Sage wasn't done with her absurd questioning. "Hey, didn't Persephone raise you?"
He dropped his head back on the couch and groaned in irritation. "No. I never lived with Persephone, and before you ask it, she never entered a competition with Aphrodite to win my attentions. She was already married to Hades by the time I was in a relationship with Aphrodite. She and I never met."
Sage dropped onto the couch cushion next to him, propped her elbow up on the back, and stared at him with a look of enthralled interest. "What was Aphrodite like? Was she, like, the most beautiful woman you've ever seen? I know the myth about you dying had to be false if you're here." She gasped. "Did you fake your own death to escape her sexy demands? Was she too dominant?"
He did not want to talk about Aphrodite. He stood up and headed into the kitchen to find something to eat. Opening the cupboard, he realized…with Hermes not visiting like he used to, he didn't have much to offer. A couple cans of soup, some peas, a box of taco stuff…but he didn't have any meat or veggies or even cheese for those. Without working electricity, any cold items had to be cooked immediately when he got them. He picked up a half-eaten box of cookies he was sure had expired four months ago and tossed it back in.
Fuck, this whole situation was embarrassing, and he wished he could melt into the floor and die there. On the plus side, Sage had finally stopped talking. How did someone talk so much?
Adonis put both hands on the counter and hung his head. He didn't know what to do. The right thing was to let her go. Sage obviously saw him more as an amusement than anything, and she'd grow bored once she finally accepted that he couldn't be with her like a man should. Yet, the fear of losing control of himself if the curse drove him mad with lust made it impossible to do the right thing. Neither situation ended well for him, but he'd choose hurting one woman's feelings over doing something he couldn't undo. Maybe he was Hades-ing her…just not for the reason she believed.
As the door opened and closed, he jumped and spun around. What the hell? Adonis rushed into the living room. The clothes he'd given her to sleep in were folded neatly on the arm of the couch and Sage was gone. So was her bag. "Shit!"
By the time he reached the door and opened it, lust hit him like a wrecking ball. Doubling over, he realized he'd taken his night of relief for granted, like he took everything for granted. Why couldn't he be the man everyone expected him to be: perfect. The paragon. The handsome man all mortals wished they could be, wished they could fuck.
The truth was so different. Everyone loathed him, and not out of jealousy. He wasn't a good person. He'd been selfish, greedy, and arrogant. He deserved his curses. Deep down, he'd always known. "Sage?" he bit out as he buckled over on the decrepit porch.
She didn't answer. How had she gotten so far from him already? He wasn't sure how far she even had to go for the curse to return.
When he lifted his head to search for her, he caught sight of her purple hair and black dress as she ran through the mud across the field and disappeared into the trees.
Seeing her for that brief moment, with her out of range of whatever Pan did, ignited his blood like fire. Everything he should have felt when seeing her in that circle of candles the night before burned through his veins. He was hard now like he had wanted to be then. Only the sensation became amplified by the fact he'd waited too long to appease the satyr curse.
Tears pricked his eyes. It wasn't fair. She was his salvation, and he couldn't have it. Everything he wanted was within his grasp, all for nothing.
What a fucking joke.
Clearly, Sage had outstayed her welcome. She could catch a hint.
Okay… Sometimes she could catch a hint. When Adonis had stepped through the trees and she saw him for the first time… She shivered at the memory. His eyes had been so intense. Wild, bright blue even by candlelight. His long blond hair gave him a sense of savagery when paired with those ebony horns. Sage had wanted to jump his bones right then and there—and then he'd gotten mad at her because he was having some supernatural performance problems.
Didn't it happen to all guys eventually? Well, not the cursed by a god part, but the trouble getting it up? It was a perfectly normal thing.
Unlike horns and hooves. And satyrs and nymphs.
She still couldn't believe she was a nymph. Thinking herself a witch seemed easier somehow, but she would concede to the satyr's assessment and assume he knew what he was talking about, even if he was a surly old man trapped in a young man's gorgeous and flawless body.
