He was staring right back at her, an unreadable expression on his face. I could feel the tension between the two from where my feet were rooted to asphalt.

  “Nyx?”

  We both turned back to face Butcher at the same time. He wore a pensive expression, eyes trained solely on my best friend.

  “Can I talk to you a minute?”

  Taking that as my cue I pushed off the truck again, this time to give the two of them some semblance of privacy.

  Not entirely sure what to do with myself, I decided now was as good as time as any to share parting words with Luce. He had just finished shoving the first-aid kit into one of the gear-bags when I reached him.

  Remembering the cold look on his face after his whispered proclamation had me keeping an even amount of space between Zane and me. Not because I was afraid—not a single cell in my body was scared of this man. It was something…else. Something I couldn’t explain and was doing my best not to decipher.

  It was strange.

  It was beginning to aggravate me.

  Especially since he’d had a gun to my head and continually put his hands on me without any fear or hesitation.

  The first incident alone would have had any other man on the ground with my Kambit buried in their jugular.

  But not this one.

  And that made even less sense to me.

  “You sure you want to do this?” Luce asked, zipping the gear-bag up and then holding it out to me.

  “Are you talking about going to find the kids? Because I’m not giving myself a choice about that. If you’re talking about working with the piece of shit who had a gun to my head a few hours ago, you’re not giving me much of one either. Are you?”

  “Your mouth is something else,” Zane chuckled.

  “Good thing I don’t care about your opinion then isn’t it?”

  He laughed and announced he’d give us a minute before walking away with a quiet, “You will,” ominously being left behind.

  Luce silently glanced from Zane’s retreating form back to me, a blank expression on his face. His silence spoke volumes. I didn’t need him to fight any of my battles, but the fact he wasn’t saying anything at all unnerved me.

  This was the part of me I hated, the one like mom. I hadn’t felt this many different emotions in ages.

  “What the fuck is going on, Luce?”

  “Nothing you can’t handle, Addy.”

  Damn him! Murdering my brother was probably something our parents wouldn’t forgive me for, but I was so close to crossing that line.

  “I’m going to come for you. You know that right?” he suddenly said.

  “Yes,” I tersely replied.

  “She has me, anyway,” Zane abruptly interjected, having crept back up as silent as a shadow.

  I didn’t know what the hell that meant, and I wasn’t going to ask. If he was referring to himself as a means of protection, then that was just laughable.

  I wasn’t the biggest, baddest thing in the Badlands, but I could make someone think I was.

  They shared a look I didn’t bother trying to understand, and then my brother was staring at me again.

  “As soon as Dad is filled in I’ll be coming with the acolytes.”

  If you’re not burned on the Leviathan first. Another thing I was trying to not think about, how our Dad would react to all of this.

  This made me feel better about my part of this whole thing. There was nothing worse than his anger.

  “That’s bullshit!”

  I whirled around, seeing a pissed off Butcher walking away from Nyx. And then there was Cameron, diffusing the would-be situation as always. No doubt he’d just tried to convince her not to go, clearly failing.

  “Aw, a lover’s quarrel,” Maliki fake sympathized from where he was standing.

  I gave him a flat look and then headed back towards Nyx. Annie met me halfway, her steps falling in pace with mine.

  “We should go. You know how that one tends to get,” she quietly said.

  I nodded my agreement, though I was less concerned with Butcher’s temper tantrum and more with the fact the longer we waited the further my sister was getting away from me.

  We finalized a few last details and then parted ways. I never thought I’d see the day Venom and Savages paired up for a similar cause, yet here we were.

  After settling into the passenger seat of the XL, I pulled a map out of the glove box. The SUV had a navigation system but finding solid servers to connect to was a lot more difficult than finding a radio broadcast—those seemed to be on every channel these days, some full of false prophets preaching we had entered the end of days.

  Spreading the tear resistant paper out before me, I scanned over it to find our location, flipping the middle console open to search for a pen.

  “If you tell me how to get there I’ll trace a path,” I said when Annie climbed into the driver’s seat.

  “You’re asking the wrong person, princess.”

  Okay, that definitely wasn’t Annie.

  I glanced up before slowly shifting my gaze to the seat beside me.

  “Um, what exactly do you think you’re doing?”

  “Driving,” he casually replied as everyone else piled into the back of the truck, Annie amongst them.

  “And who decided this?”

  He started the engine and adjusted the seat to his level of comfort before answering me.

  “I did.”

  I firmed my lips into a straight line and went back to reading the map—or pretending to read the map.

  I knew we’d be riding together; it wasn’t as if his truck would be going anywhere anytime soon, but not right beside one another. Being close to him was like standing in front of a furnace.

  At the very least I was glad he had a shirt on now. Not that I particularly cared. It’s not like I had been distracted by the perfect lines framing his eight-pack stomach or anything.

  “Let me see,” Annie said, reaching for the map from the back.

  I refolded it and passed it to her. Turning back around, I crossed my arms over my chest and stared out the window.

