TWISTED (Eternal Guardians Book 7) (42 page)

C
ynna stared out at the darkening view from the window seat in the room she’d shared with Nick last night. A wide beach stretched beyond the castle walls and disappeared in rolling waves that lapped at the shore. But her gaze was fixed on the horizon, where the clouds had parted just enough to let a few shrinking rays of sunlight pass through as the sun set low in the distance, drawing everything into darkness.

She closed her eyes and breathed deep. She’d been silly to think she could have any of that sunshine in her life. The dark was all she knew. Since her parents had died, it was the only thing that was consistent.

The door behind her opened and closed, but she didn’t turn to look. Couldn’t. Not with the tumultuous way she was feeling at the moment.

“I thought maybe you’d left,” Nick said in a quiet voice.

Cynna blinked back the useless sting of tears and told herself all wasn’t lost…yet. He could very well be here to announce that he’d told the queen and everyone else in that room to fuck off. “The last time I did that, I didn’t make it very far.”

The sound of his footsteps drifted across the carpeted floor, then he sank next to her on the window seat, where she sat with her back to the wall and her knees pulled up to her chest. But he didn’t touch her. And a little voice in the back of her head whispered that was not exactly a good sign.

He leaned forward and rested his forearms against his thighs. “How much of that craziness did you hear?”

Skata.
He hadn’t told them to fuck off. If he had, his shoulders wouldn’t be bunched and that guilty look wouldn’t be pulling at the corners of his eyes.

What little hope she’d been clinging too dropped like a stone into the pit of her stomach, and that voice mocked,
What the hell did you expect? She’s his soul mate.
“Enough.”

He looked down at the floor and clasped his hands together. “It’s nuts, right? I mean…really…outrageous.”

No, it wasn’t just outrageous. It was completely sick and twisted, but it wasn’t Cynna’s place to say so. She had no hold on him. She wasn’t his soul mate. And she’d known that from the moment she’d gotten emotionally involved with him. She’d just stupidly let herself fantasize that it didn’t matter.

“So I take it she really is going to die.”

He still didn’t lift his head. Just continued to stare down at the floor with that blank, unreadable expression. “It looks that way.”

Steeling herself against a conversation she didn’t want to have, she dropped her feet to the floor, careful not to touch him, then pushed to standing. “Well, it looks like you’re getting everything you ever wanted then. Even with your brother’s blessing.”

“I don’t want this,” Nick said as she crossed to the bed. “I never really did.”

She looked down at the lightweight jacket Skyla had given her that first day, laid out on the mattress. She’d already thrown the denim jacket she’d been wearing earlier away. It was ripped at the shoulder from the scene in the alley, and she couldn’t stand to look at it anymore. Couldn’t handle remembering the way Nick had finally kissed her after she’d dragged him back from the edge, the tenderness in his voice, the sweet way he’d touched her, and his urgent need to be close to her. Not his soul mate, but her. “I guess it doesn’t really matter what any of us want, now does it?”

He pushed to his feet. “Cynna—”

“No, you know, it’s…fine.” She closed her eyes and pressed her fingers against her pulsing temple. She was lying. It wasn’t fine. It would
never
be fine, but what the hell could she do about it? “She’s your soul mate, and though I might not get the whole soul mate draw…thing, I’ve definitely noticed how you can’t say no to her. So fine. Do what you have to do.” She dropped her hand and reached for the jacket. “You don’t owe me any explanation.”

“It’s not what you think.” He stepped toward her.

She tried not to look but couldn’t keep from glancing up. His eyes were shadowed, his brow furrowed. He was probably the strongest man she’d ever met, even stronger than Zagreus because of everything he’d lived through, but at the moment, he didn’t look strong. He looked wrecked. And her foolish heart went out to him.

“It’s not just about her,” he went on. “It’s about what happens to her sisters if she dies, and the people of Argolea if there’s no ruling monarchy, and what the Council will do to my people in the settlement if the queen isn’t around to stop them.”

He was justifying his decision. A decision he’d clearly already made. Her eyes slid closed, and her heart—or what was left of it—felt like it burst into flames in the center of her chest.
 

Drawing a deep breath, she pulled herself together as best she could, opened her eyes, and tugged on her jacket. “Then I guess that’s all there is to say.”

She turned for the door, but he moved quickly, stepping in her way. “Wait.”

Angry now—that this was happening, that she couldn’t change it, that she wasn’t enough for
him
to want to find a way to change it—she glared at him. “For what?”

“Just… I still need you.”

Frustration and hurt and betrayal all swirled inside her. “You never needed me. Not really. I was just a distraction from reality. In Zagreus’s lair, when we got to the colony…here. I’ve never had any magical power over you, Nick, not like your soul mate, and you know it. So I’m sure if a nobody like me can distract you for whatever it is that you
need
, then your soul mate will do an even better job.”

She stepped around him, but he grasped her upper arm, the heat of his fingertips burning into her skin beneath her jacket as he turned her to face him.

Godsdammit
… She was past the point of understanding. She wanted to lash out, to tell him to leave her the hell alone, to run. But when she glared up at him, the anguish she saw on his scarred face nearly did her in.

“I don’t…want you to leave,” he said in a pained voice.

Oh gods. Everything hurt—her stomach, her chest, her limbs, her head. And she found herself wanting to sink in and comfort him the way she needed to be comforted right this very second. But she couldn’t. Because something told her when he eventually left her to be with Isadora, that willpower that she’d held on to so tightly all those months with Zagreus would finally break. And she’d spiral even deeper into the depths of a despair that had pushed her toward revenge in the first place. To a place she’d never break free from.

