“That’s not an apology.”
“Are you telling me those words mean nothing to you?”
She tilted her chin, anger flashing in her eyes. “Actions, Hades. You weren’t going to tell me about Leuce.”
“If we are going to speak of actions, then let us speak of yours. Did you not promise me you wouldn’t write about Apollo?”
He knew he was being a little unfair, but of the two things they were discussing, Apollo took precedence. He was a god with power and a taste for blood.
“I had to do it—”
“Had to? Were you offered an ultimatum?”
He couldn’t keep the bite from his voice, and his tone drowned out the part of him that was actually concerned she might have faced some kind of demand from her job. New Athens News was owned by Kal Stavros. At his question, Persephone looked away, setting her jaw.
“Were you threatened?” he continued.
She did not respond. She was digging her heels in against his anger.
“Did any of it have anything to do with you?”
She stood from the bath without warning, water rippling off her body, and clutched a towel to her chest.
“Sybil is my friend, and her life was ruined by Apollo,” she said, standing so close he could feel the heat coming off her body. “His behavior had to be exposed.”
Hades inched closer, tilting his head as he did.
“Do you know what I think?” he whispered furiously, letting his arms fall to his sides, fingers curling into fists to keep from touching her. “I think this is all a game to you. I pissed you off, so you wanted to piss me off, is that it? One for one—now we’re even.”
She scowled. “Not everything’s about you, Hades.”
He gripped her hips and drew her close, voice rough. “You promised me you wouldn’t write about Apollo. Is your word worth nothing?”
She flinched, and he felt it in her whole body, a desire to create distance between them.
“Fuck you,” she spat with tears in her eyes, and as much as he hated to see it, he smiled.
“I’d rather fuck you, darling, but if I did right now, you wouldn’t walk for a week.”
He snapped his fingers and teleported to the queen’s suite. It was where she usually got ready for events in the Underworld, and it would be her home for however long it took to end Apollo’s hunt.
As soon as they had appeared, Persephone pushed away from him.
“Did you just abduct me?”
“Yes. Apollo will come after you, and the only way he will have an audience with you is if I am present.”
“I can take care of this, Hades.”
“You can’t and you won’t.” He hated to say it, but in this instance, it was true. She couldn’t go up against a god—not one as seasoned as Apollo.
Her eyes glinted, lifting her chin in defiance as she tried to teleport. When it didn’t work, she stomped her foot, and from there, a mass of vines erupted from the floor and crawled toward him.
“You can’t keep me here.”
Hades’s responding chuckle only seemed to infuriate her more. “Darling, you are in my realm. You’re here until I say otherwise.”
He turned and headed for the door.
“I have to work, Hades. I have a life up there. Hades!”
He kept walking, though with each step, her magic surged, and in seconds, the harmless vines she’d sent his way earlier became thick thorns, rising from the broken floor to attack.
Hades turned quickly, dismissing her magic with a wave of his hand.
She stared, mouth ajar. After a moment, she swallowed, and there was a flash of something in her eyes that hurt his chest, a pain he did not understand but had seen in many mortals. It was the shock of suddenly understanding just how powerless she really was.
He let his hand fall, and despite everything inside him that wanted to go to her, to comfort her, he turned to leave once more.
As he did, she yelled after him, her voice breaking with a distinct crack he could feel in his heart. “You will regret this!”
At the door, he turned his head a fraction and answered, “I already do.”
When he stepped out of her room, he found Hecate waiting. The goddess’s eyes were glassy with anger. Hades wasn’t certain what had summoned her, but he had a feeling it had something do with the surge in Persephone’s magic.
“Don’t,” he warned, and while his voice did not waver, his insides shook.
He didn’t want to hear what Hecate would say, because he already knew he had fucked up. He knew it with every beat of his heart, but if he hadn’t gotten her out of the Upperworld and into his realm, there was no end to the list of the things Apollo might do.
At least here, she was safe—and he’d take that in the end, because the one thing he wouldn’t live without in this world was her, even if she hated him.
To her credit, Hecate said nothing, and Hades made a wide arc around her, leaving the palace altogether.
Chapter X
Bakkheia
Hades was distracted, his mind on the final moments before he’d left Persephone in the queen’s suite of his palace the night before. The broken note in her voice tortured his thoughts and clawed at his chest. That night, he’d watched her from his balcony, wandering through the garden. She fit so perfectly among those flowers, like his soul had known to make it for her before she existed.
Even then, with all the knowledge that their fates were entwined, he could not manage to talk to her, to make this rift between them right. In some twisted way, he feared comfort would only seem like he approved of her actions, and he wanted her to know the consequences of dealing with gods.
“My lord?” Antoni queried, and Hades looked up, meeting the cyclops’s gaze in the car’s rearview mirror. “Apologies. We have arrived. Would you like for me to wait for you?”
Hades had asked Antoni to take him to Bakkheia. He’d decided to put this anger to good use and confront Dionysus over his involvement with Acacius, and he preferred to arrive in a mortal fashion, as it would announce his presence. Not only that, but teleporting into a god’s territory was usually frowned upon, though Hades would have been able to do so, given that he shared control of the Upperworld with his brothers.
“That won’t be necessary,” Hades replied. He would choose a far quicker exit when he was ready to leave the God of Wine’s territory.
Antoni looked at him in the rearview mirror.
“Pardon the observation, my lord, but you seem…off tonight.”