Chapter Sixty-Three
Persephone
My ankle caught the first step down from the dais as he began counting down from ten, nearly sending me sprawling the remaining four stairs.
If he heard my fumble, he made no sign. Recovering with a wobble, I trudged forward, trying to keep my footfalls as quiet as possible, going so far as to remove my shoes so they didn’t sound out my position and even tossing them in the opposite direction to throw him off.
As much as my fierce, competitive streak kicked, the way his eyes darkened right before the room did promised me a different kind of victory should I fail to evade him.
One that had something deep within my core clenching in a way that echoed the wickedness in his eyes.
I sprinted behind the throne to the first hallway I could find, breaking line of sight nearly immediately.
With a giggle and a potent rush of adrenaline, I rushed, switching direction in each hallway, passing servants and nymphs looking at me like I’d lost my mind.
I paid them no attention, my goal only to run.
I counted down in my head, feeling my anticipation grow eagerly.
I ducked into the first room I came to once the end of his countdown echoed through the corridors like the sound of a gong.
I darted right, around one final corner.
A storage room perhaps, with sheets thrown over tables, miscellaneous items strewn haphazardly about and a layer of dust reigning over it all.
It even faded the window above, filtering the light and giving it a softness.
I carefully maneuvered myself behind the nearest desk, settling down on my knees and elbows so I could peek under the cloth that covered it, a direct line of sight to the door.
My massive grin subsided when I realized the dust on the floor was disturbed.
My footprints were a telltale map all but pointing to my location.
I grimaced. What were the chances he didn’t notice?
The way his dark eyes always took in every detail, however small, I didn’t like my chances. My core clenched again, my blood singing, the anticipation of him finding me building to an all-time high.
I held my breath when the dull, echoing thud of footsteps sounded from outside down the hall. What struck me was that there was no pause in the footfalls, no stopping to check rooms, no nothing. I slumped, knowing it probably wasn’t him.
“Oh, little shadow,” came that delicious purr that startled me out of my skin. His dark laugh was softer than velvet and loaded with insinuation. “How convenient that you’re already on your knees.”
I startled forward, turning with a gasp. Hades’ hip rested against the desk, blocking any semblance of escape. His eyes smoldered when he looked down at me like two scorched embers.
“How did you find me?” I gaped. “You didn’t even come through the door!”
His answering laugh was darker than the shadowed room it echoed through. “Every path, every corridor, every brick in this place bends to my will.” Biting his lip in anticipation, his eyes scanned me from where my knees met the ground to the top of my head. “You cannot hide from me.”
Grasping my wrists, all I knew was his laughter when the room gave way to darkness only for another, more familiar room to take its place. Back to where we began.
I was standing in front of him, before his throne.
His stare had me aching. Wanting. Needing.
But so did the chase. And it wasn’t yet over.
“As if my first time worshipping you would be in a dusty storeroom.” He stepped forward only for me to shift backwards. His eyebrows shot up, tension building along those broad shoulders, gauging my reaction.
“There’s more desire to run in me, oh mighty Underworld King.” I fluttered my eyelashes at him, watching his nostrils flare at the challenge. “If I’m yours,” I stared up at him with a smirk that was so unlike me, “prove it.”
He pounced. I didn’t even get to make good on my challenge to run before his hand tangled in my hair, pulling just enough that it sent a thrill down my spine.
Even as he forced me to sit on the edge of his obsidian throne, his shadows came up to hold me in place, like the chains of the shades.
It was then, when I was completely at his mercy, that he sank to his knees before me.
The gold flecks of his eyes didn’t just spark with his desire, they ignited, like infernos in the dim.
“You have me in awe on my knees, little shadow, and I’m happy to never get up from here.
” He slid my dress up, baring me to him.
I clamped my thighs shut out of instinct more than anything, only for him to forcefully widen them.
Sharpening his tone, he continued, “I’ll worship from my place down here until our souls are the dust between stars, and if there’s something beyond this eternity, you’ll be mine there too.
” His tongue shot out, my head falling back at the contact with the most intimate part of me, a breathy moan falling from my lips.
“Eyes on me,” he commanded, his resonance wasn’t loud but it echoed in every corner of me. “Or are you still running?”
He didn’t just mean now. His words were loaded, rife with more. I would happily worship at his alter, in any way he asked. Be broken for it, if need be. But I think I would enjoy his idea of unmaking me, bending me to his desire.
“Still chasing?”
The spark in his eyes echoed within me, like a gong going off, fracturing any semblance of control I had left. I could no longer deny that every part of me wanted every part of him. All his potential selves, past selves, and every version of him he could become.