“Neither do I,” she managed. “But I’ve never gotten what I want out of life. And this time, I’m not willing to compromise.”

Gently, she pulled her arm from his and straightened her spine. “It’s selfish of me. I know it is. But I won’t share you with someone else, especially her. I just...can’t. If you do this, then you have to do it without me.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Z
agreus stalked out of the cavern where Lykos was tormenting a particularly naughty nymph chained to the wall. Nothing pleased him lately. Not the sounds of agony in his lair, not watching Lykos—now that he was healed from his wounds—work his special talents on a nymph who’d tried to run away. Not even toying with the trio of Maenad nymphs he’d taken to his bedchamber last night.

He headed for his office, pushed the door open, and dropped into the chair behind his massive desk. The underwater window cast shades of blue and green over the dark room, and he stared at the fish swimming by, wondering if ripping a few to shreds would do anything to bolster his mood.

Probably not. The only person who could lift his spirits was an entire world away, probably fucking his uncle right this very minute.

His mood slid deeper into darkness. He clenched his jaw and drummed his fingers along the stone surface of his desk. The tracking device in Cynna’s arm had been a diversion, so that she and Nick would think that was how he was monitoring their escape. But he didn’t need it to know where she was or what she was feeling. Thanks to his blood, which now circulated in her veins, he was privy to her emotions. And those emotions—those disgusting, abhorrent emotions—were currently fucking with his plans.

His sweet Cynna felt strongly for Nick. Yet instead of being overjoyed by that feeling, she was currently brimming with anger, something that infuriated Zagreus beyond reason. Until he felt the burst of joy and excitement he knew came only from that useless emotion Argoleans and humans called love, he couldn’t tell if his uncle had truly fallen for her yet.

He loathed the fact that he needed that to happen, but breaking the son of a bitch emotionally was the only way he was going to harness Nick’s powers once and for all. Still…the thought of Cynna fucking the bastard, of her enjoying it, of knowing that she was falling in love with the asshole made Zagreus see nothing but blinding red.

“Did you think you could double-cross me and I would not find out?”

Startled out of his rage by the sound of the menacing voice, Zagreus jolted and glanced to his left, where Hades sat in a chair in the dark corner of the room, his black-as-sin eyes like daggers boring into his son.
 

Fuuuuck. Play it cool.

Zagreus glared right back at dear old Dad. “You’ve got nothing better to do than bother me? Things must be slow in the Underworld.”

“Don’t play coy with me, son. Where is your female? The one you so like to fuck in this deplorable lair you call home?”

Zagreus’s blood heated, but he forced himself not to react. “Around.”

Hades pushed out of his chair, his gaze never once wavering from Zagreus’s face. “Your female is in Argolea with my prize.”

A bead of apprehension slid down Zagreus’s spine. “Why would you ever think that?”

“Because I have spies within the Argolean Council who keep me abreast of what’s happening in their realm, and the two were recently spotted there together.” He slammed his hands on Zagreus’s desk, making Zagreus inch back from his father’s rolling, heated fury. “There’s no way they could have escaped from your control unless you let them go. The demigod’s powers may continue to grow, but he’s not as strong as you. Not yet. Not unless he breaks. And something tells me if you released your bitch with him, it means you’re about to claim something that does not belong to you.”

Zagreus’s pulse pounded hard as he stared up into Hades’s enraged face. As a god, Zagreus was immortal. His father couldn’t kill him even if he wanted to. He couldn’t even strip him of his powers. But he could destroy everything Zagreus had built, and he knew where Cynna was located. In retaliation for what he considered betrayal, Hades wouldn’t hesitate to take the only thing Zagreus really cared about.

“I’m not waiting to claim anything,” Zagreus lied. “This is all part of my plan. He cares for the female. Physical pain didn’t break him. Sexual pain didn’t seem to faze him. Emotional pain is the only thing that will work. The female is on our side. In fact,” he went on, extending the lie, “this was all her idea. As soon as the demigod falls in love with her, she’ll alert me. My presence will signal the ultimate betrayal. And that will be enough to finally break him the way we want.”
 

Hades eased back, his eyes full of distrust. But Zagreus knew the god wanted Nick more than he wanted anything else. And this explanation—even if not completely true—made perfect sense. He breathed a little easier. Yeah, he might just have lost Nick’s powers for himself, but if he played his cards right, he could keep his lair and Cynna too.
 

Rage covered Hades’s features, and he slammed his foot into the floor. A massive earthquake shook the tunnels, knocking over the stone desk, dropping pictures from the walls, making rocks crumble from the ceiling and crash against the ground.
 

Zagreus lurched back from being pummeled by falling stones. When the shaking finally subsided, Hades’s booming voice roared through the cavern.

“I will not be fucked with. I warned you what would happen if you double-crossed me.”

“I’m not double-crossing you,” Zagreus lied, pushing to his feet. “He’s going to break.”

Hades stalked forward, forcing Zagreus to scramble back until his spine hit the wall. The god-king of the Underworld glared into his son’s eyes.

“You’re right, he will. But you, my lecherous son, will never claim him. And when he finally breaks, Krónos’s powers will transfer to me. I want him back. Now. If you ever want to see your precious bitch again, you’ll do exactly as I say. Gather your satyr army and be ready to march at midnight.”