A day passes, and then another, one week bleeding into the next. I spend my days alternately obsessing over when Mother and Zeus will make their move and sinking into the distraction that living with Hades offers. Each room is a new exploration, containing a secret to hold close to my heart. There are shelves tucked into every nook and cranny, all filled with books with spines weathered from many rereads. I conquer one room a day, drawing this journey out, feeling like I’m getting closer and closer to knowing the man who owns this place.
Several times a week, we revisit the winter market and Hades lets me tug him along like a well-loved stuffed animal as I explore. He’s also taken to showing me other hidden gems the lower city has to offer. I get to see dozens of the columns, each depicting a unique scene that relates to the business they bracket. I never get tired of the way his expression goes from guarded to a little awestruck when he realizes how much I value these experiences. I feel like it’s allowing me to get to know this part of the city, yes, but also the man who rules it.
And the nights? My nights are filled with knowing him in an entirely different way.
I close the book I wasn’t reading and look at him. He’s sitting on the other side of the couch with a stack of paperwork and a laptop. If I squint a little, I can almost pretend that we’re normal people. That he’s brought his work home with him. That I’m perfectly content to be a housewife or whatever label fits my current status.
“You’re thinking rather hard over there,” he says without looking up.
I fiddle with the book. “It’s a very good book. A real puzzler.” I don’t sound remotely convincing.
“Persephone.” The seriousness in his tone demands a response. A truthful response.
The words bubble up before I can call them back. “You haven’t taken me back to your sex dungeon.”
“It’s not a sex dungeon.”
“Hades, it’s the very definition of a sex dungeon.”
At this, he finally sets his laptop aside and gives me his full attention. His brows draw together. “We’ve been having a good time.”
“‘Good time’ hardly begins to cover it. I enjoy exploring your house and the lower city. I enjoy exploring you.” My cheeks heat, but I power on. “But you said you wanted people to take us seriously, and how can they take us seriously if you’re not treating me like they expect you to?”
“I haven’t wanted to share you with the voyeurs from the upper city.” He says it so simply, as if he’s not dropping a bomb. Hades tugs off the throw blanket I’ve curled up under and tosses it onto the floor. “You’re right, though. It’s possible they haven’t moved yet because we haven’t forced them to.”
I go a little melty at the feeling of his hand closing around my ankle. It’s always like this with him. I keep waiting for the intensity to fade, for ready access to each other to wear off the shine of having sex with each other. It hasn’t happened yet. If anything, the last couple of weeks have made me want him more. I’m Pavlov’s dog. He touches me, and I’m instantly aching for him.
What were we talking about?
I give myself a mental shake and try to focus. “Are we trying to make them act?”
“We’re trying to hurt them. Or him, at least.” Hades slides his hand up my calf to hook the back of my knee and tug me down the couch to him. We came straight up to his room after having dinner at a charming little restaurant down the street, so I’m still wearing one of the flirty dresses Juliette put together for me. From the heated way Hades rakes his gaze over me, he likes it even better when it’s bunched around my upper thighs. “Show me.”
I reach down with shaking hands and pull my dress up, just a little, just enough to give him a look beneath it.
Hades raises his brows. “Look at you, wearing panties like a good girl.”
“Yes, well, sometimes I like the tease.” I let the skirt fall to my waist and tug my panties to the side. It doesn’t matter that Hades has seen and had his mouth over every inch of me. It feels wicked to do this, and riding the edge of that feeling is an addiction I’m not sure I’m ever going to shake. I can’t think about that now, can’t contemplate after.
After the winter is over. After I’ve gained my freedom. After I walk out of Hades’s life forever.
He tugs me another few inches closer and leans down to settle between my spread thighs. A single look and I release my panties and prop myself up on my elbows. Hades presses an openmouthed kiss to the silk. I whimper. “Gods, that feels good.”
He seems to have no interest in moving my panties out of the way, working me through the fabric slowly, getting me all wet and slippery. It’s only when I’m breathing hard and fighting not to lift my hips that he looks up. “We’ll have a party tomorrow.”
