Chapter 28
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Hades
“If anyone starts digging,” Apollo said, “it needs to be quiet. No pressure on Lettie. No questions. No confronting her mother.”
“Not yet,” Zeus agreed.
My eyes narrowed. “Not ever without me.”
“Fine.”
“And not without Lettie deciding what she wants,” I added. I’d be damned if I let them force her to confront something that might cause her pain.
Zeus stared at me. So did Apollo. Because that wasn’t what they expected from me.
Possessive, yes. Protective, yes. But this?
Letting my woman make the decision for herself.
That was something else. That was me recognizing what Apollo had already said—if Lettie was Colette, then she’d spent her whole life with choices stripped away before she ever knew they existed.
I wouldn’t add to that. Wouldn’t take from her the way everyone else had.
She’d decide. When she was ready. If she was ever ready.
And until then, I’d protect her from every fucking person in this room if I had to.
“She matters most,” Apollo said.
I looked at him then. Held his stare. “If she’s Colette, I want my sister back,” Apollo admitted, the words scraping their way out of him.
Tearing pieces off as they came. Raw and bleeding and honest. “I want to know her. I want Dad to know her. I want her to know she was loved. That she was wanted. That we never stopped looking.”
Rykard made a broken sound behind him. A sound that came from somewhere deep. Somewhere that had been hemorrhaging without stopping. Apollo closed his eyes for a second. “But I don’t want to hurt her,” he said. “I don’t want to rip open her life because I need answers.”
The room was too quiet.
Then I said, “You won’t.”
Apollo opened his eyes.
I wasn’t threatening him. Not exactly. I was making a promise. To Lettie. “If this is true,” I said, voice low and lethal, “whoever took her will pay. No matter who it was.” That included her mother.
A few brothers shifted. No one argued. Good.
Because I meant every fucking word. If someone had stolen Lettie, if someone had ripped her from her family and raised her as their own while Apollo’s mother died not knowing her baby was alive, I was going to find them.
And I was going to make them suffer in ways that would make Kronos’ death look merciful.
I’d start with their fingers. Break them one by one.
Then their hands. Their arms. Work my way through every bone in their body until they were begging me to stop.
Until they were screaming for death. And then I’d deny it.
Keep them alive. Keep them suffering. Make them understand exactly what they’d taken.
“Rykard can meet her,” I said.
Apollo’s head snapped up. So did Rykard’s.
“But not alone,” I added. “Not today. Not with this shit hanging over her head and her not knowing it.”
“When?” Apollo asked.
“Harvest Festival’s coming up,” Zeus offered.
I looked at him. He shrugged. “Town event. Public. Natural. Rykard can see her without anyone forcing shit.”
Something shifted in the room. Not proof. Not even close. But interest. Suspicion didn’t always arrive screaming. Sometimes it walked in quietly and sat in the corner until everyone realized it had been there all along.
“Since when do we go to Harvest Week?” Hermes asked.
“It’s a start,” Apollo said, ignoring the question. “Public enough that we’re not forcing anything. Natural enough that it doesn’t spook her.”
“We wait until Harvest Week,” Zeus declared. “Rykard meets Lettie. Talks to her. We go from there.”
Rykard exhaled. Apollo hadn’t realized he’d been holding his breath.
“Until then,” Zeus continued, looking around the table, “this doesn’t leave church.”
One by one, brothers nodded.
I didn’t.
I was staring at Apollo again.
“What?” he asked.
“You sure?”
He knew what I was asking. Was he sure enough to risk Lettie’s peace? Was he sure enough to potentially destroy her world if he was wrong? Was he sure enough to live with the consequences if he was right?
“I’m sure something isn’t right,” Apollo said. “Every time she looks at me, something in me recognizes her.” He looked down at his useless legs. At the limbs that had betrayed him. “If I do nothing and she turns out to be Colette, I’ll never forgive myself.”
