by Amelia Wilde
“Perhaps you’d like to lie down,” I tell her, adjusting myself on the sofa, my heart a bird with twisted wings. Demeter used to leave them all over the forest at my father’s house. “Rest before our conversation.”
“I’m not leaving.” She lifts her chin. “Continue, James.”
He cuts a glance at her, then at me, and then he swipes both hands over his face.
“Stalling won’t make it easier.”
“I’ve located the women.”
Dread curls at the middle of my chest, slowing my heart and choking off its blood supply. “All of them?”
“As far as I can tell. They’re together.”
James won’t look at Brigit. Brigit watches me, her green eyes clouded with worry. Or perhaps she’s still furious with me for not letting her come. Perhaps both. It occurs to me that this isn’t the place I want to hear this news, not where I’ve made it so pleasant for myself, but there’s no stopping him now.
“They’re with Demeter.”
A twin explosion to the one that took down most of my building goes off behind my eyes. Fire rushes out from its epicenter to the far reaches of my brain. The last of the laugh-smile runs away. I reach for a smirk and can’t find one. A frown—also no. Because James isn’t finished yet.
“With her,” I prompt, because this is a thing I often have to do. Prompt people to speak when I want them to. Though now I fervently wish that none of this was happening.
“A building on Front Street.” Front Street is in a dark part of the city, even darker than the brothel. A place where no light penetrates. My people are there more often than I am. James swallows hard, his shoulders drooping another inch, and oh, fuck me. This is the part he was afraid to tell me. He lifts one knuckle to dab at his eyes. “They’re working for her now.”
A whispered breath in my ear. Why would you let this happen? It’s Katie’s voice that asks the question. Such a small sound in a riot of imagination.
If I’m going to know, I have to know all of it. My mind is already retreating from the scene. The shell of me is folding in, closing up. Lights out. “And how is she keeping them there? As far as I know, she’s not a particularly large woman.”
James’s eyes are so sad that it’s difficult to look at him. “Some of the police officers who frequent—”
“Leave now.”
“I have people working on a tentative plan.” He looks like a kicked dog, hands in his pockets, head bowed. “I’ll let you know when—”
“Don’t bother. Let her have them.” His head comes up. Brigit’s mouth has dropped open, a round, astonished O. “It’s the family business, after all. Let her run it for a change.”
“She won’t run it the way you did.”
That makes me laugh, a hollow sound. Letting them choose their men for the night. What sort of crazy fucking business practice was that? No wonder the women were taken from me. “She’ll probably run it better.”
“You don’t mean that.” This from Brigit.
I give her a searing glance. “She’ll use them harder. More often. She’ll make more money, and that’s the whole point of a business, isn’t it?”
Tears glisten in her green eyes. “That sounds terrible.”
“It’s a terrible business.”
“Sir.” James frowns, glancing between us, almost as if he wants to defend her from me. From me. As if I would ever let him touch her. As if anyone could take her away from me now. “We can get them back. If we mount an attack—”
“With what fucking army?” He tenses, though I haven’t raised my voice. “I don’t want them back. I’m done owning a brothel. Done with the business. Now get the hell out of here.”
Brigit
I don’t think Zeus sees James turn and run for the door.
I don’t think he sees anything.
His eyes don’t follow me when I turn to go, and I don’t feel the heat of his gaze on my back when I pull open the double doors and run out onto the landing.
James is halfway down the stairs, taking them two at a time, and I feel so ridiculous. So stupid, to be naked under this robe. I was going to take what I wanted from him, come hell or high water or head of security, and now I’m half-naked and bursting into the sunlight outside the house.
“James. Stop.” He does, but I can tell he’s reluctant. He tugs at the rumpled front of his suit, swiping at his eyes. I don’t know anything about him, only that his husband arrives in a champagne-colored car to pick him up from the whorehouse every morning. I only know that from an awed whisper at the spa. The earth shivers beneath my feet. This shadowy, elegant figure doesn’t cry. He hovers at the margins, occasionally appearing at Zeus’s side to tell him something. James doesn’t wear anything other than a neutral expression. A frown, maybe, if things are especially bad.
