Chapter 19

Chapter

Nineteen

P ersephone

I haven’t been able to stop thinking of that night in the hot tub with Hades. The night of so many changes. So many firsts.

I swear, I felt something in my chest—something which has always been achingly empty—snap into place. I could have sworn I saw something crackle between us. An energy of the faintest blue, like the halo of light around a bright moon in the darkest sky. It had danced there between us for seconds before drifting away. But I swear, I’d been able to feel it, like silky water flowing between my fingers.

I’d thought it was yet more proof to the madness I suffer. But Hades felt it, too. The nip of something snapping to place, that is.

I’m not sure he could see the energy between us—could feel the crackle of it.

But I felt it. I felt it, and there’s no forgetting it now.

Days later, I can feel the static of the energy that swirled between us. It crackles at my fingertips as I brush away dust from the pillars into the tunnel we’ve unearthed. I feel that crackle even now, as a team of highly skilled individuals excavate the tunnel while carefully trying to preserve the deep stretch of ancient stairs.

In some places, the earth that filled this tunnel has packed to the steps to remain forever a part of it, coating the stone as though caressed by the wrinkled hands of Mother Nature herself.

It’s beautiful and somehow sad, the wreckage of time.

I feel so incredibly, dangerously close to this place of ruin. Like it’s somehow imbedded in the fabric that crafts my very soul. With every step we unearth, a new flash of something that mimics memory drifts into my mind, rooting there. It threatens growth I’m not sure I can handle, as each new piece fits into the puzzle of the last, painting a bigger, clearer picture of a past that can’t possibly be real. Can’t possibly be my own.

And yet…

Addison drops down beside me, spreading his legs and dropping his elbows onto his knees. He stares out over clasped fists into a distance of sand, and blue, and ruins. From the corner of my eye, I watch as his jaw works.

I pretend I don’t notice.

“What’s going on with you and Hades?”

Surprised, I glance at him.

“We’re—um—” I don’t know why talking about Hades is so hard for me with Addison. Why it feels so awkward. Why I feel like I’m doing something wrong.

“Annie?”

Nervously, I tuck my hair behind my ear. “We’re just—we’re…”

“He burned me that night, you know?”

My eyes slide to Addison’s. There’s grave seriousness in his eyes. “What?”

“At the club, when we were dancing. When he grabbed my shirt, lit it on fire—I had his knuckles burned into my chest.” His fingers move to the buttons of his shirt, pulling it open. “I don’t even know how he did it.” Addison scoffs, shakes his head. “It’s healing, but you can still see it.”

He’s right. I can see it. It’s faint now, but the red lashes are there. Nausea rolls in my belly. My tongue feels bone dry. “I—I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have anything to be sorry about.” He doesn’t bother to rebutton his shirt as he resumes his position, staring into the distance as anger dances in his brilliant blue eyes. “But you need to be aware of who you’re fucking around with. ”

I can’t help it; I flinch at his tone. “He’s not a bad man, Addison.”

Those blue eyes cut to mine. “He lit me on fire.”

“I don’t even know how that happened. It doesn’t make sense.” Still, I can’t dispute it. “He wasn’t even holding a match.”

“Doesn’t matter how he did it. He did it.”

“Look—” I start to stand but stop when his hand falls on my knee. His skin against mine has my belly clenching as it swoops. Like a murder of crows sweeping from the sky: their mission a soul to steal.

Darkness hovers at the edge of my vision, growing, spreading like a virus until there is no more daylight. Only darkness. Only shadows.

I can still hear Addison, his smooth, lovely voice calling my name in the distance. “Annie? Annie?” There’s panic there in the depths, clinging to it. “Annie?” I can’t see, though. Can’t think. Can’t pull myself back as I feel his hand on my thigh, shaking. His voice sounds again, far closer, right in my ear now. “Persephone.” The panic is gone. Something else is there in its place. Hunger. It’s so deep, so delicious and dark. Sensual. “Don’t go.”

A shudder rolls through my body at the feel of teeth there on my ear. A nip, a glide. His voice sliding over my skin, feeding the beast of desire that spills endless hunger in my core. A hunger he won’t feed.

His hand slides up the back of my thigh, and I feel the wisp of fabric drift open as it falls away. My eyes flutter to see darkness where there had been light. The big belly of a swollen moon casts silhouettes of tall temples over the land. Beneath my bare feet, I feel the baked stone of the mouth of a temple I’ve walked too many times. A temple crafted entirely for my passage. A temple the people have come to associate with the seasons. Even now, beyond the heat of his body pressed into mine, his mouth on my neck, his hand drifting higher and higher, I can feel the chill of winter in the air, drifting up from the sea as though it knows tonight is the night I leave.

He pulls his mouth from my throat, and I finally see him. Addison—but not. He looks like him, so much like him, but there is something different in those familiar blue eyes. Something dangerous in the twist of his easy smile as he looks down at me. He says, “I love you.”

I laugh, low and husky and— not my laugh . I hear my voice say, “You love everyone.”

