Not to mention, I’m inherently easily distracted, like all of the children, it seems. We like shiny things, booze, violence and sex. We don’t do serious very well.

Blowing out a breath, I decide to continue reading about the Duchess after all, and blame my easily distracted mind on Daddy Issues or genetic makeup.

Unlike in this life, they didn’t avoid sex with me in this retelling. They took it. Made me want them as much as I hated them. My body stayed on fire because they were constantly driving me over the edge.

In one chapter, I spent two days tied to a bed as they took their turns, bringing me to so many orgasms that I seemed to float off into a transcendent head space.

“Totally gipped in this life,” I mutter under my breath, flipping the page.

This chapter might be my favorite, because in it, I struggle with a conscience, telling myself it’s wrong to love all four psychos. Me. The Devil’s daughter.

Apparently I only had a conscience when mortal. I’m sure that was quite the annoying thing to suffer through.

Weirdly, I remember expecting to have a conscience when I first started coming about. I knew it was wrong to watch them in their most private of moments.

I thought I just learned not to care. But nope. I just finally crossed a line and never felt guilty about it. Because guilt isn’t one of my purities. And a conscience doesn’t exist for this hell spawn.

Obviously, the Duchess version of me was also clueless about her origins, and she’d been raised in societal norms where letting four very corrupt men have their wicked way with your body at their leisure while your husband allowed it was not very ladylike.

So she runs, trying to escape them.

My lips curl into a grin when they find her within a day, and they punish her by taking turns as she fights against them, trying to resist, but unable to really do so in her mind.

Spoiler alert: That’s when she finally admits she loves them and accepts the fact she’s just as dark and twisted as the four of them.

My eyes close as the book comes down to my chest, and I imagine what it would be like for one of them to hold my shoulders down, two of them to hold my legs open, and then take turns on who fucks me into submission.

Everything inside me clenches, and a moan slips out of me.

The book is suddenly snatched out of my hand, and my eyes fly open as I scramble to grab it back from Gage as he jumps to his feet.

Jude snatches me at the waist, dragging me back down and holding me to him, as Kai’s mouth goes to mine.

“Hurry and see what it’s about while she’s distracted,” Ezekiel says as Kai kisses me stupid.

Jude’s fingers are sliding up my side in the T-shirt I fashioned before bedtime. All the sensations are definitely distracting.

“Damn,” Gage says under his breath. “We were twisted fucks in this life, and she apparently really likes it.”

Kai breaks the kiss, a dark grin on his lips, and I jerk my head over to where Gage is grinning mockingly at me.

“This could work out with what we planned,” Gage goes on, tossing the book to Ezekiel.

Kai is on me again, ripping me away from Jude, and coming down on top of me as his lips crash to mine once more.

I moan into his mouth as he shoves my legs apart, making room for himself.

“How twisted?” Kai asks, biting down on my bottom lip.

“Very fucking twisted,” Ezekiel says on a shuddering breath, his voice thick with a reflection of the same twisted desire.

We should probably not be feeling so good about being evil. It probably upsets someone’s balance somehow.

In the next instant, Kai is shoved off, and the book is pushed into his chest as Ezekiel takes his place on top of me.

I’m in a haze of sensation, pulling E down to me so I can soothe some of the ache I’ve been left with.

He kisses me hungrily, groaning into my mouth as he rips me up from the floor. When he starts walking, carrying me in the process, my legs wrap around his waist.

Breaking the kiss, I pull back to look at him, seeing the other guys have disappeared.

“Don’t stop, and you’ll be my new favorite,” I assure him.

His eyes light up with that gold as he siphons us, and suddenly I’m being dropped to a bed.

That has me pulling my T-shirt over my head in an instant, but he just grins instead of coming down on top of me. My eyes get distracted, taking in the room I haven’t returned to until now.

My breath leaves in a rush when I realize we’re in my room, but it’s completely redone.

All the magazines that I’ve idly been tearing apart and collecting ideas for my dream room…it’s all here. Even the bed. The bed that stretches from one wall to another, making it the largest bed I’ve ever seen in my remembered life, and perfectly comfortable for five to sleep in.

