The Darkest Lie lotu-7

by Gena Showalter

  Being moved while she was helpless irked.

  Usually she protected herself from just such a situation with shadows. She had only to crook a mental finger just before she drifted and they would envelop her the entire time she slept, making it impossible for anyone to see her. But once she'd realized she was inside Gideon's home, she'd stopped summoning those shadows.

  Perhaps she'd wished, on some level, that watching her while she slept would revive his memory of her. Perhaps she'd wished he would grow to desire her again and beg to be a part of her new life. Which was stupid. The bastard had left her to rot inside Tartarus; she shouldn't want his desire.

  She should want his ruin.

  "Well, well. I'm so upset you're finally awake."

  At the sound of his voice, deep and rumbling, Scarlet stiffened, gaze once again roving. Then, she spotted him, and her heart stopped abruptly. He stood in the bedroom's doorway, muscled arms hanging loosely. He was a warrior whose wicked face promised incomparable nights of sinful pleasures, his eyes bright with anticipation and contradicting his casual pose.

  Gideon. Once her beloved husband, but now a man who deserved only her scorn.

  Her heart kicked back into gear, quickly gaining speed, and her blood heated with tendrils of awareness. The same reaction she'd experienced the first time she'd seen him, thousands of years ago.

  Not my fault, then or now. There was no man more beautiful, part angel, part devil, and all the more masculine for it. No man who tempted even as he repelled, someplace deep inside a woman warning her of the dangers that awaited her should she succumb to his allure. Dangers she couldn't help but crave.

  He wore a black T-shirt that read "You Know You Want Me," black pants that bagged just a little and a silver chain belt. There were three piercings in his right eyebrow, and now one in his lip. A hoop. Silver. To match his belt, she thought snidely.

  He'd always cared about his appearance, and hadn't liked being teased about it. Something that had once amused her, for it had showed a softer side of him. A hint of vulnerability.

  Today, however, she couldn't summon any joviality. While he stood there looking as edible as a chocolate truffle dipped in caramel, she probably resembled a gutter rat dipped in sewage. She'd only been able to scrub herself with the water the Lords brought her each evening, so her clothes were wrinkled and dirty and her hair a mass of tangles.

  "Got lots to say, huh?" he muttered. "We're on the right track, then."

  She knew he could only speak lies, so she knew exactly what he meant. He wanted her talking. Keep it cas. Don't let him know how he affects you. She arched a brow, donning what she hoped was an unconcerned expression. "Remember me yet?" Good. There hadn't been a single spark of hurt in her tone.

  His eyes drained of emotion, making those crystalline orbs look as hard as diamonds. "Of course I do."

  So, no. He didn't. Bastard. She didn't allow her expression to change, wouldn't let him know how much he upset her. "Then why did you take me out of the fortress?" Slowly, purposefully, she traced a finger down the column of her neck, between her breasts, wondering if—yep. His gaze followed the entire way. Did some part of him still find her attractive? "I'm a very dangerous woman."

  "Haven't been warned about that already." The words were broken, emerging on a rasp of breath. "And I didn't remove you to talk comfortably, that's for sure."

  Not because he'd wanted her, then, but just to appease his curiosity. Her hand fell to her lap. She was not disappointed. This was more of the same, and she'd steeled herself against the mental anguish countless times already. One more time should hardly make a difference.

  "You're a fool if you thought a change of scenery would loosen my tongue."

  Though he remained silent, a muscle ticked in his jaw. He was clearly perturbed.

  She offered him a sugar-sweet smile, determined to enjoy the moment. And there was something satisfying about leaving him in the dark, keeping him guessing the way he'd kept her guessing about his whereabouts for thousands of worry-filled years.

  Reminded of her worry, that soul-deep, ever-present worry, she couldn't stop her smile, fake as it was, from vanishing. She even had to press her tongue to the roof of her mouth to stop herself from chomping on it in fury.

  "I'll come back for you," he'd told her one night. " I'll set you free, I swear it."

  "No. Don't go. Don't leave me here." Gods, she'd been so whiny back then. But she'd been a prisoner, and he'd been her only bright light.

