A Taste of Greek (Out of Olympus #3)

by Folsom, Tina

  “Penny, you’ve come back,” Sophia answered, her face impassive.

  How much did Sophia know? Did she know anything about the theft? Or had Hermes not told her?

  Penny forced a smile. “I’m so sorry to disturb so early in the morning, but I’ve come to talk to Hermes. Is he here?”

  Sophia nodded. “Come with me.”

  Penny followed her in the direction of the kitchen, but before she even reached it Hermes already came toward her.

  “H-h-hi,” she stuttered when he stopped in front of her.

  Hermes stared at her, an unreadable expression on his face. “Penny.” His one-word greeting was a low husky whisper and it sank deep into her chest.

  The sound of more footsteps disturbed the quiet in the house, and two men appeared behind Hermes. One she’d met before: Triton. The other one, a man with short dark hair and just as handsome as Triton and Hermes, she’d not been introduced to, even though she’d seen him at the party that night.

  “Well, if that’s not our little thief!” Triton acknowledged her, his eyes drilling into her.

  Penny cringed. Shit! They all suspected her, and rightly so. But to hear somebody else say it, to hear them call her by the name she deserved nevertheless hurt. Thief, how she’d always hated that word.

  “Let me handle this,” Hermes snapped at his friend without taking his eyes off her. “Recognize this?” He dropped his lids, looking down to his hands.

  She followed his gaze as he raised one hand. Shock made her gasp for air.

  In his palm, he held one of the winged sandals. Undamaged, unblemished, the wings fully intact.

  “I take that as a yes,” he said calmly.

  Seconds ticked by. Penny swallowed hard, her palms becoming damp, her heart racing, her mind searching for how to say this, for how to get the words past her lips, the words she needed to say.

  “I’m the one who stole them from you.” She looked into his eyes. “I’m so sorry.”

  21

  A feeling akin to relief swept through Hermes. Penny had come to him and confessed. At least this meant she wasn’t bad through and through. There was some good in her. How much remained to be seen.

  “So it wouldn’t surprise you if I said that I found this in the safe in your office, would it?”

  “No, it wouldn’t.”

  “Then where is the other one?” Hermes forced himself to ask. “The other sandal. Where is it?”

  Her gaze swung back to the sandal in his hand, then her mouth dropped open. “You only have the one. The one from my safe.”

  “Yes, that’s what I just told you. This was in your safe!”

  “You didn’t steal the other one back?”

  “No! If I had the other one, I wouldn’t be standing here, asking you where it is.” Impatience crept up his spine.

  She closed her eyes shut for an instant, as if trying to wish away the truth before her. When she opened them again, she looked straight at him, regret and shame colliding in them. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know where the other one is.”

  Hermes’ heart stopped. “What?” Hadn’t she just admitted that she’d stolen his sandals? “Damn it, Penny! Don’t feed me bullshit! We’ve already established that this sandal was in your safe. We both know how it got there! So cut the crap and tell me what you did with the second sandal!”

  Penny dropped her lids. “It disappeared. I swear.”

  “Disappeared?” Eros cut in. “How the fuck can it just disappear from the safe?”

  Penny jolted at Eros’s words, her eyes snapping to him. “It was never in the safe to begin with. I only put one sandal in it. The other one . . . ” She paused, hesitating.

  Hermes took hold of her chin, capturing it between his thumb and forefinger, and forced her to look at him. “Who has the other one?” Did she have an accomplice?

  “I don’t know. I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry?” Eros spat. “Sorry! Do you have any idea about the damage you’ve done? The trouble you’ve caused?”

  Hermes turned to the love god. “Shut it, Eros. I said I’d take care of it.” Then he turned to Penny. “Tell me who put you up to this. Who’s your accomplice?”

  “My accomplice?” Disbelief spread in her eyes. “I have no accomplice.”

  Disappointed that this meant Penny had planned this all by herself, that nobody had put her up to it, he dropped his hand to his side.

