Of course she did, you silly bitch. He hadn’t begged Aphrodite on his knees to rip his heart out to stop the pain after she’d turned down his suit. What was it that made that goddess so special that she was worth all the pain and sacrifice done in her name? Was it something secret in the way she smiled? The way she laughed? The way she held her thighs closed tight and pretended to be so virtuous her feet never touched dirt when she walked?
Would anything ever belong solely to Hera? A moment that was just theirs, a look he reserved only for her, a certain touch… She wondered if she was naïve to want those things. Zeus had never given her any cause to think she could have them from him or anyone else. Were they only in fairy tales and stories once told to frightened brides on their wedding nights?
She hadn’t noticed his approach, so he startled her when he pulled her to him. He searched her face with an intensity that made her squirm—she wanted to turn away so he didn’t see the need in her soul or the love that burned for him not a flickering beacon in the dark, but a bonfire.
“You’re so beautiful, Hera. It’s like you were made to belong to me.”
Hera wanted to cry out that was the truth of it on his lips. She had been made for him, only for him. The hollow of her throat curved for his lips, the shape of her hip for his hands, her legs to lock around his waist and her heart a great chasm to be filled by all that he was and all he wanted to be.
“I keep wondering why you’re here.”
She forced a smile. Hera wasn’t ready to talk about this—they’d found a comfortable routine, they were together. For a moment, Hera had forgotten she’d assured him what he could give would be enough. She didn’t want to shatter their idyll, not until she had a foundation built to replace it with something better. “I told you why I’m here. To be with you.”
“Why?”
What sort of answer did he expect to that? He was either being purposefully obtuse or he was mocking her. Either way she didn’t like it.
“Why not?” she tossed back, just to be difficult.
“Hera, I saw that look. I’ve known you long enough to know when something makes you unhappy. You just made a face like you were chewing on barbed wire.”
“I’m a female, Hades. You can’t expect me to be happy 24-7.”
“Give me some credit. I know the difference between your expressions of casual displeasure, irritation, and all out misery. That face you made, something is hurting you. Tell me.”
You are. You’re hurting me, Hades, tearing up my insides with that same barbed wire and twisting it around my heart. But it’s not your fault because when you would have let go, I demanded you twist it again for good measure.
As if she’d ever tell him anything of the sort. “Nothing. I’m hungry.”
“You’re not breeding are you?” He sounded scandalized—something out of a Georgette Heyer novel.
“I’m not a horse, Hades. I don’t breed.”
“That’s not an answer.” He looked stricken.
“No, of course not,” she reassured him. “But Nyx is. Maybe I’m having sympathy cravings.” She wanted to ask him if it would be so bad if she was. Hera realized the futility of her thoughts. Hades wouldn’t be a good father without his heart.
“You guys are that close? Is she going to slap me for making you both walk funny?”
“Sorry, sugar. Apollo is the one who made her walk funny. Waddle, to be specific, the poor dear.”
“Isn’t she a little old to be having godlings?”
“Aren’t you a little shitty to be asking?” Hera rushed to Nyx’s defense.
“Probably.” His gaze drifted down to her lips.
“Oh, no! Don’t even start that. At least not until later,” she said as she pulled away from him. “You offered me dinner and you’re not getting out of it.”
“Fine.” Hades sighed as if she’d taken away a favorite sweet.
She rather liked that comparison. Hera could be happy being his favorite indulgence. Contrary to the earlier path of her thoughts that made her scowl as if she’d been forced to lick between a centaur’s hooves.
“You can’t go out like that.”
“Like what?” he looked down at himself. “Oh. Right. 1800’s gentleman wouldn’t go over well at old Red, would it?”
He blinked out of the room and Hera released a breath she didn’t know she’d been holding. She shook her head sharply—like that would rattle out whatever was loose and her brain could go back to working in a way that wouldn’t break her heart.
Hera thought of hearts then, but not of her own—of Hades’ heart sitting alone on the mantle. Her gaze was drawn to the box unwillingly. She didn’t want to look—she wanted to leave things alone and let them be.
Although, this goddess was female to the core, she couldn’t leave well enough alone, not when she knew she could ease the pain of the one she loved. Even if it meant she’d lose him.
She took a few halting steps, afraid he was going to catch her peeking. Hera didn’t know how she’d explain it, but then decided she wouldn’t. If he cared so little about the thing he’d shoved it in a box to rot, then why would he care if she wanted to poke at it? He couldn’t feel it.
Hera drew the box down to her and cradled it against her chest before she peaked inside. She blew warm breath on it again as she had before and more of the soot and ash blew away from the gray mass. In one place, she saw something pink and it had spread.
“Give yourself to my keeping,” she whispered.
It shuddered against the confines of its tomb.
“I swear I’ll treat you tenderly. I know there’s darkness in him and I know Persephone was afraid, but I’m not. The only thing I fear is eternity without him.”
With the next shudder, all of the ash and the gray fell away to reveal something smooth and pink. When it shuddered again, Hera realized it wasn’t a shudder at all, but a beat so loud and strong it echoed through the room.
