Becoming Bad (The Becoming Novels) Read online

  Patience was not in MacTire’s repertoire, and what little he had with this softly-softly approach was wearing thin, fast. Immediate gratification in all things came with the territory. It was a millennium since he’d last locked wills with a mate, and that had ended in carnage to rival any of the human wars. History would not repeat itself. Ashling DeMorgan would bend to his will or she would break, just as all the latents before her had.

  Bundling her into his arms, he settled her lax form into the nest of pelts. Swollen lids and hitched breathing told him she’d cried herself to sleep, again. His hand hovered above her pale cheek, the urge to smooth her hair a compulsion quashed in the fist of self-loathing that branded his tenderness weak.

  He would blame it on their blood-tie, short-circuiting his brain, but this one was undeniably different from the others. She was that elusive thing you wanted all the more because it was denied you. Oh, he could take her, against her will. She wasn’t strong enough yet to fend him off ... though that situation was changing by the day. Hell, she would even enjoy it, thanks to the cruel irony of the blood-tether that kindled lust even in the ice-pool of her hatred.

  But you want her to want you, the voice goaded.

  Yes, damnit, he was egotistical enough to believe she would come begging on her knees.

  As though feeling his thoughts, Ashling moaned in her sleep and shifted, one hand falling limp across the furs. Something bright caught his eye. Clutched in her fist was an old coin, that coin. It dangled from the black cord MacTire himself had wrenched from Connal Savage’s throat, right before he ordered his execution. His jaw tightened and he stiffened, restraining himself from ripping the detested thing from her hand.

  Even in fucking death …

  A silent storm of frustrated rage, he blasted from the room to stalk the stone corridors in search of Brandr. He found him in his sleeping quarters, draped in a blanket of willing, naked female.

  ‘Wake up,’ he snarled, back-handing Brandr’s bearded face. The brunette stirred, Bambi eyes staring groggily up at the King. At the prospect of the male joining them in their bed, her expression quickly formed into one of lustful expectation.

  ‘Trouble in paradise, my Lord?’ Brandr’s voice was thick with sleep as he raked the wild mass of dark curls from eyes that were darker still.

  ‘That’s none of your fucking business.’ Tight-lipped, MacTire reigned in his anger. ‘Is this the thrall the Savage bit? The one you picked up in Doyle’s office?’ His hand braceleted one of the girl’s slender wrists, already bruised from the latest orgiastic feast at which she’d featured as the main course.

  ‘She’s the one,’ Brandr nodded, ‘quite the little firecracker too.’ With the flat of his hand, he pushed the girl from his bed. ‘What is mine is yours, my Lord.’ A smirk played at the corners of Brandr’s mouth. If he had an opinion on what MacTire was or wasn’t getting from the she-wolf in his chambers, Brandr knew better than to voice it.

  ‘You’re going to do something for me,’ MacTire commanded the girl, tugging her into the corridor by her wrist. She stumbled along the uneven rock in her red-soled shoes in an effort to keep up.

  ‘Yes Sir, of course. Anything,’ she breathed and it sounded seductive. He pulled her harder.

  The bastard had moved her again!

  Ash popped up meerkat-style and the floor yielded with the motion, cushioning her. Her fist pounded the soft bed. ‘Asshole! I can sleep where I want!’

  ‘You shouldn’t insult his Highness,’ the voice was dreamy behind her, throaty, ‘you should worship him.’

  Ash spun off the mattress to confront the intruder. It was a she. It was the she. Red Shoes. The sight of her sickened Ash to the core. This was the woman Connal had supposedly turned into the simpering addict now stood before her. This was the woman that had been ravaged as Ash watched. Her entire body flamed in remembrance. She tried, and failed, to look the woman in the eyes. The wall was a safer focal point.

  ‘What are you doing in here? Mac went that way, I think.’ Her arm waved towards the door, but the woman ignored the invitation to leave.

  The thrall was positively scowling, her pretty face displeased at Ash’s nickname for the King. ‘I’m not here for him,’ she said. ‘His Highness does not wish for my company.’