Old as dirt, and she still wanted to jump his bones. It wasn't fair. And now, as he obviously had zero interest in her, she wouldn't stay a moment longer.
Since the ground was soggy, Sage decided to run across the squishy, wet terrain between the field and house. She never should have stayed the night. Had she really tried to seduce a satyr? Repeatedly… Somehow, as he'd continued to reject her, the totality of her actions started to become clearer. What was she doing? She was as good as harassing him, and she was better than that. Not to mention, his living circumstances seemed shady.
Was it even his house, or was he squatting? She supposed if she were a satyr, she might squat in vacant houses too. Sounded like a legit thing for a satyr to do though. Hide. Wait for naked women to appear in the woods.
Oh, wait. Until that backfired and got neither of them anywhere.
This is so lame.
Not to mention, she still found herself horribly attracted to him even when he snapped at her like a cantankerous old grizzly, and now she was muddy.
As she reached the tree line, she almost tripped when Adonis shouted her name. Why even bother going after her if he didn't want her? He didn't want to talk about the gods, he didn't want to make her his nymph-bride, he didn't want her to help with his curse—which she'd be completely down for because it sounded sexy as shit being, like, the one to break a centuries-old curse. So why keep her around if he didn't want that?
Sage wasn't the smartest girl in the world, she owned up to that, but she could tell when someone hid something from her. Adonis needed her for a reason, but he didn't want to tell her the whole truth about it. That concerned her. Honesty was everything. So, she had waited for him to turn his back, changed into her dress, grabbed her things and split.
"Sage!" Adonis yelled again. He sounded…hurt? She almost stopped and turned around, but it would do her no good. She couldn't be empathetic to him or she wouldn't leave. Her curiosity about him and his plight were far too alluring.
Never should have stayed.
Fumbling in her bag for her keys, her flip flop got stuck in the mud and she landed on her hands and knees in a puddle. Her bag fell off her shoulder and dropped directly into water.
"My phone!" Her panic eased slightly as she remembered this bag was waterproof. Allegedly. Hopefully…
"Sage?" He was closer now.
She tried to get up and slipped again, falling on her backside. Her shoe had come completely off and was lost to the mud. The traitor. Well, this will be embarrassing.
"Where are you—are you okay?" Maybe the pain in his voice from before had been in her head. She didn't detect it now. Faux concern, perhaps.
"I'm fine."
Far too much humor colored his tone as he stated, "You don't look it."
Sage preferred it when she was the one needling him. "Leave me alone."
Adonis stepped into the puddle and leaned over her. His looming form served only to make her current predicament more mortifying. She was a sexual creature from myth and lore, and she was having her ass handed to her by a puddle. Good thing she wasn't a water nymph, or this would be plain sad.
"What are you—" He scooped her up as she made a mad grab for her bag, barely getting a good grip on it. "Ack! Put me down!"
He chuckled, grating her nerves. "I thought you wanted me to touch you?"
Ugh! Was he seriously going to taunt her now? He ran hot and cold faster than anyone she'd ever met. "Not when I'm all muddy and gross. I need a shower,
and I lost my shoe."
"Weren't you just bathing?" he teased and she didn't know how to take it.
"You know what I meant."
"You're in luck since I have running water." He ignored her annoyance as he bent to grab her flip flop and then proceeded to carry her out of the puddle, and she repositioned her bag to rest on her chest. Seriously though, why the change in demeanor? What had her trying to leave stirred up? "It'll be cold, unfortunately. But, to be honest, you could probably use it." His grin didn't help matters.
Oh, hell no. He was enjoying her dilemma far too much. "Put me down. Now."
"We're going to talk, for real this time. No more aggravating each other for kicks."
Of course he wanted to talk when he had the upper hand. Typical man. "We tried that, and every topic I brought up you didn't want to discuss."
He met her gaze and paused before exiting the woods. A car engine filled the silence as someone drove by. Once it passed, Adonis stepped out into the field. "With good reason. Aphrodite broke my heart because I became a satyr, and I handled it atrociously. To be fair, our relationship was rocky even before that. She was my everything, and I was nothing but a plaything to her. I don't like reliving it. I was never some important person. The mythology, which gets as much wrong as it gets right sometimes, was meant to antagonize me. It worked."