“Oh, you can’t do that just yet. Hades is going to kill me.” Hera looked around for a panicked moment and wondered where she’d hide her lover’s newly animated heart. She’d have to worry about that when they got back. There was no time.
At her distress, the movement stopped and Hera almost let out a wail of abject despair. It was almost as if it could sense all of her feelings. When it felt warmth from her, it knew it was safe to breathe, to be. When it felt her fear it played dead.
Who knew a man’s heart could be so complicated?
“I love him, you’re safe,” she cooed before she snapped the lid shut.
“What are you doing?” Hades demanded as he appeared.
Fuck.
Well, she wasn’t going to lie, but that didn’t mean she had to give up the ghost either.
“Talking to your heart.”
He cocked his head and looked at her as if she were some strange new kind of beetle he’d found mashed under his boot, with that same clinical detachment. For one horrible moment, she thought he would ask her why.
“Take the damn thing if it amuses you. I’ve got no use for it.”
Hera was torn between soaring on wings of elation that he would give his heart into her keeping and feeling the darkest depth of despair that he had such little care for a part of himself.
“Thank you,” she said simply.
It would be easier to hide the fact it now beat; it didn’t have a regular rhythm, but contrary to his desires, it lived.
Hera would make good on her promise, she’d never let anything cruel touch that tender flesh, she’d hold it dear for all of her days. She vowed it on her goddesshood.
“Can you quit playing with it so we can go?” he grumbled.
She smiled and stepped into his arms to teleport.
“Are you sure you don’t want to stay in?” Hades asked in a suggestive tone and traced his fingertips up the base of her spine.
“Hades, what part of you broke it wasn’t clear?”
He laughed and rather than being a calcula
ted sound to seduce or mock, there was genuine mirth in his tone. “Did I really? You know I’ll have to brag about this one.”
“There’s no one to brag to, oh Prince of Darkness. Every being in Tartarus heard me screaming that last time. I’m actually rather embarrassed.”
“Your pleasure should never embarrass you, sweetheart. Especially when it’s me doing the pleasuring.”
She slapped his arm. “No, Hades. Stop saying pleasure. Or anything coitus related. It hurts.”
His eyes darkened. “Isn’t that what I promised when you came, sweet Hera? That it would hurt? You said you’d take everything I had to give you.”
They’d gone from splashing in the wading pool to the drowning water in an instant. Rather than struggle to stay above the murky depths, Hera let go. Any momentary discomfort she felt would be worth proving to him she was wholly his and more than that, he could trust her promises.
“Yes, I did promise. And I always keep my promises, Hades.” She drew herself up on her tiptoes to close the distance between their lips. “Always,” she repeated before kissing him hard.
“Good,” he said as he relented. “I didn’t want you to get any little girl ideas simply because I gave you a box with a piece of rotten meat inside.”
“Hades, you have such a way with words. I don’t know how any goddess could resist you.” She rolled her eyes.
A loud thump echoed through the room and Hera’s eyes went wide. His heart must not have cared for her sarcasm, or the comment cut him deeper than she’d intended. They were going to have to come to an understanding when she got back. No way was she going to spend eternity mincing words while he got to call the pot and the kettle whatever he wished.
“What was that?”
“Who cares? I’m hungry. Let’s go.” His eyes scanned the room again. “Listen here; if we don’t teleport right now, I’m going to have a full-blown goddess style temper tantrum. Smiting will ensue.”
Hades laughed again. “You’re so cute. Would you hit me with one of your little mini lightning bolts?”
“My lightning bolts are bigger than Zeus’, just so you know.”
“I’m sure they are, my Queen.”
“I like the sound of that. So, later, when I tell you to get on your knees and lick my boot…”
“You don’t have to be Queen of the Gods for that. You want me to lick anything all you have to do is ask.”
Why did she get into these word games with him? He always won. Everything he said or did oozed sex and power. He could wield both sharp as any blade.
“Right now, I want to go somewhere to lick bacon grease off my fingers.” Hera hoped the visual was too icky to encourage any sort of innuendo, but she should have known better.
“Kinky.”
“You’re such a dick.”
“You like my dick.”
“Not right now I don’t.” Hera winced in pain as her battered body protested her arousal.
He laughed again. “I’ll make you a deal. I’ll behave—,”
She snorted.
“I promise, I will. But you have to eat your dinner from my hand. I want you taking those scallops from my fingers. Bacon grease and all,” he said with a smug grin.
The thought of taking her food from his hand caused a tremor to go through her. She was convinced Hades was going to be the death of her before the night was over.
20
HERA
“Hera and Hades, sittin’ in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G,” the gargoyle sang loudly.
“Shut the fuck up, you little troll.” Hera wasn’t about to take any lip off of this creature.
“Not a troll. Gargoyle. Stupid goddess.”
Hera gave it a sly look and then kicked it on her way by. Hard. Too hard for her poor
little toes. She howled and it laughed with malicious glee. “Oh yeah?” She hauled it up over her the shoulder and the stone creature yelped.
“What are you doing?”
“Yeah, Hera. What are you doing?” Hades asked as he entered the room.
“Throwing this smart-mouthed piece of furniture out the window.”
“And what has Peri done to merit such action, may I ask?”