  Ooh, was that jealousy? Amusement briefly overcame irritation. ‘No? Such a shame …’ Ash replied, moving around the room, keeping the thrall at the centre of her attention, vaguely aware what she was doing could be classed as prowling. The woman brought out Ash’s claws, and she’d yet to figure out how to properly sheathe them. Red Shoes knew things, things Ash needed to know. ‘Have you been down here long?’ she asked.

  ‘Time has no meaning. There’s no daylight, you know, no night. Clocks don’t work.’

  She was slightly robotic, and Ash shivered.

  ‘Then how do you measure time?’ Her brows creased. She’d taken to making marks on the walls, tallying days however she could.

  ‘There is no time. There is only them. They are sun and moon, seconds, minutes, and hours. Fill time with them and you’ll never be left wanting.’

  The girl was a grade-A wackadoodle. Ash’s eyes narrowed. ‘The person who made you like this, did he leave you wanting?’ She couldn’t bear to mention his name, but she had to know. She had to know that Mac was lying to her.

  The woman actually purred, animated by the talk of sex. ‘Oh, he was spectacular. A pirate. He blew Jack Sparrow out of the water.’

  That dreamy look crossed Red Shoes’ face again and Ash nearly lost the non-existent contents of her stomach.

  ‘He bound me in my own underwear, did you know that?’

  The woman’s laughter drew Ash’s claws out full length.

  ‘He was a beast, all teeth and rutting. He got me addicted to the way they bite … Fuck, the way they bite … have they bitten you yet? You should let them, it’s orgasmic. On and on and on.’

  The scent of copper hit Ash’s nose seconds before the wet trail from her palms hit the sensitive skin of her wrists. She’d speared her own hands on the tips of her claws. Bearing down on the pain, Ash searched for restraint as the woman continued on in a stream of verbal porn, graphically describing the night Connal had forced her over a desk and …

  Ash growled, and it wasn’t a human growl. It was predatory, belonging to something with fangs and talons that could shred flesh. The thrall was too engrossed in her story to notice Ash was circling her. Instinctive, her feet silent on stone, she tightened the circumference with each pass.

  ‘I haven’t seen him since I’ve been down here, I miss his cock. Have you seen him? Maybe he will take me again, I’d die to get my mouth on him. I want to finish him, he left too soon last time. Do you think he remembers me?’

  The simpering thrall didn’t realise until it was too late and her words sliced a knife of jealous possession through the cords of Ash’s restraint. Red Shoes went down hard.

  A primal heart, beating stronger than anything human, took control, and dagger claws tore the girl's naked skin. Shrieks rose above Ash’s deranged growls.

  Blood painted the rock beneath them, spattering across Ash’s skin. Edward Scissorhands had nothing on her, a small voice in the back of her head quavered. She terrified herself, even as her hand caught the thrall’s ankle, dragging the worming female back from her pathetic attempt at escape. So easily broken, the damage didn’t seem nearly enough. The primitive thing inside her was frustrated, starving for something it knew. It wanted Connal and this female had touched him.

  That feral possession was killing the thrall.

  Yet there was no stopping. Inflamed by the blood, Ash struck again and again, forcing the woman to feel her punishment. It felt wrong but it smelled so right. Fear and pain, acrid and sweet.

  ‘Stop, please stop!’ The woman’s screams were wet with blood, bubbling out of her throat. ‘Help! Oh God, help! I’m sorry, so sorry!’

  The rambling hysteria only presented Red Shoes more as pre
y. The predator relished that its quarry was making more noise than an air siren.

  Ash caught her own reflection in the girl’s horrified brown eyes. Devil-red irises and sharply lengthened canines snarled back at her. Her skin was blood-smeared, her hair tangled, and she bore the scratch marks of the woman’s initial defence before the body beneath her had gone belly up in submission.

  Ash snapped her teeth inches from the thrall’s throat, and the female emitted a lusty moan. Even in agony, she was drawn to respond. Ash recognised the surrender, could smell it in the pound of Red Shoes’ heartbeat, and the beast was torn between backing off and tasting her obedience.

  It never got the chance to choose.

  Tackled from the unresisting, barely-breathing female, Ash found herself pinned, snarling and torquing, under the King’s colossal muscle. Her back cracked into a whip of pain, like its collision with the rock floor had shattered the vertebrae. She cried out.

