by Mila Young
As she stood with her back to me, I studied her like someone else would. I tried to see her as a person I hadn’t been cursed to love once upon a time.
She looked lovely, there was no doubt about that, with a gorgeous body. And she was a nice person on top of that. She worked hard for a long time to give me what I’d looked for in our relationship. She could have hated me, pushed me away, but instead she endeavored to make it work. But a person could only pretend for so long, and even though she’d done the right thing—she had tried, she’d given me everything when I’d tricked her into staying in the Underworld with me—all I saw when I looked at her was resentment.
“So, are you just going to stand there?” I asked when she stared out at the city without saying a word. It was as if she expected me to ogle her. And I was furious that I’d fallen for it.
“The Underworld is unraveling,” she said, turning around.
I frowned at her comment, at the concern in her voice. It was hard to think such a shitty, dark place could get any worse.
“It’s why I’ve come,” she added. “Things are obviously not going very well up here, so I thought I’d do what I can to help.”
“Ha!” I barked. “You have no idea what’s going on.”
Persephone lifted her chin. “I know a lot more than you think. I’m aware you’re hurt about what happened with us, that you’re mad at Hera, and somehow you think taking it out on me will help.”
“Don’t even go there,” I warned. “I’m not in the mood for games.”
“And I’m not playing any,” she said tightly, her lips pinching.
“Look, I don’t want you here. I don’t want anything to do with you. I know it’s not your fault, but I don’t have to face you if I don’t want to. It’s the reason I left you alone down there, for fuck’s sake! Something had to give.”
She drew in a sharp breath and strolled past me, the fabric of her white dress sashaying around her legs. She swung her hips from side to side, and her long hair brushed her perfect ass. But I wasn’t turned on by her anymore. It was funny how a broken heart could translate into a limp dick.
“Was it Poseidon?” Persephone asked.
I narrowed my eyes at her. “How would you know who came to talk to me? Have you been watching me?”
“I’m just trying to make sure you’re okay. But I didn’t spy on you. He’s just the most likely to try and fix things. He feels so terrible about what happened between you, him, and Zeus.” Her voice sounded genuine, and her tone held no hint of mockery or sarcasm, but I didn’t need to deal with her overprotectiveness right now when I felt like shit.
I turned my back on her. I wasn’t even going to listen to that crap anymore. Everyone always advocated for my brothers, saying they were so fucking great. Well, I knew otherwise.
Was I holding a grudge? You bet. But you didn’t get your entire life—which was an eternity—ruined and not feel something. It hurt like a bitch, and I wasn’t going to forgive and forget like everyone was expecting me to.
When things went well with Persephone, I wasn’t so pissed off, except for when she’d leave to spend six months of summer in the upper world. Then I thought about letting it all go. But that had failed and all the hell that had gone wrong in my life smacked me in the face, and the smile and wave routine exhausted me when I seethed on the inside.
“I’m out of here,” I said, marching toward the door, as if I needed to use it to walk away from her. I could just poof out of the hotel, and she wouldn’t be able to do a thing about it. But part of me wanted her to call me back and say something. I didn’t know what I was waiting for. An apology was unfair because this wasn’t her fault any more than it was mine. I was a fucking contradiction.
But I was sick and tired of everyone else being so damn accepting of their fate.
“Oh,” I clipped, turning around and snapping at her when she wasn’t the one to call me back. “Don’t talk to Elyse again, either.”
“What?” Persephone challenged. “You don’t have the right to tell me whom I can and can’t see.”
“No, but I can tell you to stay the fuck out of my business and talking to Elyse falls in that category. It’s. My. Business. So leave her alone.”
Persephone crossed her arms in front of her chest. “I wish you’d just accept you’re in love with her.”
Her words were a punch to the gut. She didn’t hold back and was always so blunt.
“I don’t do love, Persephone. Don’t you remember?” Thank fuck that gods didn’t blush, because I’d have been in trouble. “It’s why Hera cursed me in the first place—so that even the awful God of the Underworld could fall in love. It took a curse to do that. And no one has been throwing curses around lately for me to fall into the same trap twice.”
She stared at me intensely with a lecturing gaze. “You’re not unlovable, you know.”
“You didn’t want me,” I responded bitterly and too fast.
“Because we weren’t meant to be together,” she argued, her voice climbing slightly. “Didn’t you ever ask the Fates?”
I rolled my eyes. Persephone loved asking them about her future, as if it would change from the previous week, when she’d last asked. When you didn’t die, everything else became a pebble in a river that kept on flowing. Eventually, time sanded it down until it didn’t matter anymore.
So, knowing all the good and all the bad that would happen to us had become a pastime for Persephone. A hobby, her obsession.
“I don’t ask them about things I don’t care about.” I huffed and watched her stroll over to the edge of the king-sized bed and sit on the end.
“Or things you do,” she said softly. “But I bet you wondered about Elyse. Didn’t you? I see how you look at her.”
I was about ready to blow my lid. “Can’t you find something better to do with your time?” I snapped.
“Not since you trapped me down there. It’s a bore, and I need something to occupy myself with.”
