Page 14 of Hades and Persephone: Crown of Souls

“Anything, Hades. I’ll give you anything.”

“Say yes, Persephone,” I plead.

She breathes, “Yes.”

I shove the shirt from her body, not caring as it falls in a pool at her feet. Her legs wrap around my waist as I lift her into my arms, and before I’ve even entered the pool, I’ve entered her body.

She moans. I thrust. And she clings to me.

I am home.

Home.

Chapter

Eight

Persephone

The scentof fresh baked goods and something sweet rides the sound of celebration that spills in from the open balcony doors. Cheers and songs drift from the city below to poke and pull at my curiosity. Beside me in the massive bed, twisted in a tangle of silken sheets, Hades sleeps. It’s the first time I’ve seen him sleep so deeply; the lines of his usually hard face entirely swept away by a peace he hadn’t known in the Earthly realm.

Still, as though tethered to me, he is woken by my absence before I even make it to the balcony. His deep rumble stops me in my tracks. “Persephone?”

Glancing over my shoulder, I find him sitting in the bed. My heart skips. My breath catches and my belly twists just like the sheet that currently twists around him to offer me peek-a-boo glimpses of hard, perpetually tan, skin.

God, he’s sexy as hell.

The thought is there in my mind before I’ve had a chance to censor it. His lips pull into a lazy smirk that only twists more knots in my belly.

Before he can speak, I mutter, “Don’t let it go to your head.”

Hades laughs. But he doesn’t just laugh. He throws his head back and roars. The chords of his thick neck tense with the movement, as the rock-hard muscles of his torso shift under the violence of his very obvious humor.

Turning to face him fully, I wait, one hip cocked, hands planted on the flare. He finally regains his composure enough to look at me.

Silly God.

He lets out another sound, but this one is new. Something I’ve never heard from him before. Something I want to hear again. It’s as close to a giggle as I suspect I’ll ever pull from him, and it’s painted in pure delight.

It’s beautiful. He is beautiful. And if I am to believe the insanity that has become my reality, he is mine.

Every ounce of teasing laughter that lived in the moments before is burned away by the fire in his gaze as his eyes drop from mine to roam every inch of on-display flesh I’ve left exposed for him. Which, honestly, is everything.

After he fucked me senseless in the bathing pool, he’d taken me to another magnificent, if considerably smaller room adjoined to the bathing room, to rinse us off under a fall of water that appeared to fall straight from the stone of the mountain, already decadently warm. Then he brought me to the bed where I drifted quickly into sleep.

Now, the way he’s looking at me makes me think we’re in for round two.

Another loud celebration cheer snags my attention, though.

Hades answers my unspoken question. “Asphodel City.” The next comes somewhat reluctantly. “They are celebrating.”

Well, color me intrigued.“What are they celebrating?”

Even though my body is entirely naked, his eyes linger at the small, curious smile that curves my lips. That smile falls when he answers, “You.”

I’m confused. My thumb lands in my chest as I feel my brows arc high. “Me?”

He nods. “Yes, Persephone. You.”

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