Summer Queen

by Amelia Wilde

  The car pulls away from the curb. My body tenses, getting ready to throw myself at the window, but of course I don’t. I’m frozen here in my seat with a man Hades never warned me about. Why would he? He had no reason to think I’d ever be here. I had no reason to think I’d ever be here. We both thought I’d be trapped in the mountain.

  He’s frowning at me, that man. Studying me. It’s the kind of expression that hides more than it shows. The kind of handsome I know instinctively not to trust.

  “I’m sure your mother won’t be happy to hear that you spent so much time discussing...things with Hades.” The pause tells me he knows exactly what kind of discussions we had. “I suppose it was too much to expect restraint from him.”

  “What does it matter to you?”

  It takes forever to look him in the eye, and another forever for him to smile again. Handsome. Relaxed. If I didn’t know better I’d think he could be kind. A low laugh, easy and warm. It’s nothing like the bitter shards of Hades’ laugh. If I’d met a man like this first, I don’t know what would have happened. Terms like better or worse don’t seem to apply.

  “It’s not nice to give damaged gifts. Exactly as I said before. And I have a suspicion that if I examined you, I’d find one small part of you missing. Your hymen.”

  A lurch, a fall. The floor of the car isn’t steady any longer. It’s tipping in front of me, rocking back and forth. An unsteady ship. No part of me longs to go back to my mother’s fields. Maybe I did when we were speeding past in the train, but now? Now?

  The blood drains from my face.

  The thing about running away from my mother is that I knew I could never go back. Never. She might have warned me about Hades, she might have warned me about bad men in the city, but if he takes me back to her?

  She’s the danger.

  I can’t think about what will happen. The locked doors. The months of silence. The hard glances and harder slaps—I can’t. If he takes me back to her, I won’t survive.

  A memory comes back strong enough to draw blood. A back room in the city, a woman with cards. A tower falling. Do you know this person? Magda’s hand on my shoulder. I’m not going to kill my mother. That’s crazy. I would never do that.

  My world has already been destroyed and remade. The cards told the truth.

  I’m the thing that set all of it in motion, just like that woman in gray said. I’m the little fool. Is my mother the dangerous one, or am I? A sudden ache at the back of my throat and the center of my heart makes me sit up straight, trying to relieve it. If she had only been able to love me, really love me and not possess me the way she did, none of this would have happened. The cards never would have fallen that way.

  “Don’t take me back to my mother.” A broken whisper. I no longer care what it sounds like. “I don’t know who you are, but I know you can’t possibly be that evil.”

  He offers his hand with a flourish that makes my heart skip. I take it because what other choice do I have? “How rude of me to totally neglect our introductions when we’ll be working together so closely.” His other hand taps lightly against his chest. “Everyone calls me Zeus. Even my sister, though she usually prefers names for me that have a bit more bite. I’m sure she’ll tell you all about me, now that you’ve been enlightened.”

  He drops my hand. His sister. His brother. I’m speechless. Betrayed. She never told me. She spent all those years forcing me to look at that mountain and whispering horror stories in my ear, but she never once let the truth slip. I’m more like her than I realized.

  Zeus drops my hand. “Perk up, Persephone. We’re here.”

  4

  Persephone

  Zeus’s property—I’m assuming it’s his—could not be more different than Hades’ mountain lair. Hades’ home and his mines and all of his other secrets are in a place blasted from black rock shot through with gold. It’s night incarnate. And even though the sky is pitch dark, this building shines. It glows. Enormous windows take up most of the first floor. Frosted glass allows light out, but doesn’t let me see in. My heart beats wildly. Zeus’s smile hides secrets. I’m sure of that. His building must hide even more.

  But he’s proud of its facade. Miles and miles of white marble, soaring into the sky. If Hades lives in a fortress, Zeus lives in a castle. A castle transformed into an elegant city building and planted on the corner of a block. It could take up the entire block—I have no idea. I wouldn’t be surprised.

