That Fatal Kiss (28 page)

He came to a halt directly before her as she reclined upon a high-backed bronze bench. Since she seemed inclined to glare up at him indefinitely, Hades chose to serve the first volley. “Pleased with yourself, are you?”

“Immensely.”

“I take it you thought to punish me by meddling in my affairs.”

“
Your
affairs? Am I not your queen? I thought I had some say in the running of this world. Did you not recently tell me you do not rule alone as long as I am by your side?”

“You were not by my side last night,” Hades noted through white lips.

“You appeared well equipped to amuse yourself in my absence,” Persephone said, tucking her legs underneath herself as she sat up on the bench.

“I was not…
amusing
myself in your absence—”

“How it galls me to have to admit that Artemis was right,” Persephone cut in. “You males, you’re all alike! I wanted so much to believe that it was not so, that
you
were different!” She narrowed her eyes at him before turning her face away in disgust. “But you’re no better than the rest. You’re just as bad as your brothers.”

The unflattering comparison put an end to the god’s restraint. Pale and very nearly shaking, Hades spoke in low tones. “You may choose how you will depart from here—either walking before me with your dignity intact or dragged out by the hair and on your rump.”

“I choose to remain right here, on this bench.”

“Persephone.”

“I stay.”

Hades carefully drew in and released a long breath. “Very well.” He waved his hand over the bench.

“What have you done?” she asked, attempting to rise up from it now and failing.

“I’ve granted you your desire,” Hades replied. “You wished to remain on that bench and I have made it possible.”

“What?” she yelped. Her eyes widened with horror as he turned to leave. “Wait, Hades!” He turned and looked at her with solicitous expectation. “Release me!”

“I shall. At some point.” And then he left.

“Hades!” she called after him. But he was gone and she had no other choice but to remain where she was, as she had insisted.

MUCH LATER THAT
day, at the time of the evening meal, Persephone was relieved of the tedium of Tartarus. Four of the palace servants braved passage through the fortification to bear her, still on the bench, out to a large cart. They secured the bench within it and bore her back to the palace. They carried Persephone into the large dining room and set her before Hades. He dined sumptuously and seemed not to notice that she’d joined him. The goddess glared at him while straining futilely against her captivity and eventually said, “How good of you to summon me at this late hour.”

Hades looked up from his food, then held out a fig, inquiring, “Would you care for some?” At Persephone’s muttered curse, he placed the fruit into his own mouth. He chewed it with great enjoyment and swallowed, then took a healthy draught of wine. Pressing a cloth to the corner of his lips, the god asked, “Did you enjoy your stay in Tartarus?”

“Release me from this accursed bench, you
beast
.”

Hades leaned back in his chair. “How can you fault me for giving you what you said you wanted?”

“I did not want to be imprisoned!”

“Then I would advise you not to revisit Tartarus, especially if your intention is to wreak such havoc there as you did today,” Hades stated, grabbing a goblet of sweet nectar. “Should you do something of that nature again, you may rest assured of a more taxing castigation.”

“Your directive is duly noted,” Persephone growled. “Now, release me!”

Hades regarded his seething wife. When she’d been brought in, he was tempted to tell her how breathtakingly beautiful she looked when she wanted to throttle him. Long past his own anger, his spirits were buoyed by the knowledge that she must truly love him to be so enraged by seeing him in the embrace of another. Too, the image of her stuck to the bench, the way he’d left her, evoked the odd chuckle from him throughout the day.

But now, seeing her so wretched before him, he could take no pleasure in her suffering. He’d gone too far with the lesson, letting his anger best him, and he felt the full shame of it. Seeking to assert himself, he’d meted out a punishment that not only added to her already weakened condition, but deliberately humiliated her. What damage had he done to their relations? What if her present anger with him was such that an immovable wall stood between them? Moreover, he still had not explained that the circumstances in which she’d found him the day before had not been of his own choosing. What would Persephone do when he released her? Would she flee again, to Hecate? Or would she lunge for his throat?

“Haaa-deees!” Persephone ground out, looking for all the world as if she did intend to put his immortality to the test.

He could put off the inevitable no longer. With another magical wave of his hand the invisible suction ceased and Persephone bolted to her feet. But because she’d sat with her legs folded beneath her all those hours they now buckled, and the goddess sank down to the floor with a dull thud. Appalled, Hades was out of his own seat in an instant. He knelt before her, saying, “By the Fates, what have I done? My dearest, darling Kore, forgive me—” But Persephone smacked away his helping hands in response and Hades could only watch as she painfully pulled herself up and staggered out of the dining room.

He remained in his kneeling position, guilt knotting his gut for his torment of her. Stupid, he’d been so stupid. Disgusted with himself, Hades got up off the floor, not knowing how he could ever face her again. But then he envisioned her, weak from starvation and shaky from her punishing day in Tartarus, and a fierce worry arose within him. Alarm winning out over self-loathing, he went after her, thinking he would do whatever he must to make amends if only she would be well. Hades tore through the corridor, unsure of where to look, and found himself headed for their bedchamber. Just as he turned a corner, Persephone collided with him and fell down hard on her backside.

“Hades!” she hissed as she arose, and he flinched at the way she made an obscenity of his name.

“Persephone, let me help you—”

“You keep quiet,” Persephone said, “until I tell you to speak, or I promise you, you will never see me again.” She took hold of his arm and pulled him into their bedchamber. She then kicked the door shut and pressed both hands against his chest, giving him a hearty shove.

