Total pages in book: 113
Estimated words: 107826 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 539(@200wpm)___ 431(@250wpm)___ 359(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 107826 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 539(@200wpm)___ 431(@250wpm)___ 359(@300wpm)
Adonis’s dark eyes take on a look I’ve never seen before. On anyone else, I would call it cruelty. “And yet you didn’t revoke my permission to your apartment or take your key back. Seems like you’re sending mixed signals.”
I didn’t do either of those things because deep down, I’m a sentimental fool. Not that I’ll ever admit it. I lift my chin. “An oversight on my part. I’ve only been married two days, after all.” I’m being an unforgivable bitch, but why is he here? Surely it hurts him to look at me as much as it hurts me to look at him?
Adonis shakes his head. “I didn’t come to fight with you, Eris. I came to make sure you’re okay.”
“What are you talking about?”
“There was an attack.” He looks away. “Someone tried to kill Athena.”
13
ADONIS
Eris was sleeping. With Hephaestus.
Even as she stares at me in shock, rattled by the attempt on Athena’s life, I can’t erase the image of her sharp features relaxed, her body tucked into his embrace. They look good together. I knew that, of course; photos from their wedding were splashed all over MuseWatch. Her in that gorgeous gown standing next to his broader form, them both the same height with her heels. His brooding attractiveness and her sharp beauty.
A matched pair.
Eris slaps Hephaestus’s shoulder. “Stop pretending to sleep. I know you’re awake.”
He rolls onto his back, seeming completely uncaring that he’s as naked as she is. Eris has always stopped my breath in my lungs. She says I’m the beautiful one, but she’s the kind of devastating that brings down cities and leaves a trail of broken hearts behind her.
Hephaestus is different. He draws me in a way that’s all too earthy, his massive body peppered with scars and the kind of muscle definition that makes me want to trace the lines with my tongue. Despite myself, my gaze snags on his hips, where his cock jerks as if in response to my attention.
“See something you like?” he drawls.
Eris flicks the sheets over his hips. “Stop showing off.” She snaps her fingers. “Adonis, focus. What happened to Athena?”
Right. The reason I came. I clear my throat. “It was a sniper. They shot at her from a building across the way. She received minor injuries from shattered glass, but is otherwise fine.”
“A sniper.” Eris frowns. “But that won’t trigger the clause, even if they were successful.”
“You know that. I know that. The greater Olympus population doesn’t.” Somehow, in all the chaos after the house party, that piece of information was never made public, which just proves that Minos is smart. He leaked enough information to cause problems, but not enough to actually change power.
If Athena was killed without the proper steps being followed, her murderer would be executed and her successor would be appointed by Zeus, just like every Athena before them.
“I bet you’re happy.” She glares down at Hephaestus. “This is what you wanted, isn’t it?”
“I wanted to be one of the Thirteen.” He pushes off the bed and carefully stands, but on his first step, his knee buckles.
I move on instinct, catching his elbow and keeping him on his feet. It brings us startlingly close. Close enough that I can smell Eris and sex on his skin. Jealousy and something infinitely more complicated sink their fangs into me.
I love her. I’m quickly having to admit that I’m attracted to him. The thought of them fucking, of them sleeping together, claws at my insides, knowledge I can’t escape.
Hephaestus’s gaze drops to my mouth for one charged moment and then he shakes me off. “I got it.”
We watch in silence as he moves slowly into the bathroom and shuts the door firmly behind him. I turn back to Eris almost reluctantly. I didn’t think he would still be here, or I never would have come.
Except that’s not the truth, is it?
When I heard the news about Athena, I didn’t stop to think. I was already walking through the lobby to Eris’s building by the time my brain caught up with my body. I can barely process the relief I feel over her being okay when this is what I found. It feels like she stabbed me in the gut, and I don’t know what it says about me that I can’t just be happy she’s alive and well in this moment. I can barely look at her. “You slept with him.”
“He’s my husband. I’m allowed to fuck him.”
She’s being intentionally difficult. I clench my jaw. “That’s not what I mean and you know it. You slept with him, Eris. What the fuck?”
“Adonis—” She stops short and sighs. That sigh feels like a hook in my chest, dragging what’s left of my jagged heart out into the open between us. It’s only been a couple weeks since she broke it off, and it’s never been so final between us. My brain knows that it’s over. My heart hasn’t quite caught up.