It was Griff, only he looked different. Gone was the luxuriant hair, replaced with a short style that made him look like a human o ce worker. He wore a black suit with a white shirt with only one button loose and a strip of red silk in the top pocket.
He had the same angular brow with startling amber eyes as before, the same high cheekbones, a perfectly straight nose, and gorgeous lips. He had a trim beard that was thicker than a five o’clock shadow that accentuated his masculine charm.All the air left my lungs, leaving me reeling forward.Was this some new brand of torture? It had to be because to his left and right were identical twin women, each with broad smiles, chestnut hair, and white dresses that looked more like bandages.And they looked happy.I stopped breathing. My body went perfectly still. And the only sound filling my ears was the roar of my blood.From the way they pressed their petite bodies against my mate, it looked like he was sleeping with them both. Or the dirty, rotten wolf was building up to it. Where was he? My gaze darted left, right, up, down, taking in the surroundings.The background was the kind of bars I imagined could be in Heaven. Pristine. Minimalist. White. Perspex shelves that displayed an array of liquor bottles spaced out like they wore works of art. Long, dangling lights shaped like tiny globes. It was modern—well beyond the likes of Kirk, Spock, and Uhura.I shook my head, trying to dislodge the vision, but it remained there in glorious technicolor. My lungs started working again as realization trickled through my skull. Demons were sadistic bastards, but they wouldn’t go so far as to fabricate something so elaborate. Not for a woman who died at the age of twenty-one and barely made it as an alpha. This had to be real.“What are you showing me?” I hissed. “Why is he alive and still young when I was executed for his murder?”“Your mate escaped Hell.”My nostrils flared. In the years I’d been stuck in my shit hole of a cell, people had tried to break out. Some old bastard had convinced a bunch of gullible souls to stitch themselves together to create a being of immense power. I think it was called a soul king or something similar.It hadn’t worked.The combined spirits had torn apart a bunch of pit demons, and I had seen my tormentors ripped to shreds and tossed into the lake of lava. But lightning had filled the air and dismantled the soul king, ending that particular escapade.“How did he get out?” I snarled.“If I knew the answer to that question, you would still be in your cell,” Hades said, his voice bitter.For the next few heartbeats, I watched Griff take the twins to a booth, where a bottle of champagne awaited. After settling into their fancy seats, they embarked on a session of public petting.Angry sparks flew off my skin, filling my vision with white. I had to stop this. Griff didn’t get to leave his eternal punishment while I still suffered. But beneath the fury was a despair as deep as the ocean. Seeing him with those women reminded me of everything that I lacked. Beauty. Charm. A personality someone could love.The skin around my eyes grew hot and the edges of my vision turned red. No one ever needed to tell me I was ugly because the truth was plain to see in the mirror. It hadn’t mattered because I had a purpose beyond making myself attractive to men. I was going to carry on Dad’s work as the alpha.Griff popped the champagne cork. Foam spurted across the table, making them all laugh.I ground my molars and snarled. The moment our eyes had locked, my wolf had recognized her mate, even though I’d been reluctant to acknowledge our connection. But Griff had noticed it too, and he’d been determined to make me his.Until he’d gotten what he wanted and rejected me.He filled their flutes with the bubbly liquid, and the trio clinked glasses.“And where is he now?” I snarled.“Franklin Gri ths is safely ensconced in the heart of Shifter City,” Hades replied. “The most magically secure enclosure in the Supernatural World.”If I wasn’t so transfixed by the sight of my mate molesting those beautiful twins, I would have given the Demon King a look as blank as my mind. “I’ve never heard of the place,” I growled, already devising a way to break out of Hell so I could kill him all over again. “Is it in Atlantis?”He sighed. “It’s in Logris.”I finally turned to lock eyes with the Demon King. “What?”He drummed his fingers on his thigh. “Humans found the location of Logris shortly after Yule. We had to separate the city into its smaller villages and scatter our location across parks around London.”My gaze darted back to the screen, where one of the twins had disappeared. Griff lay back on the booth’s leather seat with a lazy grin. I ground my teeth. I didn’t need to have memorized my dog-eared copy of The Joy of Sex to know she was giving him a blowjob.