Abstinence wondered how long that could be considered abstaining and if she were cheating Fate. She knew no matter what she thought she was getting away with now, if she were cheating, it would come and take a big bite out of her ass sooner or later.
Truthfully, she hoped she was doing the right thing. Abstinence loved the taste of food, but she wouldn’t make herself ill for it. So far, there’d been no repercussions, but that didn’t necessarily mean anything. Part of her said she should abstain from ingesting food completely, but he loved to cook and she loved to eat.
It was probably a good thing she’d gotten this gig or she’d be a million pounds and they’d have to roll her out of her house. Or cut out a wall. She licked her lips in anticipation as he dropped the noodles into the boiling pot. Her favorite part of the lasagna was actually the cheese. The more cheese the better. Actually, if there wasn’t enough cheese to stop an elephant’s heart, she didn’t want any. The same with pizza. She especially loved the hard, crusty bits of cheese that crisped on the edges. Yeah, that was nowhere near abstaining because she could eat that stuff with a steam shovel instead of a fork.
Zeus poured another glass of wine and handed this one to her. “So, have you thought any more about what I said?”
Not this again. “We’ve been over this before. Let’s not ruin a nice evening, okay? I like spending this time with you, but if you’re going to pressure me, I don’t think we can see each other,” Abstinence snapped. She knew it had been too good to be true, he would never leave it alone. For self-preservation, Abstinence was going to have to break her promise to him. Every time he asked her, she was a little bit closer to breaking. He almost had her convinced she wouldn’t die. He could sell a litter box to a dog.
“Abi, this isn’t about sex.”
“Everything with you is about sex.” She looked at him pointedly.
“I have stayed on my own side of the kitchen all night. Not to mention slaving like a dog over this meal for you.”
“If it’s not to be mentioned, why mention it?” She raised a brow.
“You argue more than Hera ever did. I don’t know why I’m even interested.” Zeus tested the noodles and finding them ready, laid them out in the pan.
“I don’t either.” Abstinence shrugged.
“I just want to fall asleep with you in my arms. Why does that make me the bad guy?” he asked in a sincere tone.
“Stop it!” she cried.
“Stop what?” He seemed genuinely confused.
“This. Acting like you care. That you want something more from me than what you’ve been told you can’t have.” Tears gathered in her eyes, but she’d be damned if she’d cry.
“Abi,” he said quietly and leaned across the island to tilt her face up to his. “I don’t want to hurt you. I want to be with you in whatever ways are allowed to us. I wouldn’t trade all of this for the momentary relief for my cock.”
“Why not? You wouldn’t have thought twice about doing it to Hera and you were married to her for eons. Me? I’m just a new piece of ass on the Lane.” Abstinence knew her words were harsh, but she had to either get through to him, or make him leave. “Don’t try to say you have feelings for me, because even if you do, this can never work between us. You have to eat and I won’t tolerate infidelity. Shitty of me, I know, when I can’t fill that need. But that’s just how I feel.”
“I don’t simply have feelings for you. I love you.”
“You’re cruel.” The tears slipped down her cheeks one at a time, even they were not to be indulged in.
He moved around the island and took her into his arms. “Don’t cry. Please don’t cry.”
She pushed him away. “Don’t touch me softly, or say these things to me. I almost believe you and we both know how this will end.”
“I won’t deny there are some challenges, Abi.”
“My name is Merry.”
“Merry,” he tested it on his tongue and smiled. “You know you love me too. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have tried to teach me those lessons.”
“You read too much into me doing my job.” She turned away from him, from his warmth and the promise of his embrace. It was all she could ever have and he was offering it to her for the taking. Such pretty lies and poison promises.
“I still felt your desire for me even when I was fat, selfish, and disgusting.”
“Because I desire your body doesn’t mean I want you as a man.” She hated how he brought her dirty secrets to light. Abstinence would rather he didn’t know these things, let alone speak of them.
“Good thing too, I’m a god. Not a man.”
“You’re a sex junkie.”
“I am,” he admitted as he stepped closer to her and ghosted his fingertips down the side of her cheek. “But I don’t want my hit from any other goddess.”
“And how long will that last, if I agree? A few pretty days and then I’ll cave, I’ll ask you to make love to me, because I’ll believe everything you say. But you won’t make love to me, you’ll fuck me and that will be end of both us and me.”
Zeus sagged against her with sorrow. “What do I have to do to earn your trust? Give me your gift, Abstinence. Not the one between your thighs, but the kiss of your power again on my brow.”
She spun to face him and found herself in his arms, just as she’d feared. They were so strong, so sure and the earnest need in his eyes made her want to believe anything he said to her. His wicked tongue painted pictures of her deepest desires and then told her they were within reach.
He descended as if he were going to kiss her, her eyes fluttered closed and Abstinence knew fear, but she couldn’t stop this now if she tried. But moments passed and the deadly brush of his mouth on hers never came. She opened her eyes and his lips were only the breath of a secret away from hers.
Electric lust shot through her and she twined her arms around his neck. His touch at her waist burned through her shirt and scalded her skin. His irises darkened as he sensed her lust and it fed him. The intimacy of the energy exchange was like dumping gasoline on an open flame.
