Page 1 of The Devil’s Bargain (A Devil to Die for #3)

Calix had no clue how he’d ended up here, he really didn’t. He’d tried resisting, running, and even moving on, but nothing ever worked. No matter what he did or where he went, he wasn’t able to shake free of the pull Mercy and Aodhan had over him.

Wasn’t able to get rid of the tracking device he’d found hidden on his person or deny the truth any longer.

Whether it was because of the way they had treated him when he’d been locked in their house or not, they’d gotten what they wanted.

Calix willing to submit.

Setting the plan into motion from there had been simple enough. He’d gotten away with giving a few blowjobs to strangers during his training as a stimulus, so guessed Mercy’s reach either didn’t travel all the way to Alter, or the director was waiting for Cal to take things up a notch.

Ultimately, Cal had bet it all on the latter.

He’d told the Night Manager of Moonward Manor, where he was currently living and working, that he was ready to take on real clients. The hardest part had been convincing Gael to approve, since Calix had outright refused to sleep with any of his trainers during stimuli lessons.

If he’d been wrong and they hadn’t come for him, Calix would be sleeping in the forest tonight with two strangers.

And he would have been heartbroken, whether he wanted to admit that part or not.

But he was neither of those things right now. Mercy and Aodhan had come for him. They’d punished him for running, but he’d figured they would. He wasn’t even mad about it; was actually pleased whenever he thought about the fresh brandings on his inner thighs.

Pleased enough his dick gushed and he mewled around Aodhan’s cock.

“Suck harder,” the doctor demanded, threading his fingers through Calix’s hair to tug tightly on the strands. He was angry with him still, that much was apparent, but he couldn’t really be blamed for it.

Even if he and his partner, Titus “Mercy” Mercer, had deserved it.

“Getting cold feet, little monster?” Mercy asked, driving into Cal’s body with enough force to rock him forward, forcing Aodhan’s cock deeper down his throat.

With them taking him from both ends, it was getting more and more difficult to think properly, but he still somehow managed to shake his head, the motion slight with his mouth as full as it was.

A part of him was nervous, worried he was making a mistake, but the rest of him knew it was far too late for regrets.

Second-guessing his choice wouldn’t change anything anyway. The inevitable could only be avoided for so long, and Calix was tired of running.

His whole life had been spent that way. Avoiding his problems, excusing them away so he could turn a blind eye to the horrors and pains of his daily existence.

Lying to himself and those around him. He’d wanted so desperately to believe he was a good person, and through that desperation, had only allowed himself to get dragged deeper and deeper into the abyss.

Maybe, once upon a time, Cal really had been a good person, or, at the very least, a semi-decent one.

Not anymore.

Proof was in the fact that he was currently getting spit-roasted by two murderers who’d only just made fresh kills. He’d seen one of the bodies with his own eyes, but he didn’t need to see the second to know both of his clients had been offed.

It didn’t matter that Calix had selected them based on Gael’s recommendation, or that they supposedly had criminal records he hadn’t bothered learning the details of.

The important fact here was that he’d known if Mercy and Aodhan came for him as he hoped, the chances of those other men getting away with their lives were slim to none.

And he hadn’t cared.

He’d gone through with his twisted plan anyway.

“Did you miss us?” Aodhan’s grip on Cal’s face gentled, not by much, just enough to be noticeable. “I missed you, Be’urn. Missed the way you look at me, just like that. Pupils blown with lust and a dash of animosity.”

“Do you blame us?” Unlike the doctor, Mercy didn’t let up, continuing to pound into Calix, voice steady as though he weren’t currently fucking like a madman.

Cal nodded, holding Aodhan’s gaze in the process, even when he was suddenly pulled off the doctor and lifted onto his knees. He cried out as he slid onto Mercy’s cock, gravity working in the director’s favor as he wrapped strong arms around Cal’s chest and stomach to hold him in place.

Aodhan didn’t seem upset, his hand moving to stroke himself as he watched the two of them from hooded eyes, soft bursts of air slipping from his parted lips as he rocked into his palm.

“Sylar got your tongue?” Mercy teased when Calix didn’t elaborate, even though it was obvious that’s what they wanted from him.

“Don’t threaten me with my pet,” he growled, glancing to the right where the bathroom door was shut. He’d gotten the sylar his last night with Mercy and Aodhan on Emergence and hadn’t been able to leave it behind when he’d escaped. “If you hurt Vesper, I’ll never forgive you. I mean it.”

“We don’t need the bond to know you’re telling the truth, Azi,” Mercy used the term of endearment for him in his own tongue, a Connect language Calix didn’t know or understand.

Though Be’urn, which was what Aodhan called him, wasn’t an Emergence word either. They were all native to different planets, shared different cultures, and yet here they were, tangled up together like jagged pieces of a warped puzzle that never should have been allowed to see the light of day.

And, damn it all to hell and back, Calix wanted to be a part of it.

“I tried not to,” he confessed, his words broken and thready, since he was unable to act unaffected by the rough sex the same way Mercy was. “I tried to forget and move on.”

“How many guys did you suck off before you realized that was impossible?” Aodhan enquired.

Which was dangerous.

The doctor had a temper and less control over himself than his First. Or, that wasn’t entirely true.

