11. Leni

“First time flying private?” Lev’s cocky as he relaxes back on the cushy linen seat, lap belt struggling to contain his bulk as he props the heel of his neon orange Charmander sock on his opposite knee, effectively commandeering all of the communal foot space between us.

Why are males.

He’s showered and changed. His shirt says Dance For Me and his bottoms are sweats dotted with corgis in sunglasses.

Style. Eclectic casual quirky style, but style nonetheless.

I turn away from it. Outside the oval window, the sun blooms upward, pink and fiery, swirling in the morning haze. A beautiful vista if you ignore the police tape and body bags littering the shoreline.

The knot in my stomach feels like a permanent fixture, causing me to question if I’ll ever digest again or if it’ll remain a bucket of churning rocks until I die. Plus five years.

Starvation. Now there’s a slow, creeping death.

I keep my back straight, socks flat on the carpet, my seat belt securely fastened, with my hands on my thighs, palms up in repent.

“Don’t tell me you thought Poseidon would rescue you,” Lev continues, flipping up his armrest to unfold a small table. “All you creatures are the same. Any problem and you’re burning incense and sacrificing a sheep, hoping the Gods will handle it. Do you think just because you’re family, they give a fuck about you?”

Ironically, they might now.

Blood crimes are on caliber with Divine comeuppance.

“Drake’s gonna have fun with you,” he tells me haughtily. “Pretty things break into the littlest pieces. Too small to fit back together.”

“That’s enough, Lev.” The cockpit door unlatches and Cross stalks out. He’s shirtless, same dirty jeans hanging off his hips. Has a thin needle balanced between his teeth, the end connected to a black thread poking through the open wound in his shoulder. He stops in the aisle next to us. “Tell me if I’ve got the edge, I can’t feel a damn thing.”

Lev’s up and hovering so quickly, his thigh snaps the table clean off. “It’s because—”

“Because I threw too much tonight. That’s it.”

“We both know it’s not.” Lev directs a menacing expression toward me. “Unbuckle her and open the door. Fixed in thirty seconds. Fuck the thread.”

I snort, the insult pouring from me, quick and sharp, so unlike me. “Of course you would think throwing me out of a plane would propagate magical healing. You couldn’t finish a puzzle if it had more than five pieces.”

Lev’s nostrils flare. “You—”

“Yes, me,” I snarl. “Are we back to this already?”

Cross catches the Russian’s arm, hauling him back from me. “Go assist with controls.”

They square off, two bulls in one stall, vibrating with aggression until finally, under his breath, Lev grunts, “This isn’t just about you. What will Atlas think? You’re putting them in danger too.”

Cross doesn’t shift his focus from me as he tells Lev, “You’re dismissed.”

The Russian huffs but gives me a silent, hateful glare, then stomps to the front of the plane and disappears. “He only threatens when he can’t argue.”

“Should he be near the pilot?” I ask. Someone should.

The spymaster shrugs. “We’re twenty thousand feet and cruising. That’s enough time to reverse any stupid choice he makes.”

My mouth drops open. “He wouldn’t.”

“He has. Don’t give a hothead immortality.” A sigh. “He’ll lighten up. He’s fussy because I ended his fight early. Has a thing about honor and hand to hand combat.”

Honor feels like a stretch.

Perching on the arm of Lev’s chair, Cross stays quiet as he stitches his shoulder. Before takeoff, he scrubbed clean with a washcloth in the tiny bathroom, attacking raw skin, and scouring harshly.

The result makes my mouth dry.

A wealth of exposed muscle so severely carved, specks of dirt remain untouched in the valleys of his abs and hide in the two angled lines pointing low on his torso where a trail of light brown hair vanishes beneath the edge of his pants. The place my gaze keeps returning to, though, is the three tipped flame on his heart, the same punishing black as his neck and wrist tattoos. Kadmos’s mark.

If the shadows nesting in the footwells and aisle weren’t already bathing me with warmth, I might have shivered. There are no enemies here, and despite my talk, we both know I couldn’t land a single finger on him without his allowing it, which means the only reason for him to still flex his power is to warm me.

My heart twists painfully.

“If you wanted someone to cheer for, you should’ve put him in the ring. There’d be a shrine.” He yanks on the needle, wrenching the bullet hole together before cutting the thread with his teeth and tying a knot.

I think if he could punish the rest of his body as easily as he bites his lips, he’d be red and raw everywhere.

“You’re not healing,” I point out.

He looks at me, chews his lip. Stands, rolls out his shoulder. “No, I’m not, and the only reason I’m admitting as much is because of the moratorium you’ve placed on ‘fine’.”

