5. Charon

5

CHARON

I do not, as a general rule, lose my temper. A year ago, that might have been different, but I’ve seen too much shit since then to allow my emotions to get the best of me. That doesn’t stop my fear and anger from damn near swallowing me whole at the sight of Eurydice walking toward the lower city across the Cypress Bridge.

I fight to keep it under wraps, but it slips through my fingers like the fog that blankets the ground around us. She nearly misses a step when she notices me, but I can see the exact moment when she decides to power through this on bravado alone.

She lifts her chin in a move I’ve seen Persephone do a hundred times and marches right up to me. “What are you doing here?”

“No.”

That trips her up. She blinks those big eyes at me. “What do you mean ‘no’?”

“No, you don’t get to go on the offensive, when you’re clearly in the wrong.” Some of my anger seeps into my voice, and I can’t stop myself from continuing. “You know it’s dangerous to be out by yourself, let alone to be on this bridge. Over this bridge. You, of everyone, know it’s dangerous. Why the fuck are you out here without an escort?”

“Zeus is dead.”

“Zeus is alive and living in Dodona Tower.”

She thins her lips. “He’s not the same and you know it.”

Yeah, I guess I do. I’ll never be a fan of Zeus, regardless of who holds the title, but even I can’t deny that this one is miles better than the last. I won’t allow her to distract me with semantics though. “And you know damn well that he’s not even the biggest threat out there right now. Everyone is a threat.”

A year ago, she would have burst into tears at my harsh tone. Six months ago, she would have flinched and apologized immediately. Tonight, she doesn’t do either. She steps closer and pokes me in the chest. “I am not a child.”

“You keep saying that, and then you act like a foolish teenager.”

She pokes me again. “No, fuck that. I will suffer the overprotectiveness from my family and Hades. Not from you. You took me to Minos’s party. You trusted me to hold my own there.”

Yeah, I did, and I regret the fuck out of it. I thought it was a safe enough adventure for her to experience, to tag along on my fact-finding mission. Her delight at accepting the invitation was worth the ass reaming I got from Hades and Persephone over it. Or so I thought.

Then people ended up in the hospital, and Hephaestus ended up dead.

“I regret that.”

Her shoulders fall a half inch and then hike back up. “No. You don’t get to do that. You are the only person who’s looked at me and seen someone beyond a victim in waiting. You don’t get to take that back. It’s cruel.”

She’s right, but that doesn’t change the fact that she’s trying to distract me. I hate that it’s working. The last thing I want is to hurt this woman. I’ve been twisting myself up in knots to ensure I don’t make her uncomfortable. So, yeah, I might regret the danger she was in at the house party, but I don’t regret how she came alive there in a way I’d never seen.

None of that matters in this moment though. Not when she’s being reckless and trying to cover it up. “Where were you?”

“Where were you?” She’s still in my space, her spiced perfume taunting me as much as the warmth coming off her body. “I texted you earlier and you didn’t answer.”

Guilt flares, threatening to hijack my anger. Going behind her back to talk to her ex without her explicitly asking me to was a shitty move, even if I did it with the best of intentions. Mostly. There may have been part of me that wanted to get a look at the man, to search for a hint of what it is about him that holds Eurydice captive, even a year and a fucked-up betrayal later.

He’s attractive enough, even more attractive than his brother Apollo. Their father is Swedish and their mother is Korean, and while they both have her coloring, Orpheus favors her more clearly than Apollo. He’s almost pretty, but the year of suffering has sharpened that beauty into something else entirely. His black hair was always longish, but now it reaches his shoulders in a careless fall of silk. The biggest change is in his dark eyes. He still has enough charisma that I was caught off guard, but the loss there called to something I refuse to look too deeply at.

I know what he lost.

I refuse to make the same mistakes he did.

“I had some things to take care of.”

She searches my face for a long moment. “Uh-huh. Well, I also had some things to take care of.”

“Eurydice,” I bite out.

“Charon.” She mimics my tone. “You don’t get to keep secrets and then expect me to spill all mine.”

My hands move on instinct, catching her hips. She’s wearing a coat, but it’s too thin; I can feel her body clearly beneath the fabric. “It’s not the same.”

“Okay.” She flattens her hand against my chest. We’ve fallen into a bit of a comfortable friendship over time, but there’s a new intention in the way we touch each other after last night. I know I should hold off, should put some distance between us, but with the Cypress Bridge looming over us, I can’t quite make myself release her.

