24. Nat

24

Nat

.45 ACP

I sit on my hill, kicking pebbles into the chasm on the city side, ignoring Hades’ call for me to return home and resume my duties. The sunrise is almost at its peak, but today the orange feels less like a bath and more like a cold shower. Theia cannot see the sunrise, the only person I’ve ever met to look at it the same way as I do, to truly appreciate the view.

A twig breaks behind me, and I almost roll my eyes, even as a smile creeps over my mouth. “I thought I told you to fuck off.”

“I’m been called a ditz, but I’m positive I would have remembered fuck on those lips, darling.”

It takes every ounce of my training not to turn and look.

Sin drenched in creamy orange and soft pink. I close my eyes so I don’t chase the urge to face it. See something else that I’ll miss interminably when I go home.

“I thought you were Drake. My appointed babysitter that follows me when I leave the house and reports back on my every heinous crime.” I’m complaining, but it emerges softly.

Wasn’t it only hours ago when Drake and I were hiking this hill together, when we sat quietly and he asked to touch his finger to my palm, that I realized he’s my friend? Dark and spooky. Immune to emotion.

Theia’s opposite.

Yet they ask questions the same: no judgment, earnest curiosity. Good.

Kind.

Sin chuckles from behind me, but there’s a harsh quality to it. “Yes, I heard about your session with Drake.” He pauses before admitting, “I may have shot him.”

My heart stops. I jerk around, hair whipping my cheek. “What?”

“Concerned dear?” His mouth curls into a smirk as he studies me expectantly. In his fingers, he holds a crinkled brown paper bag.

The sight of him carves into my ribs, a God bathed in the sun’s glow. The gold of his skin tinted orange accentuates his arrogant stance, legs spread wide, shoulders pushed back, daring anyone to challenge him.

I drink him in. Striking, despite his clothes. Another ridiculous outfit. A mismatched combination of mossy green work pants and a rainbow printed blouse. No belt. No knives. His aura seems to assume a subtle orange hue. I know it’s not possible, but he makes it so. By the time I reach his purple gaze—no orange can compete with that color—I find jealousy etched into every line of his face, but also hope.

Hope.

Why?

I withdraw my hand from the earth, severing my connection with the Underworld, and brush away the dirt clinging to my nails.

A squall brews overhead, making the air damp. Thunder echoes from afar, lightning flashes in the sky.

“He’s fine. If I’d known you’d talk to him like that, I wouldn’t have,” he confesses.

“He’s not afraid of me,” I reply in the same hesitant, quiet tone. “I enjoy talking to him.”

He sighs again, as if I’m exhausting. “I’m happy you have someone to talk to, Nat.” He sits beside me, long legs hooking over the cliff’s edge. “I just wish it was me.”

“We don’t talk.” I look at him. “We fight and …”

I stop.

He grins. “I believe I’ll die wanting to know the end of that sentence, love.”

My chest constricts. I’ll spend my life figuring out what the end is. “You smell like blood.”

“Don’t shoot someone holding a crossbow.”

I turn toward him. Stop halfway, strangling my concern. Furies don’t worry about black souls. “You’re an idiot.”

“Give me a pass, Bloodspiller. I still taste you on my tongue when he tells me you let him touch you. He could’ve been holding a missile, and I would have taken the shot.”

I ignore the rush of desire from his threat, his devotion. “He said please.”

And I’d been curious, morbidly curious as to what precisely Drake would learn. If I could face it.

“You gave him your secrets.”

My body tenses. “He told you?”

“Yes, love.”

“Then I’ll be removing his arms.”

“You can’t control it, the impulse to kill.” He’s tiptoeing, and it’s horrible. It’s everything Megaera warned me about. “Can you? If it wasn’t Nicki, it would’ve been someone else, Varley … Me.”

A scorching rush of guilt and shame wash over me. “Yes. I’m a monster,” I admit hollowly. “I know.”

He peers at me for a long while, and whatever he sees in my expression calms him. His shoulders stoop. “No. That’s not what I was going to say.”

“Why not? It’s true.” I dig into the dirt with my toes, wanting to bury myself.

As if there’s no argument, he grabs for his takeout bag, opens it and wafts the unmistakable scent of grease at me. “Last time, you were ravenous. After.”

After the thrall.

I don’t think I have an appetite until an onion ring is perched on my thigh. He’s right and I hate it. I’m starving.

We eat side by side, watching the sun arc, stealing day from night, fingers gently brushing. When the pit in my stomach is crammed with cheese and beef and sesame seed bun, I say, “I’m sorry. I—”

“Don’t apologize for kissing me or I’ll think you regret it.”

I do though.

I close my eyes, fold my arms tight against my chest. “I could’ve killed you.”

“But you won’t.” He’s smiling, cocky, unfazed by the threat.

I resist the temptation to push him off this hill. “Yes, I will.”

“You tried, once. But since then it’s been poor attempts. Honestly, it’s as if your heart’s not in it. Tragic. I’m extremely lovable.”

