“True, we see keystones and Pure Souls come and go. Your good versus evil, battling on behalf of all mortal souls doesn’t have much to do with us anymore. But a female Pure Soul who sees my nephew daily and isn’t hanging off Dionysus’s arm, but instead, chooses another to wed! Plus, my wife has threatened to neuter anyone who tries to seduce you, male or female...” His eyes felt heavy on her, almost as though his gaze could touch her physically. “I understand you entertain both sides of that equation. Or did, before you were married.”
“I did,” she said, lending a bit of defiance to her voice. Just because she fell for a man didn’t mean she disassociated pride from her past. “But I belong to Jerry now.”
“So you do.” He pursed his lips before turning away. “Yes, I’m positive it’s those things, and not you being part angel, that has everyone dripping with intrigue.”
Hades may have been devious and looking at her like he wanted to eat her, but he surely wasn’t stupid. “You know.”
“I’ve spent a lot more time with angels than most of my kind. Those who usurped my throne and seized the Underworld, for example. Since only archangels, fallen or otherwise, can manifest flesh and reproduce with humans, I imagine your parentage lies with that wretched lot.”
A tinge of bitterness snuck into his tone. Riona wasn’t certain exactly how many thousands of years had passed since that time, but the freshness of the hurt was still apparent in his jilted tongue and it took her aback. She wasn’t sure if she should offer sympathy, or quietly excuse herself.
“Will you tell the others?”
“You think I want to drive all Olympus to hysterics? Zeus would have to slay you. I’d place a hopeful wager that if my wife would de-sex anyone who would sex you up, she’d be equally peeved if anything I did led to your untimely execution. And where would that leave me? Besides, you might take a few of us out in the process.”
“I don’t have my blade with me.” Riona clenched her empty fingers as though she could wrap them around the hilt of her father’s weapon.
God, her father’s weapon. She really hoped it was still safe in Boston.
Hades nodded. “No matter. An angel can also be a conduit for Big Boss’s will, and nothing in any realm can withstand that. We learned that the hard way. Luckily, here, we have one thing that at least can keep an angel at bay.”
“Steph told me; Zeus’ lightning.”
Hades lifted an eyebrow. “So my wife knows your secret as well? Or was she just briefing you on the checks and balances written into the Accords?”
She bit the inside of her cheek, tasting blood. She really had to improve her whole talking discreetly thing.
“Okay, you know my dirty, little secret,” Riona said, moving on. “I’ll try to keep things under cover, but that’s easier said than done. It’s like I’ve grown a third leg.”
The corner of Hades’s mouth twitched. “I can sympathize.”
His innuendo was developing an odor. Riona pressed on. “What I mean is, it’s like I’m having to learn how to walk all over again. Sometimes, I’m totally immobilized, and sometimes I sprint without realizing I’ve taken a step.”
Her eyes focused on the deftness of his hands as he rolled a scroll against his palm. “Do you have a plan for how to do that, keystone?”
Keystone. Marc’s snide smile danced behind her eyelids. “Please don’t call me that.” She blinked away the bittersweet nostalgia. “And no, I have no idea. I was hoping Ramiel might come to check on me. I’ve invoked him a couple times, but I guess now I know why he’s not showing up. Sounds like your policy on angel visits might mean it’s not a very good idea for him to come here.”
“There are other reasons his presence is unwise.” His fingers turned red as he threaded them and squeezed. “But I agree. Without the capacity to discipline your abilities, it’s only a matter of time before you would do the wrong things in front of the wrong people. If you need a tutor, I may have a solution.”
“What?”
Hades shrugged, gathering up his scrolls and standing. “Let’s just say, I know a guy.”
Riona barked out a laugh. “Is that a nephilim thing? Dee says he ‘knows a guy’ every time I have a problem.’”
“That does sound like my nephew.”
“I thought he was your brother-in-law.”
Hades made a hasty nod. “He’s that too, but I tend to think of him as a nephew first. Because when the day comes that Persephone...”
His voice trailed off.