  “Did you plan this right from the beginning? From the moment you walked into Vivian’s coffee shop and saw me?” Had she known about the sandals all along and sought him out? And what an easy mark he’d been, walking right into her honeyed trap.

  “No!” she protested vehemently. “I didn’t plan anything. I just . . . it just happened. I didn’t know what I was doing.”

  Didn’t she? “Did you sleep with me just so you could steal my sandals?” The gods help him if she had. Because there was no greater fury than that of a god used in such a fashion by the woman he wanted. Yes, wanted. Because he still wanted her, and right now he despised himself for his weakness.

  “No! How could you even think that?”

  The hurt look in her eyes gave him pause. Was she telling the truth? “Then why? Why did you sleep with me?” Why was he asking this when the question he should be asking was, where his second sandal was?

  Color rose to her cheeks and spread over her entire face faster than he’d ever seen a person blush. Embarrassed, she looked away, avoiding not only his gaze, but also the scrutiny of his friends. Clearly, the reason for sleeping with him had nothing to do with his sandals. His heart made a skip and a jump at the revelation. She’d slept with him because she liked him. It shouldn’t matter to him, but it did.

  “Then why, if you didn’t plan this?”

  “I woke up and . . . I’d noticed the sandals before. I just wanted to get a closer look at them. They were so unusual. So much like the sandals worn by the Greek god Hermes. I couldn’t figure out why . . . why you would have sandals made to look like those of a god. And then when I discovered that the wings seemed to be made of gold . . . ” She shook her head as if she still couldn’t believe what she’d seen.

  Hermes ventured a guess at what had happened. After all, he knew that she took care of her grandmother whose medical care had to cost a fortune. Maybe she’d simply been desperate. “Did you think you could melt them down? Make some money?”

  “No!” she blurted. “Hermes, I’m so sorry. It was spontaneous and stupid. I was just curious. I was going to bring them back. I just wanted to take a look under the microscope in my office. I was going to bring them back immediately, but I spent more time in my office than I thought. They were such amazing replicas. I couldn’t stop looking at them. When I saw what time it was already—”

  “I just need to know where the other sandal is,” he interrupted, not sure what to believe anymore. Had it really only been scholarly curiosity that had her take them? Had she truly wanted to return the sandals?

  “I don’t know. I swear. I took one sandal to a lab in the university to get it carbon-dated. I called in a favor from my friend Irene, and she came in yesterday.”

  “Carbon-dated? Why on earth?” he interrupted again.

  “I just wanted to know whether they could be real. But Irene hasn’t completed the test yet.”

  Hermes sighed, but before he could say anything else, Eros opened his mouth. “As if they could be carbon-dated so easily. Those sandals aren’t from this world.”

  “Shut it, Eros!” Hermes hissed, but it was too late.

  “What do you mean by not from this world?” Penny’s gaze bounced between him and Eros, a million questions in her face. “They’re obviously made of leather and gold.” She gestured toward the sandal in Hermes’ hand.

  “Don’t mind him. Finish your story,” Hermes gritted.

  Then suddenly, a flash of realization flitted over Penny’s face. She pointed to Eros. “His name is Eros?” She stared at all of them with suspicion in her eyes. �
�How many more friends with Greek god names do you have?”

  “Never mind that,” he ground out. “You were telling me about your friend Irene doing the test. What happened?”

  Penny tore her gaze away from his fellow gods. “Irene put the shoe back into the room where she keeps all specimen and went home. She was going to return the sandal to me this morning, but when she came in, the sandal was gone.”

  “Gone?” he echoed.

  “Yes, just vanished.”

  “Who would have taken it? Irene herself? Maybe she saw the value in it and took it for herself.”

  “Never! She’s not the type.”

  Hermes couldn’t help but let out a huff. “The type? I never thought you’d be the type to steal from me either. Guess what: people deceive people.”

  Penny shook her head. “She would never do that.”

  “We’ll see about that. Who else knew about the sandals?”

