“Maximus?” My voice bounces off the high ceilings.
“He’s asleep.”
I whip my stare toward the sound. Small sparks of light crackle off Z’s fingers, illuminating his face in the darkened sitting area. I move farther into the room and switch on a table lamp.
He looks me over with an appreciative gaze.
“My my my. If Maximus saw you in that dress, I’m not sure I could have dragged him away from you.”
I drop onto the couch adjacent to him and fold my arms across my bodice defensively. I’m not in the mood for diplomacy or for his frivolous flattery. “What happened?”
He lifts his brows. “A few things. Some good. Some not so good. And your beloved may have a bit of a headache come morning…”
“What?” I stiffen and jolt, moving to perch on the cushion’s edge. All too quickly, my vision from earlier bombards my brain. If Maximus and Arden really did lock horns…and then trade blows…
“He’s fine,” Z reassures as if reading my mind. “He just had a little more of the devil’s poison than he probably should have. Then again, I wasn’t too far behind him in that department.”
The devil’s poison. I frown. Then his meaning clicks. “He’s…drunk?”
“Very.”
I’m a little annoyed and worried over this news, but my curiosity about the meeting itself wins out. “What good came of the meeting, then?” The next question, what not good came of it, is there too, but I don’t voice it aloud. I trust—and dread—he’ll get there, whether I like it or not.
“Well…the meeting itself, I suppose,” he finally says.
I grip the cushion’s edge to avoid overtly clenching my teeth. “Excuse me?”
“Getting three conceited bastards such as ourselves to sit down and have a conversation without starting a war is always a win.”
Outwardly, I deflate a little. Inwardly, I’m ready to toss the whole coffee table through the window. I truly hope—and damn near pray—there’s more good news than that.
“But what about Maximus and me? What did Hades say…about us?”
Z curls his bottom lip between his teeth, a gesture that makes him look either torn or confused.
“We didn’t get as far with that as I would have liked,” he finally confesses.
I slap my hands on the cushions now. “Are you serious? You didn’t even discuss it?”
“No, we did. But we’re of two minds when it comes to this dilemma, and it will likely take more than one meeting to sway him. Hades… He’s very…”
“What?” I demand when he tries to buy time with the lip-gnashing move again.
He frowns. “He’s very interested in you, I’m afraid. Specifically.”
I push together my own brows. “Which means what? Are you sure?”
“I am. Maximus couldn’t talk about anything else once we left the Labyrinth. After he and Hades spoke in private, he seemed convinced that this is about more than my brother keeping all his subjects in the right place.”
Nothing about his countenance gives me a glimmer of hope. In fact, I’m washed over with fresh dread.
“But you said Maximus was drunk.”
He lifts his brows. “Oh, yes. Definitely.”
“And you still believed him?”
Z shrugs. “Gods are unpredictable. Much like the weather. But if Maximus’s instincts are correct, you being the object of Hades’s fascination… Well, it could be an interesting development.”
My eyes bulge. “Interesting? Nothing about this is interesting, Z. This is terrible and terrifying. My fate is hanging in the balance here, and you’re both out getting drunk!”
I shoot to my feet, enjoying the brief advantage of height over him, which is ridiculous because he’s a god and I’m just wearing stilettos. The inequity between us is staggering, but I’m not deterred. I’m furious to the point of fires igniting in my eyes, enough that I see the little bursts reflecting in his.
“You should be fixing this, damn it, not sitting around drinking and bickering and bantering.”
He sighs and rests his cheek against his propped-up fist. “But Kara, that’s how politics works. If all we did was remove the hindrances and fix our problems without delay, eternity would be so incredibly dull.”
I give in to gnashing my teeth, internally biting on the verbal lashing I want to dole out right now. Because as pissed off as I am, Z is still my best bet. I can afford just about anything I could ever want, but I can’t afford to lose him as a resource right now. I force myself to take a deep breath, a concerted effort to calm my nerves.
