Page 53 of Tempted By Hades

“Me?” Was he serious? “I organized this entire affair, remember?” She couldn’t hide the annoyance on her face.

“No, I mean.” He shook his head. “Minthe said she wanted some honey juice, but I didn’t know…”

“We’ve been here for a while now,” Minthe informed her. “We finished work a little earlier than expected, so we decided to come to your little affair.”

“I was looking for you,” Hades added. “And Minthe came down with me.”

“We did see you earlier, but we didn’t want to interrupt. You seemed a little busy.” The Naiad tsked. “Dancing with that handsome friend of yours.”

“Friend? You mean Adonis?” Oh, so Hades had been here earlier. Was it him who she felt was staring at her?

“You two seem very close,” she added. “Closer than friends.”

Hades’s expression darkened. “I thought you said you’d be busy with running the street party. Not cavorting on the streets.”

Her irritation went up a notch. Cavorting? He made her sound like she was some common streetwalker. Who was he to talk? He was the one cozying up to Minthe.

A dread filled her chest. Had she been wrong about them this entire time? Were they more than associates? Were they sleeping together all this time? Maybe even laughing at her behind her back as they fooled her into thinking they were only working together.

Her annoyance turned into fury. Well, since he thought she was sleeping with Adonis, she may as well own up to it.

“If you’ll excuse me, I should go find Adonis. We have plenty more cavorting to do, after all.” Without a backward glance, she stomped away from them.

The nerve! How dare he! Adonis was her friend. Minthe, on the other hand…

She stopped short in the middle of the street as a different thought trickled into her mind. Is that why he didn’t want to sleep with her? Because he was already with Minthe? After all, there was no way she could compare to the voluptuous Naiad. Minthe was gorgeous, sophisticated, and probably experienced when it came to sex.

She, on the other hand…

“Persephone!”

Hades?

Looking behind her, she saw him stalking toward her, closing the distance between them in ground-eating steps. She made a move to run, but he quickly caught up to her.

“Don’t even think of running away.” His tone was dead serious.

She crossed her arms under her chest. “What do you want, Hades?”

“Who is that man to you?” He loomed over her. “When you asked for permission for him to come here, you said he was a friend. Did you lie to me? Is he more than a friend?”

“That’s none of your business!”

“Anything that pertains to you and the people you bring here is my business!”

“But not my personal life or who I have in my bed!” she shot back.

Fury lit up his eyes, turning them into shiny obsidian. “So, you are sleeping with him? Have you been doing it all this time? Sneaking away to the Upperworld while pretending to work on the street party?”

She let out an indignant squeak. “How dare…ugh!” Throwing up her hands, she spun around, taking a step away from him. Before she could take a second step, however, she felt a hand grip her arm firmly, and then suddenly, she was transported into an unfamiliar place. “What the?—”

The room was massive, decorated in dark, masculine colors, the furnishings all heavy wood antiques. There was a dressing table on one side, and a large window on the other, with heavy damask drapes drawn to keep the light out. In the middle was a large four-poster bed covered in a dark velvet blanket.

She didn’t need to ask where they were—this intimate space screamed Hades.

She spun around to face him. “You can’t just transport me without permission! This may be your realm, but you can’t control me.”

The fire in his eyes only burned brighter. “So, am I right? Are you fucking him?”

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