Caught off-guard, he fell back upon their bed and was amazed to feel the chains he had commissioned fasten about his own limbs. But what utterly bewildered him was that his wife now pressed a golden bough against his chest, and he could only stare mutely up at her and wait to see what she might do next.

“Now it is your turn to grant me satisfaction,” she stated, her chest heaving from her exertion. “Tell me—who was that nymph you were embracing?”

“She was Minthe, sent by Aphrodite,” Hades answered. At her look of astonishment he explained fully, beginning with Eros’ warning of the Goddess of Love’s plan for retribution and ending with how he resisted the nymph’s advances.

“Then…you did not…want her?” Persephone asked, her voice thickened by emotion.

“Of course not. I want only you.” He added with some asperity, “I thought I had made that perfectly clear.”

Persephone threw the bough to the floor and waved her hand over the chains. When nothing happened she stamped both feet. “Release him!” she shouted.

“Only I may command them to open.”

“Then do so, quickly.”

Mystified by her agitation, Hades did as she requested and she threw herself in his arms as he sat up. He held his sobbing wife, clueless as to how he might staunch the flow of her tears. Seeking to turn them to laughter, he offered, “She makes a far better plant than she did a nymph.” Pleased to hear her chuckle through her weeping, he held her close and stroked her shuddering back. They sat that way until her tears subsided and she looked up into his face. He noted the dark shadows under her eyes and the way her skin stretched across her high cheekbones and his heart ached for the part he’d played in getting her to this sad state. “I wish you would forget your fast and at least drink some nectar, Persephone. You look…absolutely dreadful.”

“I thank you for the compliment.”

The tartness of her reply was a relief to Hades. And though he still worried for her, he did not wish to upset her again. So he dropped the matter of her fast for the moment and attempted, instead, to titillate. “Come,” he said, “let us forget our quarrel and get some rest. I have some strenuous activities planned for us tomorrow.”

“Is that right?”

“Aye. I thought we might return to Elysium for another bout of wrestling.” The look that followed that suggestion was positively decadent.

“A sound plan,” Persephone said, allowing him to pull her back on the bed with him until they lay in each other’s arms. “Only I worry that you will not be able to defend yourself against me in your advanced age, given how poorly you performed this evening.”

“Your wifely concern does you credit,” Hades said, following with, “you little minx.” When she chuckled, he asked, “Then you have forgotten your ire against me?”

“No, but I realize it was misplaced,” she replied. “I cannot blame you for Aphrodite’s scheming...and…”

“…yes?”

“I am sorry.”

“You were upset.”

Persephone sighed. “I was. But I was wrong to upset the order of Tartarus in return. It was, in essence, the equivalent of a child’s tantrum.”

Hades echoed her sigh as he brought her hand up to his chest. “Yes. It rather was.”

For a moment, silence swelled. Then Persephone began to shake with laughter and was soon joined in it by Hades.

The goddess propped herself up on one hand. “You’ve forgiven me already, of course.”

Hades’ laughing lips settled into a mysterious smile. “Have I?”

Persephone removed her other hand from his grasp to run her forefinger along his face. “I believe you must have, yes.”

“Rather sure of yourself, aren’t you?”

She bent down to kiss him, then slid up and over until she straddled Hades. “I am now.”

The god’s hands grasped her thighs firmly. “Just a moment, my dear. There’s one matter regarding Tartarus of which you should be apprised forthwith.”

“You have all of my attention, Hades,” she said, unpinning his robes and leaning down to kiss his shoulders and chest.

“I’m delighted to hear it,” Hades replied, eyes closing as she worked her way up his throat. “Though I fear we shall soon become a bit…distracted.”

The goddess brushed her lips up his chin and across his face until she reached his mouth. Her tongue reached in to give his several long, lush strokes. Pulling back slightly, she whispered, “Please believe that I am completely focused upon you.”

“You flatter me,” he said, giving her thighs a warning squeeze, “and yet—”

“And yet,” Persephone interrupted, “I seek to do more than flatter.” Managing to push his hands away, she slid down his torso, pulling the cloth covering him off as she went.

“Is that so?”

The goddess kissed his chest, lapped at his nipples. She ran her tongue down his chiseled abdomen while her hands reached for his rising erection. “Yes, my Lord Aidoneus, I seek to do far more.” Persephone wrapped her hands around him. “I seek to worship
you
.”

“Persephone, wait…”

BUT THE GODDESS
could not wait. Her entire body tingled, and the urgent need to taste him could not be denied. Persephone’s tongue gave the head of his shaft a long stroke and her own eyes closed from the rush of lust which overwhelmed her. His spiced, musky scent surrounded her and she inhaled deeply as she tongued her way down and back up. Then she took him in her mouth and rode her way down until he reached the very back of her throat. Her growl of pleasure joined his and she felt herself become slick with anticipation.

Persephone moved smoothly up and down, repeatedly swallowing him, feeling the fiery ache rise up in her womb. As deeply as she took him in, it wouldn’t be enough. The sudden groan emanating from somewhere above warned her that she wasn’t the only one not getting enough. Hades’ hands locked on her shoulders to ease her off. She cried out in protest as he slipped out from under her, and then gasped as he reached from behind her to pull her up against him.