Total pages in book: 87
Estimated words: 82080 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 410(@200wpm)___ 328(@250wpm)___ 274(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 82080 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 410(@200wpm)___ 328(@250wpm)___ 274(@300wpm)
“Yes.”
I don’t know that I trust him with this. He’s still so new, he practically shines. The fact that Hades wants him trained up under Tink would blow my mind if I let myself think about it too hard. Tink’s skills are hard-won, and she had most of them before she was put in the position to make a deal with Hades. Training her was just a matter of refining them a little and pointing her in the right direction. Hercules is another creature entirely. “That’s enough for now.”
He blinks those big blue eyes at me. “What?” He has the audacity to sound hurt, and I hate that I want to smooth his pain away at the expense of my own. He’s an adult, and his actions have consequences just like the rest of us.
“I’ll have someone drop off the files. Study them like your life depends on it. It might.” When he doesn’t immediately move, I dig my nails into my palms, striving to keep my growing emotional bullshit out of my voice. “Hercules. Please leave.”
He studies me for a long moment and finally nods. “I’ll fix this.”
I don’t ask what he means. In the end, it won’t matter. “Some things aren’t capable of being fixed. The faster you figure that out, the faster you’ll get ahead in life.”
Chapter 16
Hercules
I’m half expecting Tink when someone knocks a little while after I return to my suite, but when I open the door, it’s a striking Black woman with a mass of braids piled on her head. She sweeps a look over me and shrugs. “You’re pretty, but I don’t think you’re pretty enough to be causing all this drama.”
“Thanks?”
“It wasn’t a compliment.” She shoves a laptop at me. “Don’t take this out of your room. The sensitive material on it can’t leave the property. I don’t think I have to tell you what will happen if you try something.”
Nothing good. So far, nothing about this situation has gone like I expected, but I don’t think for a second that Hades would allow me to pass on privileged information without recourse. I don’t know what kind of recourse, but it doesn’t matter. I have no intention of sharing it. Even if I did, I have no one to share it with. “I’ll keep it in my room.”
“Glad we got that sorted.” She points at herself. “Allecto. I run security. You have any problems, you come to me or one of my people. You become a problem, I deal with you. Got it?”
“Got it,” I say faintly. Tink had mentioned security, but because I wasn’t currently allowed into the back rooms of the club where the intense play went on, I had put it from my mind until later. It was enough to know that Hades protects his people.
“Then we shouldn’t have any issues.” She frowned at me. “Don’t know what he was thinking bringing you in.” She shook her head and walked away.
I step back into my suite and close the door. Allecto’s thoughts aren’t anything that haven’t been echoed back to me by multiple people since I arrived here. I get it. I don’t fit in. I have to be trained from the ground up in a way that none of the other employees seem to require. It didn’t make sense before, the reason why Hades would drag me into a lifetime deal. Now that I have some distance—now that I know it’s because of Zeus—I understand it a whole lot better.
Seems fitting that I should suffer for the sins of my father. Seems almost like penance after how things fell out with Leda. I couldn’t save her, couldn’t stand up to him no matter how hard I tried. If there were others…
I stalk to the couch and drop the laptop there. Of course there were others. My father has hardly been a paragon of virtue, only to break character with Leda. There were others. There must have been.
Thirty years ago, one of the victims of my father’s sadistic nature was apparently Hades’s son.
I wish I knew more. What happened in that situation. What happened in the wake of it. Did Zeus kill him? The thought makes me sick to my stomach. I wish I could rule out my father being a murderer, but he’s a rapist and has no problem committing assault. Why not murder as well? Would knowing the truth even matter? As Hades said, it happened before I was even born. It has nothing to do with me.
Until now.
Then there’s Meg. It’s obvious Hades didn’t tell her his reasoning or his plans, and the fact that I knew even part of it hurt her. She covered her reaction up quickly, but I saw it all the same. I had assumptions about those two when I first came here and now, less than forty-eight hours in, I’m having to question all of them. They present a united front, but the closer I get, the more the cracks in their relationship start looking like canyons. It’s none of my business. I should know by now to stay out of shit that doesn’t concern me.