This golden god isn’t as soulless as he wants me to believe.
There’s something in Torben that is damaged the same as I am, and that dark part of him calls to me like a siren’s song.
Who hurt him the way society hurt me?
I don’t know why, but I want to rip whoever it was to shreds. I would though. He doesn’t deserve this pain.
It’s not hard to understand why he keeps mountainous walls in place around himself. He’s guarding himself, trying to keep other people out… or maybe he’s just trying to keep himself in.
I know that feeling. The one that says you won’t get hurt if you don’t let anyone get close to you.
For years it was easy to convince myself I was better off alone.
It’s easier not to get hurt when you don’t care about anyone.
It was how I survived being adopted by a pack who didn’t want me. But being alone makes for a dull and lifeless existence. Bea splashed color into my monochrome existence, yet now Latham, Aric, and even Torben are adding to the canvas and promising me a masterpiece on the other side.
“It’s only going to get worse from here,” Torben says, his face pinched like only part of him is truly concerned for me. There’s a war playing out behind his eyes, and I wish I could decipher where the lines are drawn. Or what each side is fighting for.
“I have nothing to go back to.”
The truth hangs over us like a dark cloud, but he knows I’m right. All that waits for me back down this mountain is betrayal, a pack I never truly belonged to, and the position Kyvain all too generously offered me.
“I refuse to be a whore.” The softest whisper leaves my lips, but Torben hears it. His arms tighten around me to almost crushing levels, but I don’t complain.
I find comfort in it, interpreting it the way I need, whether Torben means to offer me protection and solace in his arms or not.
I close my eyes as my head lolls against his massive shoulder and heat washes over me from the rapidly appearing man I know has just popped into existence.
“Oh fuck!” Torben chokes out, and I realize I must look dead in Torben’s hold. “No…”
“She’s breathing, you unobservant asshole,” Aric helpfully replies. “Just look at her tits. They’re moving.”
A blush blooms in the arches of my cheeks as I realize Aric is ogling my nakedness. My gaze snaps open and levels on the smirking man with molten eyes.
I’d say Aric’s a perv, but really, he’s just raw. I get the feeling he doesn’t get a lot of contact with other people in Hell. He doesn’t have a filter or awareness of someone who’s constantly performing for everyone around them.
He’s entirely himself.
And that’s something I don’t think I’ve ever seen in anyone I’ve ever met.
Latham hurriedly magics me a large tee-shirt that I wiggle into as best as I can while being pressed against the giant who refuses to put me down.
I hope he never does. I hope he carries me around like his lap goddess for the rest of his immortal days.
“We were trying to get in, but…” Latham’s eyes darken.
Aric’s glower is as dark as midnight. “The fuckers took you to the one place we couldn’t go.”
“Technically there are entire realms you can’t go.” Torben’s smirk is thoroughly amused as he steals the weary eyed house cat from my arms and carefully hands it to Aric.
Aric’s lips curl as he takes the thing like it might possibly explode in a fiery ball of fur if he’s not careful. Honestly, Loki might. If he was fully conscious that is…
I swallow hard at that thought.
“As much as I love this bromance, can we go?” I glance over Torben’s shoulder, worried those icy skeletons are going to stomp through the snow and actually succeed at killing us this time. “I’m not sure if I actually killed them or just temporarily took them out.”
Aric tenses, his entire frame going into beast mode as he prepares to unleash hell on earth… or whatever fucking realm we’re currently in, because it’s definitely not the mortal one I grew up in.