She was just as quick as I was. I could’ve fallen for someone who wasn’t half as sharp. But it’d been Persephone, and I’d been doomed to arguments that were never resolved because neither of us could admit to being wrong.
“All I’m saying is stay away from her,” I fumed tightly.
“And I’m saying allow yourself to feel.”
I released an impatient snort. That was the one thing I wouldn’t do because it came with regret, humiliation, and pain.
“You know what?” she said, and I hated the sarcastic tone of her voice. It sounded as though she was done arguing and that always made me feel like I’d lost the fight. “It’s fine. You just carry on doing you without noticing everyone who reaches out to you.”
“Who reaches out to me?” I asked.
Persephone closed her eyes as if her head hurt. But it was something she’d seen humans do. Gods and goddesses didn’t get headaches. She had a habit of trying out human mannerisms after watching what they did up on Earth, like the time she went through a ‘totally’ phase, using the word in front of every sentence, until I banned anyone from using it in the Underworld because it drove me insane.
“You’re never going to change,” she began, opening her eyes again and meeting my gaze. “It’s a pity, because she has so much to offer.”
I didn’t want to hear any more. I was tired of being told I was the one in the wrong when everyone else messed with me. I was tired of being forgotten when all I wanted was to be loved.
Which was pretty damn pathetic, anyway.
So, I disappeared from Persephone’s room, leaving behind the woman I’d once loved.
I visualized myself vanishing, and the world around me evaporated. In a split second, I took form again in my house on the bad side of town. Just as I collapsed on my bed, X appeared in the corner, black fog swirling around his feet, his eyes filled with eternal fire as he grinned.
“I’m not in the mood for your shit,” I said, deliberately looking away. Why the fuck didn’t anyone leave me alone?
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“But you can’t get rid of me. It’s not really up to you if I stay or go.”
I groaned. Somehow, he’d escaped my control, and I ought to have been angry, but I was exhausted and frustrated. I wasn’t sure what the hell he wanted from me.
“Why the fuck can’t you leave the humans alone?” I demanded to know.
He hovered there like a nightmare. “You have no power over me.”
It looked like it was my fault, but it wasn’t. I wished it was so I could do something about him, fix up this mess of him targeting innocents. But it was out of my hands, and I already had so much to deal with, I didn’t know what do to anymore.
I covered my face with my hands and wished it would actually help.
Elyse flashed before me. Her dark hair, her big eyes, the way she looked at me when I felt like the rest of the world fell away.
Persephone was right. Of course she was. She knew me well enough to always be right about me. I was in love with Elyse. But I wasn’t going to admit it to anyone.
I looked up and X was gone. Thank fuck.
Being in love only brought me pain before. And Persephone remained in my life, showing up where she wasn’t wanted.
If that was what happened when I loved, I wasn’t going to go for that shit again. Love was grand and all, but it hurt too. And there was just as much chance of it failing as there was of it succeeding.
And those weren’t the kind of odds I wanted to bet on anymore.
Chapter 10
Poseidon
Elyse was struggling. I’d tried everything I could think of to find Catina, to figure out where X might have taken her.
But I had no idea where else to look. X couldn’t go to Mount Olympus, so he had to be here on Earth. I’d covered all the abandoned islands where cyclops and other creatures used to live.
And I found nothing.
The Underworld didn’t make sense unless Catina was dead, which I wasn’t willing to accept. I didn’t want Elyse to think that way, either. Why would X take the human and kill her? He’d have done it in front of Elyse for maximum torture, so I held on to hope.
But the more time that passed without Catina returning, the more Elyse blamed herself in one way or another, because she hadn’t been able to save her.
On Wednesday morning, Ares arrived at my apartment. He didn’t just appear like the gods usually did. He knocked on my door as if he respected my privacy. I appreciated that. Lately, he’d shown a different side of himself, one very different from the image we all had of him. He tried to be a better god, and I admired his effort.
“Beer? Soda? Milk?” I asked, opening my fridge. The shelves were filled with all sorts of drinks and a half-eaten red velvet cake. I’d tried a piece at a café the other day and fell in love. Of all the human foods I’d tasted, this dessert had to be the closest to ambrosia, so I’d bought the entire cake from the store.
“No, thanks. I want to talk to you about Elyse,” Ares started. “She’s not coping well with her friend’s kidnapping.”
“I know.” I shut the fridge door. “Not sure how else to help her.”
“I’ve done what I can too.” Ares stood in the living room, his hands hanging by his side, his shoulders rigid. “But you need to step it up a notch.”
His face changed when he talked about her. His eyes brightened, his voice filled with excitement.
“You care about her,” I ventured.
He nodded once and folded his arms, defensive, his chin lifting. But I wasn’t going to attack him. I understood he saw something in her that reflected a part of himself. She did that for all of us. Touched part of us, connected with us, made us reflect on who we were.
It was one of the reasons I didn’t mind that she was with Apollo anymore. Elyse was the type of person who made you like yourself again, just because of who you became in her presence. She never asked anything more of me from you than to be myself. And at the heart of it, she wanted love and happiness. As simple as that. I had every intention of making her smile every single day.