“After your execution, your beta, Gerrison, took over the pack, and he became the Shifter King,” Hades said. “Unfortunately, he was murdered by another wolf named Mondo, who subsequently lost an alpha challenge to a creature named Beowulf Kenneally.”Somewhere in the back of my mind, I wanted to ask why he’d referred to someone with a wolfish name as a creature, but Griff threw his head back on screen, looking like he was in the throes of ecstasy. A growl reverberated in the back of my throat. That wretched bastard.“Beowulf was challenged by Gerrison’s daughter, Lydia, who lost the position to Fenrisùlfr.”“What?” I turned to look at Hades, whose lips had tightened. “Are you talking about—”“Fenrir, the Norse god?” he asked. “Yes. He’s another one who escaped Hell and now rules Logris. There’s an open invitation to every shifter in the Supernatural World to fill your former city.”“Wait, so Logris is now—”“Shifter City,” Hades said, his words clipped with impatience. “Franklin Griffiths absconded with thousands of wolf shifters, and he continues to steal more. Nobody knows how he did it, why he took so many with him, or what he’s done with my former inmates, but he now resides within the impenetrable walls of what used to be called Logris.”My gaze drifted back to the screen, where Griff was devouring the other twin’s mouth. Each moment was a fresh slice of anguish across my heart, making me feel lonelier than ever. After they’d sentenced me to death, the executioner had severed my soul, cutting me off from my beautiful white wolf.Losing her had been even worse than discovering that Griff had not only rejected me but usurped my position in the pack. His large hand cupped the woman’s tiny breast and kneaded it like it was a round of dough. My insides, which had been empty since I’d refused my last meal, now filled with revulsion.Then the screen went blank.I jerked forward, my mouth falling open. “Where’s the rest of it?”“You’ve seen enough to know that your unfaithful mate is enjoying a life of unbridled luxury in the Living World,” he said.Bitterness coated the back of my tongue, but I managed to swallow back the bile. “Why am I here?” I rasped, my throat feeling like someone had scratched it raw. “Is this part of my torture?”Hades sniffed and smoothed a manicured hand down his lapel. “Hardly.”I stilled, waiting for the man to speak. Maybe if I drew out this meeting and gave him a few vague answers about Griff, then I might get to spend the night in the palace dungeons while he continued the interrogation. It was strange to have lived for years in that gritty cell. Stranger to crave its safety during my torture sessions with the imps. But what was most strange was that I couldn’t face going back to the Punishment Pits.“Part of me found my stay here bearable because I knew Griff was somewhere in those stalagmites, suffering the same torment.” I dropped my gaze to my lap.“He wasn’t.” “What?” I whispered.“Griff, as you so fondly call him, resided in a village within the Asphodel Meadows,” Hades said, his voice filled with regret.“But he was a back-stabbing bastard.” I raised my gaze to meet the Demon King’s.Something in his eyes said he could relate to my anguish, which was bizarre because he was so handsome and looked like he could get the pick of women and keep them endlessly fascinated. Not only that, but Hades didn’t need to trick anyone into going to bed with him.“A bastard who committed minor crimes.” Before I could speak, Hades raised his palm. “Miss Aibek, you need to understand that there’s an ocean of difference between seducing women for fun and profit, and shooting a man in the kneecaps, beating him to an inch of his life before shooting him again in the chest and then setting him alight?”My lips puckered. When he put it that way, he made mesound like the villain. “But—”“No,” he said in a voice sharp enough to cut through my counter argument. “When the enforcers broke down the door of the alpha’s basement, they found you dancing a jig on his charred corpse.”“I’d do it again if you gave me the chance,” I snarled.Hades looked like he was trying not to roll his eyes. “And this is why an incorrigible soul like yours would never leave the Punishment Pits without my assistance or intervention.” “Why?” I spread my arms wide. “Because I broke the law to get justice?”He shook his head. “Fortunately, I would like to offer you an opportunity to escape your deserved punishment and live out your afterlife in the comfort of the Asphodel Meadows.”My heart skipped several beats before rolling like thunder. “You want me to track him down and kill him?”