  "I love you too much to be without you for long, sweetheart. You know that. But I have to do this. For both of us."

  Of course, she hadn't seen or heard from him after that. Not until the Titans escaped Tartarus, a prison for immortals, and wrested control of the heavens from the Greeks. Not until she'd come here to Earth and searched...only to find him carousing for tail at some skanky nightclub.

  The fury expanded, dotted her line of vision with red. Deep breath in, deep breath out. Slowly the dots dissipated.

  "We're done here," she said, though she remained still, gauging his reaction. "You're not getting what you want, and you're certainly not keeping me here."

  "Feel free to run from me." He crossed his arms over his massive chest, pulling the fabric of his shirt tight across his pecs. "You won't regret it."

  Again, she knew what he meant. Run, and he would ensure she suffered. But she said, "Soon as I stretch, I'll take you up on that offer and run. Thanks for the suggestion, by the way. I never would have thought of it on my own."

  He growled with frustration and anger, all hint of casualness gone. "I was cruel to bring you here. You don't owe me a favor in return, so you had better not stay put."

  "We're in agreement. You're cruel, and I don't owe you anything, so I won't feel obligated to remain."

  Another growl. She tried not to laugh. Damnation, he was still fun to tease.

  Fun? Her grin faded a second time. She should hate that he could only speak in lies, not enjoy it. That deceitful tongue of his had once shattered her already fragile heart.

  "That's so not enough from you," he sniped.

  "Wow. Already begging for more." Once, she'd thought him special. But he'd proven himself exactly like the others. Her mother, her king, her supposed friends. They should have cared about her, but they had betrayed her, each and every one of them.

  They'd been criminals, sure, but even criminals could love. Right? Right. So why couldn't they love me?

  She'd spent her entire life locked inside Tartarus because her mother, Rhea, wife to Cronus, had had an affair with a mortal just before the queen's imprisonment and had eventually given birth to Scarlet inside her cell. A cell she'd shared with several other gods and goddesses.

  Scarlet had been raised among them, and at first, they'd liked her. As she'd aged, however, jealousy had sprouted in some. Lust in others.

  Captivity, hatred and bitterness had soon become her only trusted companions.

  Until Gideon.

  He'd once been an elite guard to Zeus and every time he'd brought in a new prisoner, their gazes had met. She'd waited for those moments, desperate for them. He'd enjoyed them, too, because he'd begun to visit Tartarus regularly. Not to lock up another criminal but simply to see her, to talk to her.

  Don't think about your time with him. You'll soften toward him. And you can't soften, you idiot.

  After gaining her freedom, she should have stayed in Olympus, which was now renamed Titania, thanks to Cronus, and found a nice god to settle down with. But nooo. She'd had to see Gideon one last time. Then, having seen him, she'd had to remain near him. Then, having decided to remain, she'd just had to convince herself to warn the Lords away from her, since she'd heard that they were tracking every immortal paired with a demon from Pandora's box, with the intention of recruiting them...or killing them.

  Bastard, she thought about Gideon again. Excellent. That's more like it. He's a filthy liar, a cold-blooded killer, and you hate him. He still planned to kill her af
ter he got his answers; she knew he did. Because she would never aid him, and that made her a liability.

  "This silence is awesome," he remarked.

  "Glad you like it," she replied. Annoyance bloomed over his expression, and she had to fight another grin. "'Cause I'm willing to give you a lot more of it." Another growl.

  "Oh, and for your peace of mind, you should know that I'm not going to run." Yet. She wanted to talk, too, though not to satisfy his curiosity.

  For too long, she'd wondered if he'd found someone new. Someone permanent. And it was past time she knew. Of course, if he had, Scarlet would have to kill the bitch. Not because she still cared about Gideon—she didn't, she reminded herself—but because he didn't deserve such happiness.

  That wasn't vengeful of her. As his scorned ex, that was simply her right.

  "No thanks for staying put," he said with a relieved sigh.

  Thanks, he was saying. "You're not welcome." Fuck you, she was saying.

