Greed: Goddess of Delphi (Goddesses of Delphi Book 3)

by Gemma Brocato

  Oh, Hades. Was the cranky man’s inattention to her nudge an omen that she was next in the supernatural challenge to save humanity?

  Foam dripped down the side of the cold glass while she hesitated. It had been two weeks since the last challenge in the battle the Muses fought against Pierus and his daughters. At stake was control of Olympus Enterprises, Lia’s family’s corporation, and the Muses’ birthright.

  For a brief moment, she considered broadcasting a telepathic message to her eight sisters, to find out if anyone had seen one of the evil god’s magpie daughters. But it was too soon. The last three challenges had at least a month between closing one out and starting the next battle for mortal safety. Polly had defeated Greed most recently. And like Nia and Clio’s challenges before hers, it had been a close call. Of the six Muses remaining, not one of them wanted to be next in meeting what could be an apocalyptic event. And every single one prayed her challenger would be Sloth.

  Long ago, Lia’s father, Zeus, had transformed Pierus’s wretched daughters into disgusting birds. Over the millennia, Pierus had challenged them, but they’d always won. This time was different. Pierus had enlisted silent partners in his hostile takeover attempt. This time, it wasn’t just the Muses’ lives as immortals at risk. Zeus’s life was at stake as well. And if one of Lia’s sisters lost, they all forfeited their immortality. Facing eternity in magpie form would suck monkey balls.

  The world would be a forlorn, awful place without the music, art, and intellectually advanced life the Muses represented. Pierus’s girls only stood for tyranny, greed and other evils of the world. Letting them loose boded ill for mortals.

  Mr. Grumpy looked up and arched a brow her direction, breaking her free from her musing. When she hurried toward him, he bent his head to look at his phone once again.

  She laid a napkin on the thick granite bar top, sprinkled a little salt over it, and then deposited his glass in front of him. “Here you go. Can I ask you a question?”

  With the phone still clutched in his hand, he lifted his gaze. “As long as it isn’t What’s your sign? What a bunch of hooey. Seriously, does being a Sagittarius really make me jovial and fun loving?”

  Certainly not in his case. Talk about a skeptic. That word alone sent a pang of discomfort through her. She plucked a fry from the plate, dipped it in the puddle of salted ketchup and munched as she thought.

  One of Pierus’s conditions was that they had to team up with a man who didn’t believe in magic. Recently, she’d begun to look at all new men she met as potential partners for the task ahead of her.

  She answered his question. “Not at all. He had wings and a tail. Nothing fun in that.” She and her sisters had played with Crotus in a long ago lifetime. The Satyr, otherwise known as the star sign for December, had been a fun playmate. And oh, that star boy could kiss. Lia found her gaze dipping to the frown on Mr. Grumpy’s lips, idly wondering if he had similar talent.

  Except his lips were curled in…revulsion?...as he watched her chew. She covered her mouth with a hand and swallowed hard.

  Laughter erupted from the people scattered throughout the room, including the table where his friends sat.

  “Ben, you’re missing the show. Come on, buddy. Stop working and live a little.” The man addressing him lifted a nearly empty pitcher of beer, signaling for another.

  The man named Ben lifted his shoulders and muttered, “He’s going to miss his beer when it’s gone.”

  Lia strained forward as he spoke, only able to actually hear him thanks to her super powerful immortal auditory senses.

  Frowning at him, Lia called to her bartender. “Celeste, can you get table eight another pitcher?”

  The woman pulled a clean pitcher from a high shelf and set about filling it.

  Lia dipped her chin and slanted a look up at good old Gloomy Gus before her. “That’s the second time you’ve intimated beer is about to become a thing of the past. What’s up with that?”

  “Alternaria blight.” Goddess, that frown seemed a permanent fixture, his dark brows creating an angry slash over icy eyes.

  She bit back a laugh. “Alter-whatsit? Am I supposed to know what that means?”

  “Downfall of most botanists. We think everyone knows about crop issues.” The man’s tight grimace did little to ease the stormy line of his brow. “It’s a fungus on hops, which, as you know, is a key ingredient in beer.”

  “The best beers are hoppy.” She gestured to his still full glass, a brand that practically detonated the sharp bittersweet flavor in the drinker’s mouth.

  “Unfortunately, due to the widespread nature of the blight, it’s going to be tough for you to find good hoppy beers in the next year. Or years.” He tapped rapidly over the keypad of his phone. He pointed at her plate of potatoes. “There’s a potato blight as well. Which is fine, because that shit is bad for you.”

  “Hey, I like my fries. Don’t go hating on them.”

  “Really not going to matter, once potato crops start failing.”

  That tidbit boded ill for her business. She did own a comedy club that served adult beverages and pub food, including deep fried spuds. “Okay, buster. If you deliver bad news like that, you ought to at least tell me your name.”

  “Bennett Jordan. Ben.”

  “Thalia Thanos. My friends call me Lia. My employees call me bitch.” She laughed. “But only behind my back.”

  Finally, a moody chuckle from the preoccupied man. The husky sound shimmied up her ribcage and lodged at the base of her throat. And that smile? It looked rusty, but oh Lordy, it was a work of art framed in that square jaw.

  He scrubbed his hand over his head, causing silvery strands to wink in the intense, focused overhead light. The rest of the club, except for the stage, had minimal lighting, and was dim just over his shoulder.