  “This is a nice ride,” the woman with colorful hair said after we’d been on the road a few minutes.

  Cam thanked her politely, and I smiled. He harbored hate or prejudice for rarely anyone.

  If everyone were a bit more like him, maybe this wasteland wouldn’t be full of killers, though, that may not necessarily be true. Power was claimed in a variety of ways and bloodshed had been one even when the world was considered ‘good’.

  Truthfully, it was hard for me to believe it ever was. History lessons taught me that there’d always been corruption, thievery, crime, murder, and an overall struggle to live a full, somewhat enjoyable life.

  Nothing was any different now except we governed ourselves and anarchy controlled the masses. Rich versus poor had become strong versus weak. This place was beautiful to me regardless. Not even the dark presence of the man beside me could tarnish that.

  The flick of a lighter pulled me from the bubble of thoughts I’d immersed myself in.

  A peculiar, familiar smell hit my nostrils’ a second later.

  “Are you serious?” I looked over at Zane as he accepted a joint from Maliki.

  Instead of answering he brought it to his lips and took a heavy drag. I counted the seconds in between until he exhaled his smoke in my direction.

  “How very mature of you,” I quipped, waving a hand to disperse the cloud.

  “Wanna hit?” He kept one hand on the steering wheel and offered me the joint with the other.

  If it weren’t so dark inside the XL, I would have let my expression answer for me.

  “You just had your mouth on that.”

  “So? You wanted me to put this same mouth on you a few hours ago.”

  “You know that isn’t remotely what she meant,” Nyx cut in.

  “What does ‘bite me’ mean?” Maliki questioned.

  “When spoken to little boys such as you, it means fuck off,” Annie replied.

  I laughed at her bluntness. “Refer to her definition for future reference.”

  “Little boys, huh?” Zane mused, passing the joint to the guy with long hair when he stretched between the seats for it. “I’ll remember that.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Meaning when I make good on my promise, you’ll find out how untrue that is.” The light from the XL’s screen perfectly illuminated his accompanying smirk.

  Remembering his whispered proclamation, I swallowed and faced forward again.

  I didn’t understand why he even said what he had to me. We’d just met one another tonight. We were not friends, we were not teammates, and we damn sure weren’t lovers. We were not anything but the Savage Princess and Venomous Prince who were never supposed to be this close to one another.

  I knew what my family did to his just as I knew what his family did to mine. What could he possibly want with a devil like me?

  We had to work with one another, for the time being, and I got that. I still didn’t understand why, however, I was going to take a page out of Nyx’ book and use them to help him find my sister.

  In the meantime, I wasn’t going to allow him to get to me with whatever this unorthodox energy between us was.

  Although, that was much easier said than done when an invisible string felt as if it were trying to draw me towards him—the desire to follow it evident in the concupiscence thoughts I was trying not to have, and the needling curiosity I was trying to quell.

  Needing to clarify for myself as much as him, I cleared my throat and quietly said, “Maybe you should stop smoking because you’re living in dreamland. That will never happen. We will never be more to each other than what we are right this moment.”

  “We’ll see,” he confidently replied without missing a beat.

  I shook my head and looked to the night sky, asking my satanic god for patience.

  Chapter Eleven

  Undecim

  I wasn’t one for worrying.

  Even now as I went against the grain and abandoned my usual process, driving towards the unknown, I wasn’t worried.

  Demon and Mark would do what they needed to do to survive, and they knew I would be coming for them. It wasn’t even a question, and when I got there, they knew whoever had chosen to fuck with them, which in turn fucked with me, would feel the full effects of their spines being crushed and necks being snapped.

  All this would come after watching me destroy everything they held dear, loved ones not excluded.

  I checked the rearview, seeing six of my seven passengers in various states. Trix had fallen asleep with her head on Ace’s shoulder. Maliki was listening intently as Annie showed him the path to Hocking Hills on the map. I wasn’t surprised she’d offered. She came off as someone that had common sense.

  The other two were staring out the window like Addy was. She yawned, and I glanced overseeing her chest puff up as she stretched. She tried to look at me discreetly, eyes darting away the second they met mine.

  I liked how she tried to pretend my words didn’t bother her. Like she wasn’t already struggling to keep illicit thoughts of us in a dark corner she could ignore.

  That was her first mistake.

  Everything degenerate flourished in the blackest corners of the sickest minds. And Addy? I knew she was a sick bitch. She just hid the worst of it beneath her pretty face façade. I wanted it unearthed.

  She’d gone to staring out the window not saying a word for the past two hours. I found myself wondering what she was thinking about. Naturally, I wanted it to be me.

  I had time to ensure it always would be. At least as long it would take to get Demon back. By that point, she’d have a clearer understanding of how things would be between us.

  She didn’t believe what I’d told her back at Copperfield. That was fine. Her acquisition was something I was looking forward to. It was overdue, and I was eager to start.

  Her friends weren’t a threat to me.

  There was no one out here to protect her or intervene. She’d been placed at my altar, and before this was over, she’d be down on her knees worshipping me.