“It has a name? Well, Peri the Penis is mocking me.”
“I see. Would you like me to toss it out the window for you? He looks heavy.”
“Nooo,” it yowled.
“No, indeed. He needs to learn to respect me and he won’t do it if I don’t handle this myself.”
Hades nodded along as if weighing the merits of her argument. “Open the window before you throw him out of it. Getting stained glass down here is a bitch.”
Hera held him high above her head and she wanted to let go. She tried to force her arms to fling him forward and send him hurtling out into the fiery lake beneath the balcony, but she couldn’t do it. She wanted to, oh how she wanted to, but he was a living creature.
She placed him down on the floor next to the balcony door. “I’m not going to do it this time because I think melting would hurt. A lot. So, you get a reprieve. Sing that damn song just once more though and I’ll chuck you out into that lava so fast the knobs on your head will spin. Got me?”
“Yes, Hera.” He made a sullen face. “I was just playing. And you called me a penis.”
“I did and I’ll call you worse if you don’t behave.”
He grumbled and pouted, then went quiet. It didn’t even giver her a nasty look before he closed his eyes and hardened into unreadable stone.
“Look at that. Before you know it, you’ll be propping your feet on him while you read those Lusha Lovelace books.”
“How do you know what I’m reading?”
“I know more than you’d think, Hera,” he promised.
“Is that another innuendo, because I can’t take it, Hades. Not again. I can’t even walk.”
“At the risk of sounding like my brother, you’re a goddess. Why do you need to walk?”
“Oh, because I should be on my back all the time?”
He gave her a wicked grin. “No, because you should have a strong god to carry you wherever you’d like to go.”
“That would only lead to more fucking. I’m out.”
Hades laughed. “You’re delicious, Hera.”
“Stop it,” she pleaded.
“But I like it.” The corner of his mouth curved in the beginning of a mischievous grin.
He sounded so earnest; she wasn’t sure if he was still playing with her or if he’d confessed something important. Gods were like that—unable to speak of softer things unless in jest.
“I guess if you like it, I don’t have a choice.”
“How about we get out of the castle tonight? Dinner?” he offered.
This was the first time he’d suggested they do anything but roll around naked. Not that she was complaining, well, her nether bits were protesting loudly, but Hera had a lot of time to make up for. Somebody could have told her she shouldn’t try to make up for it all at once.
“Can we go to—,”
“Red Lobster?” he supplied. “I don’t know why you’re not sleeping with Poseidon. He could set you up with all the scallops you could ever want.”
“They wouldn’t be bacon-wrapped. You know how I love my bacon.” She shrugged as if that were the only reason she wasn’t interested in the God of the Sea. That and he and Nyx had dated. Even among goddesses there were rules about dating your BFF’s ex.
“Everything is better with bacon.” Hades swatted her on the ass.
Hera gasped and slapped his arm playfully.
She wondered if he’d done these things with Persephone. Hera wished she could stop coming back to that, but every experience she shared with him, she wondered if Persephone had done it first. Or worse, she’d done it better.
Of course she did, you silly bitch. He hadn’t begged Aphrodite on his knees to rip his heart out to stop the pain after she’d turned down his suit. What was it that made that goddess so special that she was wo
rth all the pain and sacrifice done in her name? Was it something secret in the way she smiled? The way she laughed? The way she held her thighs closed tight and pretended to be so virtuous her feet never touched dirt when she walked?
Would anything ever belong solely to Hera? A moment that was just theirs, a look he reserved only for her, a certain touch… She wondered if she was naïve to want those things. Zeus had never given her any cause to think she could have them from him or anyone else. Were they only in fairy tales and stories once told to frightened brides on their wedding nights?
She hadn’t noticed his approach, so he startled her when he pulled her to him. He searched her face with an intensity that made her squirm—she wanted to turn away so he didn’t see the need in her soul or the love that burned for him not a flickering beacon in the dark, but a bonfire.
“You’re so beautiful, Hera. It’s like you were made to belong to me.”
Hera wanted to cry out that was the truth of it on his lips. She had been made for him, only for him. The hollow of her throat curved for his lips, the shape of her hip for his hands, her legs to lock around his waist and her heart a great chasm to be filled by all that he was and all he wanted to be.
“I keep wondering why you’re here.”
She forced a smile. Hera wasn’t ready to talk about this—they’d found a comfortable routine, they were together. For a moment, Hera had forgotten she’d assured him what he could give would be enough. She didn’t want to shatter their idyll, not until she had a foundation built to replace it with something better. “I told you why I’m here. To be with you.”
“Why?”
What sort of answer did he expect to that? He was either being purposefully obtuse or he was mocking her. Either way she didn’t like it.
“Why not?” she tossed back, just to be difficult.
“Hera, I saw that look. I’ve known you long enough to know when something makes you unhappy. You just made a face like you were chewing on barbed wire.”
“I’m a female, Hades. You can’t expect me to be happy 24-7.”
“Give me some credit. I know the difference between your expressions of casual displeasure, irritation, and all out misery. That face you made, something is hurting you. Tell me.”
Ambrosia Lane 1-3: Saranna DeWylde Page 18