“J-joshhh…wh-why are—”
“You wouldn’t listen to me, Ruby,” he said harshly. His voice sounded far away as my consciousness began to retreat. I wanted to move my legs to kick him, but I no longer had control. My entire body had gone numb.
“This is your fault. You think I want to do this?” My legs hanging limp over the edge, he placed himself between them. His hands wrapped around the back of my thighs, pulling me closer. I wanted to scream, but I couldn’t form words anymore. I couldn’t do anything.
“I can’t get you out of my mind, but you won’t come back to me. I hurt for you so much, Ruby. Not even Kendall can soothe it anymore. It must be you.” He continued speaking, muttering to himself. A blind panic set into me. I knew what was about to go down, but I couldn’t put the words to it. I couldn’t stop it.
Josh’s hands continued groping me, reaching beneath my top. His sweaty palms wrapped around my breasts, and terror seized me. He was seriously going to do this.
“You wouldn’t let me touch these when we were together. You were such a prude. Not anymore, though, are you, Ruby?” Squeezing my breasts, his face in my neck, I could feel his pathetic excuse for a cock pushing against me. Pins and needles prickled my skin as I tried to cry out for someone. Anyone. I screamed and screamed, but I was locked in a nightmare where no one could hear me.
Josh’s fumbling movements worsened the more he touched me. My skin did that to people. I was such a fool for even wanting someone to pass the time with. I was lonely and starving. For attention. For sex. For everything. I was a fucking demon deprived of all that I needed, so I played with fire and now I was going to burn.
Burn.
I was burning inside.
“You’re mine, and I will have you.” Josh pulled back, fumbling to undo his pants. I couldn’t see the movements, I couldn’t move my head, but I could hear every notch of his zipper, and every rustle of clothing as his pants dropped to the floor.
It was so similar to before. It was scary.
Except this time, I didn’t have Moira to save me.
Josh’s filthy hands wrapped around my waist, pulling me closer as he rubbed himself against me. It was savage and disgusting. His hands clumsily tugged at my shirt, pulling it off, my head lolling as he jerked the fabric over and tossed it aside. I could feel everything and nothing, and I couldn’t escape. I was no longer me. My consciousness retreated further, searching for safety in some dark corner of my mind.
The girl on the table was pinned and helpless, but not so far away—I was burning with hatred. Burning like I never had before.
As his mouth wrapped around my nipple, I stopped screaming for help, and started screaming for death.
His death.
I wanted him to bleed for this.
I was going to hurt him.
Hell, when I came to, I was going to kill him.
It was that simple thought that unlocked something inside of me. Something I’d never known was there. For the first time, lying on a table, drugged and unable to move, I saw a glimpse of something…not of this world.
Something dark.
Deadly.
And as his hands unbuttoned my pants, that something cracked its eye open.
**Rysten**
Something reached into my chest and yanked my heart out.
At least that’s what it felt like.
Out of nowhere, a pure undiluted terror seized me. It demanded my attention; all of it, as the searing pain crawled inside me. I grasped at my chest as I fell back into the sofa. My wine slipped from my hand, spilling across the pale furniture, staining it a deep burgundy. The pain eased for a moment, and I looked up around the room. Julian gripped the island counter hard enough that the quartz crumbled beneath his fingers.
“What the fuck was that?” Laran yelled down the hallway. He emerged holding a hand to his chest, his eyes glowing red.
“I have no idea, but I’m going to assume we all felt the same thing?” Julian replied tersely. The words were hardly out of his mouth when it started again. Worse than it was before. The pain that ripped through me burned. Only when the scorching heat died down, did my vision clear enough to see the world around me.
Laran’s knees must have buckled, because he’d fallen to the floor. Allistair was collapsed sideways into the wall, his glass of scotch seeping onto the carpet in an amber pool. Even my brother, the strongest of us Horsemen, was leaning onto the counter for support. A vein in his temple bulged; the only indication Death would ever give he was in pain.
“Who could possibly attack all four of us?” I breathed.
Silence enveloped us as another wave of heat tore through my chest. This surge tasted of fury, not just pain. The psychic power bypassed my shields like they were nothing, igniting a torture I had never known.
As it waned, I realized a small piece of the essence was familiar. It was wild…
The truth and the horror hit me at once.
“Ruby.”
All it took was her name to spur us into action.
I had no idea how she’d done it. How she could possibly be hiding so much power? Allistair had said he felt it...but in that moment, I didn’t care. All I cared about was finding her and ending whoever was hurting her—if there was even anything left of them.
We were the Horsemen, and we were immortal. She had brought the four strongest beings that roamed any world, outside of herself, to their knees. It was very plausible that whoever hurt her was already dead.
“We need to find her now,” Laran said.
I shadow walked out of the room and onto the streets of Portland. They would catch up if they hadn’t already. Right now, Ruby was the most important thing. I made it three steps down the street, before another wave of uncontainable rage washed through me. It was crippling, and I stumbled, but I would not stop. I would not fail her.
I used the pain and the rage and the terror to fuel my hunt. They would lead me to her.
I had no idea where she was, or how to reach her, but somehow, her power guided me.
Like a string connecting the two of us, it wrapped around me, pulling me towards ground zero.
I came around another corner and stopped immediately at a door. I could feel it in my bones. She was here. This was it. I was standing at a club called Pandora’s Box.
I pushed through the line of people to the front, punching the guard that dared block my way. They were not my concern. Inside, it smelled of liquor and sweat. The humans danced, if you could call it that, grinding on one another in sync with the music.
The lights above shifted and moved as I dove into the crowd, pushing the humans out of the way as I went. I ripped through the dance floor and scanned the bar. Ruby wasn’t here, but I could feel her close. Her pain was more pronounced now. Her terror more defined.
Images flashed through my mind.
My blood ran cold.
Lured by the invisible line, I found myself at the base of the stairs. Not a single bouncer tried to stop me. They were more preoccupied with the humans that had started collapsing one by one. Ruby’s power tainted the air, and I had no doubt she was the cause.
I raced up the stairs after War and Death; Famine at my heels. The world slowed down to one single purpose, and that was getting to Ruby. I was so focused on reaching her, that when Julian kicked the door open, I was unprepared for the rage that took me as I stared at the bare ass of her ex as he was removing the jeans from her limp legs.
He’d drugged her. He’d molested her. Now he was about to rape her.
I lost all sense of rational and let my fury consume him.
Chapter 14
The door burst open and light danced across the ceiling.
Josh halted in his fevered attempt at removing my pants, and the brief interruption ripped my consciousness away from the inner beast. But the damage was done. I now knew she was there, deep inside of me. Sleeping in a cage, waiting for the door to open. My vision swam as voices began to file in.