I don’t want to like him. I’m sore, tired, and wearing yesterday’s panties. I don’t even want to smile. I tilt my head at the window to hide it, feign casual. “Your friend wants me dead.”

“A fact you’re taking tremendously well.” From the overhead bins, Cross unfolds a long sleeve, waffle knit shirt. Black. Does he ever wear color? Has he ever risked being seen?

“If the plane goes down, I’m not the only one on it.”

“The Great Plan turns Machiavellian.” He’s teasing.

“Machiavelli hated the Greeks. Called them fickle.”

The edge of Cross’s mouth curls as he meets my eyes, still holding his shirt instead of wearing it. “And what would you call them, Leni?”

What would I call beings that would have lightning slap us out of the sky and send us into the hungry mouth of a thousand toothed sea monster if I insulted them? I shrug. “Capricious.”

His laugh is deep and lovely, and sends blood rushing to my cheeks.

I have no idea how much time has passed since we were in that street. Since my plan imploded once and for all. Only that now I’m wearing Cross’s old t-shirt and brand new socks that crawl up my calves, and under his attention, I still feel utterly exposed.

The higher we climb, the brighter the sky gets, and the more looking burns my eyes.

I can still feel Cross pulling the cotton over my head, dousing me in the scent of smoke and rain and him. Still feel the goosebumps on my neck as he carefully freed my trapped hair from the collar. The glide of his knuckles on my neck sending goosebumps down my arms. “It’ll do,” he’d muttered, facing the security cameras point blank as he stole the thickest socks off a rotating display, and bending down to his knee to guide my wet wrinkled feet into clean black knee highs.

Then, Cross made two phone calls, and an hour of silence and pothole dodging later Lev was hopping out of our cab to open the gates to the tiny, un-towered airport. The narrow white plane was already waiting, engines warm.

The Kingsguard may have fallen, but they’ve lost none of their power. Even banished and hated, a predator never truly loses.

“Are you hungry?” Cross asks, pulling my attention from the smoking city disappearing on the horizon. “What about thirsty? How is your temperature? Your lips are still blue.”

Carefree. Chatty. He’s in Lev’s seat, finally wearing his shirt, long deft fingers peeling a mandarin orange. No, a tangerine. Clementine. Pomelo?

I snap at him. “How can you eat right now?”

“I’m hungry.”

So cavalier. So unaffected. “You haven’t even rinsed all the blood off.”

“What’s the point? Besides, I’ll never truly have clean hands, will I?”

Is he making a joke? “Aren’t you ashamed?”

His fingers pause, silver and black eyes flicking up to meet mine. “If I waited for the guilt to fade, I’d starve. Soldiers eat when there’s food, rest when it’s possible.” He holds out a slice, picked entirely clean of pulp, for me. “Never know when you’ll need both.”

I ignore the offering, return to the window. I’m not angry at him. Part of me even wants to thank him for the Ballasts, for Odren, for pulling me out of the water.

It’s almost surreal. When I close my eyes, I remember parts of his rescue. Fractured, out of time moments.

Fingers on my pulse, firm hands urging my heart to beat. Whispers and snarls. Breathe. Breathe. That’s it. Breathe. Lips on my forehead. A burst of hot energy wrapping me up. That’s it. There you are.

His skin molding to mine, him wringing out my hair, demanding that I hold on, telling me good. One particular whisper, so frantic, so hoarse, and dark and rushed as I coughed up water and salt, makes my skin tighten. That’s my good fucking girl.

I cross my legs, and pluck salty, scraggly hair from behind my ear to mask the flush in my cheek. That male had been desperate for me, willing to pull realms apart to save me, and now he’s … snacking.

No, I’m not mad at him. I’m mad at myself for not being mad, for marveling at the death he reaped all for me.

Gods I wish I were mad. Wish I weren’t struck dumb with awe at his trail of destruction. Wish I wasn’t flattered each time he wielded his immense dark power like party trick for me. Warming my toes with the same shadows that severed the heads of my enemies. It’s as absurd as using a jaguar as a foot rest.

And it electrifies me.

Which terrifies me. I’ve inadvertently created an endless loop of I-love-it, I-love-it-not when it comes to this male. He threatened me. He protected me! He left me. He found me! He bit me. He kissed me! It’s exhausting.

“Do you remember who I am?” Cross asks suddenly. If he chews any harder on his mouth, he’ll shred it.

“Blackguard.”

“Yes. Good.” A slight nod. “My brother in the Blackguard, Drake, he’s a lot like me. He goes by many names. Inquisitor, oppressor, thug. Tormentor. We’ve always referred to him as our interrogator because there’s not a word for ‘impalement expert’ in every language.”

