Page 91 of A Touch of Chaos

“Have you located Doctor Phanes?” Theseus asked. He watched as Tannis’s blood pooled on the floor.

“He is being escorted here now along with his nurse,” Perseus said. “We found them in the parking garage, disoriented.”

She’s under your skin.

It was true. Ariadne was under his skin, and he hated her for it.

Hated her because she knew and she had used it to her advantage, to take control of this very moment. He had to admit he was surprised she had made her move, knowing he would seek revenge…knowing Phaedra would suffer too.

The door opened, and Theseus looked up to find Damian, a son of Zeus, entering with the doctor and a middle-aged woman. At first, their expressions weredistant, a symptom of compulsion, but then their eyes fell to Tannis, lifeless on the floor.

The nurse screamed, and Damian covered her mouth, muffling the sound.

“Please, my lord,” Doctor Phanes begged, eyes already watering. His large, sweaty forehead gleamed under the fluorescent lights. “I…I do not know what happened.”

“Shh,” Theseus said as he approached and pressed a finger to the man’s lips. He waited until he was certain the doctor would remain quiet before pulling his hand away. “I know it was not your fault. Some things are outside your control, just like the length of your life.”

Theseus took a step back, and Perseus raised his weapon.

“Please,” the doctor whispered, his plea drowned by the sound of Perseus’s gun firing.

The nurse screamed but she was silenced shortly after by Damian, who kept his hand over her mouth and wound his arm tightly around her neck until she slid to the floor.

In the quiet that followed, Perseus spoke.

“I will find her, my lord, and your son.”

But Theseus did not need help locating them. He knew exactly where they were.

“No,” he said. “You will bring me Dionysus.”

CHAPTER XIX

HADES

Hades had not expected to leave Bakkheia in such a foul mood. If Persephone had heard the way he’d spoken to Ariadne, she likely wouldn’t speak to him all night, but Dionysus’s decision to essentially kidnap Phaedra and her son would have horrible consequences. He only hoped he could stop Theseus before the demigod saw them through, but those worries were for tomorrow.

Tonight, all he wished to concern himself with was Persephone.

Except when he returned to the Underworld, she was not alone. Hecate had joined her in his office.

“When I said wait for me, I meant alone,” he grumbled, though to be fair, he was not unhappy to see the Goddess of Witchcraft.

“Shut up!” Hecate snapped as she embraced him, and though her actions surprised him, he hugged her back. “You’re an idiot,” she said with her face buried in his chest.

He smiled softly. “I missed you too, Hecate.”

She pulled away and touched his face. He had never quite seen this look in her eyes before. It was almost like she was indisbelief—like maybe she had not been certain he would actually return.

That thought turned his stomach.

“You need to shave,” she said.

“Noted,” he replied.

“I will leave you,” she said, taking a step back. “But I had to see you—both of you.”

Hecate turned to Persephone and hugged her tight; then the goddess left, and they were alone.

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