“You’re right. I don’t regret taking you to Minos’s party. Because you held up your end of the promise and listened to me when I gave you an order. You knew it was dangerous, and you trusted me to protect you—just like I trusted you to not do anything reckless that would get you hurt.” I lean down a little without fully meaning to. “Whatever you did tonight? It was reckless. I ought to put you over my knee and paddle your ass.”

She smirks, and it’s a bolt of sheer lust to my system. Eurydice doesn’t fear me in the least, and I want to inhale her fledgling brattiness straight into my lungs. She shifts her hand, pricking my chest with her long nails. “You’re all bark and no bite.”

I don’t mean to draw her closer, to back us toward the large pillar at the entrance of this side of the bridge. There’s not much light to begin with, but here in its shadow, everything feels softer. Dreamlike. “I am trying to give you what you need.”

“What about what you need?”

I know what she said last night. That I deserve more than a woman hung up on another man. Maybe she’s right. I don’t give a fuck. “Why don’t you let me be the one to make that decision?”

“I don’t want to hurt you,” she whispers.

As if being so close to her isn’t a glorious agony already. I don’t say it. My desires are not her responsibility. But last night changed things, whether she wants to admit it or not. She wants me too. She loves me, and not only as a friend. “Life is full of hurt, baby. I meant what I said. I won’t pressure you, and I won’t throw this shit in your face.” I should stop there. But she’s close and touching me, and I can’t let this moment slip past without telling her the full truth. “I know you have unresolved shit. I know your heart still hurts for him. But I’m not so selfish as to need your whole heart, Eurydice. Any pain that comes from being with you is far outweighed by the joy of having you in my life.”

“You really mean that.”

It’s not a question, but it demands an answer all the same. “I do.”

“And if I said yes? That I would give this a shot?”

My heart is pounding so hard, I’m surprised she can’t feel it. Maybe she can. “I’d like to say I’d take you home and romance you slow and sweet.”

“I don’t want slow and sweet, Charon. I don’t know if I ever did.” She drags her hand lightly down my chest to my stomach. She’s moving slowly, giving me plenty of time to stop her. Gods help me, but I don’t. Not even when she cups my cock through my slacks. Eurydice squeezes me lightly. “What if I want fast and hard and…now?”

I have kept myself on a tight leash, and she’s doing her damnedest to pick it apart, thread by thread. “I am trying to do right by you.”

She leans back against the pillar. I can’t see her expression clearly, but I know her well enough now to know she’s got a challenge in her eyes. It’s a flicker I’ve seen more and more often in the last few weeks. I shouldn’t enjoy it as much as I do; when she’s challenging me, she’s not doing what I say, which means she might be acting out and putting herself in danger.

She’s not in danger right now.

I’m standing between her and anyone that might be out on the street. I can’t claim to know every bit of her, not when she’s showing me glimpses of pieces I’ve never seen before. But I know my intentions.

“I am heartily tired of people thinking they know what’s best for me.” She rubs her thumb back and forth against the underside my cock where it flares. “Why don’t you start worrying about you? What do you want, Charon? Right here? Right now?”

I want to marry you.

I won’t say it. I might be all in for this woman, but she’s not quite there yet for me. How can she be? Part of her still belongs to someone else. I’ve laid the groundwork for Orpheus to give those pieces of her back, but who knows if he’ll take me up on it? Who knows if we even need him to anymore?

“Charon?”

There are a thousand ways this could go wrong. I meant what I said before about wanting to romance her soft and slow. But I’m not a fool. I know how to divorce what I think she should have from what she actually wants. “Is that what you want? Right here, right now?”

“And if it is?” There it is again, that brattiness that I want to wrap up and bolster for the rest of my fucking life.

I shift closer, pressing my cock more firmly against her palm. “Prove it.”

“Prove it?” She leans closer until her breath ghosts against the front of my throat. “Like this?” Eurydice hesitates, but I don’t have a chance to tell her to keep going. She undoes the front of my pants with quick fingers and delves her hand inside. “Or like this?”

The shock of skin against skin snaps what’s left of my leash. I wrap my hand around her wrist, pinning her to me. “You know how this works. Give me a safe word, baby.” Technically, this is a conversation we should have had well before it got to the point of her hand in my pants, but I might die if she stops touching me now.

“Lyre.”

