twenty-two

Poppy

She hadn't known how much she needed to be kissed by Hades again until it was happening.

She did not know much about kisses—nothing really—but she knew that he was kissing her like a drowning man clinging to a bubble of air. Like a man starved. She knew about starving, after all.

And she knew about hunger.

She tasted the hunger on his lips, the blood, the pain, the desperation.

His whole body was shaking, and she pressed herself up close against him, wanting to comfort him, wanting to comfort herself by his warmth and proximity. But for him, it seemed to have the opposite effect. As soon as she moved, his tall form bent and swayed over her, and she was afraid that he would faint and fall. But he didn't.

He moaned brokenly and pulled her hands behind her back, joining them at the wrists with one, large hand, and with the other he cupped her neck and turned her face so that his mouth would fit better over hers. His heart was beating in a frenzy; she could feel it underneath his shirt, fluttering against her own. He tasted like blood. Sweet and salty at once.

"Wait," she dropped her mouth from his and he stumbled and almost fell.

"What is it? Am I hurting you?" The panic was a low rumble in his voice, but she heard it and it cut her to the core.

"No, you are doing the exact opposite," she said. "But I wanted to do this." She brought her hands to the front, surprised when he resisted, held her back.

She had to twist them to get out of his grip, and her bad arm started to hurt, but at that moment he quickly realized how strongly he was holding her and let go. She cupped his cheek and he winced, turning his face away from her light touch.

"I'd rather hold your hands back," he said tensely, his Adam's apple bobbing. "I don't want to be distracted by…unwanted thoughts, if you are touching me. Is that not to your liking?"

"I don't mind, if my touching you hurts you," Poppy replied. "But sometimes I feel that…Sometimes it hurts me not to touch you."

He looked down at her—he was a good head and a half taller. His eyes were haunted by that tortured look and she knew that he was lost inside his own head, somewhere far away, in the past, where she couldn't reach him and help him. But then a sudden smile brightened his face, teeth flashing white.

"You insist then," he murmured. His hands were still at his sides, she noticed. Not attempting to grab her wrists again.

"I do." I think. No, I do.

"What happened to the little poppy seed I rescued from the Thames?" He was still smiling, his lips stretched and pink, dried blood on his chin. His eyes looked bluer than the sky, light shining in them. "What happened to that obedient girl who did not dare raise her voice to argue with me, much less do anything else?"

"You," Poppy replied and it barely took any courage at all to say it. It was the truth. And nothing was so frightening, after all, about stating the truth. "You happened to her. You taught her how to fight. Now teach yourself."

His eyes drifted shut, and his head fell back, chin jutting out at a sharp angle, as his arm came around her shoulders in a vise grip, crushing her against his chest.

Something like a sob rose in his chest.

"Do with me as you like," he breathed in an almost inaudible voice. "Have mercy."

Then his mouth came down on hers again, this time more softly, teasing her, begging her lips to open more and let him in. Slowly her hands came up to the nape of his neck and she tangled her fingers through his long hair. He inhaled sharply against her lips, but it was not a painful breath. She might even go as far as to say it was one of pleasure.

"Persephone." Her name was a moan on his lips, a prayer. "God help me, I should stop."

"Don't you dare."

He chuckled against her lips, then lowered his face to better fit his lips on hers.

"You called me beautiful once," he said in a moment, panting against her mouth. "Did you really, or did I imagine it?"

"I did. You are."

He looked down at her, his face an open book. His eyes, God, his eyes. They were open for once, really open, letting her see everything in them.

"My soul is black," he said.

"It is not," Poppy replied quickly. "You are just overly dramatic, that's all."

He laughed and looked down, as if he were embarrassed.

"I also seem to remember you saying you didn't care enough to hate me. What about not caring enough to hate me now? Did you care today, Wyatt? Did you care enough to stop me? Did you care enough to be so bloody stupid?"

"I did," Poppy replied. "And I may be stupid, but I was not the one being beaten to a pulp by the men in my own employ."

His eyes darkened. "See that you don't start caring." His voice was low and seductive, like the most decadent bite of cake. His lips were brushing hers as he spoke, teasing them open. Ready for more.

"Oh, I already have," she replied absent-mindedly, her brain otherwise occupied. Her knees were in the process of being turned into water, and she did not know how she would manage to stay upright. She was melting.

"What?" The sudden harshness in Hades' voice startled her. "No. No. Tell me you're not serious, Wyatt."

He stepped slightly away and cold rushed in between their bodies. She ached with his absence.

She lifted her lips to his, but she was met with a cold, impenetrable wall. The warm, laughing man she had been holding and kissing a moment ago was completely gone, and in his place was the prince of the Underworld, cold and dark. Closed up and forbidding. Pushing her away.

"This cannot happen," he murmured to himself, viciously biting his lip.

"What are you—? Hades, look at me."

But he refused to, his eyes firmly on the ground. They had turned gray again. Dark, colorless. What had happened?

What did I do?