I nodded. Not happy but I accepted his answer. Because I understood that too. The weight of not knowing. The guilt of not acting. The fear that doing nothing would be worse than doing something.
Zeus picked up the gavel, then paused. “Anything else?”
No one spoke.
“Then we handle the vote.”
My head turned slowly toward him.
The shift was instant. The Colette suspicion didn’t disappear.
It didn’t settle. It didn’t hurt less. But I compartmentalized it.
Locked it away in a box I’d deal with later.
Right now, there was only one thing that mattered, and that was Lettie.
My woman. My queen. The vote that would make her officially mine.
Zeus looked at Apollo. “You still have hesitation?”
Apollo shook his head. “No.”
My eyes narrowed. I studied his face, looking for doubt. For any hint of reservation. Any sign that he would fuck this up for me.
Apollo met my gaze. “If she’s my sister, there isn’t a man in this room I’d trust more to protect her.”
Something flashed through my chest. Not gratitude. Not exactly. Respect, maybe. Recognition. He was giving me his sister. If Lettie was Colette, then Apollo’s first act as her brother would be handing her to me. Trusting me to keep her safe. To protect her. To love her the way she deserved.
I gave him one hard nod.
Zeus looked to Rykard. “Rykard?”
Rykard’s voice was rough when he answered. “No hesitation.”
“Then vote on the floor,” Zeus said. “Violet ‘Lettie’ Foster as Hades’ old lady.”
Apollo lifted his hand first.
I stared at him. Let him see exactly what that meant to me. Let him see the promise I was making. If Lettie was his sister, I’d protect her with my life. I’d kill for her. Die for her. Burn the world down for her. And if she wasn’t his sister? I’d do the same fucking thing.
Hands lifted around the table. Unanimous.
My chair scraped back as I stood. For a second, I thought about saying something.
Thanking them. Acknowledging what this meant.
But the words wouldn’t come. There was only one thing in my head.
Lettie. I needed to find her. Needed to tell her.
Needed to make this official before anything else could go wrong.
The church doors swung open, and I pushed through them with Zeus at my back.
The hallway was quiet, the clubhouse settling into that strange lull between chaos and nightfall.
My blood was still running hot from the vote, from Apollo’s revelation, from the weight of what I’d just claimed in front of every member of this club.
Lettie was mine. Officially. Unanimously.
And I was going to find her and make sure she understood exactly what that meant.
We hit the main room, and that was when I saw them.
Rhea and Lettie stood near the entrance with Cerberus padding behind them like some massive, four-legged guardian.
The dog’s eyes swept the room, cataloging threats, before settling on me with what looked like approval.
But it was Rhea who stopped me cold. Her eyes were red-rimmed, cheeks streaked with tears that hadn’t fully dried.
Her face was blotchy and raw, like she’d been crying hard enough to shake her entire body.
Like she’d finally let herself break. Finally let herself feel the grief she’d been holding back since Kronos died.
Lettie had her arm linked through Rhea’s, her body angled toward the older woman in a way that was deliberate. Protective. Like she was holding her up, or maybe just holding her together.
The tenderness of it hit me like a fist to the gut.
Zeus moved toward his mother immediately, pulling her into his arms. I watched him hug her, watched the way she stiffened slightly before melting into him.
My chest tightened, something warm and unfamiliar spreading through my ribs.
Something that felt dangerously close to pride.
But when he pulled back and got a good look at her tear-stained face, something shifted in his expression.
His eyes narrowed. Suspicion flickered. Control reasserted itself.
“Mom, why are you crying?” Zeus’ voice was sharp, edged with suspicion. He shot a brief glare at Lettie before turning back to Rhea. “What happened?”
Rhea straightened, pulling herself together with visible effort. “I’m grieving the death of my husband, son. I’m allowed to cry.”
“Of course you are. I just haven’t seen you do it since the funeral.” Zeus’ tone was careful now, but there was an edge underneath it. A need to understand. To control.
“Have you looked?” Rhea snapped back, and I felt something shift in her. Some steel that had been buried under decades of compliance suddenly surfacing.