I don’t ask why, but part of me can’t help wondering if the word has something to do with Orpheus. I push the thought away. “Good girl. Now, you have a choice.”

“Mmm.” She ignores my hand around her wrist and strokes me slowly, exploring the length of my cock. “What choice?” Her voice has gone low and sweet, but a thread of the earlier sauciness remains.

“You’re going to let go of my cock and walk with me to my car.”

Her grip tightens. “Or?”

“Or I’m going to fuck you right here in public where anyone walking past can see us claiming each other.” My brakes are gone. There are a thousand reasons not to do this right here, right now, but I can’t think of a single one. Not with her little gasp of surprise ghosting against my throat. “Decide, Eurydice.”

She makes me wait, the little brat. She strokes my cock another time, two, and I let her. I might be hanging on by a thread, but I won’t toss her over my shoulder and haul her cute little ass to my car. She has a choice. It’s a narrow choice, but it’s still a choice.

For the second time this week, I have absolutely no idea what she’s going to do.

“Quite the decision.” She inhales deeply and drags her nose over my throat. “It’s cold out here. Take me to your car.” Eurydice kisses my neck. “Anyone walking by can see still us…claiming…each other.” Her hand tightens around my cock. “But at least we’ll be warm.”

My brain barely has time to comprehend her words before my body moves. I dip down and toss her over my shoulder. My car is just around the corner, so I pause to tuck my cock back into my pants before I stalk down the sidewalk to it.

I half expect Eurydice to squirm or holler, but she’s relaxed and loose over my shoulder. I’m nearly to the car when she tugs up the hem of my shirt and plays her fingers across the small of my back. “Hurry up.”

I hurry the fuck up.

No point in bothering with the front seat. We both know where this is going, and it’s not me taking her back to the house. I yank open the back door and spill her down across the seat. She grins at me and grabs the front of my pants. “Hurry up.”

I follow her into the back seat and drag the door closed behind us. The sedan isn’t the largest, and I curse as we try to untangle our limbs. Or I try to untangle and Eurydice works on getting my pants off.

“This isn’t how it’s supposed to be,” I mutter as I jerk her pants over her hips and down her legs. She has to fold her knees nearly to her chest, and I curse again when I reach her boots. I can’t yank them off without hurting her, so I force myself to slow down and untie them. “Supposed to be private. Just us.”

“You’ve thought about it?” She wrestles her arms out of her coat and pulls her shirt over her head.

One boot, two boots, then I’m finally able to free her legs. I end up kneeling on the floorboard between her thighs.

Thought about it? I’ve craved her like a fire in my blood, but it’s more than that. I want to fuck her, to hear her little sounds of pleasure, to know exactly what gets her off the hardest. No shit I want that. But I want everything else too. The mornings and the late nights and the bitchy days and the happy ones. “Haven’t you?”

“Yes.” She hooks my neck and then her mouth is on mine. Kissing me with the same desperation surging in my blood. I knew she was right here with me, but this is just further confirmation. This is happening. We’re in this together.

I’ve imagined kissing Eurydice more times than I can count. Soft and sweet. Hard and frenetic. Everywhere in between. Reality is so different, it’s barely comprehensible. She’s warm and soft in my arms, and she teases my mouth open and takes what she wants. She tastes like peppermint, and it drives me wild.

She works my slacks down my hips and pulls me tight against her. I freeze at the feeling of her pussy against my length. She’s wet and so hot, she practically scorches me.

Slow down. Slow the fuck down.

I break the kiss and press my forehead to hers. I’m breathing as if I’ve run a great distance. “Not supposed to be like this.”

“You keep saying that.” Her nails dig into my ass and she rolls her hips, rubbing herself up and down my length. We’re pressed too tightly together for her to get me inside her, and I’m both grateful and furious about it. “Tell me how it’s supposed to be, Charon.”

“Supposed to be slow.” I hardly sound like myself. “Wine you. Dine you. Seduce you properly.” I press my forehead harder against hers, until it almost hurts. Too rough, but if I don’t do something to ground myself, I’m going to be inside her. “Tease you until you’re begging for it. Not in the back seat of my fucking car where anyone can see you taking my cock like a good girl.”

“Charon.” Eurydice licks my throat. “Maybe I want them to see.” She’s writhing against me almost desperately. “If you don’t fuck me right now, I think I might die. We’ve waited so long. You can seduce me properly later. Please.”

