Page 30 of Guided by the Stars
Her insult should upset me, but a grin unravels on my face and I dispel the vines with a flick of my wrist. “Come into my perfectly adequate-sized hut.”
Her eyes were watching my movements and she saw the vines disappear back into the ground. Pure amazement shines through her eyes, even though she tries to keep it hidden. Not for the first time, I wonder what her gifts will be. Her bloodline has lain dormant for centuries, but we all felt the tremble that shook our domains when they came to life.
Jax takes her inside, his hand on the small of her back, and I wish I could touch her like that. There’s a part of me that longs for the easy camaraderie she has with Jax, even though I know it’ll make things harder. For me and for her.
When I follow them inside, Jax is handing her a plastic container. “I grabbed what you had in your room,” he says to her.
“You took my things?” she asks and takes the water bottle from Jax, placing it between her legs, and starts opening the container.
“Well, I didn’t think you’d be comfortable naked and starved, though we wouldn’t mind the first one,” Jax replies with a wink, digging further into the bag.
The sweet-tart scent hits me right away. I lunge toward her, slapping the container from her hand. Pomegranate seeds go flying across the floor.
“What the fuck?” she shouts. “Am I to starve then, your asshole-ness?”
I glare at her before turning the full force of it on Jax. He noticed the scent too, it’s distinct and nauseates us both. “I didn’t know, I’m sorry, I just grabbed things. Here,” he says, tossing a granola bar to Adriane, but I catch it instead.
I grow a tree in the middle of the hut and shiny red apples hang from its branches. “You can have something fresh,” I say, plucking an apple from the tree and holding it out to her.
Instead of taking the apple, she raises an eyebrow and scoffs. “I know how Hades trapped your mother here and there’s no goddamn way I’m falling for that bullshit.”
My fists clench, and the apple explodes in my palm. “That fucking bitch isn’t my mother and you won’t call her that again. Trapping humans isn’t my style, the company I keep is with me by choice and not some fucking scheme.”
“That’s why you only have one companion,” she mumbles, eyeing the granola bar still in my other hand.
I shake the pieces of fruit from my fingers and grab another apple. “As long as you only eat in private with either Jax or myself around, you’ll be fine. This is for your benefit, and if you’re as smart as you think you are, you’ll shut up and eat.”
She takes the apple from me, her eyes still wary as they pass between Jax and me. He’s nodding and smiling at her, offering her reassurance until she takes a small bite and then another.
“Are you the devil and I’m the innocent Eve?” she asks, taking a huge bite from the apple. Juice runs down her chin and I watch its progress, wishing I could follow it with my tongue. I step toward her and she backs up against the wooden wall of the hut. I prefer the lust in her eyes, even though I can tell she’s trying to fight it, trying to gain leverage with her sexuality.
My fingers trace the length of her arms and as much as I want to deny the feelings, I can’t. It’s as if she’s replaced my blood with hellfire, lighting me up from the inside. Goosebumps appear on her flesh, her eyes hooded despite her effort to hide how I affect her. I lean one arm against the wall above her head, crowding her. “Not quite, Red. I can play the devil, but you’re nowhere near innocent.”
Her eyes flash as I back away, anger replacing desire. “You’re the one who took me, asshole. I didn’t fucking ask you to bring me here,” she says and throws the apple at me.
By the gods, this girl is feisty. If she knew how much it turned me on, I wonder if she’d continue. With quick reflexes, I catch the apple, and her eyes widen a fraction at my speed. “How about we don’t run tonight? You never know when your knight in shining armor won’t be around,” I say and take a bite of the apple.
She flips me off again and lays down on the soft patch of grass I made for her. “You’re more of an asshole in dark armor,” she says, shivering.
Jax shakes his head at our bickering and moves closer to her, taking his shirt off to place beneath her head. She eyes his muscles and tattoos and a shot of possessiveness runs through me.
For once, I decide not to say anything. This girl is already captivating me, and I’m heading into a dark place that I can’t afford to be in, but I’m terrified to leave. Both our lives depend on me giving her to Hades. She might think this is a fate worse than death, but I know firsthand what happens to those who defy the gods. Whatever he wants with her can’t be worse than spending eternity in the depths of Tartarus.
Her exhaustion takes hold and before long she’s asleep, dreams not yet plaguing her. I know I should get some sleep, anything to gain a bit of energy back. Who knows how long Hades will play his games, laughing at us as we go in circles and drain our energy. But I motion for Jax to follow me outside the hut and we sit on the ground.
I wish there were stars here, anything to gaze at beyond the bleak darkness. I’m so fucked. My mind spirals down a destructive path as I realize I may not get my freedom after all. Will Hades stick to his end of the bargain if I’m short a human? Will he loosen the reins on me, even just a little? And when he finds out that Alexius took the otherone, well, shit will hit the proverbial fan. He hates him even more than I do.
Golden boy Alexius. That smug little prick on Mount Olympus and his piece of shit father fuel my rage. As much as Hades might fuck me over, at least he owns it. He wears his darkness like a badge of honor, on display for all to see. But not Alexius or his father. No, they put on a show, pretending to be perfect, infallible. I see through their glamor at what they truly are; just as dark and destructive as the rest of us.
“We can still fix things,” Jax says, watching me. “My visions failed us again, I wish I could get a better grasp on them.”
“Nah, man. It’s not your fault. It’s just…I was so fucking close I could taste it. And as fucked up as it sounds, I wanted my fathers approval. To finally show him I could do something right, to be more than just his whipping boy or the entertainment for him and his bitch of a wife,” I say, grinding my teeth together as a memory sparks. Persephone caring for me, taking me to Earth to watch the seasons change, playing with me in her garden. Then...her look of horror and disgust when my abilities showed, her hatred of them and me. The punishments came, tattoos to mark their disapproval on me or being starved of nectar. But as I got bigger, so would the beatings. I eventually took matters into my own hands, tattooing over the scars they inflicted as my own personal ‘fuck you’.
The disgusted look in Persephone’s eyes changed, though, as I grew out of my gangly limbs and into a strong demigod. Lust merged with her hatred. Her hands would wander and her words turned more vulgar when Hades couldn’t hear. I preferred her hatred to that, though. I would never feel anything but complete loathing for her.
“Did I ever tell you the story of the first time I tried to talk to Alexius?” I ask Jax, and when he shakes his head, I continue. “It was the Winter Solstice on Olympus, the one day we’re allowed there, which is fucking bullshit. I didn’t really have friends, just myself and the shadows, but I tried talking to him, anyway. I wanted more details about my mother, I needed to know more, but the bastard ignored me with his head held high, looking down his nose at me, as if he was the almighty ruler and I was the eagle shit beneath his feet.”
I chuckle, annoyance and pain surfacing despite the many years since it happened. “I tried to talk to him for years. Every time he’d ignore me, and every time Hades would punish me when we got back to the Underworld. I stopped trying the year before you came here. I’m not sure why I even tried for as long as I did. Shared blood means nothing, it’s the bonds we make ourselves that are strong.”
