Page 77 of Hounded: Ashes to Ashes

He adjusted his grip on the glaive while fat tears rolled down the girl’s cheeks.

“Please,” she sobbed. “If you kill me, I’ll go back to Karst, and you don’t know what he does… He touches me?—”

“I know,” Loren said, just as gruff, just as grim.

“And you don’t care?” She stood there, huddled and desperate, and it was then I noticed her clothes. Skimpy and sheer, they looked like lingerie, barely covering her tits and ass. I wasn’t shy about showing a bit of skin, but this was giving shades of slave Leia, or the main character in any given porno.

Moira used to dress Loren up, too. He always changed as soon as he got home, but I’d caught him in hellish attire once or twice. It consisted of chest-baring, fitted garments, and he looked delicious in them. But also miserable. Uncomfortable and exposed. And she touched him. Used him the same way I imagined whoever Karst was used this woman.

Lorendidknow, and he did care. That was why he stalled with the glaive in mid-air, delaying the killing strike until he quit it entirely.

He released the weapon and threw it toward the ground where it would have clattered if it hadn’t dissolved first. Then, he turned aside and pinched the bridge of his nose with a grimace.

Creeping over to him, I rested my hand on his arm. “You’re letting her go?” I asked hopefully.

“I’ll leave the state,” the girl said between sniffles. “The country. You’ll never see me again.”

With his face downcast and his lips pressed in a thin line, Loren looked resigned. I didn’t like resigned, for myself or anyone else.

“What if she comes with us?” I asked. “That way you can keep an eye on her. Or Whitney can.”

Or Sully, who was already neck-deep in hellhounds but didn’t seem to mind. If they kept piling in, though, we might have to get them their own apartment.

“Maybe she can help us,” I added.

The woman brightened at my suggestion. “Help with what?” she asked.

“Fighting Nero,” I rushed to reply. “And the witch.”

“You’re going to fight him?” she asked. “How?”

Releasing Loren’s arm, I ventured into the space between him and the girl. My proximity all but ensured her safety; he would never do anything violent with me in the way.

“We have a strategy,” I said, sounding far more confident than I should have considering the word “strategy” had only been thrown around loosely and was being overseen by a guy who lost his troops and his soul due to poor battle tactics.

“Well,” I added after a moment, “we’re working on one.”

Loren crowded in behind me and curved his hand around my hip. It wasn’t the affection I craved, but I would take protective or even possessive in a pinch.

The woman wrapped one arm across her bare midriff and the other over her cleavage, belatedly self-conscious. “I’ll come with you. To fight Nero. If he’s gone, we can all be free.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. “Reinforcements, right, Lore?”

Loren grumbled, then pinched a bit of fabric at my waist and gave a tug. I turned after him and beckoned the girl to follow, too.

She didn’t have a choke chain—those were all gone, from what I’d seen—but her long hair had previously obscured the leather strap buckled around her throat. It was more cute than cruel, with a little bow and an engraved nametag.

Abigail.

I couldn’t wait to take some bolt cutters to the damned thing.

Indy

The collar was,in fact, the first thing to go.

After we took away, it was time to add. I dragged Abigail to Sully’s room and raided the closet with reckless abandon while Loren leaned against the doorway looking every bit the guard dog.

Abigail didn’t tell me much about her style preferences, so I settled on something cute and sensible—wide-leg trousers with a bandeau top—and laid them out on the bed.

---