  Zeus reaches back into the car, hand extended, a true gentleman. My legs shake, weak, which forces me to lean on his hand. We walk together between two planters of flowers. The blooms are a riot of color in the golden light of the streetlamp and I have a sudden twist of homesickness. The last time I saw this many flowers it was because I was in my mother’s fields.

  I miss the fields. I don’t miss my mother. Unless Zeus is lying—and I don’t think he is—then I’m not sure I know her at all.

  Two men wait in sharp uniforms in front of a pair of huge double doors. The doors are a solid white, like the rest of the building. The men step forward and open them for us in a smooth, choreographed motion.

  And inside...

  It’s a party.

  That’s what it has to be. Music spills out onto the sidewalk, music and warmth and the low hum of people chatting. A woman laughs, the sound contagious, and my mouth twitches reflexively. Suits and gowns are briefly visible in the open doorway, bathed in more warm light. A man at the other end of the room leans over a woman on an antique sofa, pressing kisses to the hollow of her neck. She tips her head back to give him better access and I think of inching my thighs apart for Hades in the black of the bedroom he gave to me. How did this get so out of control? How did I never see all the ties between the people I knew? They were there, all along, and I was oblivious.

  Zeus repositions his arm and my hand, and now he’s escorting me in. Hot shame trickles down my back. I look completely foolish. The women in here are in short gowns with plunging necklines, fabric that shines in the light, and I’m wearing what is essentially a bathrobe with buttons. I’m barely dressed.

  A four-piece band plays in the corner of the room. A woman with a violin is the centerpiece and the music threads itself through my heart. It’s nothing like the pop music we used to listen to when I got to go to school, and nothing like the folk songs my mother insisted were the only things worth listening to. Sensual. That’s what it is. It’s sensual and upbeat, and the violinist seems lost in it.

  “Zeus, you’re missing the party.” A woman with bright red lipstick approaches and extends her hand. Zeus bends over it and kisses her knuckles. What is he doing? Is this really a thing people do? Maybe if you’re as gorgeous as this woman is, with her dark hair in a shining wave and her dress showing off every curve of her body. Her bright eyes turn on me and I’m swept away in another flush of embarrassment. Her hand drops down to my face and she traces underneath my chin. “Did you bring us a new plaything?”

  Zeus laughs easily, but his arm tightens to his side, taking me along with it. “Not a plaything. A guest. So you have to be nice to her.”

  “Oooh. But can’t we play with her while she’s a guest?”

  He gently removes her hand from my face. “No.”

  “Why not?” She pouts, her cherry lipstick perfect. I haven’t seen anything that bright since the poppies in my mother’s fields and the splash of red fabric in the closet Hades made for me. “They enjoy fresh meat. If I’m honest, so do I.”

  Zeus catches her wrist in his hand and brushes his lips against the fine bone there. “Shouldn’t you be playing elsewhere? You have a lot of admirers here tonight.”

  “They tip better if they’re jealous.” She winks at Zeus and turns away, hips swaying with every step. The back of her dress plunges so low it takes my breath away. One wrong move and she’d be completely exposed. Maybe that’s the point of it. I follow her path through the couples leaning breathlessly into each other and waiters with trays balanced carefull
y on their hands, the single women in tight black dresses and bright jewel tones, men on the prowl...

  “What is this place?”

  Zeus glances down at me. “My business, little Persephone.”

  “Your business is parties?”

  A smile quirks the corner of his mouth. “You could think of it that way.”

  I don’t want to think of it that way—I want to know what it is. The evidence is right here in front of me, but my brain can’t connect the dots. Frustration rises, hot and choking. I’d give anything for the cool of Hades’ mountain.

  But Zeus leads me farther into the warmth of the room. I feel his attention shift away, though he keeps me close. He’s scanning the entire place. I steal enough sidelong glances at him to learn that the charming smile never drops. People see it, and react to it, like they’re bathing in sunlight itself. It’s different for men and women. We pass the four-piece band and go into another, larger room.

