Goddess of Pain - Katie May Page 0,63

glaring at where my hand rests, but I merely give him a dull look.

“Really, asshole? He’s my fucking brother.”

In response, Tate flips me off.

“You could’ve just asked,” Ray snaps, not tearing his gaze away from a scowling Avery. It’s one expression I’ve never seen on my lover and best friend. He’s always so happy and up-beat…even when he’s murdering people. And though I see anger emanating from his eyes, I also see hurt, so prominent that I nearly choke on it.

He’s upset that he doesn’t have my brother’s approval to date me. Despite regaining his memories from our time in the Realm of the Gods, he still considers Ray one of his best friends, and he’s hurt that Ray doesn’t trust him enough to date me.

I make a promise to myself that I’ll talk to Avery about this at a later date as I type in Ray’s password.

“One, two, three, four,” Desmond snorts, staring over my shoulder at the screen. “Really?”

Ray finally tears his gaze away from Avery to glare at Des.

“Fuck you. And seriously, Em, what do you want with my phone?”

“I just want to see…” I click on his photo icon and freeze when I see the most recent picture, taken just last night. My lungs suddenly seem incapable of taking in air, and my heart roars in my chest. Desmond, still behind me, freezes before releasing a muffled curse. Helio leans close as well, his dark beard scratching against my shoulder as he stares at the picture with me.

“Is anyone going to tell us what’s going on, or do you want us to guess?” Tate asks, irritated.

“It’s…it’s her.”

“Are you talking about my girlfriend?” Ray demands, lunging forward to take the phone from me. “Do you know her? Why are you acting so fucking weird?” The last statement is said as a low grumble as he shoves his phone back into his pocket.

But despite the picture no longer being in front of me, I can still see her face. Her mousy brown hair and elfin features. Those keen eyes usually hidden away behind a thin pair of glasses. Her lips pulled back into an easy-going, familiar smile.

Rebecca.

My best friend.

A goddess.

And apparently, my brothers’ new girlfriend.

If there’s one thing life has shown me, it’s that there are no coincidences. There’s no way for me to deny it anymore, and I try to swallow around the lump of betrayal that had crawled its way up my throat like a disgusting, hairy spider.

Rebecca is the goddess who took away my memories and put me on the Earthen realm. She’s also the one who wants me dead.

And I’m going to have to kill her, and destroy my brothers in the process.

Chapter 22

“Can I just say that I’m officially the most badass motherfucker here?” Desmond stands with a cocksure grin, scrubbing his hands down the front of his pitch-black shirt. Behind him, the door with the lock he was attempting to pick swings open on nearly inaudible hinges.

“Do you want a trophy?” Tate sneers, shoving past the grinning God of Combat.

“If the trophy is for the biggest cock, then yes,” Des quips in response, his smile widening at the vitriol spewing from Tate’s dark, nearly obsidian eyes. Obviously, I know they’re not actually black but a dark, mahogany brown—on closer inspection, you can see tiny specks of gold surrounding the pupil like fireworks.

“Put your dicks away, and let’s get to work,” I huff as I enter the modest, two-bedroom apartment. It has a similar floorplan to my own, with a kitchen situated immediately to my left and a hallway to my right. However, there’s a large peach-colored wall that divides the kitchen from the living room.

“It’s empty,” Avery declares as he does a quick check of all the rooms.

It was surprisingly easy to get Rebecca’s address from my brothers, not that they knew what we were doing to begin with. All I needed to do was snatch one of their phones when they were distracted and click on Rebecca’s contact information. And now, here we are.

A tangle of nerves resides in my stomach at the deception, but I keep my emotions at bay. I have a job to do, and that includes stopping the dumbass bitch who’s trying to hurt me and my family.

My eyes rove around the cute, modern kitchen before I head through an archway and into the living room. There’s an exterior door that leads onto a small deck, but since the apartment complex is devoid of trees, all I