  That would be her second mistake, a tragic one really, falling for the man destined to be her ruination. You know what they say, all legends fall in the making. It was almost a shame she would never even see it coming.

  Chapter Twelve

  Duodecim

  There was no sign of human life anywhere. Not that I expected there to be. No one with half a brain would wander the Badlands at night unless they had the protection to do so.

  I smothered a yawn for the millionth time and rubbed a kink from my neck, adjusting my ass on the leather seat.

  By car it would take us another six hours to reach the rendezvous point, that’s with nothing being in our way and on the off chance we couldn’t get our people back before then.

  We’d been driving for four when Zane turned into the parking lot of an old service station and parked, cutting the engine.

  “What are we doing?” Nyx asked, exhaustion coloring her tone.

  “Everyone in this truck except four people needs to sleep, some of you probably need to shit or piss, and now is the time for food if you’re hungry.”

  “He’s right. It won’t do anyone any good to run a rescue mission tired.” Annie said.

  I didn’t have anything else to add to this conversation, and they were both right. I wanted to get to my baby sister as fast as possible but doing so fully rested and ready to kick some Stag ass was better than going tired and getting my ass kicked instead.

  I undid my seatbelt and then got out of the truck, stretching my legs as they slid to the ground.

  There was a soft swoosh of air from the rear of the XL as the hatch was popped, rising on its own.

  “Shouldn’t we check to make sure it’s safe first?” The man named, Ace, asked once he was out of the truck.

  “What could be inside here but a waif?” Cam replied.

  The two of them had fallen into conversation about forty-five minutes ago and were like old friends already. That was Cam, though. He was hard not to get along with and from I could tell thus far Ace was just as laid back.

  “What’s a waif?”

  “A straggler—someone irrelevant. If anyone is in there they can either leave or, well, either way, they’ll be gone,” Nyx answered him this time.

  The woman with the lavender pixie cut was already sorting through our bags when I stepped up to grab one.

  She glanced at me for a second and then reached for one perched on top of the others.

  “This one works?” she turned to me with the bag in her hands.

  I studied her face a second, seeing for the first time how pretty she was. Her dark brown skin was flawless and bare aside from a septum piercing in her nose.

  The Venom mark sat on the left side on her neck, letting me know she was a full-fledged member opposed to Ace who wasn’t marked yet.

  “It’s fine…thanks,” I added at the last minute, gently taking the bag from her. And I didn’t feel weird about it. I felt no hate for this woman.

  The brand on her neck only made me aware of what faction she called her family just as mine did.

  She flashed me a smile, “I’m, Trix. If we’re gonna be stuck together, you should know my name.”

  “Addy,” I replied with a small smile of my own, taking a step backward, right into a solid wall of muscle.

  Before I could correct my mistake his hands were on my hips. A slightly surprised breath slipped through parted lips. I turned my head and looked up into a pair of increasingly familiar ocean eyes.

  Damn, those eyes.

  I could practically hear all the souls they’d claimed screaming at me to run away from him. I almost felt sorry for all the women who’d been lured in and trapped by their seductive allure.

  Almost.

  They should have known better.

  The cruelest demons had the most beautiful faces. That was unspoken law in the Badlands.

  Staring up at Zane, I knew I was dealing with one terrifyingly sinister bastard. Something about that made my pulse kick up in excitement.

  He was looking at me like he wanted to rip open my chest, tear out my soul, and either shred it apart or consume it. Unfortunately for him, I wasn’t born with one. Secondly, I knew better than to fall for a man with a bad boy persona. In his case, there was a third strike because this gorgeous man was explicitly forbidden, off limits, and an asshole.

  I thought it would be the same for him, but he would not keep his hands off me.

  I pursed my lips and stepped away from his scalding embrace, purposely rubbing against his front as I did.

  It was a bold move I admit. Not only was I toying with a man who was known to walk a tightrope between sanity and unstable. I felt as if I was calling fate out on her shit, testing if the magnetic pull between the two of us was real or fake.

  Either way, we were going to be stuck in one another’s proximity for the time being, and I wasn’t going to let him keep fucking with me.

  “You have a hard time keeping your hands to yourself.”

  “I don’t see anything wrong with holding onto what belongs to me.”

  Wow. “Belong?” I tittered, taking another step away from him. “I belong to myself, Z. You better get that through your head, I will never be yours.”

  “Giiirl,” Trix intoned beneath her breath, poking out her lips and going back to digging in the rear of the XL.

  I went to walk away that time; I took one step before he moved around and stopped right in front of me.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” Nyx demanded from behind him. I peeked past his shoulder to see Maliki stopping her from coming towards me.

  Just like that the tension between our two groups leaned towards hostile and away from amicable. Cam looked as if he were about to swoop in and pull me away, but I knew that was a terrible idea, and gave a slight shake of my head just as Annie placed a hand on his shoulder.

  I didn’t feel bad about my actions, but I regretted saying anything at all.