Chapter 9

Chapter

Nine

P ersephone

"Let me get this straight." Willa drops another cube of sugar into her already sweet coffee. "You're moving in with the guy five days a week?"

"Essentially, yeah."

I don't bother correcting her and saying that I'd pretty much agreed to spend six days a week with a man I hardly know. In his house. As his… companion ?

"Girl, that's nuts." She peers at me through furrowed brows, half her attention on the coffee she's stirring. "You just met him."

"I did."

"I think he's a psycho for even asking this of you."

I laugh, trying to put us both at ease. Inside, I've been a panicked mess since the totally bizarre interview/proposition I'd had with Hades yesterday. "You're the one who brought up I was looking for work. He just filled that need, I guess."

"Yeah, in a really creepy way."

"It's not creepy, Willa. It's sad."

Her head jerks back on her shoulders. "How is it sad? The guy's a billionaire. He can have anything he wants." She snorts. "He's as far from sad as sad can get."

"Just because he can afford a lot of things, doesn't mean he can get anything."

"Uh, that's exactly what it means. Look what he's doing to you."

"He's not doing anything to me." I'm starting to feel defensive, and that's making me feel annoyed. "He offered me a job, and I agreed."

"I just think he's taking advantage of you."

"He's not." At her disbelieving look, I say, "I don't need the money so much that he can take advantage of me. There are boundaries. I've made them clear, and he's agreed to respect them. If he suddenly opts not to respect my boundaries, there are plenty of other jobs. I'm sure I'd be able to get one."

"Then why don't you?"

"Why don't I what?"

"Get a different job."

I shrug. "I guess I'm curious. "

She looks doubtful. "So, it has nothing to do with the fact the man is hotter than hades? Total pun intended."

"I'm not going there." But I can feel my face flaming. I shift in my own seat at the little table, thankful no one else has crawled out of bed yet, and try to attempt to conceal my discomfort with a sip of my coffee.

"Oh, come on. If you're taking this job with Mr. Rich and Steamy, you've got to at least give me the goods."

"There are no goods. There will be no goods." I huff. "I told you, it's strictly professional."

"Sure." She gives me big, disbelieving eyes and a hell of a snort. "Because that's going to last."

I hold firm. "It is. I would never sleep with my boss."

She gives me a look that says she doesn't believe me, and she can't wait to tell me she knew all along just how this was going to play out.

I sigh, feeling my shoulders fall. "I think he's just lonely, Willa. I think he has so much money that real relationships aren't something he trusts. Probably because most people think the way you do, and see him as nothing more than a bank sum."

Willa gasps in mock outraged affront. Then she rolls her eyes. "Okay, okay. I get it. You're a saint." She narrows her eyes at me. "What is he paying you?"

"I insisted on minimum wage. "

" Why would you do that?"

I twist my lips to the side and admit, "It feels wrong that he would pay me more when he's really just paying for me to sleep, you know?"

"Okay." She takes a big gulp of her coffee. "I need a hot as hades man to pay me to sleep. Bonus points if his name is actually Hades. Hey, can I borrow yours?"

"Nope." I grin, but it is borderline forced. I know she's just playing with me, but the idea of sharing Hades in any capacity feels—wrong. Wrong in the kind of way that has nausea swirling in my belly and unease prickling my spine.

I don't like it. The very idea that I'm at all possessive of my boss has alarm bells ringing in my mind.

Willa pouts. "Seriously, it's not fair. How does this kind of thing even happen to people? And why am I never the people it happens to?"

I give her a smart little smile as I let my lips linger on the rim of my cup. "Probably because you see the negative first, and therefore miss your shot."

"I do not see the negative first."

"Was it not just you trying to talk me out of working for the creepy, but hot billionaire named Hades?"

"Whatever." She gives me an indignant sniff. "I still think you're crazy."

If only she knew just how on point she was.

"Maybe a little."

The sound of bare feet shuffling over tile has Willa craning her neck as she peers to the side to see Theo lumbering into the little eat-in kitchen. With his eyes still half-closed in sleep, he doesn't see Addison come from the other side, and is unprepared for his attack. Having been together for the last week, both living and working close, things have gotten quite comfortable between most of us. We're like a little family, which is kind of a bad description if I'm being honest. Too many have either slept together, or have intentions of sleeping together, to be called family.

But since I have no intention of sleeping with anyone, I don't mind the little euphemism in my mind. It works for how I feel around them. How I'm coming to feel around them.

I'm entirely unsurprised when Addison reaches out to twist Theo's bare nipple. I'm even less surprised by the roar Theo lets out as his eyes snap wide and he shoots off after Addison for retribution. The two of them have gotten close fast, probably because they're nearly the same person.

Not only are they the same person, but they're both man-whores, said with the utmost respect, because although I don't engage personally in casual sex—or any sex, really, I know a lot of people like to.

The idea of casual sex blows my mind. No matter how I've tried, it's simply not something I understand. Maybe it's the way Mom and Dad have been together since high school. Maybe it's my upbringing in the church, although I've never felt particularly close to the God my parents' worship. Probably because, when I'd been a young child, afraid and hearing a voice in the deep of my mind, there had been no real comfort within the walls of my church. Where there should have been love, and acceptance, and healing, there had only been fear, and judgement, and divide. The sourness of my near damning diagnosis had clung to me in the years after, a stickiness I'd been unable to wash from my skin.

Maybe my lack of sexual interest has nothing to do with my parents or the church, after all. Maybe it has everything to do with the fact I've never felt the kind of attraction that would drive me to sexual exploration. At least not before now.

No, casual sex isn't something I engage in. But it's also not something I bother judging others for. How another wants to live their life is of no consequence to me.

Still, I can't help the realization, as I watch Addison catch Theo in a headlock, with his muscles and tan skin and floppy, golden blond curls, that maybe the sexual part of me I thought I lacked is finally awakening. Because I can't deny the tickle I feel in my belly as I watch the handsome boy all the girls giggle over and bat their lashes at, dominate—and wonder deep inside what it might be like to be the prey.