1. The Odyssey #2
“Very well. Send them to the private lounge.” Orion released a heavy exhale, the kind that usually signaled the end of a very long, very expensive night. “My apologies. It seems the real world insists on intruding.”
I knew I shouldn’t stick my nose into his business, but I’d never been good at doing what was expected of me. “Is everything all right, Lord Maris?”
Fortunately, Orion didn’t seem to mind my nosiness. “Just politics. The one storm I can’t control. Nothing of concern.”
The politics of the Olympian Houses were always of concern, but I had no intention of testing my luck further. “If there’s anyone who can understand the importance of work, it’s Danae and me. Please don’t let us keep you.”
No doubt, he’d have left either way, but he seemed charmed that I’d given him the excuse.
“I’m afraid I must. I hate having to deprive myself of your wonderful company, but it can’t be helped. Enjoy the Odyssey. And if the noise gets to be too much, the upper observation deck is usually empty. The view is worth the climb.”
With that, Orion bowed and turned away, vanishing into the crushing press of bodies. The aide trailed him like a shadow, and the moment they were gone, the vacuum of authority filled instantly with chaos. The bass seemed to hit harder, the laughter shriller.
Danae slumped against the railing, her posture collapsing like a marionette with cut strings. “Okay. He’s gone. I didn’t make a fool of myself. I didn’t faint.”
“You didn’t.” I reached out and tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear, fixing the damage the wind had done. “You stood your ground against a House Poseidon Alpha. I’m proud of you.”
She looked around at the swirling lights and the sheer, overwhelming scale of the party. “So… now what? We can’t just stand here.”
A server drifted past us, balancing a silver tray of champagne flutes. Not the glowing poison House Dionysus was pushing. Something with a little more promise.
With almost unusual enthusiasm, Danae intercepted the server and grabbed two glasses from the tray. She shoved one of them straight at me and shot me a sheepish glance. “To survival?”
I had no desire to drink Orion’s champagne, but when Danae looked at me like that, I couldn’t refuse her. “No, Danae.” I took the offered glass and pasted a smile on my face. “To you, and your genius.”
After all, tonight wasn’t about my resentment of the Olympian Houses. It wasn’t about me at all. It was about Danae, and as long as she was happy, so was I.
The guest cabin smelled of lavender and pressed linen, a sterile sanctuary that felt a world away from the riots on the deck.
“I think the room is spinning.” Danae flopped onto the duvet, burying her face in the pillow. Her heels lay discarded on the plush carpet. She’d kicked them off the moment we’d crossed the threshold. It was a minor miracle she’d even worn them for so long and hadn’t abandoned them hours ago.
“We are on a boat, Day.” I picked up her heels and set them down neatly by the door. “Everything is spinning.”
“No. It’s the champagne.” She rolled over, blinking up at the ceiling with glassy, unfocused eyes. “I think… I didn’t survive it, after all.”
“You did good.” I pulled the duvet up to her chin, watching the tension finally bleed out of her frame. She looked impossibly young like this, stripped of the equations and the anxiety. “You’re going to be fine. Just sleep it off. I’ll wake you before we dock.”
She was asleep before I finished the sentence.
I stood there for a moment, listening to the soft sound of her breathing.
It was the only steady thing I had heard all night, a quiet victory in a chaotic war.
I checked the lock on the door—twice, rattling the handle to be sure—and slipped out into the corridor.
I needed air. Real air, not the recycled, perfume-heavy draft circulating through the vents.
Not for the first time, I wished we’d been a little more careful with the champagne. It had only made me slightly tipsy, but Danae had always been a lightweight. She’d regret this tomorrow. Kind of like I regretted it already. But for now, I didn’t want to think about it. At all.
I walked back to the elevator and pressed the topmost button. Orion had said the observation deck would be empty. Maybe in this, at least, he’d be right.
The elevator carried me to the upper levels in moments. As the doors slid open, the wind hit me, a frigid slap that cleared the champagne haze from my head. I didn’t let it get to me. I walked to the railing and leaned far out.
From up here, the party was just a dull thrum in the floorboards, a beast locked in the basement.
The ocean stretched out in every direction, a black, restless expanse that swallowed the moonlight.
“Finally.” I let the air out in a long, shaky rush, my lungs finally expanding fully against the corset of my dress.