“Always, little shadow.”
The coldness of the obsidian throne couldn’t reach me here.
His tongue lashed me, sending little embers of sensation along every nerve, alighting them as they passed.
My hands delved into his hair, long nails scratching his scalp as my hips moved, desperate and searching.
I crumpled into a string of curses when he added one finger, then two.
My lips parted, his name leaving them in a breathy moan.
“Fuck,” He groaned devouring like a male starved, the sound making me tighten around him.
He pushed me higher, higher until the entire throne room fell entirely away, until the world was a needle point and only we existed.
Only this. “Say my name like that again, and I’m going to forget that I’m trying to be gentle. ”
“I said to bite me before.” My gaze was steady when it reached his this time. “I don’t need gentle. I need you. I want you to bite and never let go.”
He grinned, the deviousness pouring off of him in waves, like his shadows steeping the room in darkness.
The wicked glint in his eye promised madness, and I knew my ruin was at hand.
He upped his pace with his fingers, making my breath leave me.
But it was when his teeth raked that hyper sensitive bud, when they closed in gently around it, that I cried out, not for mercy—for more.
I felt my insides quicken when pleas devolve into wordless cries of pure carnal desire.
“You beg so prettily, Persephone.” He crooned, stoking the fire in me further until I stood over a precipice. “Beg one more time. Just once for me.”
“Fuck,” My eyes fell closed as my hips searched for the friction he was denying me. I whimpered as he tutted me, his tongue going back to that spot, keeping me tantalizingly close, but not over the edge. “Please, Hades. I’m begging. Please.”
Five seconds. Five seconds was all it took for him to up his pace with that carnal glee before I was falling. I held to the arms of the throne as if I’d fall off the world if I didn’t.
“You have no idea how long I’ve waited to do that. To see you so undone.” He said, standing. I blinked up at him, my haze only just beginning to lift. “Oh, I’m not finished with you, little shadow. I’ve not taken all I want yet.”
He stepped into the shadows again, so subtly I almost didn’t clock the movement at all.
When he reemerged, I was surprised to find him under me.
He reclaimed his throne like the dark god he was.
While I rose, only to find my legs straddling him once more, his fastening came undone, springing the length of him free at last. He guided me over him, the tip of him against me. My lips parted—
—only for his lips to crash against mine as I sat.
He swallowed every sound as I stretched around him, his hands worshipping every curve of my body in a way that was so addictive I understood why Minthe never wanted to let go.
The way this male was under my skin, I don’t think I’ll ever be free of him even if I desired it.
He moved within me, two gentle strokes, an ask.
I slammed myself down, my head tipping back in bliss.
His hand buried itself in my hair, his fingers twining through, keeping my throat open for his lips.
The ground quaked, or maybe it was me. We were cataclysmic, inevitable.
Something inside me changed, like a key turning a lock, and I knew I could never go back to being without him.
He grunted, moving inside me even as he carried my weight. My own mewls rose up to meet his growls of desire. I’m getting close to that edge again and all I could do is hope he wouldn’t deny me. Not this.
“Come with me.” I urged, upping my pace into something feverish.
“Fuck, Hades. Please.” Each word was its own bitten out sentence as my climax built deep in my core until I was desperate with need.
His hands slipped from holding me, to pulling me forcefully down onto him, a pleasure drunk scream finally breaking from me as I shattered.
He pistoned, thrusting quickly, loudly, getting impossibly larger, harder within me before he followed me over the edge, following my single command.
When the world, my senses returned to me, it wasn’t in chaos, but stillness.
Quiet. His worship of me changed. He no longer consumed me, just held.
Not taking, but keeping. His arms wrapped me as tightly as the shadows did, pulling me against him.
I went liquid. My lips touched his throat, reverent and tender.
His lips found the side of my head with a devastating sweetness that cracked my heart open.
“Did I hurt you?” He asked in the kind of quiet that gives way to concern. Like he was bracing himself. I sat up to meet his eye, my hand stroking his cheek once before my lips claimed his softly.
“No,” I whispered, pressing my forehead to his. “That’s not something I’m worried about. People painted you a villain, but you’re one of the only ones who never hurt me. You aren’t the thing that destroys me. You’re the reason I survive.”
He didn’t respond, at least not in words.
I felt him stiffen around me, pulling me closer as words failed him.
The gesture threaded itself in knots in my heart.
I knew with a devastating certainty that this was the only place I ever wanted to be and those threads would never come loose.
Even if they were cut, even if the Fates themselves demanded it, we would never be wholly unraveled.