I recoiled.

Sully growled.

And Drake commanded the guard trapping Jealousy and me, “Grab the vials and my brother’s cell phone from my pocket.” He raised his eyebrow at the floor where his clothes were strewn.

The man ducked and fossicked through his pockets, coming up with a cell phone and three tiny vials of sorcery.

“Give them to her.” He pointed at Jealousy.

Jealousy took the offered gifts. The second her fingers curled around elixir, a darkness fell over her. A shadow that seemed to suck her down into whatever trickery she’d planned.

“Load a program,” Drake snapped.

“What do you want?” she asked quietly, carefully, her thumb flitting over the phone and bringing up the app I’d seen Sully use.

Sully’s growl filled the room. “You do this, Jess, and I’ll kill you myself.”

She ignored him, scrolling through fantasies. “Underwater? Flying? Sacrifice? Forbidden sibling? Abusive teacher? Shared woman? S and M club?”

“That one,” Drake nodded, licking his lips, his cock swelling with anticipation. “BDSM with as many toys as possible.”

Jealousy swallowed hard and nodded, pressing a line of code and flinching as a ‘Load’ button popped up. “It’s ready.”

Drake smiled like the devil. “Pass me the elixir.”

“Don’t you fucking dare!” Sully snarled. “Have Jealousy, the traitor. Fuck her. Take her however you want. Just leave Eleanor—”

Jealousy fisted all three vials, carefully placing one into Drake’s eager palm.

She caught my gaze.

I bared my teeth.

She shrugged slightly, but instead of apology, I saw fierce determination.

Had she hated me all along?

Had this been her plan?

To become indispensable to someone who would keep her? Who would put her in the position of power she’d told me she always wanted? The gatekeeper of hallucinations and madam of trapped goddesses.

Betrayal burned through me. “How could you—”

“Time to play, Jinx.” Drake grabbed me, wrapping his hand around my nape and jerking me into him. Our bare flesh slicked together with oil. His hard cock pressed against my belly.

No!

I squirmed and fought.

It wasn’t enough.

He fed the nasty, abominable bottle past my lips.

I fought harder.

Fuck, I fought.

He tipped it upside down.

Elixir splashed onto my tongue with its nauseous takeover.

I turned wild.

I kicked and scratched, punched and struck.

“Christ!” Sully’s howl filled my ears.

I tried to spit out the fragrant sugary drug.

I hit him.

I kicked him.

I almost got free.

But he was Sully’s brother after all, and he did exactly what Sully had done to me at the beginning of our story.

His palm slapped over my mouth.

His fingers pinched my nose.

He suffocated me...

killed me...

destroyed me...

“Fuck this!” Sully’s roar bounced off the walls. A gunshot rang. A bang ricocheted.

Greyness drowned me.

Lungs clawed me.

I had no choice.

I gagged.

I moaned.

I swallowed.

Chapter Twenty-Five

I WAS A SCIENTIST—not because I’d been born into the lineage, but because I had an obsessive need to chase the impossible. I didn’t accept that a human body was at its full capacity in its current pathetic state.

I believed we were a battery—a machine working at thirty percent—and all we needed was a compound or chemical...something to trigger a new state of being. A stronger state, an invincible state.

Medical advances had gotten me closer to that goal.

Trials and failures had inched me closer to achieving what no one else had before.

But it was fury that shattered the threshold of evolution.

Seeing Drake touch her.

Drug her.

Rub his cock on her.

Yeah, it was the best narcotic, stimulant, and biological enhancement I fucking needed.

Three men were nothing.

Their weapons were nothing.

Life was fucking nothing if he hurt her.

My body moved of its own accord, sweeping from kneeling to standing and choreographing a war that I disassociated with.

My entire mind and whole heart were already across the room with Eleanor. I didn’t feel the crunch of my knuckles as they ploughed into someone’s face. I didn’t hear the crack of their bones as I kicked a man’s ribs and sent him sprawling to the floor.

I didn’t feel their retaliation or the stitches pulling my flesh, nor the hot gush of fresh blood.

My eyes had found their target.

Drake.

Motherfucking Drake.

He fought Eleanor as she turned into a cyclone in his arms. She scratched and clawed, she screamed and went crazed, knowing as well as I did that she had a few short minutes to get away. A few measly minutes to run before she’d spread her legs, welcome the devil, and fuck whichever man would have her.

No.

A simple word. A ruthless voice in my mind.

No!

She’s mine.

A bullet zinged past, missing me by a fraction.

I shoved my bound fists into a guard’s neck, making him gag for air.

I fell to my knees as two men landed on my back, crushing me.

My eyesight still flickered with black clouds and grey paint. Shadows danced over clarity, leaving my other senses working at maximum. My sight had returned in spurts, teasing me with slow recovery.

But even lacking vision, I was still dangerous.

Tritec licked through my blood, granting false power, making me otherworldly in my strength.

Shoving the two guards off me, I round-housed one and sucker-punched the other. I didn’t wait to see if they’d fall. I strode toward Drake holding my woman, snarls tumbling from my throat, sounding exactly like the wolf I was nicknamed for back in society.

Drake’s naked cock branded her back as she struggled in his embrace.

I would kill him slowly.

Painfully.

I crouched and prepared to attack, but Jealousy moved, inserting something into her ears, catching my sniper attention.

Crimson fog descended over my broken vision.

Her!

She betrayed me.

Betrayed Eleanor.

Betrayed Cal.

She deserves to die.

I ran for her instead.

A mercenary grappled me to the floor.

I spun onto my back and fought him, striking his nose and snapping gristle before he could wrap his hands around my throat. He choked on blood, and I kicked him away. I shot to my feet again; no injured leg or half sight would stop me from killing Jessica Long and making her pay.

Her gaze flared wide as I stalked toward her, my trajectory once again foiled as three men tackled me. I fought them, all while my attention stayed on her. While Drake restrained my woman, and Jealousy waited for me to kill her, she gave me the saddest, sweetest smile and tore off her bikini.

Her breasts, her pussy, she stood there stark naked as I howled and punched the men restraining me. Harder, faster, crueller. I drove them all closer to death with sheer brutality.

Another bullet let loose, wedging into the floor and erupting a plume of tile dust.

Eleanor let out a tattered moan.

She’s slipping.

Sinking.

Hurry!