“What?” Zeus asked.
“I’m drowning, Kane. I need to get away for a while.” Rhea’s voice was steady now, but there was a tremor underneath it. A woman who’d finally reached her breaking point and decided to do something about it.
I watched Lettie’s hand tighten on Rhea’s arm. Just slightly. Just enough to say I’m here. I’ve got you.
And I understood then what had happened.
Lettie had done something I hadn’t thought possible.
She’d broken through Rhea’s walls. She’d given her permission to grieve.
To want something for herself. To acknowledge that she was drowning and that it wasn’t acceptable anymore.
My queen had done that. She’d walked into this clubhouse, into this woman’s life, and given her something no one else had been able to.
Permission. Understanding. The knowledge that wanting to escape wasn’t selfish, it was survival.
The power of it made my chest swell. Made my throat burn. Made me realize that Lettie wasn’t just mine. She was something more. Something better. Something that could heal wounds I didn’t even know existed.
“What do you mean, Mom?” Zeus was trying to regain control now, trying to understand the situation so he could manage it. So he could keep everything exactly where he wanted it.
“I mean, I want to take a trip. I need to get away from the memories for a little while. I need to find out who I am without your father. Who I am without my husband.” Rhea’s voice was quiet but firm. This wasn’t a request. This was a woman making a decision about her own life.
“Mom—” Zeus started, but Rhea cut him off.
“I wasn’t asking, Kane. You do what you have to do, but I’m leaving in two days.”
Zeus clamped his lips shut. His jaw worked. His eyes went dark, revealing that controlled fury that made prospects piss themselves. He was calculating, running through scenarios, trying to figure out how to reassert dominance over his own mother.
It was desperate.
Pathetic.
And absolutely fucking fascinating, because for the first time since Kronos died, my president looked like he didn’t have all the answers. Fucking beautiful.
“Where are you going?” he asked, his voice carefully controlled.
“I don’t know. I just need to go.”
“A prospect has to go with you.” It wasn’t a suggestion.
It was a demand. Zeus was desperate to stay in control, to keep his mother tethered to the club, to him, to the life she’d been living.
But Rhea just looked at him. And in that look was resignation and defeat and the acceptance of a cage she’d been living in for decades.
But there was something else, too, something that looked like freedom.
“I know,” she breathed.
Two words were her only reply. She didn’t argue or demand he back off.
She turned to Lettie and held out her arms. My queen walked into them without hesitation, and they hugged like they’d known each other for years instead of days.
Like Lettie had given her something precious, and Rhea was grateful beyond words.
Lettie pulled back and smiled. I watched Rhea’s face soften, watched her nod like they’d made some kind of agreement. Some kind of pact.
“I’ll see you tomorrow for lunch,” Rhea said.
Then she kissed her son on the cheek and walked down the hall, her spine straighter than it had been when she came in. Like she’d shed something heavy. Like she’d finally decided her own life mattered.
Zeus turned to me and Lettie with fire in his eyes.
“What the fuck did you do?” he snarled, the accusation clear.
I stepped forward before he could say anything else. Before he could direct that rage at my queen. My body moved between them automatically. A wall of muscle and violence and absolute fucking certainty.
“Watch your fucking tone, brother,” I snarled back.
Zeus’ jaw clenched. He wanted to argue, wanted to assert his position.
His title. He wanted to make this about something he could fix.
But he couldn’t. The truth was sitting right in front of him: his mother had made a choice.
And that choice had nothing to do with Lettie manipulating her and everything to do with Rhea finally deciding her own life was worth living.
“You’re damn lucky the vote already went through.” Zeus stormed off, and I didn’t turn around until he left the main room.
I looked down at Lettie. Her eyes were bright, her expression soft but determined. She’d known exactly what she was doing. She’d known Rhea needed permission to grieve.
To want.
To leave.
Lettie crossed her arms over her chest. “What vote?”