“This is enough for me. I don’t need anything else but what’s in this space of breath between us. Do you feel it? Can you taste it, Merry?”
Hearing her name, her true name, from his lips was like a forbidden caress. Everything he said, everything he did, it was as if it had all been designed to make her lust. Perhaps it had been a survival tool given to the god at inception.
“This is what I need. Will you give it freely?” he asked her.
She could almost taste the wine on his lips and she wanted him to kiss her now more than she wanted anything else. Even her next breath. Abstinence thought of her sister and her children and the selfish part of her thought that maybe, just maybe, her sister had had enough of the bounty of the universe. Why should it always be Merry who sacrifices? She rose up on tiptoe to close that space, but Zeus retreated as far as she advanced. He held her still.
“No, I won’t let you do that. Not until you believe what I feel for you is real.”
“Why? I know you didn’t simply wake up a new god having learned your lesson.”
“Why not?” His golden brows arched in consternation.
“It doesn’t work that way.”
“Maybe with mortals it doesn’t.”
“With anyone.” Even though she knew better, she still wanted to believe him.
“There was a goddess who cared enough about me to open my eyes to the kind of god I was. I didn’t like what I saw when I looked at myself, but I admired what I saw when I looked at you.”
“And wanted to have it for your own. You already told me you were trying to get between my bony thighs,” she drawled.
“It isn’t even about that anymore, Merry. I saw your willing sacrifice for those you love, the uphill battle you had with me, but caved not because you didn’t want to do it, but because you thought maybe it would do me more harm than good. Maybe it would have, but it would have been better for you. But you d
idn’t see it that way. You’re like no one I’ve ever met before.”
“Only because you’ve never cared to really know the people around you. Look at your brother. He’s noble and good, but you don’t see it.”
“I do see it. Now, because you showed me. You make me a better god, Merry. And I find that when you look at me, there’s a light in your eyes I’ve never seen from another. I’d do anything to keep that light shining there. Anything. Even deny myself what I want.”
“Are you capable of denying us both for my own good?” Her lips parted in anticipation.
“Yes. I can do anything to keep you safe.”
“You say that now. But what about in a hundred years when you’ve not had intercourse with anything but your hand? Can you really live eternity that way without hating me?” The look of horror on his face told her everything she needed to know. “See, you can’t. And I understand.”
“I love you. I’ll wait to be with you, but if you think in a hundred years you won’t believe it by then, maybe that light I thought I saw in your eyes, that belief I felt you had in me for the god I could be, maybe I was mistaken.”
He was saying all of the right things, but she was so afraid. Afraid to really let herself love him, to let herself believe in him and the strength of her power. Abstaining had taught him so much already, unless he was only spewing a line, but his sincerity was sharp like a knife.
Zeus let go of her and finished laying out the lasagna in the pan and shoved it in the oven. She was struck by the mundane nature of the task, but it seemed to be laden with sorrow somehow.
Merry—for she was Merry now and not her office—she hated the pain on his face. She wanted to soothe him, to ease his burden.
“You know, if you cook while having high emotions, the food will taste of them. Nothing I ever made when I was upset ever tasted worth a damn.”
He pursed his lips. “It will be fine. Leave it in for an hour. I left more mozzarella and parmesan in the fridge to put on top when it’s done.”
Zeus walked away.
Wait, what the hell? Where was he going? Was he leaving? She’d gotten exactly what she wanted. He was leaving her alone. She knew by the way he’d spoken he wouldn’t be back.
The thought of never seeing him in her kitchen again, never laughing with him, or sighing with him over Buffy reruns, or any of the other things they’d come to do together left her with a great, empty chasm in her heart.
She loved the way he held her hand, the way his proximity warmed her to the core and even the way she yearned for him when she knew she couldn’t have him. He was leaving and he’d never come back. It was best that she let all of those things be lost to places darker than memory.
And at last, when it was all said and done, she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t say goodbye.
Merry darted to the door and it was already halfway closed. “Stay!”
For one horrible moment, she didn’t think he’d hear her, or if he did, he didn’t care. His hand was still on the outside of the doorknob. This was the only time he’d ever used the damn door. “Please.”
The door creaked open and Zeus stood in the doorway, his presence filling the entryway. “You don’t want me, Merry.”
“I do!” she cried and reached for him.
He pulled out of her grasp. “No, you don’t. Not like you need to for this to work. You don’t trust me and it’s not that I mind earning your trust. I’ve promised I would, it’s that you won’t let me. You speak in terms of hundreds of years. If you don’t trust someone after that long, you never will and that’s not fair to either of us. I know I’m a work in progress. As much as it galls me to say it, I’ve realized I’m not perfect. But if you can’t love me the way I love you…” He shrugged and turned to go.
“I’m afraid,” she blurted.
“Who isn’t? This love shit is scary. I’ve never told anyone I loved them before. Not even Hera when I asked her to be my wife.” He stepped down the stairs. He was still leaving!
“You can stay the night.”
“Not good enough.”
“You said I taught you things. Maybe you can teach me too,” Merry said desperately.