  Now that she’d had a chance to interact with him, she realized he wasn’t as old as she’d initially thought. Maybe in his upper thirties. Which in her mind made him dead sexy. Throughout the thousands of years she’d existed, in each new lifetime, she’d always been attracted to mature men, much to her mother’s dismay.

  “Can’t really see you being a bitch. Your employees must be temperamental.”

  “Lia,” Stewart called from halfway down the bar. He lifted his empty glass.

  She did a quick mental count. This would be his second old-fashion, but two ounces of rye whiskey was still two ounces. And this would make four.

  “Excuse me a minute,” she said as she moved away from Ben. “Stewart, who’s your designated driver tonight? And you better not say Jeremy. I’ve served him three screwdrivers tonight.”

  “Aw, come on, Lia. Just want to have a little fun.” The man’s tone stroked close to wheedling. He waggled his blond brows and opened his lovely baby blues, making puppy eyes at her.

  Suppressing a laugh, Lia held up her hand, palm flat, and waited, saying nothing. Eventually, after a couple of moments of bellyaching, Stew dug in his deep pants pocket and pulled out a rabbit’s foot ring with a passel of clanking keys attached.

  He dropped the ratty mess into her hand with a grimace. “Now can I have a drink? And will you call me a cab?”

  “Yes, and you’re a cab,” Lia quipped, gratified when she got the expected groan. She lightly tossed the keys with a grin. “Oh, you meant later. Call you a cab, later.”

  Stewart made small talk while Lia dropped a sugar cube into the glass, then wet it with Bitters, and a shot of club soda. She muddled the cube mixture with a wooden tool. His grin lit up as she swirled the glass to coat the inside. She added several ice cubes, and the whiskey. He took his first sip on the way back to his table.

  Lia rinsed the muddler, dropped in its proper place in a canister filled with bar tools, and then moved back toward Ben.

  He had his face buried back in his phone as she approached.

  “Good Lord, man! You are at a comedy club. Pay attention to Paul’s routine. It’s funny.” She playfully reached out to snatch the pho
ne from his fingers.

  He blocked her hand with his then closed his fingers around her arm.

  The moment he completed the circle of his hand around the thin bones in her wrist, her world dimmed, then burst into stark black and white images that typically accompanied the foresight she’d been gifted for this lifetime.

  They were sitting in a theater. With one arm slung over her shoulder, he had her hand pressed to his lips, kissing each fingertip. His eyes glowed like blue flame as he held her gaze. Emotion traveled up her body, igniting a tiny spark buried within her into a blazing inferno. Even his body heat was palpable in the premonition. On the screen before her, a movie played, the sound curiously muted. A dense black mass seethed over a mountain peak.

  The camera zoomed in and the image resolved into a swarm of giant black and white birds. She pressed against the back of her chair as birds darted toward the camera. She screamed when a small flock erupted through the screen flying like projectiles from the stage to the balcony where they sat. They swirled around her and Ben, pecking at her face and chest. A scream reverberated around her brain. Ben held her arms as she flailed them to keep the birds from tangling in her curly hair.

  Her arm jerked in its socket, pulling her out of the vision. The black and white images faded to be replaced by Ben’s concerned blue eyes.

  “Hey, are you okay?” His hands rested on her shoulders, the warmth seeping into her chest.

  She heaved a deep breath, and then another before she answered. “No...yeah, I’m fine.” Oh, goddess, she was so far from fine it wasn’t funny.

  “You seemed to get lost for a minute.” His hands fell to the top of the bar as she scooted backward.

  Hesitant laugher sounded around them, followed by squawking from the stage.

  Lia spun toward the bird-like sounds to discover her comedian flapping his arms like wings and racing around the stage. He sped down the steps to the main floor. His erratic swooping and diving movements among the audience drew startled gasps. He knocked into empty chairs and banged into tables, spilling drinks.

  Stewart stood and threw his arms around the comic just as the man passed the regular’s table. Stew rocked under the force of the impact, but maintained his footing, and held onto the young comedian. The younger man fell within Stew’s arms, and then emitted a horrendous screech that scraped Lia’s eardrums with supernatural fingernails.

  Ben had shoved to his feet, his barstool knocked to the ground with a loud bang. His glance at Lia reflected his confusion.

  Lia stood momentarily frozen in place as Stew and Jeremy lowered the unconscious comic to the ground. The guy’s features blanked, leaving him looking as though he was sound asleep.

  From one of the spotlights over the stage, a black and white feather floated to the wooden planks below.

  Lia clutched her fingers together to hide her trembles. As she moved toward the comic’s prone body, she broadcasted a nudge to her sisters. Her message was simple and to the point.

  “It’s started again.”

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  About the Author

  Gemma's favorite desk accessories for many years were a circular wooden token, better known as a 'round tuit,' and a slip of paper from a fortune cookie proclaiming her a lover of words; some day she'd write a book. All it took was a transfer to the United Kingdom, the lovely English springtime, and a huge dose of homesickness to write her first novel. Once it was completed and sent off with a kiss, even the rejections addressed to 'Dear Author' were gratifying.

  After returning to America, she spent a number of years as a copywriter, dedicating her skills to making insurance and the agents who sell them sound sexy. Eventually, her full-time job as a writer interfered with her desire to be a writer full-time and she left the world of financial products behind to pursue an avocation as a romance author.

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  @GemmaBrocato

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