“A…party.”
“Mm-hmm.” He finally, finally nuzzles the panties to the side and gives my pussy a slow, thorough kiss. “Tell me what you want. Describe it in detail.”
I have to bite back a moan. “What?”
“Now.”
I stare down at him. He wants me to describe what I want right now, while he’s tongue-fucking me? Apparently so. I bite my bottom lip and try to focus through the waves of pleasure he’s sending through my body. I’ve had a lot of time to get to know my tastes and Hades’s tastes, but this feels like a completely different level. “I, uh, I want…”
I don’t want to tell him.
I dig my fingers into his hair and lift my hips to give him better access. The next lick never comes. Despite my grip on him, Hades lifts himself easily away from me. His brows draw together as he searches my face. “With all we’ve done in the last few weeks, what could you possibly want that has you hesitating now?”
“I like being with you. I love what we do together.”
He frowns harder. “Persephone, if I wasn’t ready to give you whatever you need, I wouldn’t have asked.”
I don’t want to. I really, really don’t want to. It’s too wrong, too dirty, even for us. I know it’s hypocritical in the extreme to call Hades out for holding back with me and then turn around and do the same to him, but it feels different. It is different.
He moves while I’m still fighting with myself, sitting up and hauling me into his lap. My back to his chest, my legs spread to the outside of his thighs. Just like I was that night where he made me come and then I rode his cock in front of everyone.
The same night that seeded the fantasy I’m afraid to put to voice.
Hades slides his hand into my panties to palm my pussy and push two fingers into me. Then he stills, holding me in place in the most intimate way possible. “You’re tense, little siren. Is this bringing back memories?”
“Of course not. Why would you say that?” I speak too quickly, my voice too breathy to make my bravado the least bit convincing.
He kisses my neck and moves up to my ear. “Tell me.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Do you think I’ll judge you?”
It’s not that. I whimper as he curls his fingers along my inner wall. Just like that, the truth spills from my lips. “I don’t want to do anything you don’t want to do.”
He goes still for one long moment and then chuckles against my skin. “I hit a nerve that night, didn’t I?” Another delicious curl of his fingertips. His voice rumbles in my ear. “Say it. Tell me what fantasy you’ve had playing in the back of your mind since that party.”
My resistance crumbles. I close my eyes. “I want to be the one on the dais. Not in the shadowy corner with you. Right out there in the spotlight while you fuck me in front of everyone. Where you claim me and make me yours where everyone can see.”
He keeps stroking my G-spot. “Was that so hard?”
“Yes.” I grip his forearm, but even I can’t say if I’m trying to push him away or keep him touching me. “I know you don’t like being exposed like that.”
“Mmmm.” He nips my earlobe. He presses the heel of his palm against my clit. “Do you think there’s anything I wouldn’t give you while you’re mine? Fucking anything, little siren.”
I don’t have words, but that’s okay because he apparently has words enough for both of us. He keeps up those slow movements, a steady coiling of pleasure through me, tighter and tighter, as if we have all the time in the world.
Time is one thing we don’t have.
His free hand comes up to yank the straps of my dress off my shoulders and let it fall to my waist. Somehow this being half-dressed while he fucks me with his fingers feels even sexier than if I was naked. Hades always knows what gets me off the hardest, and he never hesitates to put it into reality. “I’ll bend you over a chair and flip up your skirt so everyone can see your needy little pussy. Spread you wide with my fingers.”
“Yes,” I gasp out.
“I’ll give this to you, love. I’ll give you everything.” He chuckles darkly. “Would you like to know a truth?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll get off on playing out that fantasy, too.” He pushes a third finger into me. “If I want to strip you down and fuck you until you’re begging for mercy, that’s exactly what I’ll do. Because it pleases me. Because it will get you off. Because there is nothing you can ask me that I won’t give you. Do you understand?”