“In any event,” he suddenly continued, taking on his former formal timbre, “when you’ve been roaming around the mortal realm as long as he has, opportunities to network are plentiful. It’s part of our culture, to make ourselves strong by allying with as many as possible. Dee, as you refer to him, was raised here. Hence, it does not surprise me to hear you say that he carries on that tradition.”
“Wait, Dee grew up on Olympus?”
Hades gave her an amused chuckle. “Hmm, how curious that you heard it from me first. Might make you suspect he’s ashamed of it, might it not?”
This time, she let the question hang in the air. Who was she to speak on Dee’s behalf?
“In any case,” Hades resumed, “if you’d like help, meet me in the courtyard after the house falls into slumber tonight. I’ll make sure,” he winked, spiking her heart rate, “that you get what you need. Now, I have a meeting. Please, enjoy the library as long as you wish.”
Riona crossed to one of the bookshelves and ran her fingers over the bindings of what looked like ancient texts. The lettering seemed peculiar to her eyes, but as she squinted, she started to make out the hand-inscribed words. “Thanks, I think I will.”
AFTER SPENDING THE morning catching up with the friends that hadn’t taken the final plunge into the abyss, Persephone headed home to orientate her semi-human houseguest on the details of dining with her family. She wasn’t so much worried about communicating the do’s as the more important, don’ts. One: don’t bring up anything to do with the angels, Ramiel in particular. Two: do not, under any circumstances, leave with anyone without checking with her first. Third, go easy on the wine.
Unfortunately, the goddess couldn’t find the witch lingering anywhere around the estate. Even the maid who serviced the guest suite said Riona didn’t come out from her room all day as far as she knew. With growing concern, Persephone decided she could risk thirty seconds alone with her husband to make a simple enough inquiry. Asking, “Have you seen my friend” couldn’t possibly give him enough time to do anything that might set her body buzzing. Not that he wouldn’t press for the opportunity, and the bastard was fully aware that the staff were forbidden to enter his library, so privacy was always assured.
Not that an audience had always succeeded in stopping him in the past...
She tried to dismiss the image that filled her mind: Hades kissing her neck, his fingers digging into her ass as he took her, rough and hard, on top of his desk.
Persephone stifled the uptick in her breath as she remembered it didn’t matter how sensational a lover her husband was, she wanted out. Enough was enough of this annual home confinement.
When she opened the door and found a redhead curled up on the leather couch, her mind conjured another image, however. Hades, beheaded, his blood on her hands.
“Please tell me you’re lacking an afterglow.”
Riona barely looked up from the book spread open on Hades’ desk. “This isn’t that good of a book.”
“In Hades’ library?” Persephone looked all about her. “And where is he?”
Riona shrugged before popping another olive from a dish on the chair beside her into her mouth. “He took off a while ago, and said I could stay if I wanted. I picked up one book just to be kind and got hooked. This,” she tilted the antique volume in her hands to flash Persephone a view of the cover, “is a complete history of the Underworld before the Grigori ran it. Did you know Hell wasn’t always a place for punishment? It used to be jus
t a place where all the dead souls went, and only the really wicked ones were ever tortured or burned.”
“I know.” Persephone plopped down on a sofa. “You forget, I lived there. But can I ask how you’re able to read that?”
The witch’s face screwed up. “What do you mean?”
“It’s in Greek, Riona,” the goddess informed her. “And not just any Greek. Old Olympian Greek. I thought you didn’t speak anything but English?”
“I don’t.” Riona closed the book, looking at the cover with curiosity. “And it is in English.”
“No, it’s in Greek. You sure you haven’t studied the classics?”
“Only Coca-Cola Classic. Weird. Must be an angel thing. I’ll have to remember to ask about that.” She put the book on the table and threw her arms back, stretching out her body. “Is it time for dinner yet? I’m starved and nearly out of olives. Hades said we’re going to your dad’s house?”
Persephone nodded. “Yeah, I wanted to talk to you about that. You see...”
“You’re in luck.”
