I’d bet that my tormenters had opened my chest more often than other parts of me. The heart was the most vital organ. It defined a person. I just hadn’t expected the heartless god and devil to be so interested in mine.
I had only a thin pair of underwear on. I had no way of knowing if I’d been defiled or raped, but I wouldn’t waste time ruminating over it. I had one single purpose in Hell—I would survive whatever shit came my way, I would grow stronger, and then I would destroy the god and the devil and slaughter everything that moved in this realm before I went down and never rose again.
Once you quenched fear, subdued hope, and no longer expected a future, nothing could ever stand in your way.
My heart hardened to steel. I breathed out icy air.
“You were experimented on,” Loki said softly, his gaze turning solemn as he averted it from my breasts. A flash of dark rage flitted by his eyes. “But you weren’t defiled. I insisted on that with all the power I had. That was part of my terms. I’m to reform you, to make you Lucifer’s and Ares’s tool and weapon, and finally their bitch and consort. They, however, were gracious enough to allow me to have the first sample of you.”
A wave of chill iced my bones; nausea twisted my stomach. Ice crystals formed under my feet on the hot land.
I was a walking incarnation of cold rage, but it didn’t faze the demon prince.
“They don’t care about my means,” he said, watching me closely. “They want results.”
“Aren’t they a bunch of delightful dicks that eat dicks for breakfast?”
“Never heard of that funny expression. Anyway, demons and gods don’t think like humans, and you’re still conditioned by human morals and concepts, Celeste, even though you aren’t one of them.”
“They expect you to use yourwayto beat me into submission?” I asked, a blank mask on my face despite my fury. “Are you the worst of the worst in Hell, Loki?”
He grinned savagely and seductively.
“The worst of the worst in any universe, cousin,” he said. “As I said, I have a reputation to maintain, and Hell isn’t like anyplace.”
“Why am I not surprised?” I said, putting sarcasm in my tone and pushing down my fear as I let my formidable will dominate and fortify my every thought.
“I’ve never taken an unwilling woman into my bed,” he said with a taunting smile as he eyed me expectantly. “I never need to. They crawl to my bed, begging to be fucked and always screaming for more.”
Loki was extremely attractive. He was every bit a dark prince of Hell. While Lucifer was all golden, despite how mythology mistakenly describes him as a dark, shiny being, his heir was all dark and gorgeous—jet black hair, obsidian bedroom eyes with fire that could melt panties, and dark bronze skin.
I suspected that many people mistook Loki for Lucifer, and I don’t think Loki was particularly pleased by that.
Hell’s prince could also change his appearance at ease, but I knew this one was his true form. For some reason, he wanted me to see his true form, and it’d always been that way with us.
He wore a pair of designer denim jeans and a thousand-dollar gray shirt, sleeves rolled up, revealing his muscled forearms and a thick, white-gold bracelet. No one would’ve thought he was a half-demon in any human social setting. He looked every bit a powerful billionaire from a dark romance novel.
He wasn’t lying about his appeal. I didn’t doubt that women of different races and species would beg him in bed and scream for him in pleasure. None of them could recognize him for what he was, and I doubted any could sense the ruthless and merciless demon beneath his skin before nightmares seized them and tossed them into the pit of Hell forever.
I wasn’t one of those women and never would be.
His charm and spells didn’t work on me. Lust didn’t beat in my bloodstream when I stared at him. His dark beauty and incubi charisma didn’t touch me either.
It was laughable that Lucifer had assigned this champion to seduce, bend, and break me when they’d failed to do so after two months of slicing me open.
I snorted. “Keep at it, cousin—never take an unwilling woman.”
Somehow, I also trusted his declaration that he’d never been a rapist, despite that he was a half-demon. Demons lie, but I hadn’t detected Loki lying to me. Perhaps he still had a trace of decency left.
“A woman who always speaks her fierce mind.” Loki chuckled. “I might be the only one in Hell to appreciate your daring, Celeste. No one has ever annoyed the hell out of Lucifer and Ares until you came on the scene. It was priceless to see the black rage on their faces when you pissed them off without a care.”
I kept letting him call me Celeste. After parting with my mates, I didn’t think I could bear to hear anyone call me Marigold. She’d died in the Ever Realm with the elemental.
Bleakness engulfed me.
I’d left the past behind and I had no future.
I was a shadow and wraith of revenge.