pleasure.

“Nina…” Cain’s voice is as grave as it was when we first met, so long ago. The change in his tone from gentle and calming to cautious has me slipping into his head automatically, seeing through his eyes.

My entire body freezes as if electrical currents are sparking through my veins.

Dark horns, similar to the ones I know belong to demons, sprout from my silky black hair, the tips curling like the horns of a ram. My eyes look almost crimson in the flickering bulb of the prison, the pupils rimmed in coal. And from my back, two majestic wings spread on either side of me, the color as white as snow and sparkling with a pearly luminescence. I’ve only looked like this once before—seconds before I killed Alyssa.

“Trouble,” Cain begins slowly, and instead of backing away from me as I thought he was going to do, he takes a step closer. “Trouble, I need you to calm down. Tell me where your mind went.”

I struggle to find the words that are rooted at the very tip of my tongue, tasting sour and moldy like some type of acid. My thoughts are swirling faster than a tornado coming full force down a street, catching asphalt in its windy grasp.

“It seems…” I bite my lip as I pull out of Cain’s head once more, embracing my darkness. “It seems as if all of the people I love have pasts that I can’t protect them from. That I can’t save them from. It hurts me, and then I feel selfish for being hurt, because I’m not the one who endured it. Does that make any sense?”

Cain’s silent for a moment before he closes the distance between us and grasps my hand in his, pulling me forward. I stumble slightly, my hands coming up to fist the collar of his shirt, but he doesn’t let me fall. He’ll never let me fall.

“Come on.” Without waiting for me to respond—heck, without even waiting for me to gather my wits—he begins to drag me down the hall. With every step we take, my power fades until I begin to feel like myself once more.

“Where are we going?” I ask, loving the way his hand feels in mine. I swear my stomach gets all fluttery, as if thousands and thousands of bees have been set free, buzzing around and stinging me intermittently.

“On a date,” Cain replies simply, and that buzzing from before? It drowns out all other sounds, until I can barely think straight. Barely breathe. Barely function.

We continue to move through the twisting hallways of the Labyrinth as Cain guides us to an unspecified location.

Meanwhile, my mind is spinning, twirling, doing somersaults as a giddy elation fills me like helium in a balloon. I only went on one date before with Bronson, and that led to…

My cheeks flame when I think about Bronson using his hand to bring me to the peak of pleasure. His growly voice whispering, “Goddess,” with all the reverence he’s capable of possessing. He always treats me like a queen, his queen, and I love the way he makes me feel. Sometimes, you want those dark men with tainted pasts, but other times…

Other times, you need men like Bronson. Men who make you feel treasured and adored, like a precious gemstone you find beneath layers and layers of muck and grime.

I hear the telltale sound of a heavy door being pushed open, and I know immediately we’re entering the throne room. The last time I was here, my men were carting Logan off to press him for more information. For some reason, that bothers me. A lot. Maybe it’s because I know what it’s like to be a prisoner, what it’s like to be a captive in a war you don’t even understand. I know Logan claimed he was going to kill me, but he also told us the truth. About the lists. About the Council. About all of it. Surely he’s not a bad guy if he was willing to do all of that.

I shake my head, pushing all thoughts of Logan to the deepest recesses of my mind. Today, I’m going to focus on Cain, my darkness twin. The demon who was the slowest to open up to me, the slowest to love me. Sometimes, it feels as if I’m walking on broken glass around him and one wrong move can pierce both of my sensitive soles, causing me to bleed out. And other times, there are nothing but fluffy, wispy white clouds. I feel bereft and free, as if no one can harm me so high up in the sky. Cain is so mercurial, but that doesn’t make me love him less. I always knew about the duality of his nature—the lightness that seems to emit from his very soul and the darkness that shrouds him like a second skin. They’re just two facets of the man I love with my entire being.

“Are you in my head, Trouble?” Cain asks, pulling me from my thoughts. I turn in the direction of his voice and give his hand a soft squeeze.

“No. Do you want me to be?”

“Get your fine ass in here, baby,” he teases, and I comply immediately, sinking into his mind like a swimmer diving into the ocean.

The throne room, as always, is furnished with a single high-backed chair on a raised dais, but besides that, the room is empty. Well, almost empty.