Yikes. There'd been enough rumors about her in school that she kind of knew how he felt. Being a ginger, she couldn't begin to count on even two hands how many times she was teased for being soulless or treated as less pretty than the blonde girls. People, in general, were terrible. "I'm sorry. That must have sucked."
He nodded, returning to his more serious demeanor. "Still does." Though it was at her expense this time, she hoped to see more of the playful side of him.
The rest of the hike across the field remained silent. Once inside, he finally set her down, but her annoyance with him had faded. Sage couldn't imagine living a life the way he painted his. "So, why not let me go? I don't understand. You said you can't break the one curse because of the other, which is confusing on its own…"
Adonis sighed heavily and slid his hands in his pockets. They were standing there on his porch, covered in mud and dripping water. "Because I fucked up my choices. As punishment, I was cursed to never be able to desire a nymph that might want to help me. Because of my hubris or whatever."
"Ah, yes…gods punishing people for the very thing most of them had in droves themselves." Mythology hadn't gotten the shaming of excessive pride wrong, at least.
He cracked a slight smile. "But it had an unexpected side effect."
"E.D.?"
"What?" He blinked, his smile fading.
"Erectile disfunction?" Trust the gods to have mystical variant of something so mundanely human. "You know they make a pill for that, right?"
He scowled. "I do not have erectile dysfunction."
"You can't get it up, so…"
His eyes narrowed dangerously. "It's not like that. At all."
"Oh?" She crossed her arms and cocked a hip. "Tell me how it is then. Since I clearly don't understand how not being able to go erect for a woman works."
A tic formed in his jaw. "Satyrs have to have sex often. Once a month is usually a stretch, but some can go slightly longer."
Sage struggled not to roll her eyes. If her high school boyfriends could have gotten away with that line, they wouldn't have needed the one about how their balls would shrivel or whatever if they didn't take the edge off. "Okay. Go on."
"If we don't, we are driven to blind lust. Because satyrs are the physical manifestation of male lasciviousness, we're beasts more than men." He handed her the muddy flip flop and opened the door. "We should get inside before another car comes by."
Sage wanted to protest, but she couldn't. It was getting chilly in the morning breeze, and she wanted to clean the dirt off her anyway before getting into her car. She stepped into the front room, and he closed the door behind them. "So what happens if you don't have sex?" Still sounded like a line, but he was a satyr…and even the depictions of his kind showcased their lustful natures. She didn't doubt it was true, though it sounded hokey as hell.
"We take what we find. No control."
She froze. Cursed to have sex didn't sound terrible to her, being given a beastly appearance less so. But this… Definitely a curse one sought to have broken. "Have you raped someone before?"
He blanched and his gaze darted away from her. "No."
His physical reaction said otherwise, and a knot formed in the pit of her stomach. "You're either lying or hiding something." If he was a rapist, she was leaving. End of story. Perhaps his punishment was well earned after all. To think she'd been egging him on, wishing he would have sex with her. Bile sat sour in the back of her throat, ready to be expelled.
"I came close once, okay." His eyes glistened as his tone turned angrier, as though he struggled with emotion he wasn't comfortable with sharing. Furious with his own past. "I wasn't strong enough to resist outside influences that used my self-loathing and anger and this damned curse and my own bad decisions against me. And then suddenly I was there. Lily was there. And I… And I… Gods, I barely snapped out of it before doing something I'd never forgive myself for."
What a terrible existence. She barely restrained herself from reaching out to him, to try to hug him. Despite all he could have done, she never could stand watching a person in pain suffer.
He balled his hands into fists, but it wasn't fast enough to hide their shaking. A single tear escaped, and he turned from her, probably hoping she hadn't caught sight of it. Men were so stubborn about their emotions. They really were.