“Brigit.” Now he’s wiping his eyes with his sleeves, and when he lifts his head the tears are gone. “I can’t stay.”
“He didn’t mean what he said.”
He tilts his face toward the sun and takes a deep breath. “In this instance...” A hand to his chest. “It doesn’t matter what he says. It only matters what he does.”
The other girls at the whorehouse were largely faceless to me, a glittering crowd of expensive clothes. But now, looking at James, I can see them all. Savannah and Reya and Alicia. All the other names fall away but their faces, their faces. Everyone there, even the most egregious bitches, had a story.
And now, judging from James’s red eyes, they’re living in a nightmare. How am I supposed to sit by and let it happen? I can’t. My head against that mirror, again, again, again, can’t be for nothing. I won’t let it.
Depending on how Zeus reacts to the fact of me chasing his head of security outside, our time could be short. Out of a hundred conversations, I pick the one that seems most important. “Zeus’s sister. Demeter.” James closes his eyes at the name, face pale. “Why—” Why is too broad a question, too broad by far. Why is a question for Zeus, or his brothers, or even her daughter, not for James. “What does she want?”
“I don’t know, I don’t know.” He hisses through his teeth and puts a hand over his mouth. “I don’t fucking know. People say—” He shakes his head.
“Tell me.” It feels urgent. My heart beats like it’s urgent in the extreme.
“People say that their father—their father. He’s told you about his father.”
“Foster father,” I correct. Or confirm. I don’t know what I’m doing. The building is watching, Zeus could be watching. Make it quick.
“Not Demeter.” James actually turns to look over his shoulder. “I’ve heard that she was his born daughter.” He shudders, and it’s a sunny day but the chill goes bone-deep. He takes a step back, shaking himself out of his thoughts. “I have to go. If you’re brave enough, ask him about Cronos.”
“I know about him.” I catch James by the elbow. “Please. What does she want? What can I do?”
He looks sick, almost green, but his eyes meet mine. “I’ll send you a message. If there’s hope of getting them out,” he says. “Zeus—”
“I’ll talk to him,” I promise, but I know it’s probably a losing bet. I saw Zeus’s face when James gave him the news. It was like shutters over a window.
James leaves without another look back, jogging down the street. He’s probably parked a few blocks away to keep the location a secret. But we were standing outside for a long time, and now the concrete pathway doesn’t feel hidden. It feels bare to the world. I run barefoot back to the double doors in front, praying silently that they’re still unlocked. They are, but as soon as I’m inside there’s a deep click.
I want to sink down to the cool floor and lay there forever, but there is a broken man waiting upstairs. And women in danger. And Demeter, Demeter. I’ve never seen her, except in that painting. Except in Persephone’s face. And now what?
Now what?
I lied when I said I knew about Cronos. I only know him as a shadow in Zeus’s eye
s. As a pained admission: look at me, and tell me if my father killed women. Zeus pretends to be like him, but he’s not, not at the core. He’s spent his life trying to make up for those losses.
Which is why it’s so strange that he would refuse to do it now.
7
Brigit
I seethe for several days, and Zeus spends most of it in his office. The bedroom is incomplete without his presence. The living room is the same. But there’s only so long I can stalk around and root through his bookshelves.
Stay on the second floor.
I learned what happens when I go to the first floor, but I have to know if he’s there. His eyes, all hollowed and blank like that, were terrifying.
Back down the stairs.
Back to the double doors.
Please let them be unlocked. Please.
They are.
Golden light from outside, already fading, catches in Zeus’s hair. He sits at his desk with his journal open in front of him to a page midway through. The pen in his hand moves easily over the paper. He does not look up when I let the door shut us in.
