Painless (Steel Demons MC, #4)

by Crystal Ash

To the nurses and medical staff who risk their lives and mental health to save others. You matter. You’re everything.

💟💟

Frightened women made me scared of myself. I was capable of awful things. I killed men that rivaled my own size without breaking a sweat. But my brain was convinced the true enemies were half my size, coming at me with sharp blades, and taking joy in making my blood spill on the floor.

After Reaper and Gunner saved their animals, their own lives were saved in return. And that was all that mattered.

But the Steel Demons president grew up in a matriarchal society, where women had multiple partners as a sign of devotion and trust from their men.

“I really hope that’s you, Mariposita, or someone’s about to get a socket wrench up his ass.” “Damn. I really hope it’s me too, then.”

“Mari,” he groaned. “You can’t complain about getting dirty when that mind of yours is so filthy.”

"Then we're gonna fuckin' party!" Jandro raised a fist in the air. 'Cause fuck knows we all deserve one." I rolled my eyes. "Like you guys ever need a reason to party."

It dawned on me right then, why Reaper was so protective of his club, why the Steel Demons found every possible excuse to party and have a good time. This kind of life gave so few opportunities to laugh, smile, and feel good, so they took those moments and lived them to the fullest.

A tiny rumbling sound came from her, like the smallest motorcycle engine. Confused, I looked up at Mariposa.

But the fear in her eyes hurt me, in a way I didn't even know was possible to experience pain.

"You've taken good care of me in your field of expertise. I'll make sure to do the same." Shit. Was that too much or okay to say? Fuck, how do I know? She's smiling, but looking away. What does that mean?

You don’t have to just wish, a small voice reminded me. It sounded like the devil whispering into my ear, urging me to give in to temptations, to partake of what would, surely, feel so good. The other voice, the one keeping me on the righteous path, had been oddly silent as of late.

Immediately after Mari found her, the animals went into protective mode. They guarded and took to her like she was one of their own. Maybe their animal forms were all different species, but the three of us knew they were cut from the same cloth. We just didn’t know what that cloth was made of.

But what could I possibly give her that she didn’t already have from those two?

“When something scares me, I just—” her heart brushed against my chest, betraying its rapid beating. “I feel safer, calmer, whenever you’re around.” She tilted her face up to look at me, almost resting her head on my shoulder. “That’s all.”

Here it was, the place where I could fit. The calm in her storm, her anchor and her safety.

But that’s what I’m trying to tell you with this tattoo thing—you’re not all interchangeable to me. You’re all people I care about, but the three of you drive me fucking crazy for different reasons too.”

I wanted to be a reason she smiled so big and glowed like a little ball of sunlight. Did it really matter that I wasn’t the only one who made her feel like that? Was it really so bad that she had the capacity to love more than one man at a time?

Shadow rides in the rear because he’s the last line of defense, Jandro had told me. Nothing gets past him. The large man at my back felt like nothing short of a shield. Even though he was drawing so carefully on my skin, I felt completely protected. The house could collapse in on us and I wouldn’t get a scratch on me, because of Shadow.

“I didn’t want to follow orders for some politician, you know? Be part of a system that was driving this country into the shitter.

“You don’t think there’s something else to it?” “No.” His voice was stern, and he eyed me squarely. “I take her at her word. That’s what trust is. That’s how this whole thing works.” He drew a circle in the air between us. “If you think she’s up to something and treat her like she is, that’s a quick way to send your whole relationship crashing to the ground.”

“Your ego was bruised.” Reaper lit up another cigarette. “You wanted her to choose you for something, and she didn’t. Get ready for a lot of that, especially if she adds him in.”

“It makes it so much sweeter when she wants you, and you alone. Everything you worry about just goes away when she’s right here,” he brought a palm to his chest, “and you remember that she really does need you. She needs what only you can provide.”

Ninety-nine percent of the time, Shadow wouldn’t hurt a fly. But that one percent usually meant no survivors. The man lived at two polar opposites and knew nothing of the spectrum in between.

"But what about..." Gunner's question trailed off, but he raised his eyebrows pointedly. "Gun, if you never heard of a threesome, I regret ever letting you into my fucking club," Reaper growled. "Of course I know about threesomes!" Gunner snapped. "But...all the time?" "No, not all the time," Mari answered. "If I want to be alone with one of them, I'll say so. I try my best to keep it equal, but honestly?" A rosy blush filled her cheeks. "I love it best when all of us are together."