“I know of Drake.” The king’s favorite.

If he’s surprised he doesn’t show it. “Good. Here’s where Drake and I differ. He believes strict and unrelenting torture is the only true path to gaining information, and he’s been extraordinarily successful.” He splits the tiny orange into segments, juice running down his fingers. “We have until wheels down to ensure there’s nothing for him to wonder about you.”

A threat. “You really are an abomination.”

The side of his mouth kicks up in genuine pleasure. “And you really do remember me.”

Understatement.

Good fucking girl.

I squirm in my seat, lighting the butterflies flapping in my stomach on fire. “Yes. I do remember you, and I rather think you’re due for a little fainting spell.”

He reaches forward to deposit the peel and I flinch, shuffling back into my seat until my spine locks.

When he leans back, and splits his clementine—or maybe mandarin? There’s no sour smell, just sweet—his jaw is stiff, the tendons on the side of his throat protrude, as if he’s swallowing back a shout. “Doesn’t work like that,” he grumbles. “Not now. You should eat.”

I should stop staring at his mouth. I don’t.

He doesn’t either. Enraptured, we watch each other. Me, with my head tipped to the side, wearing his dirty shirt and lingerie from my wedding trousseau, damp and bruised and aching. A general wreck. Him in sleek black, licking sweet juice off the seams of his fingers.

Shivers cascade down my back, my blood feels hot lazy, like it’s taking a scenic route over my body, setting each crevice aflame.

He bosses me around. He wants me fed and healthy!

“I didn’t fight the Keres in the war,” he says at long last. “In the first year, I was captured.”

A lump forms in my throat. Every creature in the realm knows about the Keres War. A grueling eight year siege led by Kadmos on the Keres—an underground empire of chauvinistic, savage creatures who drink blood and devour souls. The death toll was so staggering, Yaya claimed the only victor had been Charon’s pocketbook from the sheer quantity of ferry rides he gave across the River Styx.

Then again, she also said Charon invented surge pricing, and invested an endowment of drachmas in Uber.

“They didn’t know how to kill an abomination, but they gave me their worst.” Cross flashes me a sad, half smile. “The Emperor himself charged me with isolation and starvation to get me to break. He didn’t realize that the shadows are not my power, but merely a fraction of it. My gift is to hide.”

He says gift like I would curse. And I hate this story before it begins.

“They forgot they had a hostage. Forgot the cell was full. They forgot me entirely. Assumed my screams were other prisoners. Even when I screamed my own name, when I begged them to look at me. I stopped screaming at some point.” He runs his fingers through wavy, salt-sprayed hair, averts his gaze to the window and shrugs. “Everyone does.”

“But you got out.”

“Eventually, the cuffs rusted around me, splintered into red dust.” He sets his tiny special orange down, wipes sticky hands down his thighs. “I could’ve walked out. They didn’t know I was there. No one would’ve stopped me.” His eyes lock on mine. “I didn’t.”

My throat tightens. My mind generates a million ending to his story, all worse than the last.

“For six years, I burned with hate and violence in my captor’s home. I memorized the spread of their empire, and I hurt them.” His eyes are hard, anguished, but his voice is soft, as if this part needs to be said in the quiet, underneath the roar of the engine. On his thighs, his hands curl inward. “I hurt them. Until damaging their armor, spoiling their food, destroying their weapons became too insignificant to the carnage I truly desired.”

Six years. Hiding. Alone. My lungs cave in. I yearn to reach out and touch him, to remind him he’s not there. I shove my hands under my thighs.

“The Keres live in tunnels underground, and I got an idea. Fuck, it had felt like an epiphany, like Zeus had seen me.“ He pushes out a hard laugh, wets his lips. “I blocked off the exits to the surface. Each and every one. And every time I did, the sun was on the other side, and I never once looked.” His throat moves. He takes a deep, pained breath. Closes his eyes. “The war could’ve been over and I wouldn’t have known as I welded them shut. I would’ve collected my vengeance even if they bent knee to my king, swore their fealty. It wouldn’t have mattered. I would’ve hungered the same for their heads, for their blood and deaths.”

His eyes find mine and pin me with everything coursing through him. Rippling fury, vicious hunger, pure, unfettered hatred.

The longer I stare, memorizing the splits of obsidian and the dark green slivers in the steel, the more my chest swells with sympathy. He still ached from this, it’s still raw in him. How helpless he was, how lonely. How abandoned.