“So what now?” I finally bite out. “Another night at the bar?”
“Perhaps. Po and I have had it out, so it’s time to wait. The ball is in Hades’s court. I’ve staked a claim, if you will, and he knows now that there won’t be peace between us if it isn’t settled properly. But it could take time. Try to be patient.”
My breathing is labored, despite all my efforts to calm myself. I’m not patient, and I’m not empathetic whatsoever to his deity boredom. I take a step closer to him. I feel strong, but not from my height now. From the fire roaring inside me.
“If you can’t fix this… If Maximus loses me, he will never forgive you. Never. I hope you realize that.”
He has the decency to look solemn in that moment, and with a small nod, he says, “I know.”
Chapter Fifteen
Maximus
An ox with the flu is tromping through my head. I clutch my stomach, ordering him to back the hell off. That’s before realizing the dumbshit animal is me.
“Fuuuck…”
Never has such a tormented sound erupted from me. It comes hot on the heels of feeling like I’ve licked a summer sidewalk after a fighter jet joyride. I’ve never done either but am sure I don’t want to after this.
And the kids run out of class, excited to do this every weekend at their dorms and frat houses, why?
At least I know where I am and how I got here, which is nothing short of a miracle. After Hades poofed out of Labyrinth last night, I’d finished his bottle of the good stuff, hoping it’d soothe the chaos in my thoughts. Huge mistake—one I acknowledged in that moment but traded for the hope of erasing what had gone down minutes before. To forget, if only for a little while, how it had felt to be the psychological filing cabinet for the greedy demon king.
It hadn’t worked.
Even an hour later, when I’d forgotten my birthday, my address, and damn near my name, every moment of the ordeal haunted me. The protest of my nerve endings. The scream from my blood. The schism of horror, up and down my spine, as he invaded any thought he desired and looked at every vital intimacy…
A new groan erupts from me. This time, it has little to do with my hangover. The pounding at my temples is smothered by the protest march in my heart. The roil of my gut has nothing on the bile in my throat.
The symptoms only worsen when I realize Kara isn’t sleeping next to me. She isn’t in the room at all. And the air in the spacious hillside house…
Too damn still.
“Shit.” I vault out of bed. The downy sheets tangle around my legs, hindered even more by my jeans-clad legs, but I finally leave them behind and sprint for the door. I don’t skip a beat before hauling it open.
As light blasts my eyes, I throw a hand over my face and snarl. Just as quickly, I lower my hand. It’s only sunlight. The full, midmorning version of the stuff. And in the middle of that white-gold blast from the heavens is an angel—in the form of my gorgeous demon sitting on the couch.
The new air in my lungs is warm and welcome, especially as she lifts a curious gaze toward me. She’s beyond beautiful. Her casual little dress, with its short hem and suspender-style bodice, is a shade between red and purple. She’s still barefoot, meaning I get the chance to appreciate her sparkly gold toe polish, as well.
Headache or not, I want to run over and flatten her into those cushions—in all the torrid senses of the phrase. Kara flares h
er gaze, obviously picking up the force of my craving. But she only gets two seconds’ worth before other thoughts rush to the surface.
“Hi.” Her tone is cooler than I’m expecting.
“Hi.” I scrape my hand through my hair, gripping it at my nape before adding, “You’re here.”
Kara drops her brows. “Where else would I be?”
“You’re right,” I concede. “I just thought—well, I was afraid that…”
“What?”
I drop my hand, thrumming it a few times against my thigh. It’s better than continuing to stand here, suppressing my immediate answer. It’s one thing to be dealing with a new strain of terror courtesy of Hades. It’s another to add all that anxiety onto Kara’s plate.
Though to some degree, it looks like I already did.
“Maximus?” She sets aside her laptop and the textbook from which she’s working. “Talk to me, please. What’s going on? What happened last night?”
