“Yes… Yes…”
Surrender to me, and I will show you a pleasure so intense, you’ll never crave anyone but me.
She grunted. Her fingers raced like lightning against her sex.
His skin grew hotter, tighter. Every muscle in his body contracted in anticipation of her release. His hand moved faster beneath the water, stroking in time with her hips rocking up higher and quicker against her fingers. Searching… Needing… Aching for that one scorching moment…
Yes, mono mia. Yes, there… Come for me now. Come for me right… here.
“Oh fuck…” Her spine bowed. Her groan jumped an octave as she threw her head back and screamed.
Heat gathered in the marking on his hip, and as electricity shot into his balls and exploded through his cock, he knew the same blazing orgasm was consuming her high up in the tower in that big bed.
The wicked power of their joined pleasure exploded in every nerve ending until he knew nothing but mindless, boneless, hedonistic bliss.
Zagreus slumped back in the tub as the smoldering orgasm slowly receded. Breathing heavily, he opened his eyes and stared up at the beamed ceiling reflecting the flickering candlelight.
If he hadn’t known before that she was his, he did now. There was absolutely no mistaking it any longer. Her being with him here was not chance. It was fate.
Their fate.
And it was only a matter of time before she realized that fact for herself.
Spent, he slowly climbed out of the bath, dried off, blew out the candles, then moved into his bedchamber. Dropping his towel on the floor, he slid beneath the covers and eased into the pillows, more relaxed than he’d been in—well, in nearly five hundred years.
As sleep tugged at him—the restful sleep that had eluded him for so long—he thought of her once more and told himself that this time everything would be different.
This time he’d do whatever was needed to make her his for all eternity.
Even if he had to keep her as his prisoner to do so.
Cynna paced the length of her sister Isadora’s office, where Elysia had left her and told her to wait.
After twenty-seven years, she still wasn’t particularly comfortable in this castle, but she’d never dreaded being here the way she did right now. What she had to tell Casey…
Her stomach rolled, and she stopped and placed a hand on her belly, this queasiness not from her pregnancy but from dread over what was happening to Talisa.
Cynna knew full well what kind of kinks Zagreus was into, and all she could do now was hope Talisa was strong enough to get through whatever he had planned for her. That and pray that Talisa wasn’t really who he thought her to be.
Footsteps echoed outside the queen’s open office door, followed by voices in the long corridor. Female voices.
Cynna turned just as Elysia stepped into the room with her mother the queen, followed by Casey and Callia.
“Cynna.” Isadora crossed to Cynna and quickly hugged her. “I’m so glad you’re here.”
They looked nothing alike—Cynna with her dark skin and hair from her father, Isadora taking more after their mother with her pale flesh and blonde locks—but over the years they’d become close. And though Cynna was no blood relation to Isadora’s other half-sisters, Cynna considered Casey and Callia to be surrogate sisters as well.
Which, considering what she’d come to tell them, made this whole damn situation so much worse.
“Of course,” Cynna said, releasing Isadora. “I want to help. However I can.”
She looked toward Casey and Callia. Both shared the same violet eyes with Talisa, and both looked shellshocked and terrified. With good reason. “I’m so sorry to hear what happened.”
“Tell us whatever you can,” Casey said. “About where he took them. We tried to use our gifts to see into the present, but we can’t find either of them. They’re hidden to us.”
When the three sisters joined their gifts, they could see into the present and locate any soul in any realm. The fact they couldn’t see Talisa and Max now told Cynna things were worse than she’d thought.
“I don’t know that I can help you there. When I was with Zagreus, he never mentioned any other hideouts or locations where he might be keeping them.”
Casey’s eyes fell closed. At her back, Callia rubbed her forehead.
“Tell them what you told me,” Elysia said at Cynna’s side. “About the nickname he used for Talisa.”
Casey’s head came up, and fear darkened her eyes. A fear that told Cynna she knew something she wasn’t sharing. “What nickname?”
Cynna’s chest tightened. Glancing at Isadora on her other side, she said, “You all know I voluntarily went to Zagreus. He didn’t find me or kidnap me.”
“We know,” Isadora said, touching her arm. “You thought Zagreus could help you exact revenge.”
Cynna had. She’d been so stupid back then. Not just for blaming Isadora for her parents’ deaths, but for thinking a lifetime of hatred could change anything.
She swallowed the guilt. Everything was different now. The person she’d thought was her biggest enemy was now her family, and Cynna owed Isadora and her surrogate sisters so much.
Forcing herself to go on, she said, “I did. But I went to him with a lie. Not about my reason for being there, but about who I was.”
“I don’t understand.” Callia moved up on Casey’s right. “Who did you tell him you were?”
“I told him I was her.”
“Her who?” Casey asked.
“His mono mia.”
When all three sisters—Casey, Callia, and Isadora—only stared at her in shock, Cynna sighed and added, “His mate. The female he’s loved and lost too many times to count. The one he bound his soul to so he could always find her in any lifetime. The one he now believes is Talisa. And if it’s true, if Talisa really is her, then nothing any of us do is going to matter. He’ll never let her go.”
Chapter Seven
Talisa blinked and squinted into the bright light.
Lifting a hand to block the glare, she shifted beneath the covers and pushed herself back into the pillows. She had no idea what time it was, but judging by the sunshine blazing through her windows, it had to be midday.
When was the last time she’d slept ‘til noon?
Groggy, she glanced down only to realize her nightgown was completely unbuttoned to her belly. She quickly reached for the two halves and pulled the gown closed, then remembered unbuttoning it late last night in the dark.
When the marking on her hip had grown so hot it had felt as if her skin was about to burn off. When she’d dreamt of Zagreus naked and submerged in some kind of pool, surrounded by flickering candles as he stroked himself.
Her cheeks warmed, and arousal stirred low and hot inside her all over again. She’d dreamt of him before but never like that. Usually, when he entered her dreams, the images centered on warfare and using her warrior skills to defeat evil. This dream had been different, though. This dream had been intimate. Hot. So real something inside ached to experience it all again.
One hand drifted from the buttons at her chest and slid down her bare abs, moving slowly toward that aching, wet place between her legs that needed release. As her eyes drifted closed, she pictured Zagreus touching himself the same way, remembering his muscular chest glistening with water and reflecting the candlelight, the amulet on the long chain lying against his tanned skin. Remembered how he’d wrapped his long fingers around his impressive shaft and groaned.