“Not a fan of crowds, I take it?”
The voice drifted from the shadows, low and amused. I spun around, only to see a figure leaning casually against a steel stanchion.
Anyone else might have panicked at finding a stranger in the dark. But I hadn’t lost my composure when last week’s bride had shredded her veil five minutes before the ceremony. I wasn’t going to lose it now. “I didn’t realize this deck was occupied.”
“It wasn’t.” The figure stepped into the moonlight. He moved with a lazy, predatory grace, smiling as if we were sharing a private joke. “I just escaped. Orion throws a hell of a party, but there’s only so much neon I can tolerate before I get a migraine.”
My pulse hammered a frantic rhythm against my ribs. I knew that face. Everyone knew that face. It was plastered on every newsfeed and gossip column from here to Greece.
“Alexander Stormwright.”
“Guilty.” He bowed his head with the mocking elegance of a king playing at being a commoner. “And you have me at a disadvantage.”
I fought the sudden, irrational urge to run. My instincts, usually reliable, screamed that I was standing too close to a predator. He didn’t look like a guest. He looked like a storm front waiting to break, contained only by a tailored suit and a charming smile.
“I’m just leaving.”
“Already?” Alexander arched a perfect brow, radiating a calm warmth that felt completely at odds with the cold wind. “The night is young. And you looked like you were enjoying the silence.”
“I was.” I gripped the cold steel of the railing behind me, bracing myself against the pull of his presence. “Until now.”
“Ouch.” Alexander didn’t flinch. Instead, he chuckled, treating my rejection like a delightful novelty rather than an insult. “I usually get at least three minutes of polite conversation before the venom comes out. You’re breaking records.”
“I’m efficient.” I tightened my grip on the railing until the cold steel bit into my palms. I needed that pain. I needed it to ground me against the strange, humming heat he radiated. “And I don’t have three minutes.”
“Pity.” He drifted closer. He didn’t invade my space, but he consumed the air around us, making the wide, windswept deck feel suddenly, claustrophobically small.
“You’re not part of Orion’s usual crowd.
You’re too sober. You’re not wearing enough glitter.
And you’re the only person on this ship who isn’t looking at me like I’m about to write them a check. ”
“I don’t want your money.”
“Everyone wants something.” He rested his hip against the stanchion, studying me with an intensity that felt physical. “Power. Influence. An introduction. What do you want, Ms…?”
The question hung in the cold air between us, a baited hook waiting for a bite.
“To be left alone.”
“A rare ambition.” He turned his head to the sea, the moonlight catching the sharp, arrogant angle of his jaw. “But I don’t believe you. Nobody comes to a House Poseidon gala to be invisible. You’re hiding something.”
Adrenaline flooded my system, a cold wash that started in my chest and ended in my fingertips. Hiding. The word struck too close to home. I had spent a lifetime hiding my mother’s name, my biology, and the temper that threatened to burn my carefully constructed life to the ground.
“I’m hiding from the noise,” I snapped at him. I tried to not let him get to me, but I didn’t think I was very successful. “And now, I’m hiding from you.”
“You think I’m dangerous.” The amusement faded from his face, replaced by a sharper, keener interest.
“I think you’re Alexander Stormwright.” I stepped away from the railing, putting distance between us before the gravity of him could pull me in. “You don’t walk into a room without having some kind of agenda. And I don’t want to have anything to do with that.”
“Surely, I’m not so terrifying,” he said, straightening his back. The air pressure dropped between us, a sudden vacuum that sucked the moisture from my mouth. “Stay. Have a drink with me. I promise to keep the lightning to a minimum.”
The air between us felt too thin, charged with a static that made my skin itch. I hated that his offer tempted me. “I don’t drink with crashing Alphas. Enjoy the view, Lord Stormwright. Alone.”
Without allowing him to answer, I turned on my heel and walked away. It took everything I had not to run. I forced my legs to move in a rhythm that screamed ‘indifference’ rather than ‘flight’, counting every step until I reached the elevator.
I didn’t look back. I didn’t need to. I could feel his gaze on my spine, a brand burning through the silk of my dress.
He didn’t tell me to stop. He didn’t call out to me. But when I stepped into the elevator, I found myself looking back at him. Our eyes met. And something dark and twisted landed in my gut. I knew right then and there that this wasn’t over.