  Eyes narrowing, and making him look as if he wanted to stomp his foot in vexation like a child, he traced his tongue over his teeth. Score one for Scarlet. "How is it possible that we didn't marry, yet my friends know everything about it?"

  How had they married without anyone knowing? Easy. "We married in secret, dumbass."

  This time, he didn't react to her taunt. "Was I not ashamed of you?"

  Oh, she could slap him for that. Of course he thought he'd been ashamed of her rather than the other way around. She'd been the prisoner, after all, and he the free man. Not that he remembered even that slight detail, but clearly he still thought very highly of himself.

  Bastard was too kind a word for him.

  "You weren't ashamed of me, but you would have been killed if you'd been caught associating with me," she gritted out.

  He nodded, as if he now understood she was a Titan who had been locked in Tartarus by the Greeks, rather than an actual criminal. As if he now understood that those Greeks, the very ones who had created him, would have punished him in the worst possible way for "dating" one of their reviled enemies.

  "So. If we haven't been married all this time, what name have you not been using?"

  Uh, what? He'd already forgotten her damned name when she'd told him the first time he'd visited her in the dungeon? Only a few weeks had passed since then. "My name is Scarlet." You ass! "But I already told you that." Ass, ass, ass. Her hands fisted the cotton beneath her.

  He waved in dismissal. "Didn't know that already. What I don't want to know now is your last name."

  That failed to calm her. Her grip tightened, and her eyes narrowed to tiny slits. Clearly, this was part of his excavation for information, not intimate curiosity, and he considered her dumb enough to fall for it.

  He wasn't sure if she was a god or one of their servants. As a god, she wouldn't have a last name. As a servant, she would, for last names lowered status, as if you couldn't be distinguished by your first name alone. Like a human. Gideon was doing the process of elimination thing. Not that it would do him any good, for she was neither god nor servant. Nor human, for that matter. She was something in between them all.

  "My last name changes pretty much every time I watch a movie and find new man candy," she said in a sugar-sweet tone that matched her earlier grin.

  Now he popped his jaw, lip ring glistening in the lavender light. Irritated by that, was he? Didn't like the thought of his supposed wife eating up other men with her eyes, huh?

  "Man candy? Like something you'd buy from a bakery?" His tone was sneering, intent on shaming her.

  "Hell, no." And he clearly didn't think so, either, because he hadn't passed out from his words. He was irritated, then. Good. Finally. True satisfaction. Score two. "You know. Man candy. Men to lust after, men you want to lick, men you want to suck on and take a bite out of. Well, not you, but me." No way did she want Gideon thinking she'd pined for him all these years. That she'd lain awake, wishing for him, desperate for him.

  No matter how true that was.

  Those eyes narrowed farther, his lashes fusing together and obscuring the bright blue of his irises. "You're not a Lord. Not like me. You shouldn't call yourself Scarlet Lord."

  "You call yourself Gideon Lord?" she asked. She hadn't known that. "No."

  Yes. "Well, then, I will never call myself Scarlet Lord." She wouldn't travel down that road with him again. She would not proclaim to this world and the heavens that she belonged to him.

  If she shared anything with this man, it would be the tip of her dagger. Right through his black, forgetting, abandoning heart.

  He bared his pearly whites in a fearsome scowl. "I'm not warning you to tread carefully. I'm not dangerous when I'm riled."

  "Hey, stop me if you've heard this one. But...wait for it...go fuck yourself."

  For some reason, the anger drained right out of him and his lips quirked into the semblance of a smile. "No spirit. I can't see why I would have chosen you."

  Do. Not. Soften.

  "I don't want to know who you've named yourself after." He straightened from the door frame, though his arms remained crossed over his chest. "Please don't tell me. Please."

  Casually asked, with that hint of amusement, yet there was now a sharp gleam in his eyes, as if he would close the distance between them, if necessary, and shake the answer out of her.

  If he touched her, if those strong fingers closed around her arms... No, no, no. She couldn't allow it.

