To Hell and Back (League of Guardians 1.50)

“LOGAN, YOU KNOW I don’t like it when you ignore me.”

Pain filled every single pore in his body. It seeped into muscle. Leeched into bone. It penetrated the calluses on the bottom of his feet. Even his fucking hair ached.

“Look at me when I address you.” The petulant tone in Lilith’s voice was gone; it was now steel that propped up her words. Carefully, Logan glanced toward her, hiding the agony he felt as he gazed into the bluest eyes in existence. Her face was exquisite, the poison it hid legendary.

Logan studied her in silence. It was a cosmic joke, really, that such beauty hid a voracious and sick kind of darkness. Unlike most of the bottom-feeders and midrange demons who populated the underworld, there was no need to glamor her appearance. This visage was the original. The real deal. The woman had two eyes, a nose, and a mouth, same as any other woman, yet she was in a class all her own. Her features aligned perfectly.

Too bad she was toxic. Adam, poor bastard that he was, had never known what hit him.

“Are you ready to eat?” Her voice was a whisper, the notes heavy with compulsion, and it pissed her off to no end that he was immune to her powers of persuasion.

He grunted and said nothing.

Lilith was on her bed, a massive, decadent thing set on top of a large pedestal in the middle of her chambers. Long strips of white, gauzy material floated from the ceiling, surrounding her like wispy tendrils of smoke. She was naked and stretched just so, her generous breasts thrust upward as she arched her back and smiled lazily at him.

Logan watched from the shadows, his body bruised, bloody, damn near broken—and as naked as she was. “Come here, hellhound.”

Her voice changed, the subtle compulsion no longer evident. The floor beneath his feet trembled as she sat up and cocked her head to the side. A slight breeze parted the sheer columns of fabric so she was laid bare to him.

Beside the bed a table overflowed with rotting fruit, their bruised gray-and-black skins nearly liquefied. The incessant buzzing from the flies that were never far from Lilith was like a worm embedded in his brain. It twisted and turned, burrowing deep. It would drive him crazy if he let it.

A long sigh escaped her lips as her hands fell to her breasts. Scarlet-tipped fingernails tweaked pale pink nipples until they pebbled and hardened, as her cerulean eyes gazed at him hungrily.

“Now,” she commanded.

Logan gritted his teeth and slowly moved forward. Each step was pure agony. His muscles had been stretched and pulled to the extreme and his legs felt like they were dead pieces of flesh. As he moved, fresh blood flowed from several long slices into his pectorals, and by the time he reached the bed, a trail of crimson followed him across the cream marble floors.

The pungent odor of pain, blood, and fear clung to everything. It filled the air so that his sensitive nostrils flared in disgust.

He kept his hands loose, though his fingers itched to wrap around the bitch’s neck and squeeze until he stole her last breath. Unfortunately, down here in District Three nothing ever died, and the harlot before him was immortal.

Logan took a moment and centered himself. He kept his mind blank of things she’d be able to probe. He thought of fire and death and pain. They were the things he’d been born into and ones he could easily hide behind.

Hooded eyes gazed up at him as Lilith slowly ran her tongue across full, cherry-red lips. She rose to her knees and spread her legs slightly and he could tell she was irritated that his gaze remained fi

xed on her eyes instead of traveling downward, seeking the apex of her legs. The corner of her mouth tightened and red flashed in the depths of her eyes.

He held her gaze for several long moments. Long enough to grab hold of a sliver of satisfaction as her anger increased. He’d pay for it later, but it was enough to keep his fire burning. His anger festering.

He would see Kira again. There was no other option.

When he knew he’d pushed Lilith far enough he let his gaze drop. He stared at her as if she were a bug he’d like to crush beneath his feet. Too bad his heels were bare. His kick-ass Docs with their steel-toe ends were long gone but they sure as hell would have done some damage to her pale flesh.

“You will come to me,” she said pleasantly, as if they were friends.

Logan’s gaze returned to hers. “Let’s just get this the fuck over with, all right?” There was nothing friendly about this situation.

“You wound me.” Lilith made a face and gestured into the dark. Immediately a wraithlike creature, tall, slender, merely flesh over bone, appeared with a soft, fluffy, royal-blue robe. She shrugged into it and slid from the bed.

An invisible piece of lint on the cuff of her robe claimed her attention for a few seconds and then she sighed, head cocked slightly, brow arched. Slowly a smile crept over her mouth and she licked the generous lips salaciously.

“So,” she began, doe-eyed … dangerous. “Here we are again, hellhound.”

Logan said nothing. He just watched and waited.

Lilith held out her perfectly manicured fingers and studied them. “You’re not going to tell me why you were in the gray realm, are you?” Logan stared straight ahead, expression blank.

She giggled, then stopped abruptly, like the tinkling of a bell that had been squashed.