It wasn’t that he had less control, more like he didn’t care as much to bother.

Having come from a prestigious family, Aodhan was used to getting his way.

And being let off the hook when his way happened to break a dozen or so laws.

“My trainer was just doing his job,” Calix replied.

“You don’t want us to hurt him either?” Aodhan snorted. “You’ve got to let us gut someone.”

“You already—”

“Killed your dates?” Aodhan grinned at him, the expression vicious and a bit psychotic.

It was nothing like the fake smiles he put on for the rest of the universe; those were charming and never quite reached his eyes.

The pink of his irises practically sparkled now.

“Want to hear what we did to the other one?”

“Later,” Mercy interrupted. “We finish the ceremony now.”

“Gotta lock our Third in,” Aodhan hummed in agreement and shifted closer on the bed until his knees bumped against Cal’s. His free hand reached between them, settling around Calix’s dick. He laughed when that caused him to jerk. “Do you know what happens next, Third?”

Sort of?

At the Academy, where Calix had trained to become a detective, they’d only taught them so much about the Connect. Things like the bonding ceremony were kept mostly secret, with only a few details having leaked into the public over the centuries.

Since he was a Third, the final piece that would complete the pod, Calix understood even less.

Thirds were generally protected, coveted, and cared for.

It went without saying that the process to make one was also guarded knowledge.

Seconds needed to be bitten by the First, and the First had to be a Connect, but Thirds…

Aodhan was a Vital, not a Connect. What role did he play in the binding aside from needing to give his consent to take on a Third?

“Forming the bond itself won’t hurt,” Mercy promised darkly, breathing the words directly against the curve of Cal’s left ear before chuckling. “I’ll apologize for that in advance.”

“It will after,” Aodhan disagreed. “Like a bitch in heat. Two parts pain, one part pleasure. Don’t worry though, we’ll fuck you through the first.”

“We aren’t leaving this room until you can walk on your own two feet again,” Mercy said, causing a shiver to race down Calix’s spine.

“Hold on…” That sounded like a lot. Pain was nothing to him.

He enjoyed it, got turned on by it in most cases.

The brandings kept rubbing against Mercy’s thighs as Calix was fucked, the raw flesh burning upon contact.

It didn’t hurt as much as he imagined it should, and he’d caught sight of the tube of suncream Aodhan had set on the nightstand before climbing onto the bed with them.

They’d taken care of him just as easily as they’d fucked him up, and his traitorous heart leapt at that notion. At the concept of being cared for, even if it was by the very same devils that damaged him in the first place.

The unknown didn’t scare him either. Cal was used to staying on his toes, taking chances. Gambling with his life.

But…

“You’ll feel…everything?” That was the part getting to him now.

The part causing him to hesitate when only just a moment ago he’d been so certain.

Calix didn’t like to confront his emotions himself.

The thought of sharing them with others…

Of being so fully stripped bare in front of them… That was terrifying.

Maybe even too terrifying.

“Hold on,” he repeated, a little more forcefully, but that only earned him a grunt from the others.

“You’ve already consented,” Aodhan reminded, clicking his tongue when Cal vehemently shook his head and tried to pry Mercy’s arms off his waist. “That’s not how it works.

Once freely given, you can’t take it back.

You’re ours now. The only way to stop this is if we allow it, and that isn’t going to happen. ”

“Breathe,” Mercy suggested. “It’s not as scary as you think.”

“Letting you into my head is definitely as scary as I think,” Calix argued.

“Baby,” he nosed the side of his throat, kissing a spot in the center when Cal instinctively tilted to give him more room, “let’s be honest here, shall we? We’ve been in your head from the start. And you,” he kissed him again and then motioned Aodhan closer with his chin, “have been in ours.”

“What are you doing?” Calix whined when Mercy’s thrusts slowed and Aodhan let go of his own cock to capture Cal by the chin.

The doctor arranged him so he was facing straight ahead, then settled his lips against the other side of his neck, mirroring the placement of Mercy.

There was a hissing sound, but Calix couldn’t glance down at it with his face held in place. He pictured the snake tattoo Mercy had traveling down the director’s arm, realized that it was heading for his left nipple when Mercy slid his palm up his chest to grip him there.

Aodhan started to pump Calix with a frenzy, the fast pace so different from the languid, almost shallow thrusts of Mercy’s cock, his mind momentarily blitzed out.

Electricity buzzed through him and his balls drew tight as Mercy hit against his prostate and Aodhan’s thumb swirled over his slit. They worked his body like it belonged to them, dragging mewls and sobs from him until his protests were distant and forgotten, and all he wanted was to come.

“Breathe,” Mercy suggested one final time, and that was all the warning he gave.

Both he and Aodhan took a deep breath and then buried their teeth into Calix’s neck. They broke skin almost instantly, latching on and sucking once before digging in. It hurt for a second, but then there was a sharper sting around his sensitive nipple.

The snake tattoo latched on and flooded Cal with a rush of endorphins that brought him so high his vision actually blinked out. He may or may not have screamed through his climax, he couldn’t be sure.

All he knew was his orgasm lasted forever, and when it did finally end, something invisible snapped into place at the center of his chest, tugging at his insides.

Binding him to the two men as they continued to bite and fuck him through it all.