“I love you most.” His hand is between my thighs now, drifting higher and higher, to the core of me. He strokes me.

I don’t flinch, but spread my legs wider, hooking one around his hip. I purr, “We won’t tell Aphrodite that.”

He groans. “I’m addicted to you. Losing you to him for so long—” He drops to his knees, lifting my leg over his shoulder as his hands shove at my dress. And then I feel him. His hot tongue at my core, sucking. My head falls back against the stone even as I sense the shift in the air, the warmth of flame that feasts on the chill. I let my head roll to the side. Let myself see him.

It’s been so long.

He’s so darkly handsome.

Hades.

My husband. My love. The man who might never love me back enough…

I smile, a true smile, my eyes fixing on him even as my hands drift into the golden hair of the man between my legs. I want to push him. Need to. I’ve been schooled for this, taught to play the chords of his obsession. I rock myself against Adonis, watching as Hades’ eyes flare with flames, brightening with jealousy that feeds that dark place inside me. The place she created to one day keep him, but it’s now so deeply engraved in me—it’s a part of me—the strings of this deception so twisted up in the threads that bind me to him, I’m not sure I can ever hope to untangle them.

I moan as the man between my legs sucks harder at the button of my arousal even as Hades ambles closer, his jealousy ever restrained. Always so tightly bridled. But I want to push him. To break him. To watch as he finally snaps.

As he takes what he wants from me like he did that first time, when he bred the succubus that crawls now under my skin, addicted to the carnal wickedness of his rough touch. The creature she uses now. The thing deep within that she whispers to .

Locking my eyes on Hades, I plead, “Adonis.”

Hades wraps a hand around the back of Adonis’ neck, and my heart quickens. There is a thrill that jumps inside me. Something darkly wrong. And yet I need it, can’t deny it. Won’t bother trying.

He pulls Adonis’ head away from my core, and I whimper with need as I watch the two men lock gazes. There is hate and intrigue spilling from both men, wrapping me in twisted knots I’ll never be able to unwind myself from. I don’t know that I want to.

“Do you like the taste of my wife, mortal?” Hades asks darkly.

Adonis nods, unable to lie to the God of the Underworld. The God of Death. The King of the Afterlife.

Hades’ eyes slide to mine. “Do you want him to come with us, my love?”

Those knots twist around my heart even as that yawning hunger, that pit of darkness he hollowed out in me grows. I want to hurt him back. To know he cares enough to be hurt. To believe, just once, that the cruel words she whispers aren’t true. I lift my chin, I challenge, “Yes.”

His hand tightens around Adonis’ neck for a moment. A moment I think he might just succumb to that jealousy I know lingers deep within him. I want him to. At the cost of anything or any other, I want him to.

He pulls Adonis to his feet, and, taking my hand, Hades guides us all into the Underworld .

“Annie?” My eyes snap open to find Addison is there, his hand still on the bare skin of my thigh.

Crying out, I slap away his touch as I scramble to my feet. I’m shaken, emotionally and physically rattled. I feel sickness swell in the deep of my belly as Addison—God, he looks like Adonis— Jeez, I don’t even know what Adonis looked like .

I’m making up history as I go. I’m playing into the darkly hideous fantasy of ancient myth, twisting it into the reality of my life, and I hate it. These visions—memories— whatever —they are like thorns in my skin.

“I—I’m sorry,” I wheeze, swallowing hard. I want to cry. I might actually break down and do it.

I can’t stop shaking. Can’t forget the way it had felt—the way everything had felt in my—what? Is it a fantasy? A vision? What?

“Annie, you look sick.” He points at my face, climbing to his own feet. “You’re clammy and pale.” There is so much concern in his blue eyes. “Are you okay?”

“I—I’m fine.” I feel like I’m going to vomit.

Spinning away from Addison, my eyes lock on Hades. I freeze, my feet rooted to the earth as my heart skips nervously in my chest. The darkness that swirls around him is a tangible thing that is bursting with menace. I think I see the same flames that danced in his eyes in my vision, there now in those dark depths.

Fear twists the knots that formed in my belly, the vines around my heart. I want to flee, even as I walk closer to him. My knees, like jelly, wobble.

“You’re here,” I say when I come close. I think my voice rattles.

My hands are shaking. All of me is shaking.

“What was that?” He doesn’t even have to look at Addison for me to know what he is talking about.

“Nothing.” I shake my head, and repeat, “Nothing.”

Hades looks at me for a long moment. Studies me. Finally, slowly, he murmurs, “I am a jealous—” he pauses, considering his next words and ending with, “man, Persephone.”

I huff, muttering quietly, “Tell that to the alter-ego in my fantasies.”

“What?” Hades catches me with a hand around my arm as I attempt to walk past him. His dark eyes are sharp as a blade, attempting to cut the secrets from the deep of me even as they score into my very soul. I want to weep. I want to crumble.

I shake my head again. Words get caught in my throat, but I manage, “Nothing. Sorry. I—I’m not feeling very good.”

His eyes scan my face again, as though he’s trying to peer under the cover I hide beneath. “It’s a good thing the day is over.”