Both women’s heads whipped toward the door, where Hades stood looking like a poster child for seduction. He hadn’t shaved, which was obviously on purpose. The black fountain of rough hair made him look rugged and dangerous. His custom tailored suits would have given any man walking the runway in Milan a run for his money. Whatever she thought of her husband’s personality, she could never complain at all about his looks. She would have lodged a serious grievance with her own body, however, if it kept up this traitorous, lust-driven strike against her common sense and long-term memory.
Riona stood. “I am?”
“You are. Zeus’ kitchen staff are divine, if you’ll forgive the pun.” Suddenly, the coy jollity in Hades’ eyes faded. “Why aren’t you two dressed? It’s nearly time to go. Steph, maybe you can help Riona pick out something appropriate for the occasion?”
“And by that, my lord means he’d much prefer she wear something entirely inappropriate, and wouldn’t mind watching as I personally put her in it with as seductive a manner as possible. Come on, Ree.” Persephone wrapped her hand around Riona’s and tugged her toward the door. She guided her past Hades, shoulder-butting him as she did so. “Let me make sure you get into something guaranteed to drive all the men crazy.”
Chapter 12
Anwen could have hung a fifty-pound dumbbell to counterbalance the weight of Dee’s stare. If he thought she wasn’t noticing it just because her eyes were fixed on the road in front of them, he was two pints short of a kegger.
“I told you, I don’t like to talk about it,” she said from the side of her mouth.
“So you said before,” he replied, turning his body toward the road. “And if you notice, I’m not asking.”
“You’re not saying anything, but you’re staring in confusion at me like I’m a disgraced athlete holding a press conference.”
He cupped his chin and feigned disinterest. “You don’t want to talk about it, we won’t talk about it. Doesn’t make a drop of difference to me.”
The slow boil of space between them, compounded by the thickening agent that was Jerry’s silent treatment-slash-brooding in the back seat, finally made gravy. Anwen let out a sigh and clicked off the radio.
“It’s not flying, technically,” she began. “I can, I don’t know, boost myself? Like if I jump, I might be able to get a good meter or two off the ground. But when I’m falling, I can stop myself. I can hover, but I can’t gain elevation. Makes me feel like I’m Super Mario sometimes.”
“Trust me, if Mario had a figure like yours, I’d have been far more interested in video games.” He cleared his throat, and then attempted to do the same with the awkwardness between them. “Sorry, it’s a bad habit of mine.”
“Making compliments?” she asked.
He jerked a shoulder. “Making inroads. You’re only a quartergod, so maybe you don’t have the level of drive that I do, but the nephilim are very sensual beings by nature. Have to admit, and I’m not proud of this, I’m sort of hard-wired to seduce.”
“Seduce implies some sort of manipulation, Dee,” she said. “You’re very kind, and with that body you have... let’s just say, I don’t think you have to try too hard to win any woman.”
The moment she said it, she knew that would include her, if she didn’t keep her wits about her.
He sat up a little straighter and, (thank St. Thomas), returned to the former subject. “Have you always been able to do your Mario thing?”
Anwen shook her head. “First time was an accident. I was sixteen. Not sure if I could do it before then, and just didn’t realize it, or if the situation I was in forced it out of me.”
Jerry finally ended his strike on conversation. “What situation?”
“I jumped off a bridge and never hit the water,” Anwen replied. Dee’s head whipped in her direction. “You want to know my story? That’s it. Orphaned at ten, ran away from my granddad’s home at fifteen, and tried to kill myself at sixteen.”
“But you didn’t,” Dee said, tilting his head. “You could have. Even if jumping off a bridge didn’t work, a bullet would have taken you down. A noose. Something. We’re not immortal, we’re just amazingly resilient.”
Her eyes caught a glimpse of him from the side. “What did you try?”
It was just a suspicion, but the way he hung his head told her that her instincts were right.
“Tried to drink myself to death. The human way,” he clarified. “But not as young as you. It was a little over twenty years ago.”
“Lucky us. We both wanted to die in the past, and now the demons are willing to do that for us. They’re real gentlemen that way.” A bubbled laugh popped from her throat. “Or, it seems some of them are ladies.”