“Yes.” This is it, the thing that I couldn’t quite conceptualize, the reason why that dark threat held such promise for me. I should have known he’d understand, shouldn’t have doubted him.
Hades hauls me up and bends me over the arm of the couch. He flips up my skirt and pulls my panties down to my thighs. “Don’t move.” He’s gone for a few seconds and there’s the crinkle of a condom wrapper. And then he’s pushing his way inside me, one inch by devastating inch.
The position creates a tighter fit and my panties prevent me from spreading my thighs. It’s the lightest bondage imaginable, but it makes this a thousand times hotter. Hades hooks his fingers at my hips and then he’s fucking me. I scramble to get a good hold on the cushion, but my fingers slide across the leather, unable to find purchase. Hades doesn’t hesitate. He pulls me up and back against his chest, one hand bracketing my throat and the other delving down to press against my clit. Each stroke creates a delicious friction that has me soaring to new heights.
His voice is so low, I can almost feel it more than hear it. “Your pussy is mine to do with as I please. In public. In private. Wherever I want it. The way you, little siren, are mine.”
“If I’m yours…” And I am. I undoubtedly am. I can’t catch my breath, can barely get the next words out. “Then you’re mine, too.”
“Yes.” His rough voice in my ear. “Fuck, yes, I’m yours.”
I come hard, writhing against his hand and around his cock. Hades bends me back over the couch and finishes in a series of brutal thrusts. He pulls out, and I barely get a chance to miss the feel of him at my back before he returns and lifts me into his arms. After that first night visiting the winter market, I’ve stopped pseudo complaining about him carrying me around. We both know it’d be a lie if I kept it up, because I enjoy these moments just as much as he seems to.
He walks us into what’s become our bedroom and sets me down. I catch his wrist before he can move to the light switch like he normally does. “Hades?”
“Yeah?”
The urge to drop my gaze, to let this go, is nearly overwhelming, but after he’s demanded I be honest and vulnerable with him, I can demand nothing but the same in return. I meet his eyes. “Keep the lights on? Please.”
He goes so still, I think he stops breathing. “You don’t want that.”
“I wouldn’t ask for it if I didn’t want it.” I know I should stop pushing, but I can’t seem to help myself. “Don’t you trust me not to turn away?”
His breath shudders out. “It’s not that.”
That’s what it feels like. But saying as much puts him in a terrible position. I want his trust the same way he seems to crave mine; forcing the issue isn’t the way to get it. Reluctantly, I release his wrist. “Okay.”
“Persephone…” He hesitates. “Are you sure?”
Something flutters in my chest, as light and fluid as hope but somehow stronger. “If you’re comfortable with it, yes.”
“Okay.” His hands move to the buttons of his shirt and pause. “Okay,” he repeats. Slowly, oh so slowly, he begins to remove his clothing.
Even as I tell myself not to stare, I can’t help drinking in the sight of him. I’ve felt his scars, but they’re borderline gruesome to see in the light. The sheer danger he must have been in, the pain he survived, leaves me breathless. The burns cover most of his torso and down his right hip. His legs have some smaller scars, but nothing on the same level as his chest and back.
Zeus did this to him.
That bastard would have killed a small child the same way he killed Hades’s parents.
The desire to wrap this man up and protect him makes my tone fierce. “You’re beautiful.”
“Don’t start lying to me now.”
“I mean it.” I lift my hands and press them carefully to his chest. I’ve touched him there dozens of times now, but this is the first time I’ve seen him fully. Part of me wonders what happened to him in the years since the fire that has caused him to hide so effectively, even during sex, and the protective desire swirling through me gets stronger. I can’t heal this man’s scars, not internal or external, but surely I can help in some small way? “You’re beautiful to me. The scars are part of that, part of you. They’re a mark of everything you’ve survived, of how strong you are. That fucker tried to kill you as a child and you survived him. You’re going to beat him, Hades. You will.”
He gives me a ghost of a smile. “I don’t want to beat him. I want him dead.”