"Look, I—" He put her away from him, his hands pushing her to the side, his expression cold as ice. "This was a mistake, Wyatt, forgive me. Or don't; I don't much care. You did know I was Hades all along, didn't you? What else did you expect from me? If you expect me to care, then you are more deluded than I thought. Now, look here, I have to go, there is business awaiting. Besides, I have to take care of this mess." He looked down at his bloody, half-buttoned shirt. He fumbled for words. "I'll…Yes, I'll go now."

And once more, he couldn't make his escape quickly enough. He left her there, in his boxing rooms, shaking with emotion and rejection. With need.

Look at that, Poppy thought. Maybe I do have a talent, after all. Driving him away.

She turned around, unable to watch his retreating back, unable to bear the sight of his long legs taking him away from the room.

I will not cry. Not for him.

I will not cry.

But she had cried for her brother, and for herself, and Hades was worth at least the same, even if he did not know it. She cried even harder than she had last night, because she cried both for herself and him.

What if there was a God for people like us? she had once thought, what seemed like eons ago. But what if there wasn't? What if they were too broken, too destroyed, too ruined to ever be mended?

‘People like us' indeed. As if there was anyone else on the whole of the earth quite as shattered as herself. Or Hades.

Alexei

He limped back to his rooms like a bloody coward. Every single bone in his body hurt, but nothing could compare with the searing pain inside his chest.

He did not know how to deal with the hurt, but he knew he deserved to be in pain. As much pain as she was in, and more. But he couldn't do the one thing that could comfort him, the only thing he knew how to do: he couldn't go back to the boxing ring. For one thing, his body wouldn't be able to endure another beating so soon after the first one. And for another, it was pathetic.

The prince of the Hell Club could not stop giving himself a bloody nose.

How unoriginal.

How pathetic.

He let his valet undress him and clean him up, his mind numb. At some point he must have given the order to a servant to send for Valentine, because when he got out of his bath, a few hours later, he got word that his friend was here, waiting for him. Alexei cursed under his breath.

How had Persephone Wyatt done this to him?

He had blindly obeyed her advice, almost despite himself.

Valentine had enough troubles of his own; he did not need the additional burden of Alexei's foolish antics. Before he could turn around and give the order to have him thrown out of the club, Valentine walked into his rooms, his eyes sparkling, his hair all sunshine and yellow curls, his gait decidedly…happy.

It was disgusting to behold.

Alexei's heart ached with joy for his friend.

"Now, what have you been doing to yourself, Your Highness?" Valentine asked severely, in lieu of a greeting.

With a sigh, Alexei abandoned himself to his fate.

They spent the rest of the day together alternatively talking and just sitting in silence. Alexei told him everything: about the prince hidden in the basement, about the assassination attempt, the death threats, the lot. The pugilism Valentine already knew about. Alexei did not say a word about Poppy.

He did not know how to begin.

"I am here for you, always," Valentine told him after he had listened. Alexei was leaning back, exhausted, after emptying himself. But it was the good kind of emptying. "We are all of us here for you. You were here for me and Peter and we are here for you. You will never be alone. Never. Do you understand?"

Then he proceeded to solve all his problems, one by one.

"I have a ship for your Greek prince," Valentine told him, after he had finished giving him a good talking-to for not telling him of his troubles sooner, "and I can have it brought round in a few hours. If you can find a boat or a barge to get him out from the underground tunnels of the Underworld, I can arrange for a smaller boat to take him to the Channel on the river, and from there he'll cross to Paris. Then Vienna, or some private island on the Mediterranean; whatever he prefers."

"Are you in jest?" Alexei couldn't believe his ears. Could it be this simple? This easy?

"I have gotten my hands on a yacht," Valentine shrugged, as if it was the simplest thing in the world. "I am a disgrace as a pirate; I did not even have to steal it. A gentleman gifted it to me, after I assisted him with some difficulties."

"I bet you did," Alexei murmured.

Maybe Poppy is right, and I do have a penchant for rescuing others, but I am not alone. Both Peter and Valentine are the same. Maybe because we so desperately needed someone to rescue us once upon a time. We needed to be saved and no one ever came. Maybe we decided to become the rescuers ourselves.

"So, what say you?" Valentine asked. "Shall I set the plan in motion at once?"

"I say," Alexei had to swallow past a lump in his throat, "that you are saving me."

And then, out of the blue, the floodgates opened, and he started crying, huge, gulping sobs of pain, sorrow and relief, all the tears he should have cried when he was a child, but couldn't. He felt Valentine move and then a hand on his shoulder. He shook it off, and brought a fist to his mouth, gulping down nausea.

Valentine swore.

"I forgot, sorry," he said. "I just wanted to show you that I'm here. I'm here, Mikailoff, I have you."

"I know," Alexei gasped, tears pouring down his face unashamedly.

"Shall I go?" Valentine asked softly, after a few more minutes of weeping. "D' you want me to leave?"

"Stay," Alexei said.

So Valentine stayed. And Alexei cried.