Arwen’s breath hitched when she felt the temperature in the car spike during a turn. Looking in the rearview mirror, she caught sight of Jerry, leaning forward, both his hands gripping the top of the driver’s seat in front of him.
“A woman demon came after you?”
“I was surprised too. They’ve all been men up until now. Or at least, they looked male.”
Jerry shook his head. “Of course, they must’ve been guys. You’re a chick.”
She may have imagined Dee’s blush.
“Nice of you to say such sweet things, Jerry. How do my ovaries make any difference?”
“Our policy dictates that a target must be assigned to a demon of the opposite sex until, and only until, the target’s sexual orientation is confirmed to require a same sex assignee. You’re not gay, are you?”
This time, she didn’t imagine the blush, she also shared it.
“Nothing against it, but no,” she answered. “Wait, did you say ‘our’ policy? Pure Souls have a courting policy for demon engagement?”
“Um...”
“Might as well tell her, Jerry,” Dee broke in. “She’s going to find out sooner or later.”
“Find out what?”
Jerry looked like he’d just eaten a sour egg. “Until recently I was... in the employ of Lucifer.”
Anwen’s head cocked to the side. “You were a Pure Soul working for the Grigori boss?”
His black bangs swung in time with his head. “No,” Jerry said. “I was a demon who came to work for the Pure Souls.”
Sweet mother of milk of magnesia. A lead foot smashed the brakes before a silver-tipped tongue went on a shooting spree.
“What the actual fuck?!” Anwen maneuvered the car to the side of the remote French highway before jumping out. “A demon? A demon! How can a Pure Soul be a demon?”
Jerry, as slow to crawl out of the backseat as into the situation, observed the ground and kicked some dirt. “I’m not a demon anymore. I was resurrected.”
“Resurrected?” She mewed the term like a foreign cuss word. “Who are you, Jesus effing Christ?”
“No, Jerry Romani.” He put his hands up, trying to calm her. “Somehow, when the last Pure Soul died, my soul was purged
from Hell and placed in his body. Then, a few days ago, the archangels made me completely human again. You have nothing to fear from me.”
“Too bad I can’t say the same!” Anwen lunged, and would have gotten Jerry clean across the chin if the steel cage of Dee’s arms hadn’t caught her around the middle. “Let me go, you stupid Olympian! Let me see. If he’s human, he’ll bleed just fine when I gut him.”
“Calm down, Anwen!”
God, he was so strong. She would never best him. She made a mental note of that, in case the need ever arose. A physical encounter would certainly leave her defeated. That wasn’t enough to stop her struggling, though.
“But he’s a demon!” she belted. “Probably spying on us right now. And who knows how much blood is on his hands?”
One more harpooning slash of her arms did nothing but tighten Dee’s grip. As she labored to free herself, she suddenly became aware of the solid granite body against hers, and how it felt so perfectly molded to holding her. Despite her rage, she stilled, her chest heaving for breath. Why did his chest follow the same pattern as hers?
Dee’s voice tickled across her earlobe, his chin brushing the side of her face. “He’s an asshole, and you’ll probably end up hating him. But for better or worse, Big Boss put him here for a reason, and we’re going to give him the benefit of the doubt until he gives us a reason to do otherwise, okay?”
“Until?” Jerry repeated, his face screwing up. “What do you mean, until? You think I’m just pacing, waiting for an opportunity to make you fall?”
Dee rolled his eyes, maintaining his position between the demon and the demented deb. “I meant unless, Jerry. It was a slip-up. Look, Anwen...”
Holding her at arm’s length, he tilted up her chin to meet his eyes.
“I promise you, Jerry will not hurt an innocent, and neither he, nor anything else in the world will harm you as long as I’m nearby. I promise, I’ll protect you.”
As the solemnity of his words washed over her, her scowl eased, and the corners of her mouth fell into an indifferent line. “You mean that, don’t you?”
Hex Goddess (All My Exes Die from Hexes Book 3) Page 9