  “The lounge is only the beginning of the party,” Zeus says. “It continues throughout the building. Into the back. Into the bedrooms.”

  This room has a series of low tables tucked into alcoves, each one with its own overstuffed booth. Light glitters at the edges of shadows. The couples here are eating, drinking, talking close in the booths. Did you bring us a new plaything? What did she mean? A new wave of fear tightens around my ribs and squeezes, making it hard to breathe. Zeus brings people here to become playthings. It must be common enough for that woman to assume it. He could drop me at any one of these tables, any one of these couches, and then what? Would the men without a woman circle around me?

  What is Zeus’ business?

  “It’s not really a party.” I chance saying it because impending doom is creeping in with every step we take. There is an end to this stroll we’re on. There has to be.

  “Of course it is. Don’t you see all these people enjoying themselves?”

  A couple cuts in front of us then, the man growling, the woman laughing. He has his hands tight around her waist, so tight that her dress is hiking up. It could be above her thighs soon. Nobody seems to notice or care that he’s practically stripping her down. Nobody, aside from Decker, seemed to care when Hades pinned me to him and finger-fucked me in front of all of his workers.

  “I’m not supposed to be watching this.”

  Zeus stops and takes my face gently in his hand, turning it up so that I have to look into his eyes. He’s got dark eyes, shot through with caramel streaks that look like they could be pure gold.

  “No. You need to see this. You need to understand. It’s true, Persephone. You’re here as a gift to your mother. But you’re also here as a gift to you.”

  Tears spring up in the corners of my eyes. This is not a gift, no matter how convincing he sounds when he says it. I don’t let the tears fall. I won’t.

  “There’s nothing here that I want.”

  He bends down then and turns my face away. Zeus has a soft touch. I don’t see how he and Hades could be brothers. I don’t see how my mother could be his sister.

  “Look.” I close my eyes. “No. Look.” His grip tightens, and there it is—that familial resemblance. My heart skips. A soft touch doesn’t mean he’s less dangerous. A soft touch could mean he’s far worse. A man with gentle hands in public doesn’t have to be the same behind closed doors.

  I don’t want to risk what might happen behind closed doors, so I look.

  “There. See? Nothing so bad as all that.” Zeus guides my head so that my eyes have a moment to linger on every booth, every sofa, every chair. All of them are occupied by a man with a woman, or a man with two women. Their hands glide along each other’s bodies. The women laugh, low and lovely. “You were right on one count.”

  He smells good—fresh and clean, like someone you’d want to be close to. It’s distracting in a number of horrible ways. I tamp down the instinct to ask him how I was right. I keep my lips pressed firmly together.

  “It’s not a party,” Zeus admits. “It’s supposed to be like one for the clients. I don’t like an atmosphere of secrecy. My clients shouldn’t get the impression that their pleasure is a dirty thing. The federal government says it is, but whoever listens to them?” He laughs, and the sound blends in with the music and the chatter. There are other sounds, too—the background music for all the rest. A breath, catching. A soft, needy moan, almost a whine. The word please.

  Who is making the money here?

  Zeus. All of it flows to him. That’s what it means to own something. But he can’t be the only one providing services here, because he has his hand on my jaw and nobody would pay to see that. Nobody would pay just to see that. I’m certain of it. And it can’t only be that the servers are making money, because a dinner club would be...for dinner. It wouldn’t involve so much whispering and stroking and....

  “Ah,” Zeus says. “You understand now.”

  “The—the clients are the men?”

  He moves my head a quarter-turn. “Not all of them.”

  In the last booth on the right, a woman in a flowing black jumpsuit, her hair pulled back away from her face in an indestructible chignon, leans in to the lady with the cherry lipstick. The jumpsuited woman strokes a hand through the other’s dark hair. The intensity in their faces doesn’t feel like a purchase. But that’s what it must be. Red lips purse and pout and then, with a turn of her head, she suggests going somewhere else. The two of them stand up and move quickly toward a hallway at the back of the room.