My blood heats with the memory of what happened here. I want more of it, selfishly, desperately, and I know that if I put on a show—if I acted like a self-absorbed brat—I could get it again.
There are more important things.
“You can’t leave them with your sister.” I summon all of my courage and cross the room. There are no chairs on the other side of his desk, so I’m left standing there like a student at the principal’s office. “You know that.”
“I can.” The pen pauses, then carries on. It is outrageous that a huge part of me still marvels at him like he’s a wonder of the world. But he is, isn’t he? He could be a king, riding a white horse out of a historical painting with his elegant nose and full lips and the mean, powerful set of his jaw. Streaked with sunset, he is even more beautiful.
“You can’t do that.” The possibilities are too horrible to consider, at least now, when I’m trying to win this fight. Turn the statue back into a man. “You care about them. They need you.”
“I don’t care.”
I slap a hand down on the desk, and this gets his attention. Golden eyes come to rest where my hand meets the shining surface. “I promise you, sweetheart, I don’t. It’s not good business to care about the merchandise.”
“Oh?” An aching lump takes up all the space in my throat. “Am I merchandise, then?”
He puts down his pen and closes the journal in such a practiced, graceful moment I could slap him. It would be easier to sink to my knees than stay standing under the force of his gaze when he meets my eyes. My gut recoils. Empty eyes. Unfeeling. “I don’t care about you, either.”
If he can lean on the desk like an omnipotent asshole, then so can I. The sting of his untruth is a bright line behind my sternum as I crowd his space. “You’re lying.”
“I’m not.”
“You are lying.” I climb up on the desk, directly over his secret journal, too far gone to care how I look in this silk robe. Zeus’s eyes widen a fraction of an inch. Yes. There. It’s a start. “You’re lying, and I’ve had enough of it.” I gather all my frustration with him, all my fear, and crush it tight into a ball at the center of me, push it all down until it’s a source of energy instead of bonds around my wrists. On the other side of the desk I put my feet against his chest and push him back. He only moves a few inches, but it’s enough to stand in front of him.
To touch him.
I get one palm against one of his high cheekbones and his eyes flutter closed.
Oh, Zeus.
They’re open again in the next heartbeat and his hand snaps around my wrist, squeezing tight, his teeth grinding together. He’s trying, I realize. He’s trying not to let anything show. It’s usually a matter of habit for him. Not now. The sun sinks faster, casting him into a gold-tinged shadow. “You care about them.”
“I don’t.”
“You care about me. You love me.”
“I—” I interrupt him with a kiss and yes, yes, he can’t help himself. He slips one arm around my waist, his hand spreading out over the small of my back. He does not pull me in, but his ragged breath tells me all about his resistance. What else is he hiding? He can’t hide the taste of the drink he had—whiskey—or the harsh pull of the air in his lungs.
A man on the edge. I straddle him, working my hips down until my naked pussy brushes against the front of his pants. He could lie all he wanted about this, but there’s no hiding what’s there—his hard cock, barely contained by the fabric.
Fine. I’ll make myself come this way. He doesn’t have to be part of it.
The only way to start is to start, so I test his grip on my wrist. He releases it to maneuver both hands around my waist. It’s enough freedom to graze my nails down the back of his neck, light light light, and he tips his head back into the touch and groans, his body arcing up into mine.
Be brave.
An electric charge moves between us, hot like lightning, and god, I’m wet, wanting him. My heart flutters and turns and pounds but there’s nothing for it but to hold on, hold on. He puts a hand to the back of my neck and kisses me with bruised ferocity, so hard he draws blood. I push myself into it, into the pain, because this is all I’m going to give him.
For now.
He brushes his fingertip around my hip, and this—this is a dangerous game, because I want him to touch me. I need him to touch me. My clit aches for him and I could cry, I could cry with a heated, foolish longing.
This isn’t that kind of contest.