Directly at the front of the room, sitting at the end of the red carpeting that creates an aperture towards the throne, is what looks like…white things. Their shapes are odd, almost curvy, with larger bottoms that shift inwards. Red stripes adorn each of them, but that doesn’t help me understand what I’m seeing. Near them are two round balls with three tiny holes in the center.

“Is this…some sort of sex thing?” My voice comes out as a conspiratorial whisper as I try to think of what the toys could be used for.

Cain releases a bark of surprised laughter, his breath ruffling my hair.

“No! Why would you think…?” He trails off at whatever answer he comes to. “Of course. I’m such a fucking idiot. You’ve never been bowling before, have you?”

“Bowling?” I believe I’ve heard of it before, but my mind can’t quite correlate the word with what I’m seeing.

“It’s a game, Trouble,” Cain explains patiently, not at all upset with or annoyed by my limited knowledge. I’ve been doing much better due to the movies the guys sneak into the prison, but there are still certain things I’m not overly familiar with. Like, just a few weeks ago, I learned that bondage could be used for torture…but also for pleasure. You can imagine my guys’ surprise when I threatened a jerk in the cafeteria with bondage and spankings. Suffice to say, they were not happy with my threat.

“A game,” I repeat, eyeing the white things with newfound appreciation. “What’s the purpose?”

“You have to knock those pins down,” Cain explains. A wide grin spreads across my face, and before Cain can stop me, I run forward and aim a kick at the pin at the very front and center. All ten of them topple with loud clunks.

“Did I just win?” I ask, spinning around to face him. Through his eyes, I can see that my face is alight with excitement and there’s the slightest red tint to my cheeks. I don’t know what expression Cain is wearing, but it takes him a long moment to answer. When he finally speaks, he has to clear his throat multiple times, but his voice still comes out slightly raspy and choked.

“You need to use one of these balls, Trouble,” he manages to say, and I can’t quite tell the emotion lacing his tone. It almost sounds like…awe, maybe. Love?

“One of your balls?” I lower my gaze in the direction I know his crotch to be, and this time, his gaze lowers to his rapidly hardening cock. To my immense pleasure, he sticks his hand into the waistband to adjust himself.

“Just get your cute ass over here, and I’ll explain the rules,” he instructs, though he doesn’t immediately take his hand off of his cock.

I do as he says, stopping when I’m directly in front of him. My hands automatically lower to his thighs, being very careful not to startle him, before I cup his dick through the material of his pants. His breath hitches as I continue to palm his rapidly hardening cock.

“Trouble,” he hisses out.

“You said I need to play with balls,” I singsong, and he releases a snort before he can stop himself.

“You’re sounding way too much like Rion and Abel these days,” he admits with a shake of his head. With a groan of great reluctance, he steps away from me.

Through his eyes, I watch as my bottom lip protrudes in a pout, but he simply chuckles and taps a finger beneath my chin.

“Enough of that, Trouble. We’re on a date, and we’re going to have fun, dammit. But after…” His voice turns seductive, husky, and I just know his eyes are hooded with desire. “After, we can have fun.”

My core tingles at the promise and threat in his words, and I nod my head excitedly.

“What are the rules?” I ask, rocking back on my heels. Cain moves to grab one of the two balls I noticed earlier and hands me the smallest, a pretty pink one. “And where did you even get this stuff?”

“Damien,” Cain answers, as if that one word is self-explanatory. Which, in a way, it sort of is. Damien can quite literally get almost anything he desires sent to this level of the prison. I don’t know if he uses his connection as an assassin or a mage, but he’s powerful enough to have stuff delivered to him. “And about how you play…”

For the next few minutes, Cain walks me through the rules of the game. Stand at the end of the red carpeting and throw the ball down. However many pins you knock down is how many points you get. You’re allowed two turns each time, unless you get all ten pins down on the very first try. That’s called a strike. And if you get all ten pins down by your second time, that’s a spare. And…it does something to your points, but I don’t pay too much attention to that. Cain said he’ll keep score for us.

The ball is surprisingly heavy, even though Cain assures me that the pink ball is the lightest you can have. Even still, my fingers ache as I stick them into the holes the way he directed.