Sage would be lying if she wasn't relieved he had serious regret over something he'd almost done. But…hadn't. Allegedly. There was every chance he was lying about stopping himself. How could she ever really know?
Her gut instinct told her to believe him, and her gut hadn't led her astray before.
Adonis exhaled slowly and continued, "You see, Pan was angry about what I did even if I didn't go through with it, so he made sure I couldn't break my curse. I can't be with you—now or on the night of the Satyr Moon—because it's my punishment. Not E.D. When you're around me, my body doesn't feel desire. Physical desire. Do you understand?" He faced her again. "Three thousand years of being in an almost constant state of arousal, gone." He snapped his fingers. "Just…gone."
While her mind comprehended that it wasn't her specifically causing his problems, but the nature of what she was, it still stung. Having an attractive man telling her to her face he can get hard for everyone but her… Yeah, that was a blow to her ego though it wasn't her fault. Or his. Even when she had mixed emotions about him right now. About the past that led to his being cursed—twice. She didn't think anything could make her feel worse or more confused.
"Until you reached the other side of the field."
What the actual hell? Understanding dawned on her, and she swallowed back the bile. So now she knew why he didn't want her to leave. He wasn't so much upset he couldn't get aroused by her. No, he wanted to continue not being aroused, and she provided that loophole for him. Had even told her as much but she hadn't caught on to what he'd implied.
Forget the cold shower he'd promised to cool down her libido; that revelation did the trick for her all on its own. At least, in his own weird way, his need to prevent himself from becoming a lust-crazed monster gave her assurance that he wasn't lying about nearly losing control with this Lily person. Someone who had gone past the point of no return might feel guilty, but a monster never stopped at one.
Adonis didn't want her—he wanted the control over his body she gave him.
7
Downtown Savannah hustled and bustled with locals on their way to work and tourists stopping in the middle of the sidewalks to take pictures of the monuments and the horse-drawn carriages strolling through the squares. Many of the shop windows were decorated for Halloween with spooky cobwebs and cut-outs
of cartoonish ghouls. When night fell, numerous ghost tours would trek through the squares, some on foot, others by trolly or hearse. As one of the most haunted cities in America, Halloween had plenty to offer the city.
Jacen stopped to browse a display window on Broughton Street and smiled. A handbag shaped like a bundle of hardback books rested amongst other specialty bags and wallets. London loved to read, so she'd adore such a purse. Without further thought on the issue, he stepped into the shop and bought it. He couldn't wait to see her face when he gave it to her. Nothing brought him more pleasure than seeing his girl smile.
Well, he could think of a few other things…but they all involved her smiling by the end of them. It still counted.
With his errands done and a spontaneous present acquired, Jacen needed to get back to The Aegean Inn. He had planned to spend the afternoon with Melancton, searching for Theron, but they hadn't finished mapping out where they would start. As the lights changed, he stepped off the curb to follow a crowd of tourists crossing the street, and his cell phone rang. A quick look at the screen made his heart leap into this throat. He accepted the call from Pan.
"What's the news?" Jacen said, afraid to hope. He turned onto Bull Street, and in the opposite direction from the inn. If there was bad news, he needed to walk it off or he would break. "Is it going to be possible?"
"I know how much this means to you. If we can't get confirmation before this Satyr Moon, it's not like there won't be others."
He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Only a nymph could break the satyr curse, and Pan had changed a mortal into a nymph successfully before. Problem was…Pan didn't know how he'd managed it, and she may have been coming into her powers the first time for all they knew. They had a theory that only women who had nymphs in their bloodline could be awakened, so to speak. "The Fates still won't meet with you?"
"My grandfather caught wind of what I was doing and forbade them." The annoyance in Pan's voice was palpable. "I have my syrinx, and Dionysus is dead. I don't understand why he's so tight-fisted about what we're doing or not doing still. Hell, Apollo is even out of the picture for a while. The only loose ends that risk exposure are Theron and his buddies…maybe Cyprian and his taste of stardom."
All Hallows' Satyr (The Cursed Satyroi Book 5) Page 6