So I grit my teeth. I’m still caged by him, his hand on the back of my neck, his teeth and tongue as dominant on my mouth as he is everywhere else. But when his hand reaches the front of me I play my only card and press myself flat to the front of his pants, denying him the access he wants.
He pulls me back from him with his fist in my hair, creating a superheated space between us. If his eyes could start fires I would be ash on the wind. Zeus jerks my head back another inch as if to remind me whose house I’m in, whose lap I’m in. As if I could ever forget.
“Sweetheart.” His voice the same dark curl, the same edge as slut. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”
8
Zeus
Her eyes are a complicated green, black holes in the center where her pupils are huge with lust. She’s angry. Needy. She’s red-faced with it, her hair tangled, her pussy a bare inch from my cock. I hate my pants. I hate myself. There’s a distant tremor, like an earthquake drawing closer. “We’re not doing this.”
Fuck, she’s intoxicating. I could listen to her struggle not to beg me to fuck her for days. For years. Unfortunately for me, determination rolls through her gaze like thunderclouds.
I know what she’s determined to do.
I’m proud of her.
That doesn’t make it less uncomfortable, doesn’t take the knives out of my chest any faster.
“We’re not doing what?” To emphasize my point, I pull her hair, and she pinches her lips closed over a moan.
“You’re not going to lie to me.” She fists the front of my shirt and the tension ratchets up until it pulls all my muscles tight. I fucking refuse to let her crawl away from me. She’s not going to do it. And the panting little whore won’t let me touch her. “That’s not what I am.”
“You don’t know what I’m thinking.”
“I do.” Brigit puts a hand on my face and presses the pad of her thumb to the corner of my lip. “When you’re thinking about what a slut I am, this corner turns up. And maybe it’s true.” She grinds her pussy harder into my pants, and it’s torture, it’s torture. I hiss my displeasure but she doesn’t care. “I am this way. For you. Because—” A hard swallow. I want to use her throat. “Because I love you.” She shifts her hand and covers my mouth entirely. “Don’t say a single goddamn thing unless it’s going to be I love you too, Brigit.”
She lets out a breath and drops her he
ad, moving her hips in a slow circle, and perhaps this is the way I finally die.
Brigit takes her hand away and lifts her face into the dusky half-light of the room. “We’re going to start over. Zeus, you cannot leave all those women with your sister.”
I can already feel her wetness soaking through my pants. That’s how hot she is, how ready. Still, the words she wants me to say stick in my throat.
Why?
A pair of huge hands over mine. A throat in my grip, a pale, narrow throat. Those larger hands squeezing until I couldn’t tell who was really in charge of cutting off the air supply, me or him, me or fucking him. Whose fault is it really, if your hands are against the flesh? That was the moment a part of me broke, snapped, shattered. I can’t care about them. I cannot. Because if I care, then the rest of my life is heartache and guilt, so heavy it can break bone.
It happened anyway, whispers Katie in my ear.
A great pressure around my heart. Fuck—it hurts. Like my ribs really are about to give way. Like the musculature holding my organs in place is rupturing. “I’m leaving them.”
Her hand stills on my face. The rockslide tumble at the pit of my gut continues. My foolish cock bucks against my pants and Brigit responds, adding a grazing pressure that will shortly murder me. From a place outside myself I recognize this fucked-up test for what it is, recognize it for what I want, but I can’t make it stop. Not now. It has too much momentum.
For all my fingers are fisted in her hair, I would let her go. I’m the coward. Me.
“I’m leaving you, too.”
Brigit’s eyes flash, an almost unearthly green in the low light. “No more lies, Zeus.”
“It’s the truth. I don’t care about you, I don’t care about them, I’m leaving all of you—”
She slaps me.
I’m out of the chair with a roar, the handprint sting a burn on my cheek. How fucking dare she. I’m going to fuck some sense into her, I’m going to make her understand what she’s trying to do, I’m going to force her—