“If you had taken a big boy drink instead of sipping, you’d be dead.”

He smirks, warrior posture slackening as he reclines on his hands, closer to me. Suddenly, I’m aware of his height and the breadth of his shoulders. “I relish the savor, love. Especially where you’re involved”

Under my breath, I mutter, “Oh fuck off.”

“There she is.” He smiles, then drops it. “I’m sorry too—”

“Don’t,” I butt in. “Let’s just forget it. I maimed, you yelled. We’re square.”

“I don’t want to forget it, Nat. I’m a talker. And I need to apologize for yelling. Because the realm’s a better place without Nicki, and you had a good reason. I just—” He looks up as if searching for the words. “You make me …” He gestures in the air, making odd big shapes and jabbing pokes, flailing about.

Exhales.

Dumps his mop of curls into his hands and groans. “Please, tell me what you’re feeling right now.”

I frown. “You already know.”

“I don’t. And that’s why.” He gestures again, just as wildly. “Around you, I get one distinct flavor. It never changes. I had no idea what you were feeling when you kissed me. I believed it was you wanting me. And when I realized it was the thrall, it drove me up a fucking wall. Infuriated me. Because it was so obvious. I should’ve known.”

What flavor?

It’s all I want to ask.

One distinct flavor. What is it?

Lust?

I shut my eyes.

Emphasizing my embarrassment, he sucks in a breath. His voice turns rough. “Relax. You’ve made it abundantly clear you don’t want me.”

Meaning he’ll ignore the flavor of my desire? Guilt surges through me, threatening to drown me. So much guilt that I fear I’ll never resurface. Theia, Evan, Sin and his curse.

In front of us the skyline blinks to life, security lights shutting off, the sunrise winding down. I wet my lips nervously. “I kissed you,” I confess, unable to add to the mountain of wrongdoing on my shoulders. “The thrall influences me, but it doesn’t compel me to do anything I don’t desire.” I draw in a deep breath before continuing, “But I still regret it.”

A long pause. “My honest heartbreaking Fury.”

Hades, I’d forgotten that lie.

Guilt pierces anew as I face him. “About that …”

A small blue Vinca rests in his outstretched palm, petals tipped to delicate points, their color sapphire blue, a shade off from his eyes.

I stare at the flower, throat suddenly dry as sand, feeling as if I exist on a precipice, not the hill beneath me, but an abyss from which there is no return once entered.

“Beauty for beauty.”

The words wreck me, at once making me want to pull him near and shove him away. I gulp down the tension in my throat and pluck the flower from his hold. Arch my brow at him and quip, “That’s it. One measly flower you picked too early? I thought you were the ultimate ladies’ man. What do the others do? Drag in mouse carcasses?”

“Flowers are universally romantic, darling.”

I twirl the thin stem between my fingers. “Persephone suffocates us with flowers. And once she’s gone, nothing is left except for wilted petals and dry husks. The camps reek of rot.”

His laugh is rolling and seductive. “The Goddess of Spring is not known for her vengeance.”

“Vengeance?”

“Hades stole her,” he explains with a shrug.

A blast of anger rips up my spine. “She wasn’t going to give him a chance without that, was she?” I snap. “He’s the Dark King, the Black God, the Dealer of Death. That’s what they call him. What other choice did he have but to take matters into his own hands? Once Persephone got the chance to know and understand him, she loved him. He was forgiven.”

Sin begins to speak, but I’m charging forward, anger lighting my words. “Persephone loves Hades. The Underworld is her home. He could’ve appointed her as his consort, but he crowned her as his queen. She’d never return to Olympus if Zeus didn’t demand it.” I shove the Vinca back at him. “In the Underworld, flowers just remind you of how love can be stolen from you.”

Sin crushes the bloom and tosses it to its death over the hill. “Alright,” he says. “No flowers. What would you recommend instead?” He waits, as if I have him on a string. As if knowing what I want is important.

“Diamonds.” The word comes out rough, scratchy. “I like diamonds.”

“Then diamonds you shall have.” A thrill skates through me at his unhesitating response. “I assume blood diamonds are preferred.”

“You’re horrible.”

I’m smiling.

He is too.

“Diamonds,” he repeats softly, raking a warm gaze over me. “They suit you.”

“Hades is the God of Riches,” I explain, needing his attention on anything but me. “All that lies beneath us is his. Everything that exists in the earth. We may not have stars in the Underworld, but it glitters with jewels. Sapphires, rubies, and diamonds.” I glance at him. “Your skin reminds me of the color of our soil, a dark shimmering gold.” I reach out to brush my fingers along his cheek. “You remind me of home. Maybe that’s why I haven’t killed you yet.”

“I’ll buff and polish for you.”

“Diamonds don’t break,” I continue, leaning between us, burrowing my fingers into the tilled soil. “But they’re challenging to uncover.”

Focusing, I call upon my roots. Something solid scrapes against my palm. I snatch it and lift it between us, blow off the dust. Frown.