And then I think about sticking my fingers into other holes while he watches…

“You do realize I have the muscle mass of a ten-year-old, right?” I ask Cain with a smile as I line up at the end of the rug. Years of captivity have made me weak and frail, and though my body is steadily getting stronger, it’s still nowhere near where it should be, much to my men’s displeasure.

“Suck it up, Buttercup,” he quips immediately, and I smirk when I hear Rion’s nickname for me leave his lips. If Rion were here, he’d be furious.

Pain clamors for my attention at the thought of my shifter mate, but I refuse to wallow. Not when this moment is about Cain and my relationship with him.

I try to pull my arm back the way Cain instructed, but the ball is too heavy and my arm is too weak. Instead, I use both hands, crouch down, and push with all of my might. I watch through Cain’s eyes as it slowly rolls down the rug, curving sharply to the right, and missing all of the pins.

“Does that mean I get extra points?” I ask excitedly as Cain rushes forward to return the ball to me. “It takes talent to not get any pins, wouldn’t you say?”

I can hear the smile in Cain’s voice when he speaks next. “Sorry, Trouble. That’s a big fat zero.” He very purposely grabs a red marker and draws a zero in the first box.

“That’s not nice,” I say teasingly as I crouch back down, prepared to throw the ball a second time. “You’re my fiancé. Shouldn’t you want to cheat for me?”

“Hmmm…let me think about it. Have my girl win…or kick my girl’s ass?” He pretends to contemplate, his finger tapping against his chin. “I think I’m going to go with choice number two. Sorry, love. You’re going down.”

“We’ll see about that,” I huff, filled to the brim with newfound determination. I stare at the pins through Cain’s eyes, aiming for the one directly in the middle. If I can hit that one, the momentum should push the others over as well. And then… And then I’ll get a sparey. Or whatever Cain called it.

I line up, take a deep, calming breath, and then push the ball forward. I watch as it rolls slowly down the rug, directly towards that elusive center pin…

My heart thrashes in my rib cage, and my arms begin to lift in a celebratory cheer?—

—when the ball veers to the right and knocks over the pin at the far edge.

“Oh my gosh!” I squeal like a banshee, jumping up and down and clapping my hands. “Did you see that, Cain? Did you? Look! I got a pin!” I run towards him and wrap both of my arms around his neck, my feet dangling off the ground. “In. Your. Face!” I release him to continue my little dance as his body shakes with laughter.

“Fucking hell, Trouble! If I would’ve known that bowling would get you so damn excited, we would’ve played months ago.” His body shakes with amusement as he once more pulls me towards him, holding my body flush against his. “Fuck, I love you so damn much.”

“Are you still going to love me as much when I kick your demon butt?” I tease, stepping onto my tiptoes to kiss the corner of his mouth. My lips linger there, tasting him, before I force myself to pull away, ignoring his low, heated moan.

“Want to make this more interesting?” Cain asks deviously, and my curiosity is instantly piqued.

“Depends,” I answer, curious.

“How about a bet?” His voice is smug, taunting, and it instantly has my toes curling in the slippers Damien purchased for me.

“A bet,” I repeat, my grin widening. I always love bets with my men, especially when the reward for winning and losing brings me immense pleasure.

“If I win, I’ll let you ride me.” He begins to kiss up the hollow of my throat, and I swear my soul leaves my body and orbits around the galaxy, before becoming nothing more than molten lava in the blistering rays of the sun. “And if you win…”

“If I win…” I parrot breathlessly, arching my neck to grant him better access.

“And if you win, I’ll eat you out. I’ll put my tongue between those sweet little pussy lips of yours and bite down on your clit. I’ll make you thrash, mindless with pleasure, and scream my name. And when you come, I’ll jam my cock so far into your heat, you see fucking stars.”

My body trembles at his dirty words, my mind vividly picturing the fantasy he so crassly detailed.

“Do we have a deal?” he continues in a low, seductive voice.

“Deal. After all, I am the bowling pro,” I tease, my voice still breathless from the lust coursing through me, burning white-hot.

Cain wins. By a lot. I think the final score was two hundred to twenty.

And when I ride him in the middle of the throne room, his hands kneading my breasts as I bounce on his huge shaft, I can’t help but think…

I’m the true winner here.