Page 32 of Make Me Lie (Rich Demons of Darkwood 1)

Pax murmured into his ear, “If you cut her, I'm going to cut you.”

“Easy,” Cain warned him. “I'm sure these gentlemen had the best of intentions. They just didn't realize that we're going to take care of her.”

The guy with the knife to his throat was wide eyed as he began to stammer. “I didn't know. I didn't mean to get in your way.”

“It's all right,” Cain promised, giving him a smile that didn't reach his eyes.

The guy with the knife to his throat couldn't see, but Pax stuck out his lower lip as if he were pouting at Cain. Cain just shook his head, apparently unimpressed as Pax mouthed, “But can I just cut him a little bit?”

Pax was growing on me already. It was too bad I couldn't trust him not to murder me any more than I could trust the others.

“I want you to make it very clear to everyone,” Cain said. “The girl is someone we’ll take care of. We’ll keep her from being a threat, but no one’s to interfere in what we're doing to her. No one hurts her.”

“Or they'll have us to deal with,” Pax said darkly, before he finally pulled the knife away from the man's throat.

“You can go,” Cain prompted impatiently.

The men didn't need a second invitation. They took off, scrambling over the bleachers and jumping off, disappearing into the rest of campus. I caught a brief glimpse of the one who held the knife to my throat fleeing and realized his jeans were soaked dark with his urine.

“I'm a little disappointed in you, Blondie,” Pax said. “I know you could have killed those men if you wanted to.”

“I still don't know what you're talking about. I don't know what those men were talking about.” I was going to find that Internet forum later. I needed to assess just how big the threat was that I was dealing with.

Cain locked eyes with me, stepping close, dominating me with his eyes and the power and heat of his body like he always did. He caught my chin in two of his fingers and tilted my face up to his, his eyes smoldering. He almost looked as if he might kiss me, strangely enough.

Then he muttered darkly, “That's the reason you need us, sweetheart. Because on your own... you'll reap everything you deserve.”

9

Aurora

Dinner was torture. Which was saying a lot because I'd actually experienced torture many times in my life. I sat at an over-the-top table in the banquet hall of the Sphinx, the fifty-person table completely empty besides Cain, Remington, Pax, Stellan, and myself. The fact that this secret society had a full-on banquet hall in its depths shouldn't have been surprising, considering what else I'd seen in this place this week...like the indoor swimming pool, theater room, and game room… But my mouth had still dropped open when I'd walked in and seen a room that would fit right into Versailles with its chandeliers, gold painted walls, intricately carved table, and fine leather chairs. As would befit the room, our place settings were the fancy kind, the ones that had three forks and five hundred spoons next to the plate and you had to somehow figure out what the difference was. Who were these guys, that they sat down to fancy meals like this in college? It was super weird.

People dressed in full suits were bringing out dinner to the table like we were in a palace, or at least a fancy restaurant. I tried to catch their eyes a couple of times, but they kept their gazes levied intently on the floor. If some of them had been working for the Sphinx for a while, they could possibly know something about the assholes I found myself surrounded with. I filed that away to think about and plan around later on.

A salad filled with different, brightly colored vegetables was placed in front of me. I bit my lip, wondering what fork I was supposed to use while at the same time wondering why I even cared. I just hoped that we were having actual food at this meal since rabbit food wasn't my first choice on any day.

Remington sat next to me, and he picked up a small fork on the far side of his long row of utensils, a small smirk on his mouth. He knew I was watching him, the bastard. I grabbed the same fork and began to eat, begrudgingly admitting to myself that the salad was actually pretty good, even if it could use some ranch.

"You have a fight this weekend," Stellan said from across me, his attention directed towards Pax. I pretended not to be interested in the conversation as I stabbed a purple carrot and pointedly refused to look at Stellan. Out of the four men, Stellan was the only one who hadn't spoken to me since that night at the party. Any time our eyes met, he would just gift me with an infuriating smile that didn't match the calculation in his gaze.

"Did you get someone actually good for me to fight?" Pax drawled as he sat back in his tall, leather high back chair.

Hmmm. I had heard that he did some underground fighting. I wondered if he was any good. A hand reached forward in front of me to take my plate away, and I dropped my fork on the glass plate in surprise, the sound seeming to echo around the enormous room. All four of their predatory gazes were suddenly on me, and I sat perfectly still, like I really was prey and trying not to keep their attention by moving an inch.

"It's Kaplan," Stellan finally answered, drawing their gazes away from me.

"Mmh, that will be a good one," answered Pax, sounding delighted. I couldn't help but look over at him. I'd never heard him sound so...alive. He was the most monotone of the four of them, seeming to go through life like he was above everything. Like he found his existence on earth all together boring and everyone around him beneath him.

Pax met my gaze, and for a second I was trapped in his hazel eyes, eyes that looked gold under the twinkle of the freakishly large chandelier hanging above us. "Going to come to the fight, princess?" he purred. For a second I imagined him in a fighter's ring, the light dim above him, droplets of sweat sliding down his body as he pounded his opponent over and over again with tape wrapped fists. I could almost hear the grunts of pain, the beads of blood flying from skin as he tore the other guy apart. My breath hitched just thinking about the violence of it all.

I wasn't going to examine closely why that was.

I pursed my lips and looked down at the orange-colored soup that had just been placed in front of me by another silent worker...or servant. I wasn't sure what the right term was for them.

"Of course, she is. She wouldn't miss it. Isn't that right?" Cain answered with a smirk.

"Is this where I say, yes sir?" I asked them in a bored tone.

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