“When did you—”

“We went feral like I did in hell’s throat. The mindless haze lasted for about four days. After that, we were just miserable,” Ezekiel tells me, surprising me.

“When tearing the place apart and fighting with each other got old, we started doing this,” Gage says as he appears, smirking. “One piece at a time.”

Someone appears at my back, but before I can turn around to see who is on the bed behind me, a dark, silky blindfold comes down over my eyes.

My breath hitches as my blinder deliberately takes his time tying it into place. I realize it’s Kai when he leans down to whisper in my ear.

“It’s not fair for you to know who takes your virginity,” he says against my ear. “You might favor them for too long.”

My heart starts hammering in my chest as heat swarms my body.

“I’m not really a virgin, so clearly that’s not an issue. And I want to see.”

“No,” is Jude’s response really close to my ear. “You don’t remember having sex. So this is ours to take, yours to enjoy, and all of ours to keep safe by not letting you get too attached to just one of us. Promise on our bond you won’t go phantom to peek.”

I hesitate, because that’s totally what I was going to do.

“I’ll know who it is based on the piercings. You all have different ones,” I remind them.

A deep rumble of mocking laughter comes at my ear as Gage gets close enough to murmur, “You’ll be so lost to sensation you won’t be able to pinpoint something as trivial as what piercings do what.”

A shiver runs down my body.

“Why do you have the piercings?” I ask, rambling at this point when I hear the distinct sound of clothing being shuffled off.

Now that my moment is finally here, I’m freaking out a little, if I’m being honest. I’ve dreamed of this for so long that it almost seems too surreal and overwhelming.

Understandable, especially given our newly discovered, daunting circumstances.

“Surface guardians get ink or piercings to signify their levels. We have the most,” Jude answers, sounding amused.

“Gage, lose the tongue ring so she doesn’t figure that out,” Ezekiel says.

I groan, and they all laugh under their breath.

But the laughter is gone, and my breath is stolen when someone grabs me by my shoulders and pins me to the mattress. The sound of me swallowing is all I hear when they wrench my hands above my head, only touching me at the wrists.

The huge bed allows for a lot of space, which they’re going to take advantage of, it seems.

Two sets of hands shove my legs apart even as I try to press them together, feeling a little exposed when they can all see me but I can’t see them.

The grip on my legs firms, and soon another set helps to pry my legs open, which has my back arching seconds before a mouth is suddenly on me.

My startled cry is swallowed as a second mouth finds mine, stealing all my sounds as the mouth fastened to my clit starts wreaking havoc on me.

It’s sensory overload already.

I come so quickly that they actually chuckle at me, everyone except for the one still between my thighs and driving me crazy as I clench around nothing.

It’s too sensitive, and I fight to get free. They hold me down, and I force myself not to phantom out just to get away from the pleasure that has a fine line of pain. Until I’m almost on the cusp again, another orgasm coming so quick that it’s sure to shred me.

Nothing could possibly be better.

The mouth rips away from me, leaving me just on the cusp, and I cry out in frustration. Arms grapple me down seconds before a strong hand clamps my hip, and something smooth and blunt prods my entrance.

I feel a clench down there, desperate to be filled, as two sets of hands roughly force my legs open wider. So many sounds and words escape me in unintelligible fragments.

Then suddenly fire rushes through my veins as someone thrusts deep inside me without warning. Every nerve in my body lights on fire, as an ache like I’ve never felt before doubles, almost feeling desperate for so much more.

A groan is muffled somewhere above me, before the hips pull back and surge forth again.

The hands on my legs tighten, and I feel the weight of their hungry gazes even as I’m forbidden to see them. The one inside me thrusts in harder, more urgently, and the hand on my hip starts lifting me at just the right angle.

I can’t control anything.

They have sole control.

It’s as maddening as it is incredible.

A new mouth finds mine, kissing me hungrily, as the man fucking me starts pushing me over yet another edge. My nails press painfully into my own palms, offering me just enough bite to keep myself from floating away when the third orgasm shatters me.