I did nothing but stare at her for a moment. It felt like a lifetime ago that this was all I wanted to do. To humbly assist in an event so beautiful and divine—the first meeting of mother and child. After the Collapse happened, and then had my license to practice ripped away at the final moment, I never thought I'd have the chance to do this. But the Steel Demons gave it back to me. Reaper gave it back to me.

"I'm n-n-not." I hiccuped, and a hysterical laugh bubbled out between my sobs. "I delivered a baby!" He stared at me like I lost my mind.

I was rambling, crying, and laughing like a madwoman, but I didn't care. There was no putting a lid on this pure, unbridled joy coursing through me. I did it, I delivered a perfect, healthy baby!

"Congrats on a successful delivery, baby girl. And if it wasn't obvious," he pressed his lips to my ear, "I'm all in. I'm yours and you're mine."

"It was your cat that spoke, or rather, the god that inhabits her." She swallowed. "I've heard Hades and Horus too."

My heart pounded. Finally, someone who understood how downright freaky all of this was. Reaper and Gunner played it off like, no big deal, weird shit happens sometimes. And to some extent, I could get behind that too. But Noelle's confession added a different angle I never thought of before.

He's...outside of the boundaries of time now, so he can see the future much more clearly than before."

"He hasn't said this straight out, but I think when he was alive...fuck, this is nuts. I think they were all inside him." “Inside him?” I repeated. “Like how they’re inside the cat,” she nodded at Freyja. “The dog, the falcon. Using them as vessels, somewhat. Like, one and the same, but also separate.” I gaped at her. "All of them? Like how many?"

"The parts of the future he tells me, though," she shivered, "they're scary, Mari. I'm a bitch that can laugh in the face of death, but what he says makes me so worried. The club is about to change, Mari. As a whole, all the way down to the individual people within it. "

"But," Noelle's eyes fell on Freyja, who lay stretched out on her bed like she owned it, "the goddess of love will guide you when you feel like you can't trust your own heart. That's what my brother told me." Noelle's green gaze returned to me. "And Daren has never been wrong."

In my head I saw the shadowy apparition, the figure who called himself Hades, leading a man in an SDMC cut down a hallway to a light at the opposite end.

It couldn't be him to hurt me. Never him.

Fucking hell. I started to wish she’d never told me.

yeah, me too!

That voice he spoke to me with sounded more than ancient. It sounded eternal. And nothing else had scared the living shit out of me more.

Rest, he said. I nearly fell to my knees as Hades walked to the aloe plant and placed his paw on the bone fragment there. Rest, he said again.

“It was my mom’s dream, for me to give one of her pieces to the woman I’d give my heart to forever.” He laughed softly. “I was such a dumbass. I told her I’d never get locked down, never do something as cheesy as that. But fucking look at me now.”

“Mari,” he groaned, hands sliding to my waist as his torso moved between my legs. “In a world that has gone so fucking wrong, you are the one thing that’s right.”

“Because I’m selfish.” His forehead lowered to mine, lips hovering a hair’s breadth away from a kiss. “I want to please you so fucking good, you’ll never have a reason to leave me.”

It wasn’t even the mysterious fourth person I was concerned about—but the other part Noelle told me. That if I killed one of Mari’s lovers, she’d never forgive me.

“I’m Hades.” “Hades?” I repeated. “Hades, the dog?” “Part-time dog. Full-time lord of the underworld.”

“I still don’t know what any of it means,” I admitted. “I literally looked them all up in a book three days ago.” “That’s the thing about gods,” T-Bone chuckled. “You never really know what they’re getting at, not until it clicks into place.” “Right. Still fuckin’ waiting for that part.”

“You can stay for now,” I answered. “But trust goes both ways, all right? Listen in on me again, I’m slicing your bird into three parts, which I’ll feed to the dog, cat, and the falcon.”

"It's okay." He pulled open the cabinet that had been right above my head and brought down a tall glass. I openly stared as he filled it with water from the faucet and drank deeply. Yeah, I'm thirsty too.

hahaha thirst trap Shadow, I'm here for it

The demon that haunted me the most was the one thing I swore, then failed, to do—protect my family. And I just wanted another chance to talk to someone I missed so much.