I should deny her, but I’m already shifting back so she can grip my cock and guide me to her entrance. The feeling of being dragged through her wetness muddies my mind, but I still have the presence to grit out. “Condom.”

“I’m on birth control.” She rubs the head of my cock against her clit. The lone streetlight outside paints her small breasts in vivid detail, but leaves everything else in shadow. Her breath hitches. “If you want a condom, we can use one, but we don’t need to.”

I haven’t been with anyone in the last year, and neither has she. I don’t know if I’m supposed to know she got tested the month after all that shit went down with Orpheus, but I overheard Persephone and Hades talking. She’d been furious her sister even had to worry about that on top of everything else, but it’d come back negative.

I don’t think Orpheus cheated on her, but it’s not my place to say as much. Not then, and sure as fuck not now.

I want to do this with her without a single thing between us. Maybe it’s sentimental, especially when there is something—someone—between us currently, but the desire remains. “Are you sure?” I manage.

In response, she lifts her hips and slides the head of my cock into her. I curse, long and hard, and fight against every instinct demanding I drive into her, claim this thing between us once and for all.

Slow isn’t something I’m capable of right now, but I need this to be just as good for her as it is for me. “Touch yourself. Show me what you like.”

Eurydice doesn’t hesitate. She gives my cock one last stroke and moves her hand up to her clit. I curse again, hating the shadows hiding everything but the motion of her fingers from me. Next time. Next time I will spread her out on my bed and look my fill.

Right now, I’ll have to go by touch alone.

I cover her hand with mine, letting her motions teach me exactly what she likes. She moans and rolls her hips, but I have just enough room to edge back so I don’t sink deeper. Even the head of my cock inside her is sweet agony. I won’t hold it together if I go deeper. “Not yet.”

“Please.”

“Make yourself come, baby.” I can’t stop myself from cupping her breast with my free hand. “Come for me and then you can have every inch of this cock.” She sobs out a breath and picks up her pace. I shake my head. “No, don’t rush it.” I knock her hand away and take its place. She’s slippery beneath my thumb. Warm and wet and just for me. I mimic the motions she was doing on her own, vertical strokes that tease her eager little clit.

“Charon.” She starts to shake, pressing her head against the seat hard as she tries to arch harder into my touch. “Don’t stop. I’m so close.”

I can’t see her face clearly, but I can read all the signs. I shift my touch on her breast and pinch her nipple lightly. She jolts and arches even harder into my hand. “You like that.”

“More!”

I give her more. A little taste of pain to heighten her pleasure. It’s a delicate balance that we can explore more fully later. Right now, I just need her to come more than I need the next beat of my heart.

She grabs my forearms, holding me in place as her body goes tense and she cries out. There. That’s what I will spend the rest of my life chasing. I surge forward, sinking into her to the hilt and taking her mouth again. She clamps around me, so wet and tight that I nearly blow on the spot. I try to slow down, to pace myself, but she wraps her legs around my waist and then her nails find my ass again, digging in just enough to have pain sparking.

I thrust deeper. “Oh fuck.” It’s too late. My orgasm hits me before I can stop it. I’m helpless to do anything but keep mindlessly thrusting, trying to get deeper. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

I collapse against her. Eurydice shivers a little, each move sends sparks of pleasure so acute that it’s nearly pain through me. I can’t believe that shit just happened. Any of it. I gather her close and kiss her temple. I’m not twenty anymore—it takes me a little longer to recover—but my cock threatens to twitch back to life. Fuck, but that was barely enough to take the edge off. “Sorry.”

“Don’t apologize.” She gives another of those delicious shivers again. “I like that I affect you like that.”

I like it too. But that doesn’t mean I want to make a habit of it. My cock gives another twitch and I can’t help but thrust again. She tightens her legs around my waist. I close my eyes, letting myself sink into the feel of her, of this really happening. “Again?”

“It feels good.” She rolls her hips. “I…don’t want to stop.” She kisses my throat, my jaw, the corner of my mouth. “Keep fucking me, Charon. Until we can’t fuck anymore.”

I don’t tell her it will take a lifetime before I’m satisfied with fucking her. Instead, I lean back just enough to tear off my shirt. I want to be skin-to-skin with her. I need it. Eurydice helps me get the shirt down my arms and then her fingers are in my hair and her mouth is on mine.

This time. This time, I’ll take her slow. It’s not a bed, but we have nowhere to be and no one to interrupt us. I couldn’t stop if I wanted to.