“What do you think I should do?” I needed Ares’s advice. We were all in this together, so we might as well team up already.
“I think you ought to take her out, do something with her that’s not what you usually do.” Ares tilted his head to the side but held my gaze. “It’s just a thought. I don’t know how you two are. But I can tell she likes you a lot. So maybe if we all spend more time with her will help take the edge off her anxiety until we find a way to find X. Apollo found a so-called witch to see if she can find a locator spell for Catina. I might reach out to the Oracle for any insight. You need to help Elyse through this time as well, keep her safe in case X returns.”
“Of course.” His caring suggestion surprised me, and I enjoyed this new Ares more than the old version. “I like that idea. Appreciate the advice.”
He gave me a curt nod of his head and turned to the front door to leave.
“Ares,” I called.
He stopped at the entrance and looked at me over his shoulder.
“I might have been wrong about you.”
“Thanks,” he drawled in a tone that might have been sarcastic.
But I took it at face value. After he left, I called Heracles.
“How do I make Elyse feel special?” I asked, hating how silly I sounded for asking Heracles but also excited to bring joy back to Elyse’s life during such a shitty time. “I want to do something humans understand.”
“You’re asking me about this?” Heracles asked.
“You know her best,” I explained. “And you’ve lived on Earth long enough to be familiar with their customs. I need your help.”
Heracles chuckled. “I never thought I’d hear that from any of my uncles. Take her out on a date. Flowers, dinner, the whole thing. Not just sex, but something that shows you care about her.”
I’d give his suggestion a try. The whole partnering thing was so different for us gods. We all slept around with whomever we were drawn to and thought nothing more of it, but dating seemed so much more different for humans. Maybe because they lived for such a short time. They had something to lose, so they loved hard and deep. Needing that soul-felt connection to bring out their powerful emotions.
“How have you spent so much time with Elyse and not fallen for her?” I wondered.
Heracles was my nephew, but I knew so little about him, and I regretted that now. There were many things I could have spent my time doing other than being the mediator between my two brothers. But it wasn’t too late to rectify my past mistakes.
“I only have one love, Uncle,” he replied. “Megara was my person. And after her, I just don’t want anyone else.”
Heracles and Megara had been in love a long, long time ago. After the death of his children and wife, he chose to remain on Earth without them instead of living on Mount Olympus. And I pitied him for living alone this long.
“I never knew I could be this drawn to someone until I met Elyse, so never say never.” That was a human saying I’d heard on television, and it seemed appropriate here. “You can’t be alone forever either.”
Elyse made me feel so real and raw. I had no clue how to voice the words to her, but the promise I’d make her echoed in my heart. A promise to be hers.
When I thought about my emotions for Elyse, I understood how Heracles had devoted himself to Megara. I never understood it before, but Elyse was the type of woman I’d sacrifice eternity for just so we’d have a few years more together. And Heracles had lost his wife, so living in Mount Olympus would just remind him of what he’d lost.
“Thank you,” I finally said, after asking one or two more questions about human dating customs.
“Any time,” Heracles reassured with cheer in his voice, and I couldn’t remember the last time he’d sounded so pleased to chat with me. “I mean it.”
I nodded, even though he couldn’t see me, because I didn’t know what else to say. Then I hung up the phone.
A date? Maybe
it wasn’t so bizarre. The more I thought about it, the more I couldn’t wait to try it out.
When I picked Elyse up later that evening, I carried red roses with me. She opened the door, and her eyes widened at the flowers then she smiled in a way I rarely saw. Pride tickled a spot deep in my heart I hadn’t known existed.
“These are beautiful.” She accepted the roses and smelled them, her eyes closing as she did. If I could make time stand still, I’d do it in that moment where she seemed at ease. Her mouth curled upward, and she breathed easier. “I’ll be right back.”
She disappeared into the kitchen. A moment later, she appeared with a water filled vase, and she arranged the flowers inside.
“Thank you,” she beamed, turning to me with a smile. “I can’t remember the last time anyone bought me flowers.”
She wore a little black dress with a scooping neckline, along with black high heels, and her hair was loose for a change. It hung to her hips, and I wanted to run my fingers through it, grab handfuls of the stuff.
“Where are we going?” she asked. “You look sexy.”
“Thanks.” I’d found a black suit with a sky-blue shirt and a blue tie—the lady who’d sold it to me had told me the outfit matched my eyes.
I teleported us near the classy restaurant where I’d booked a reservation. I led Elyse to a table near the back, and we drank champagne and ate food that was meant to be art, not eaten. Slowly, I watched Elyse relax, and for the first time that night, I sat back, breathing easy, seeing she’d let down her guard to enjoy herself.
“This is such a great idea.” She scooped a spoonful of lychee ice cream into her mouth, then glanced around the restaurant. The place was full. Nearby sat an old couple, eating side by side, one glass of wine each, and bent over their meals. Near the large mullioned window that overlooked the street, a group of young women giggled loudly while businessmen at the bar kept glancing over in their direction. A musician sat in front of a grand piano, filling the room with a soft tune. Close to him was a small lounge area with embroidered pillows on couches.
