Page 44 of Hades and Persephone: Keeper of Sins

“Curious about what?” His voice is rough and husky. A little breathless.

It affects me. Intimately. “What it might feel like to be with someone.”

His eyes heat, but he doesn’t reply. At least not right away. Instead, he takes a long sip of his wine. “I see.”

He takes another deep drink. I watch as his throat bobs, shocked by the thought that drifts through my mind. I want to crawl across the couch toward him. I want to taste his skin. Want to feel his throat bob under my tongue.

What the actual hell?

The sun is getting to me. It has to be.

There is no other explanation. Never in my life have I felt this way. Never have I had thoughts such as the ones I’ve been entertaining about Hades.

My body feels tingly and sensitive.

I stand abruptly. The pups stand from their beds, alert. Noc’s eyes shift between me and Hades and thedoor. He senses something about me is off. Smells it, I can tell.

A low sound leaves his chest and the girls both drop their heads between powerful shoulders, looking fierce.

Hades lifts a hand. A single hand, and all three drop their butts to the floor. Just like that.

My heart is slamming in my chest. I sense that the pups can hear it.

I need to escape.

Feeling silly and sensitive and a whole bunch of other emotions, I stumble over my words. “I should—I should um—go to bed.”

Chapter

Twenty-One

Hades

Her soul sensesthe ancient history we share, even if her memories of me—of us—are tainted by the damning effects of her tragic murder, lost to the rapids of the Lethe.

Her body knows what her mind can’t yet accept. That she is mine.

That she belongs with me.

The ancient God within me is growing restless as the days pass, bleeding into weeks. He is more than aware that she is close to him. The mate he’s longed for, for centuries. He hungers for her, for the tasteof her. His desperation simmers under the flesh of the man.Take her, he whispers,mark her, steal her.

I drag my palms down my face, restless and irritable. I need more time with her. I hunger for her when she is gone from me. The pull of her is massive. The worry is relentless torture.

“You’re losing it,” Leuce tells me what I already know. “Maybe you should just tell her.”

“I can’t. Not yet.”

She sits back in the couch, lifting an arm to drop it lazily against the back of the couch. “Why not?”

A low growl of irritation rumbles in my chest. “You know why.”

“No, I don’t, Hades.”

“She doesn’t love me.” I glare across the room where my ex-lover and friend sits. “She is human, Leuce.”

She scoffs. “She isn’t.”

“She smells human.”

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