  “You sell women to your clients?”

  Zeus puts a finger on my lips. “Oh, no, Persephone. They sell themselves.”

  5

  Persephone

  Zeus takes me to the very back of the hallway and produces a card from his pocket. He slips it into a slot on the wall and the silvery panel there opens with a whisper. A private elevator.

  Why would I need to see a place where women were bought and sold? What could that possibly teach me that I don’t already know? I’ve already given myself away, more than once. I can’t bring myself to think about the alternative too deeply.

  The alternative is that he wants me to understand his parties, and his business, so he can sell me himself. It’s sickening to think about. All those strange men, with their strange hands...

  Hades was a strange man, a small voice whispers. He has strange, rough hands, and the things he did to you are worse than anything happening in that lounge...

  The things he did were worse. And I begged for them. Don’t go too far down that road, Persephone. It’ll only end in heartbreak.

  We ride the elevator up, up, up and it lets us out into a wide hallway with plush carpet, all of it bathed in bright lights. Hades would hate it. Tables line the edges of the hall, each with a big bouquet of flowers. It must be meant to look like a hotel—a high-end place. But it’s not. I remind myself again and again. That’s not what this is. It’s not what it seems to be.

  He stops at the second-to-last door on the left and opens it.

  “For you.” Zeus gestures me in.

  As far as prisons go, it’s lovely. A big bed with plush white sheets. A lamp glowing on the bedside table. Through one open door, there’s a bathroom with an oversized tub. A chair by the wide window. A view of the city.

  A view of the mountain.

  It’s far off in the distance, but even from here, it seems to take up the whole horizon. The sight of it pierces my heart. Why? Why? I don’t want to go back there. I want to go to New York City. That’s where I want to go. But I can’t make this latest development turn into another step in my plan. The plan has been shot to hell and left for dead.

  “I have to get back.” Now Zeus is all business. “There are clothes for you in the closet. You’ll be comfortable here.”

  I won’t.

  He turns to go.

  “When are you sending me back?”

  Zeus winks, becoming the charmer all over again. “We’ll see.”

  He closes the door behind him and
I can’t help myself. I run for it, keeping my feet light and silent on the carpet. My hand meets the cool metal of the handle, a flare of hope—

  It’s locked.

  He’s locked me in.

  You’ll be comfortable here.

  I’m going out of my mind, out of my soul. I don’t know whether my mother was right or wrong. Whether it’s my fault or hers, or Hades or Zeus. I don’t know why nobody will tell me what’s going to happen, and I hate it, I hate it, but I’d rather be in that mountain than here.

  I want these clothes off of me.

  Why do I want him? Why do I want that mean, broken man in the mountain more than I want to be here, or home? What kind of person does that make me? And will it matter if Zeus sells me off anyway? He said I wasn’t a plaything. That might be because I’m an asset.

  One of the buttons pops off the robe and I tear at my nightgown, kicking off the shoes. Get off, get off. Lillian put those clothes on me knowing that she was sending me here. She knew what she was doing. Where is she now? She could be dead. She could be downstairs, one of Zeus’s women. It doesn’t matter.

  I fill up the enormous bathtub and climb in while the water’s still hot. The burn is a pleasant torture and I let it touch every inch of me, every wanting inch of me. Because even locked up with Zeus’s prostitutes, even without a hope in the world, one awful thing is still true.

  I want his cruel, heartbreaking brother.

  6

  Persephone

  I fall asleep late, wet hair splayed on the pillow, to the sounds of people fucking on either side of me. Their moans and cries sink into my dreams. My dreams become the soul-searing night that Hades ruined me. I want it and I hate it and I need it, and I wake up the next morning with aching thighs from pressing them together in my sleep.