I lean against the wall, resigned to the pointlessness of offering lame excuses for my apprehension. She already knows it’s gut-deep and real. From there, she can—and probably has—skipped to its correlation to last night. She deserves to know it all, but only after I straighten it all out enough to talk about it.
“Poseidon… Po… He was there too. He told me some things I’d never known. He and Z also had some time to hash things out.”
“Z told me that.”
I push off the wall, giving away my surprise. “When?”
“Last night. He was here when I got back from the premiere. You’d already passed out.”
I give my head a small, fast shake. Why did my father stick around after the ordeal at Labyrinth? I won’t waste time considering any noble motives. He isn’t exactly a nighttime story and lullaby kind of guy, though I remember him walking me into the bedroom, making me drink some water, and watching me collapse into bed. “You talked?”
“Yes.”
I nod. “How did the event go?” I try to make it sincere and conversational. Not easy when all I want to know is one thing. Was Arden there? If so, did he dare put his hands on her? “Who was there?”
Kara scoots to her feet and folds her arms. “Uh-uh, Professor. No side hustles on the main subject. Your evening fun report is far more vital than mine.”
It sucks to concede how right she is. As strongly as I want her to climb back into the dress with the innocent color and the sexy neckline and then reenact her red carpet game just for me, what happened at Labyrinth can’t just be washed out to sea.
“Well, what did Z tell you?”
She twists her lips. “Not enough.”
“But he said some things.” I persist. “Like what?”
A sharp huff tumbles from her. “Isn’t this the part you’re supposed to be filling in? Or did you get so obliterated that you really don’t remember?”
I pivot hard, tilting my head. “Is that what you think? That I finally got a chance to meet with the people deciding our fate, and I hit the sauce first?”
She looks away, uncomfortable. She drums her fingers against her elbows.
“Kara. Look at me.” Thankfully, she does. “I was coherent for every second of what went down with Hades.”
Her shoulders sag. Her eyes are tender. “I believe you.”
I release a big breath. “Thank you.”
“So what did happen?”
Her plea is so desperate, it edges on a sob. My gut responds by contorting into a new pretzel. I don’t even try to loosen the mangle of my heart. But if I want to salvage either of them—and save the life of the woman I’m brutally in love with—I’ve got to start putting my head to work again. Which means I have to hit her with my next miserable words.
“I can’t talk about it yet. I’m sorry.”
I don’t blame her for flinging up a hand, blocking my sincere approach.
“Kara. I have to get some distance from it, okay?” To wrap my head around how to tell her that the king of hell has now seen her naked. And aroused. And…more.
And that I let it all happen.
“To put it together properly, I have to pull it apart first.”
She lifts her head, showing me the smoke in her eyes. As always, she’s as magnificent in her indignation as her passion, and for a moment, I’m stunned into silence. But then I remember that this memory might not always be mine alone. That one day, maybe even soon, Hades will be back to “borrow” it for a few minutes.
No.
Just. Fucking. No.
I’ve got to get some answers about this. And right now, there’s only one person I know to get them from.
The determination becomes motivation. I push closer to Kara, relieved when she stands and lets me pull her in and nestle her close. “Thank you for understanding,” I murmur into her adorable top knot, which still smells like a whole salon’s worth of pricey products.
“Who says I understand?” she mutters into the dip at the center of my chest. “I trust you, though,” she goes on, wrapping her arms all the way around my waist. “So grab some coffee and get to work on…whatever you have to do. Patience isn’t exactly my strongest virtue.”
I drop my head down as she pops hers up. Our lips meet in a sweet but sizzling kiss. It’s over all too soon. “Ah, but you have so many other virtues that are better.”
She smirks. “Says the demigod who took the obvious one?”
“A gift I treasure every day,” I whisper.
She presses a kiss directly over my heart. “For that, Mr. Kane, I’ll even get your coffee for you.”
“Oh, baby.” I sniff her lingering curls again. “I’d seriously love to take you up on that and more. But I was thinking I would head over to Recto Verso. I can grab a coffee there.”