  “Nobody. I told nobody but Irene.” She stood in front of him, wringing her hands. “Please, let me make it up to you. You have one sandal back. I will have another sandal commissioned. I don’t care if I have to empty out my bank account, I will do anything to make this right.”

  “You can’t make this right, Penny.”

  “I can. Please let me try. I’ll replace the missing sandal.”

  Hermes shook his head. “The sandals are irreplaceable.”

  “Where did you get them? We can go back . . . ”

  “That’s just it. We can’t go back.” He was silent for a moment, his eyes focused on hers. Could he make her understand what she’d really done? The chaos she’d caused? It would mean revealing who he really was.

  Before he could make a decision, Eros slammed his palm against the wall. “We’re all stuck here on earth now. Without the second sandal we can never go back to Mt. Olympus again. And none of the gods currently on Olympus can teleport anywhere. They can’t perform their duties. The only way to fix this is to find the second sandal.”

  “Eros! I told you to shut up!” Hermes yelled, glaring at him.

  “Mt. Olympus?” Penny squeaked, her eyes widening.

  “You and your loose lips!” he said to Eros, then turned back to Penny. For a moment he considered wiping her memory of the last few moments so she would never remember Eros’s words, but then he decided otherwise.

  “I’m a god, Penny. The Greek god Hermes, and without my sandals I can’t do my job. None of the gods can. Chaos on heaven and earth is about to ensue and the blame for it all will rest squarely on your shoulders. Your name will go down in history as the woman who brought down heaven and earth for all eternity.”

  She stared at him, her eyes large as saucers, her mouth gaping open. “A god? You can’t really believe you’re a god, can you?” She looked at him as if he’d gone crazy, her hand reaching behind her as if she was preparing to back away from him.

  “I’m a god, and so are my two friends here.” He turned and pointed to them. “Meet Eros, the god of love, and Triton, the god of seafarers and sailors.”

  The two nodded at her.

  “Absolutely crazy,” she muttered to herself. “Completely wacko. No, this is not true. You’re crazy!”

  “It’s the truth,” Hermes insisted.

  Most mortals wouldn’t believe it if he told them that he was a god. So what if she thought he was crazy? In fact, Sophia had thought the same of Triton when he’d first told her he was a god. She’d started believing when he’d demonstrated his godly powers. But without Hermes’ powers of flying and teleporting it was kind of hard to prove to Penny right now that he was indeed a god.

  “That can’t be,” she continued while shaking her head from side to side.

  Hermes sighed. “All that matters right now is getting that sandal back as soon as possible. And we’re going to start with that friend of yours, Irene.”

  “Irene? But I told you she would never do that.”

  “You mean steal from a friend?”

  She blinked, then dropped her lids. “I’m sorry.” She edged backwards.

  Hermes clasped his free hand over her upper arm. “Oh, you’re not going anywhere, my sweet little thief!” No, she wouldn’t leave his side for quite a while. Not until this entire fiasco was dealt with, and even then . . . Well, later he’d think about how to punish her for wreaking havoc among the gods.

  “What are you gonna do to me?”

  Was that fear that shone from her eyes now?

  He leaned closer, bringing his mouth to hover only inches over hers. “First I’m going to make you help me find my second sandal, and then—” He made a dramatic pause. “Then I’m going to dole out your punishment.”

  What that punishment would consist of he wasn’t entirely sure yet.

  22

  Penny pressed the gas pedal down and felt the car accelerate. She tried to concentrate on the mid-morning traffic in the city, but Hermes, sitting in the passenger seat, made mincemeat of her efforts. Had he really said he was a god and wanted to punish her? Yes, there was nothing wrong with her ears, which meant that there was clearly something wrong with Hermes.

  How could she not have seen this coming? She’d heard of cases like these before: where some mentally ill person got totally sucked into his own make-belief world that he couldn’t distinguish reality from fantasy anymore. Only, she’d never heard of somebody who’d actually thought he was a god. Megalomania, yes that was what they called it. But were megalomaniacs dangerous? Would he go so far as to hurt her?