Zeus turned and came back just inside the door. “I’m listening.”
“I’m willing to learn to trust you.” The words fell off her tongue like lead weights, but after she said them, she wasn’t so afraid.
“That’s all I was asking for. I know I don’t deserve it yet. I hurt you, caused you harm. I don’t expect to be immediately forgiven. Only that it’s possible.”
It seemed Zeus really had learned some sort of lesson, if all of this were real. His words were so pretty, but could it be something that would sustain them? Merry realized then that she didn’t need that answer right now and to demand it wasn’t fair because it wasn’t something either of them could answer. They’d have to jump off that mountain ledge together. He’d jumped already and was tugging on her ankle, but she refused to let go of the rope. That’s why it was called “falling in love”. One had to let go and fall.
She’d been tripped and pushed, but maybe it would be okay to enjoy the view on the way down. Then she let go with both hands. “I love you.”
Merry kissed him with all of the passion she had in her heart.
While later, she’d say she got a little dizzy, it was from the shared intensity of their kiss and not because she was about to die. Although, the lasagna burned and took half her kitchen with it, but they were too busy kissing to notice.
* * *
PERSEPHONE
PERSEPHONE WAS COLD. She couldn’t get warm. Thanatos had plied her with warm fig cakes and wrapped her in down blankets—he’d lit a blaze in the fireplace and given her hot cocoa. Her hands were shaking too violently to hold the mug.
But none of those things offered the heat she craved. She wanted Thanatos to hold her.
She’d always heard Death was cold, his fingers clammy and kiss frigid and sharp like an icicle dagger. But he was none of those things. His flesh ignited hers with his heat, his hands strong and warm, and his kiss—Sweet Elysium, his kiss was like nothing else she’d ever experienced.
Part of her said this was wrong; she wasn’t the only one vulnerable. He was too because he’d made the mistake of loving her. Persephone knew she wasn’t worthy of him. She was selfish and vain; she and Hades had been a good match. He’d seen what he’d wanted and he’d taken it, kidnapping her and keeping her from the topside… Yet, somehow, he’d grown. He’d changed.
Then there was the part of her that had only now matured and she ached with the need to be touched. Persephone could see the way Thanatos looked at her, the way his eyes were drawn to the plunging neckline of her Grecian gown, the swells of her breasts as she breathed. He wanted to touch her as badly as she wanted to be touched.
“Still cold, Seph?” He tossed more wood into the fireplace and the flames leapt high.
The way the orange firelight played over his ethereal features entranced her. Almost as if he wasn’t Death at all, but the Dawn. And maybe he was. The Dawn was the beginning of things emerging out of the dark.
“I can’t get warm. I suppose it’s my just desserts for freezing all of Olympus with my emotional vomit.” She gave an uncomfortable laugh and shivered.
“You were upset. It was a reasonable reaction. It’s not like you killed anyone.” Thanatos grinned.
“Thank you,” she blurted.
“For what?”
“For everything? For coming when I called you.” She bit her lip hesitantly. “For caring about me.”
“Seph,” he began.
“For asking Hades to take me because you’d rather see me with him than dead of a foolish broken heart. For being patient with me even when what I’ve done hurts you. For treating me like a goddess instead of a porcelain doll. Everything, Thanatos.”
“That’s what friends are for.”
It sounded as if it had almost killed him to repeat those words to her and
oddly enough, it hit her the same way. She didn’t like it. “I think we’ve already crossed the friend line, haven’t we? Eros is my friend, my very best friend and he’s never had his face in my nether bits.” She blushed.
“That’s because two virgins don’t know what goes where,” he teased.
Her face flushed a brighter crimson. “No.”
“Well, why hasn’t he then?” Thanatos smirked.
“He doesn’t make me feel the way you do,” she confessed and Persephone felt the tension in the room like a lead weight.
“And how do I make you feel that’s so different?” He took off his trench coat and hung it carefully over the back of the chair.
Persephone liked to watch him move, the way the light played on his skin and the sheer grace with which his hard muscles all worked together. She liked the outline of his biceps in his t-shirt, the planes of his broad shoulders and the curve of his back. Persephone loved how his hair looked like moonlight—it was exactly like his mother’s, but there was nothing feminine about it on him.
He sat down and tugged off his boots. “You don’t know or you don’t want to tell me?”
“What? Oh.” She’d been utterly distracted simply watching him. “I’m embarrassed to tell you.”
“Persephone,” he said and made it a point to look at her. “After a god has been ears deep in your nether bits as you’ve described them, and you’ve ridden his face like a pony, nothing should ever be a taboo discussion between you. If you don’t want to tell me, it’s okay.”
Persephone blushed so hard she thought her face was going to explode. Memories of that night came flooding back to her and she licked her lips as desire flooded her. Her gaze was immediately drawn to his mouth and all of the delicious things it could do to her. She realized she was staring and the long moment that was all the heavier for the silence. She took a shaky breath, as if something so banal could ever wipe out the flame of white-hot desire for him. But she had to say this, lust or no, embarrassed or no. He deserved to hear it.
Ambrosia Lane 1-3: Saranna DeWylde Page 24