She flashes a new frown. “Do you need to grab something from your place for tonight? Mom had your suit and shoes delivered straight from the tailor. And the Gold Circle Dinner is at the Huntington Gardens, out in Pasadena. You’d be going way out of the way.”
“No. I’m good for tonight.” I gently kiss her forehead. “Thank Veronica for me. She’s been generous in handling all that stuff.” For once, I’m actually grateful for it too. I now have time to do something more important than worrying about looking the part. “I have to go to Recto Verso.”
“Okay.” Confusion knits her brow again, though she doesn’t press for details this time. Not a shock, considering how my turmoil is probably hitting her like a wall of bricks. Soothing her is out of the question, though. If I comfort her, I’ll want to do more. And more will have to wait until I get a handle on the possible depths of Hades’s mental fuckery over me.
To do that, I’ve got to get a better handle on who I really am. I’m pitifully lost about the answer, which even Z couldn’t supply after a few hours in a buzzed haze. All I got was a sheepish admission that, despite siring a staggering number of half-breeds, he’s never taken much of an interest in demigod biology. The only factor he can confirm is Hades’s inability to perform his nifty memory-harvesting thing on any full-blood deity.
While that revelation has me relieved for Z and Po, I’m back at a lot of square ones in my own bizarre journey. Is Hades capable of wreaking more kinds of cerebral chaos on my gray matter? If so, what’s his play now? How far does the demon’s spite go when Po’s lies are added into the equation? How much flesh does he plan on taking out of my hide for Kara’s offenses? Or Z’s? Mistakes during years I don’t even remember?
Right now, there’s only one person I know who might have any of that information. The former Olympus security guard who’s serving coffee in downtown LA right now.
I get to Recto Verso as the morning crowd is starting to thin. In the seating areas, there’s only a small book club and a few students in Alameda sweatshirts. Outside, the air is edged with the salt from the new onshore flow. Inside, the rich caffeine scents are tinged with pumpkin and caramel.
As I hope—and in more than a few ways, dread—Regina is front and center be
hind the counter. Her braids are piled atop her head, intermixed with a long red scarf that compliments her faded T-shirt.
“Good day, superstar.” She bids me to sit by thwacking a towel toward one of the stools at the counter.
I opt for standing, but that’s not an alarm-dinger for her. I stand at the counter a lot.
“So sorry. If I’d known you were coming ’round, I would’ve ordered up the paps for a nice warm welcome.”
I give her a half snort for that, more out of habit than anything else. It hits me then, a brand-new epiphany. Habits. How many do I have with her? Too many to track. So many that don’t feel ingrained from that first day we met in the store. They’ve felt strangely…older. Easier. Like my whole relationship with Reg. An odd deja-vu I’ve always sensed but never questioned, figuring I owe the universe some gratitude for a friend who’s always been so easy and knows me so well.
But now what do I feel? Knowing she’s been part of the grand cover-up? Knowing she was the one who set it in motion?
To keep me safe.
From what? Or, if Po is to be believed, from whom?
I know so much more now—only to realize I know so little.
“’Course, you’ve probably had your fill of flashbulbs after last night,” Reg goes on. “Though Sarah grumbled for the better part of the morning, looking for pictures of you at the premiere. Where were you? Ducking and hiding? Looked like a grand affair. We found plenty of shots of your pretty girl and her fam—” She cuts herself short after looking at me again. This time, really looking. “Ohh. You weren’t even there, were you?”
I shoot her a dark look while taking a sip of the brew she’s poured for me. “That’s not exactly an awful thing.”
“Says your mouth. But the rest of your face is giving me a different line, Maximus Kane.”
I push away the coffee. My one sip sours in my stomach. “Imagine that.”
She tosses down her cleaning rag and impales me with her full attention. “What happened? Did you two fight?”
“No.”
“Then was it Veronica’s meddling?”
Heart of Fire Page 14