  She cast him a sideways glance. Hermes appeared calm, but what if it was all a façade? It was best to treat him with kid gloves, best to go along with anything he demanded and find that damned second sandal. And once they had it back, she had to hightail it out of there. Maybe once he had his little prop back—because that was all it could be, a prop for his elaborate fantasy—he might be appeased.

  Would it hurt to find out more about this strange fantasy he was living in? Curiosity made her ask, “So when you’re not in Charleston, where do you live as a god?”

  He turned his head to her, arching an eyebrow. “So you believe me?”

  Penny swallowed, sweat building on her forehead. “Uh . . . ”

  “Well of course you don’t; why would you?” he said and looked out the side window. “Sophia didn’t believe Triton at first either. Thought he was mentally ill. A lunatic.” He turned to her again and grinned. “Is that what you think of me? That I’m a lunatic?”

  Her palms felt damp and she clamped them tighter around the steering wheel. Was this a trap? Would he lash out at her once she admitted that this was exactly what she thought of him?

  “No, of course not. I mean, everything fits, right? Your name, the sandals, the names of your friends. You guys talking about teleporting to Olympus.” She didn’t meet his eyes, staring straight at the traffic instead, hoping that he couldn’t tell that she didn’t believe him.

  “You’re a terrible liar, Penny.”

  His hand slipped onto her thigh, making her heart stop and her body jolt at the contact.

  “Does it disgust you to be touched by me, now that you think I’m crazy?” His hand moved higher up her leg, sliding ever so slightly along the inside of her thigh. “The night before last, you liked my touch. You enjoyed what we did. I remember distinctly how you surrendered to my hands, my lips—”

  He slipped his hand between her legs, pressing his fingers against her sex, making her release a startled cry.

  “—my cock. When I was inside you, by the gods, it felt like heaven.”

  Her throat went dry at the same time as liquid heat shot to her sex. “Please . . . ” She had to make him stop. She couldn’t go down this road again.

  “Please, what? More?” He leaned closer, his voice dropping to a seductive whisper, his hand pressing against her mound. Even through her light summer dress, he found her clit with unerring precision.

  “Stop! Please!” she begged, almost panting. “I’ll get your sandal bac
k, I swear. Please don’t . . . ”

  “Touch you?” he finished her sentence, a smile evident in his voice, almost as if he was toying with her.

  Maybe he was.

  “Fine,” he suddenly agreed and lifted his hand from her. “But this is not over.”

  Relieved, Penny pulled into her assigned parking spot at the university and killed the engine. “We’re here.”

  As they made their way to Irene’s lab, Penny filled her lungs with air. At least in the large hallways of the university building, she could breathe without feeling Hermes’ overpowering heat and masculine scent all around her.

  “This way,” she instructed and turned onto the corridor where the lab was located. She pointed to the entrance door and opened it without knocking.

  Hermes followed her inside, and she heard the door snap in behind them. There was a small reception area with a counter, then several glass doors on the other side of it. They led into various rooms of the laboratory, each outfitted with different highly sophisticated-looking scientific equipment.

  Penny rang the small bell on the counter to attract somebody’s attention. A side door opened and Irene entered, dressed in her white lab coat, a clipboard in her hand. Irene looked straight at her, approaching instantly.

  “Hey, Penny,” she said, her voice not as cheerful as she normally sounded, clearly still upset about the theft.

  Penny could only hope that Hermes wouldn’t be unpleasant to her and upset her even further. “Hi, Irene,” she started. “I’m sorry to have to bother you again, but my friend here, he wanted to talk to you. You know, about the sandal. It was his.”

  Regret flitted over Irene’s face, and she reached her hand out to Hermes. “Hi, I’m Irene. I’m so sorry. I really don’t know what to say. We’ve never had a theft like that here. Nobody has ever stolen anything that valuable from my lab.”

  Penny noticed how Hermes narrowed his eyes, shaking Irene’s hand. “But there have been thefts. Is that what you’re saying?”

  Irene shifted uncomfortably. “Well, I wouldn’t call them thefts.”

  “What then?” Hermes insisted.