“More or less,” Hades said with a smile, “But your mission is slightly more nuanced.”“I’m listening,” I said.Hades rose to his feet and stalked across his study with the grace of a panther. My throat dried, and I straightened in my seat, my hackles rising. Everyone knew never to make deals with demons, bargains with faeries, or promises to gods. Such arrangements always backfired, and 99.999 percent of the time, it was the god or demon or faerie who won.My heart beat faster than a drumroll, and the room became too hot, too small, too stifling. Hades’ power was overwhelming to the point where I couldn’t breathe.“Miss Aibeck,” he said in a voice older than time. “Will you go into the human world and retrieve your errant mate?”Mate.At that last word, all common sense evaporated into the ether. I blurted, “Yes, as long as I get to kill him.”Hades grinned with a throaty laugh that made the fine hairs on the back of my neck want to skitter to the fireplace and hide. “If you complete this mission to my satisfaction, you’ll have a cottage in the Asphodel Meadows and employment in my Pits, where you will spend the rest of eternity punishing Griffiths.”My breath turned shallow. This was more than I could wish for. A place to stay that didn’t give me constant discomfort, an existence free from torture, and the chance to hurt Griff as much as he had hurt me.Only a fool would refuse such a tempting offer. “When can I start?”The Demon King’s eyes glowed like Hellfire. “How about now?”Hades stepped back and gave me one of those grins that would have been frightening if my blood wasn’t already thirsting for revenge. I gazed up at the Demon King, my eyes steady, my chest rising and falling with excited breaths. Anyone looking at us would think we were a pair of maniacs. Maybe we were. Because of Griff’s calculated betrayal, I had ended up here in Hell instead of leading my pack.“Wonderful,” Hades drawled as he swept his arm toward the other side of the room. “Healer Iaso will fortify your magic and prepare you for an induction to the modern world.”He stepped back to reveal an even larger space with doors leading out on both sides. At the far end of the room were a pair of staircases on each side that led to a mezzanine. My gaze slid to a gold-framed mirror, where a short woman in a hooded cloak beckoned me over. My brows rose. Had she been standing there the entire time Hades and I had been talking?“Come along, Miss Aibek,” she said, sounding brusque.
Healer Iaso gave me a gentle pat on the shoulder. “We women have had a shitty deal when men are in charge. Things have changed a little in Logris. The Witch Queen still rules, and there’s a Mage Queen and a Fire Queen.”I flinched. Back in my day, anyone who practiced fire magic was executed without trial. “They let Fire users live?”She nodded. “Even His Majesty has softened, now that he’s found his wife.”My shoulders sagged. “What a pity I didn’t wait four decades to murder Griff.”“It’s a pity you had to murder him at all,” she said, her voice soft with sympathy. “If it had been up to me, Franklin Gri ths would have gone straight to the Punishment Pits.”It took several minutes for her words to sink in, and I stared at my lap as the other woman bustled around the room. No matter what I thought about, my mind still kept drifting to Griff. If he had wanted my pack, he could have challenged me like a wolf instead of making me fall in love. That had been the worst part of it all. I’d
I leaned forward, my brows furrowing, and stared at the screen. Everything we’d learned at the academyhad indicated that Fenrir was a wolf, not a shifter. He was the offspring of Loki, the Norse god of mischief, and Angrboda, a giantess also known as the mother of monsters. The only non-animal child they’d had was a daughter called Hel, a goddess who was beautiful down one side of her body but a withered corpse on the other.The man standing with Griff was more like an angel than a god. He had a mop of golden curls that framed a classically beautiful face of high cheekbones, full lips, a darker stubble, and eyes like vibrant turquoise. Men like that didn’t exist. At least not in our pack.“How did Fenrir gain a human form?” I asked.Hades folded his arms across his chest. “According to his sister, Fenrir performed a heinous act of magic to end the world.”My brows drew together. Something in his tone suggested that he thought the explanation was bullshit.“How did Griff convince a go