  She shrugged as if the information didn't matter. "Well, I've been calling myself Scarlet Pattinson for several weeks. Have you seen Robert Pattinson? Hottest. Man. Ever. And no, I don't care if that makes me a cougar. He sings with the voice of an angel. Gods, I love when a man sings to me. You never did because your voice is terrible." She shuddered in distaste. "I swear, it's like a demon running its claws over brimstone."

  His fingers were digging into his biceps so savagely, bruises were already branching from under them. "And now you're not going to tell me who you were before that."

  He'd dropped the "please." Excellent. She was getting to him again. But how far could she push him on this point? How much could his stupid male pride take before he did stomp over to her? Before he did shake her? And not for answers, but for an apology.

  Once, she'd known the answer to those questions. He would never touch her in anger. But he wasn't the same tender man she'd fallen in love with. A man who had shown her that first taste of kindness. He couldn't be. She and all the other prisoners had heard stories about the Lords of the Underworld and their exploits. The innocents they'd killed, the cities they'd destroyed.

  Besides, she knew what her own demon had done to her upon their pairing. The darkness, the terror, the absolute loss of control. She'd been consumed, no longer human in any way. And that had lasted for centuries, she'd been told, though there were gaps in her memory, the time seeming to have passed in a matter of days. Still. She was no longer the same person, either.

  "I was Pitt for a while," she said. "Then Gosling. Then Jackman. Then Reynolds. I always go back to Reynolds. He's my fave. That blond hair, those muscles..." She shivered. "Let's see, who else? Oh. I've been Bana, Pine, Efron and DiCaprio, as well. DiCaprio is another fave. And another blond, for that matter. Maybe I have a thing for blonds."

  Hopefully the barb cut its mark. Gideon had black hair underneath all that blue.

  "Oh, and I'm not into girls," she continued, "but Jessica Biel could change my mind. Have you seen her lips? So yes, I've even been Scarlet Biel."

  Gideon did that jaw-popping thing again. And if she wasn't mistaken, the anger had returned full force, burning away the last vestiges of amusement. "So very few pieces of candy," he remarked.

  Apparently, she could push him pretty far. How had she thought him merely angry before? That was suppressed rage she was hearing in his voice...as well as deep thrums of arousal.

  The latter was a sound she'd once known well and never thought to hear again.

  Do not smile. "I li
ke variety, what can I say? Maybe one day it'll even be my mission to bag and tag each and every one of them."

  Steam practically curled from his nostrils. Yep, rage. He straightened, stepped forward, stopped himself, and retreated back into the doorway. "We aren't done with that topic for now," he snapped. He turned as if to leave.

  "Wait." She wasn't ready to end the exchange. Not yet. "What about you?" she asked, shifting the focus off herself. Careful. "Any girlfriends I should know about? Or better yet, another wife? If so, I'll have to have you incarcerated for polygamy." There. No way he could guess at her desperation. At her clawing need to know.

  Slowly he spun back around. "Yes," he said through clenched teeth, the word barely scraping its way free. Meaning no, he had none. "I have a girlfriend, and I'm married to someone else."

  Scarlet released a searing breath she hadn't known she'd been holding. Gideon was single. A male whore who tapped any ass he could get his hands on, yes, but he was still unattached. She began shaking. Not in relief, she was sure, but in disappointment that she wouldn't get to murder someone he loved right in front of him.

  So...we're done here.

  She now had the info she'd wanted; she could ditch him. Except, she threw her legs over the side of the mattress and stood. Without knocking him down and running away. Idiot. "I'm taking a shower and you're getting me food. Don't even think about arguing or I swear to the gods I'll fill your next dreams with countless spiders." At least, she thought she would.

  For some reason, Nightmares didn't like to torment him. She'd had to beg to get the demon to do so the first and only time, and the stupid beast had protested and whined every single moment. That had never happened before. Her demon was an equal opportunity tormentor.

  Why did Nightmares like him? Him, of all people. Her demon didn't even know him, since she'd become possessed after Gideon had abandoned her. But her demon had endured her constant complaints about him, so she would have placed good money on Nightmares wishing Gideon was dead, just so Scarlet's complaining would stop.