Page 17 of An Oath at Midnight

“Stopped counting a few hundred years ago.”

I smirked. “Damn, that old?” He didn’t look old. He looked like a male in his early thirties. He was hot and broody and at times scary as hell. But you could say that about all of the hounds, honestly.

He shifted, his whole body turning to face me. “You ever come so hard you lose consciousness, Magnolia?” His deep voice resonated right through me.

I blinked up at him. “Uh…”

He flashed his teeth, white and sharp, and it was sexy and terrifying all at once. “You ever want to, you know where to find me.”

I laughed. The brazenness of these hounds was unmatched. Not surprising, considering they were created by Lucifer and were emotionally deficient. They understood loyalty, they knew anger and lust well, but that was about as far as their emotional range went—the rest was beyond their grasp. Warrick and the other mated males were the exception—after they mated, their emotions developed, to different degrees. “Warrick might have a problem with that, don’t you think?” I said. My bother-in-law was extremely protective.

Lothar shrugged. “I was at your twenty-first birthday party, sweetheart. You’re a female, old enough to decide who she fucks.” Then he waited, watching me for a response, I assumed.

I didn’t have one. “That I am. So, I’m just gonna…go over there.”

“I’ll be here all night, you change your mind.”

“Noted,” I said and hustled across the room to the table Ren and his wolf were leaning against, along with several other hounds and their females, well, the ones they’d chosen for that night, at least. One of the males handed me a beer, and I settled in. Ren was too busy to talk, so I chatted with one of the wolves.

But slowly, over the next hour, they all drifted off in pairs to find a room and some privacy, no doubt.

I ended up at the table alone, watching everyone around me.

Draven had his arm hooked around Iris’s neck, and they were sucking face every few minutes. Rose and Ronan were here as well. She was on her mate’s lap, and every now and then, he’d tug her down for a kiss. Six months ago, Rose discovered who her biological father was, and the reason she’d been sick most of her life—now she had black, leathery wings and could fly. She was also a seer and, through scrying, received messages and visions.

I glanced across the room. Willow and Warrick were just as bad with the PDA. She stood leaning against the bar, Warrick behind her, one hand resting on her belly, the other resting on the bar in front of her. And yep, every so often he’d lean in to kiss the side of her neck, telling her without words what he wanted, and she’d turn to him and give him the kiss he was silently asking for.

What would that be like? To have that? To be wanted like that?

An image of Bram filled my mind, of how he’d looked last night. Bruised and cut. After I’d healed him, I’d drifted off, but I’d woken again a couple of hours later. He’d been asleep, lying on his back, his muscled body defined by the moonlight filtering through the room. His face had been relaxed, his thick, black lashes resting on his cheeks, and his lips, full and deep burgundy, had looked so incredibly soft.

For a split second, goddess, for just a moment, I’d actually had the insane urge to lean in, and—

I swallowed hard.

Then Clayton’s hateful face had filled my head, like it did now, and had turned the soft feeling that had filled me into something jagged and awful. As if he were standing in front of me, blocking what lay ahead, stopping me from seeing anything good, or real. He was here with me now. I saw his cold blue eyes staring back, mocking me, making me feel sick to my stomach.

But worse, I felt his lips on me, cold and hard. He’d been my first kiss, my only kiss. My hand lifted to my mouth, and I rubbed at my lips, trying to take away that cold, awful feeling.

Suddenly, I couldn’t breathe. I was suffocating. I rushed across the room, plugged the code into the keypad by the door, and ran down the stairs to the den, and the coolness and silence it offered. The stone walls made it soundproof, and the wall sconces offered a soothing, warm glow. I strode along the wide cavern, not knowing where I was going, only that I needed a moment alone. The hounds slept down here. They each had their own quarters, and there was also a common area, a gym, a fighting pit, and cells for locking up and torturing their enemies—and I’m sure a lot more I didn’t know about.

A deep thumping sound echoed down the cavern, rapid and repetitive. It was coming from the gym. I made my way there on autopilot and opened the door. It was Relic. He was in a pair of shorts and nothing else, his long hair tied back in a knot, his body straining as he smashed his bare fists into the stone wall over and over again. I guess when you were immortal and impossibly strong, a normal leather punching bag didn’t quite cut it.

He stopped and turned, sensing me as soon as I walked in. He was panting, but not as much as he should be, not after trying to punch through a cave wall in the name of fitness. Relic planted his hands on his hips. “Mags, hey, what’s up?”

I’m freaked out and lonely as hell. How about you?

“Why are you down here and not up there with the others?” I said instead.

He shrugged a massive shoulder. “Felt like punching shit.”

The male was a bit of a mystery. Relic was one of the next generation of hounds, only hundreds of years old instead of thousands. I assumed he was as emotionless as the others, though he definitely hid it better. After leaving Hell, the hounds taught themselves to imitate emotion to fit in, and Relic had mastered the skill. He was also Lothar’s son, which was extremely weird since Relic looked only slightly younger, like a guy in his mid-to-late twenties.

“Your dad seems to be enjoying himself,” I said.

He shook his head. “It’s fucking weird when you say shit like that.”

“You don’t call him dad?”