Hades folded his arms across his chest. “You’ll be working in pairs. Those who produce the information that leads to the capture of Gri ths and his accomplices will spend their afterlife in comfort. If you fail, you will return to the Punishment Pit.”“That hardly seems fair,” mumbled the redhead.He swept his arm toward the door. “One of my imps will escort you to your cell if you no longer wish to participate. I will arrange daily punishments to make up for the magic you received under false pretenses.”“I’ll stay.” Her voice shook.“Good.” Hades raised a hand, and a familiar ache formed in my heart. I placed a hand over my chest and gasped. The last time I’d felt this way was when they had severed my wolf.The other women cried out.I spun around in my seat and found Healer Iaso standing in a doorway, flanked by four wolves. My gaze locked with the most beautiful one of them all, the arctic wolf with cerulean blue eyes and a pristine, white coat, and my heart melted.“Beki.” Before
I ignored those three and focused my gaze on Beki. She was all that mattered. Her, and finding Griff. Hades hadn’t said it directly, but it looked like we would be able to stay together if I satisfied the Demon King’s demands. Not that I needed any incentive to cut down the mangy wolf who had broken my heart and stolen my pack, but it now meant that I couldn’t let my hatred for him compromise the mission.“Everybody, take a deep breath in.” The healer raised both hands, which each held glowing wands.I filled my lungs with air, wondering if she meant for us to inhale our wolves.“And exhale.” Bright light filled my eyes, making them water.Letting out all the air from my lungs, I blinked away the tears, only to feel a slam against my solar plexus that hit harder than any fist. I staggered back, my lips parting in a moan. The other women’s cries echoed across the room, with one of them shrieking as though someone had punched her through the ribcage.As the glare faded, I raised my hands t
Beki nuzzled against our bond. She loved me unconditionally and wasn’t the type of wolf who wanted a better-looking human half, but even she had to admit that life was a thousand times easier with the advantage of beauty.“Wait a minute.” Marianna strode into the room, her hands clenched into fists. “Why does that behemoth get the beautiful amazon and we have to make do with average- looking Neutrals?”“Miss Aibek requires a body that can handle her immense power.”Marianna’s mouth dropped open. “She’s nothing special.”A growl reverberated in the back of my throat, and it wasn’t coming from Beki. Every time Marianna opened her mouth, it was a challenge. Now that Hades wasn’t around to protect her, I was going to show her who was the superior wolf. Squaring my shoulders, I stepped up to the black- haired woman and glared down into her ebony eyes.“Do you have something to say to me, bitch?”She raised her chin, her eyes shining with defiance. “You heard me.”My
Beki gave me an admonishing bark.“All right,” I snapped. “On occasion, one or two people have referred to me as pig-headed.”“Hmm.” Her lips tightened.“What’s happened?” I shoved my palms onto the cot and raised myself onto my elbows. The moment my gaze dropped down to boobs the size of watermelons, I got my answer. “Shit.”“Indeed.” She folded her arms across her chest. “It would seem that the body has bent to your will and created an almost replica of your soul.”“Can I see?” I asked with a gulp.She reached into her cloak and pulled out a mirror. “We can’t have you leaving Hell looking like the person who murdered Franklin Griffiths. However, I can make a few amendments to your physical form so you resemble something else.”I took the proffered mirror, my stomach sinking to the marble floor, and watched her sweep out of the room. As the door clicked behind her, Beki placed her front paws on our bond, urging me to take a look.“Didn’t you hear her?” I asked, my eyes squeezing shut.
“Did the humans put a man on the moon? I died before the rocket launched.”“So they say,” I muttered as I remembered the footage on television. “But the footage looked like the work of a light mage.”Larissa barked a laugh. “Stupid humans.”I chose a selection of outfits, from work clothes—because who knew what the mission would entail—to tight-fitting dresses that resembled what the twins had worn during their date with Griff. I paused, waiting for the surge of hot rage to burn through my insides the way it usually did whenever I thought about the flea-ridden wolf. Instead, my heart filled with the warmth of my connection with Beki.As we loaded the last of our choices and zipped our cases shut, a curvaceous woman about my body’s height sauntered into the room, looking like a 1950s secretary with her red hair swept up in a chignon. Everyone had been talking about a movie called Grease around the time of my execution, and I wondered if she was dressed like that because she’d gotten swept