“I flooded the catacombs,” he whispers, tracing his tongue over straight white teeth, his demeanor changing from somber to furious. A corrosive edge enters his voice. “The Keres weren’t killed. They didn’t fall in battle. They were eliminated. I eliminated them. Two thousand Keres. Bodies.”

Eliminated them, like pests. Like he barely thinks about it. Even though it’s clear he does, clear he regrets it, hates the choices he made.

Hoping to ease his suffering, I say, “I’ve read every creature history book in the royal library. Not one mentions a flood.”

“Who do you suppose recounts the war to the historians? The winners or the drowned?” He laughs again. Cold. “Kadmos called it a necessary breach to the cause.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because,” he lifts his head to mine, chest rising and falling, waits, like he’s changed his mind, he doesn’t want to answer. Turns away. “You started look at me like you expected me to be worse. As if you were surprised the curse hadn’t defiled me yet.” He stares at the spread orange segments on his thigh, swipes them into his palm and dumps them on my armrest. “But you see, no curse changed me. I was a killer then, and I’m one now. The male you coerced, and propositioned and kissed”—his gaze sinks to my mouth—“He’s only ever been worthy of one title: Blackguard.”

He wants to scare me, make me squirm into a ball of regret and fear, but his confession makes me brave. We’re talking mistakes? Buckle up. “I started the fire at the Ballasts.”

It’s too easy to admit it. So I push harder, try to dredge up a sick, disgusted feeling. “Those creatures today died because of me. Because I thought I had the variables managed, because I thought I was being proactive and playing to advantages. If I hadn’t started it, there wouldn’t have been an explosion. We’d never have been so easily targeted. There would’ve been no shooting.”

His mouth hangs slightly open. “You’re an arsonist?”

He sounds so dejected, I rush to explain without considering why I care what this killer thinks of me. “I lit the curtains on fire. They felt synthetic, there was a chance they might never catch flame, but …”

His eyebrow arches. But?

No but. “They were calling for your heads,” I explain, dread spiraling into my marrow. “I thought it’d give us time to get away—I didn’t think …”

“That an illegal creature fight club would double as a black market? That the owner would keep C4 and ambrosia and enough atropine to stamp out the Lycaon line in the backrooms?” He leans back, popping fruit into his mouth, each bite suffusing the air with wafts of bright, fresh citrus. “It’s all gone now. You might have actually saved lives. You don’t owe them your guilt.”

His words, calm as they are, throw a punch in my stomach. “The Keres are heathens, but last night, those creatures—”

“The Keres are no more wicked than any of the creatures I’ve met. They just don’t attempt to hide it with false humanity.”

How has he turned my confession into a debate on who’s the baddest bad? “It’s clear you’ve lost your humanity.”

Cross’s eyes slit, hiding those supernova irises. “I didn’t lose it. I cut it out like a peeling scab. Kept ripping until it didn’t grow back, long before the king fell. The Kingsguard? They don’t exist. They never did.”

He wants me to flinch or cry, but I’ve never needed someone to tell me people aren’t all rainbows and daises. I set my teeth, seething. I confessed my worst secret and he brushed it aside. Not one moment to wallow. It’s …

Clever.

Sucking the wind from my bummer sails. Snuffing out my pyre of self-loathing. Infuriating, but smart. redirecting me toward anger. He’s a good opponent. Strategic and—

Sweet Hera, Queen of Gods, is it possible I like this male? I dump my face into my palms.

He sighs at me. “If you’d prefer, I have a couple apples and—”

“No apples.”

“Alright … Lev keeps protein bars and I guarantee Zeke has candy squirreled somewhere. Usually Twix.”

My stomach growls. I jerk up.

Cross doesn’t just smile, he preens. “You have a sweet tooth.”

Teeth. All traitors. “I’m not hungry.”

His gaze fixes on my lips, bruising and biting his own as he breathes in. Holds it. Exhales. “Put their blood on my hands, Leni. If you did it to protect me, then their deaths are mine.”

“Just like that? Pass the blame?”

Rising out of his seat, he tips forward, hands planting on the back of my chair, caging me between taut forearms. In a low, gravelly voice, he says, “The guilt will drive you mad if you don’t let it go. Give it to me, I will gladly bear it.”

He’s so close I can smell the saltwater in his hair, the fructose on his tongue. A pang of heat pools between my legs, my belly quivers.

Suddenly he pulls back, a crinkly gold wrapper caught between his middle and forefinger. He sets it on my knee.

“A necessary breach,” he repeats, reclining his seat, closing his eyes. “Women, children, elders. I’m already red with blame. Might as well give me yours. In return, all I ask is that you eat.”