  She bucked against his restraining hands, her hips battling the weight of his. He didn’t give her an inch. His thighs pressed hers to the ground, ceasing her kicking. Mac was one big, infuriating shackle. She bared teeth and went for his throat. He reared back and she missed, but his hips connected with the centre of her body. Ash froze.

  She froze because if she moved, even a little, she’d be grinding on the obvious arousal pressing at the core of her.

  ‘Ashling. Calm yourself,’ Mac demanded.

  Calm was nowhere near. Flames licked between her thighs and left her slick. Her insides purred. Fury had been diverted to lust in the presence of a male. The feral thing still wanted blood, but was rendered sluggish by desire.

  Ash fought it, tugging her wrists in the vise of his hand, trying to free herself without wantonly driving for friction where she ached.

  A smirk graced Mac’s lips and she answered it with a gnash of her jaws.

  With the bloodlust retreating, panic started to slip inside, expanding in narrow airways. There was blood congealing on her skin. Her gorge rose, nausea breaking a cold sweat on her heated skin and she whimpered.

  ‘Be calm,’ Mac’s tone changed, his weight lifted from all but where he held her wrists. He was being gentle again, as though sensing the panic rising over her. He soothed a hand through her hair and her breath stuttered.

  Needing a distraction from his touch, she dared to look over his shoulder and the bloodshed played in HD in front of her eyes. That poor girl had been torn up pretty good … by her. Ash was teetering on the edge of control, and could see what happened when she’d given it some rein.

  Oh God, what have I done? Dread seized her heart in its iron fist.

  ‘You have to breathe, Ashling. I can help you, but you have to let me.’ Mac sounded exasperated and exhausted, with a dose of concern.

  A commotion came from behind him. Ash didn’t look this time. She stayed fixed on the pale, feral-eyed monster staring back at her from the reflection of his black gaze. Brandr was cursing, stomping about and muttering about the mess. He bundled the injured girl into his arms and left the room, his voice booming off down a corridor, calling for their healer.

  Oh no … she’d broken his toy.

  The others were quiet, but she could sense them, individual energies wound up by the violence lingering in the room. Fite’s contemplation was a laser beam arrowed over Mac’s shoulder. His intensity unnerved her. It sure as hell didn’t help calm her down.

  ‘Is she dead? Mac … Did I kill her?’

  Ash swallowed, tears wetting her cheeks. Mac freed her hands and pulled her up, holding her close to his chest. Despite the comforting gesture, Ash had the feeling he was still restraining her. His heart was pounding almost as fast as hers. She moved to splay her palm over that rapid beat and he flinched. She looked up at him, confused to see his jaw clench. His strong fingers covered hers, carefully easing out the nails that had slipped like needles beneath his flesh. He pressed a kiss to her knuckles while rivulets of blood crept down over his chest.

  ‘Oh God ...’ Ash pushed at him, but he held strong. ‘You should go, get away from me.’ She strained to break the bind of his arms. ‘Please, you make it worse ...’ It was the truth, her nails would not retract, her body would not calm with him this close.

  ‘She’s not dead, Ashling. She’s in shock and has lost a lot of blood, but I am confident she will not die.’

  She was certain he was lying to her but she stayed silent, tense in his arms. His chest heaved, his lips skimming the top of her head, voice a rumble at her ear. ‘Let’s get you cleaned up, and then we can talk.’

  SHOWER OF ACCUSATIONS

  It was water. Bright, sparkling, clear-as-sky-blue water and she never wanted to leave it. Surprisingly warm, it fell hard from a gap in the stalactite ceiling, making music on the crystal rock floor and trickling into the small pool basin she stood in.

  A shadow passed in front of the fire torch in one corner and Ash glanced around. Guards prowled the perimeter, their eyes averted at every doorway. They risked losing them if they so much as caught a glimpse of her naked. Mac had been very graphic in his threats.

  She didn’t really care.

  Modesty had been lost to the urge to scour herself clean, and Ash stretched up into the rain of water, letting its purity strengthen her as she abraded a rough sponge over her skin.

  Red raw, that’s how she needed to be.