I hold up the dirty ruby. “Hades is mad at me,” I explain as the storm above intensifies, the breeze becoming thick with moisture. “He wants me to go home.”

“So he’s withholding.”

“You’ll use any excuse to hate him, won’t you?”

“He’s a power-hungry, controlling God whose word is law. He’s just like the rest of the Gods, except he’s worse because he forces you to fight, he—”

“He loves us.” Renewed anger bubbles within me. “He’s the only one who can. He understands us. He loves fiercely—”

“And here I thought Eros was God of Love.”

“Eros didn’t defend us when we were persecuted. The Gods made us this way. Creatures fueled by hate and driven to kill. And then they punished us for it. Hades is the only one who sincerely protects us.”

“What could you need protection from, Nat? You’re a godsdamned Fury. A thing of nightmares.”

Shame crashes over me, hot and devastating.

He’s always thought this way, from the moment we met. He’s considered Erinyes beasts, no more than Echidna’s children. Monsters to be put down.

A stab of loneliness spears me. “You could never fathom being unwanted.”

“I know what love is,” Sin replies firmly. “And if Hades really loved you, he wouldn’t force you to stand alone. He would help find Theia. He’s the king of a realm. He can find one creature.”

There it is again. A creature of hate couldn’t possibly understand love. It stings, more than I’m ready to acknowledge. “He can’t help me.”

“He won’t.”

He’s so sure, so ignorantly stubborn, I snap, “I haven’t told him!”

Sin freezes “What? Why not?”

I don’t say anything. Too embarrassed, too enraged, too much. Teeth clamped together, tears sting my eyes. I feel lonelier than I have in a lifetime. There’s no place I’ll ever belong. I’m not tempered enough for the mortals, not pretty like the Gods, not good enough to fit with the Furies.

Sensing my sour mood, Sin sighs, sweeps an arm out behind us, clearing aside twigs and wet leaves, then his hand is on my shoulder, tugging me back.

I lean forward to be contrary, but he just yanks harder, pulling under I’m laying back in the dirt.

He sprawls right beside me, knuckles brushing mine, shoulder’s kissing, his clove scent enveloping me. Long lashes aimed at the clouds, he cups his hands and shouts, “A little help here!”

It’s not immediate.

Or much.

But ever so slightly, rain patters down on us, light spring drops, cool and mild.

Showoff .

“Look at me, Nat.”

I do. Rubbing dirt and grass and rocks in my hair, I twist.

He’s so beautiful it hurts.

“Pretend we’re in the shower.” A murmur.

My throat tightens. “You summoned a God’s favor for this?”

“For you,” he corrects, as if that’s reason enough. “Why haven’t you told Hades? If you love him, if he accepts you, then …”

My ribcage is instantly, devastatingly tight.

What is this male doing to me?

“We’re in the shower, Nat. No one can hear or see us here.”

I nod, rain licking my cheeks, throat stuffed with cotton. “Theia was abducted because of me.” It had been the equinox, when the mortal realm grows close to the Underworld, and I’d been fraying from the strain of the thrall. “I was afraid I’d hurt her. I shouted at her, told her to give me peace, and made her leave. I even watched her out the window, like some predator stalking its meal. Those males jumped her. I ran, but …”

Sin’s fingers interlace with mine in the dampening grass.

The simple touch sends a shiver through me, both comforting and electrifying.

He squeezes delicately as if to say, I’m here, you’re not alone .

A sob cracks in the back of my throat.

“It’s not your fault, Nat,” he says softly, voice a soothing balm to my battered soul. “You were trying to protect her. You can’t blame yourself for the actions of those males.”

I want to believe him, and let his words absolve me of the guilt that gnaws at my insides. But it’s not that simple. It never is. “I should have been there. I should have saved her.”

Like a real Fury.

The words lie between us as the heat of Sin’s body spreads into mine, chasing away the chill that has settled deep in my bones.

His other hand lifts to stroke a lock of hair from my face, tucking it tenderly behind my ear. “You’re not omniscient, Nat. Even with all your power, you can’t be everywhere at once. You can’t save everyone.”

He’s right, but I don’t like it. “She’s my best friend. My sister in all but blood. I can’t lose her. I won’t survive it.”

“You won’t lose her,” he says with fierce conviction, amethyst eyes oddly hard. “We’ll find her.”

That’s it. The last straw holding me together snaps. My eyes burn from holding back tears. I’m two seconds from a breakdown.

Until Sin’s grin stretches into a broad smile. “So you wanted to kiss me, huh?”

Like an air release on a vacuum, the taunt unsticks me. An image filters into my head, of rolling to my side, tucking into Sin’s strong body, and burying my face in his neck. I could throw my leg over his hips, rake my hands through his wet hair and inhale him. Soak in the beat of his heart, his laugh.

It’s not possible though. Not who I am.

So instead I reach over my head, grab a handful of mud and slop it onto his too pretty head.