  Her eyes caught on the blood tainting the surface of the pool and her knees gave. She was a stain on the beauty of the place.

  God, that poor girl.

  Ash curled her legs into her chest and let the water pound down on her head. It blurred her thoughts with its crashing noise, but it couldn’t erase the memory. She’d shredded the girl, carved her anger into the thrall’s innocent flesh until the floor ran red.

  She prayed they were only surface wounds, pleaded for no lasting damage, hoped whatever primitive healers the wolves had could help her.

  They’d all looked so shocked. Great muscled brutes and they’d drawn up short at the sight.

  All except Mac. He leapt on the damn bomb.

  She was explosive and she couldn’t find the right wires to cut to deactivate the fury. It sizzled under her skin even now, pushing, as though it was having trouble being contained by her human flesh. It itched with power.

  She couldn’t even cry anymore, not for the girl she’d destroyed, and not for herself. Even her emotions weren’t her own.

  I’m losing myself.

  She shivered, unable to shake the suspicion that the guards were not for her protection, but theirs. Not to keep others out, but to keep her in. The way Brandr looked at her, dark eyes blazing with accusation over the mess she’d made of his plaything, had made her feel so very small.

  She’d seen the violence they were capable of. If even the monsters were repulsed, what the hell did that make her?

  They'd made the thrall orgasm. She'd made her bleed.

  What were they planning to do with her? They said Connal had no control, and they killed him for it.

  The crash of the water was so loud, it deafened her. So lost was she in her mire of self-pity that she didn’t hear the intruder until she was dragged from beneath the spray, her arm clamped in a cruel, metal-tipped grip. She staggered, slipping on wet rock before he hauled her to her feet.

  ‘Don’t you dare scream, Witch.’

  Like she could. Her vocal cords were frozen in shock.

  Fite held her at arms-length, green-rimmed irises shining with heat as his gaze rocked down her body. Ash curled in on herself, shielding her nakedness. That look was pure male, so focussed, she wondered if he was taking her measurements while he eye-raped her.

  Just be glad that’s all he’s doing, Ash. I doubt he’s here to have a nice naked chat.

  He wasn’t.

  She was so tense in his grip that when he eventually released her, she stumbled, landing hard. Sprawled unceremoniously, half-in, half-out of the pool, Ash sputtered water and splashed backwards as he
stalked forwards. Crab-scuttling, she flipped onto her hands and knees to avoid the snatch of his fingers, frantically crawling until her feet found the edge of the pool.

  She could hear his growled breaths at her back, his thoughts beating her with images of her own body, slices of him entwined with her … cut short and ending in black. Fite closed down the impressions of desire and she didn’t feel him near until her head was yanked back in his fist, ripping her off balance and connecting her spine with his chest.

  ‘Calm your fucking self,’ he snarled.

  Was he kidding? The thralls might welcome him with open legs but she was not about to calmly let him rape her. Her heel rammed at his instep and she was rewarded with his pained grunt.

  He fastened an arm across her chest, crushing her breasts painfully.

  Her elbow beat at his ribs and her nails slashed at the restraining forearm.

  ‘By Balor’s cock, Woman!’ Fite released her, spewing curses. He snatched up the robe and underwear she’d dropped and shoved them at her. ‘Put them on,’ he commanded.

  She obeyed, glaring as she showed him her back and drew the robe around her, tying it tight.

  Fite crossed his arms over his chest and stared her down.

  ‘Quite the little wildcat, aren’t you, DeMorrígan?’ he said, icily.

  That’s not my name. Unease creased her forehead as she sought her voice. ‘No, I don’t understand, I ...’

  ‘First that stunt you pulled with the raveners, and now this. You think you’ve got MacTire by the muzzle too, don’t you?’

  He was on her before she could react, metal tips puncturing the soft flesh of her upper arm so hard that tears sprung to her eyes and a whimper breached her lips.

  'What are you?’ he demanded, ‘Why did she send you here?'

  ‘You brought me here!’ she replied. Was he suffering from amnesia? Ash struggled, but got nowhere. Pain hazed over her vision in crimson and her head shook as a familiar edge crept up her spine and throbbed at her fingertips. Beneath her skin, something bristled.