Chapter 21 Persephone
Persephone
Squinting down at the crimson wax seal on a piece of intricately lined paper that I am attempting to replicate, I purse my lips.
Spread around the delicate slip of parchment are a number of blocks of wax, a cluster of long handled metal seal markers, and a whole box full of tiny metal instruments with scoops and dull blades.
Feeling stiff, I sit up and set one of the blades aside.
Lacing my fingers together, I push my hands high over my head.
I’ve been working on this seal for hours now and my back throbs, angry that I have been bent over the worktable for so long. Pushing myself to my feet, I sigh. Staring at the glob, I try to figure out what is off. Something about the seal is wrong but I can’t quite put my finger on it.
Have I used the wrong blend of waxes? Or do I need to use a different seal? None of the implements are quite right for the task but that’s why I’m here, I suppose. I have used the scoops and blades and a tiny blowtorch to craft the impression of a crown in wax, the Tunisian royal insignia.
But there is something different between the seal and the picture I have on my phone. And it’s driving me crazy trying to figure it out.
“Take a break.”
Hades’ sudden and unexpected nearness practically makes me jump out of my skin. I dart a glance at him, startled. He stands less than a foot away, a brow arched, holding two white paper cups.
My eye catches on the way his black button up gapes at the collar, two black buttons undone. For some reason that small lapse — either intentionally done or not — makes my cheeks fill with heat. I jerk my eyes away and touch my messy bun.
“What?” I ask.
His expression gives away exactly nothing. He lifts a cup, offering it to me. I stand up, moving a few inches closer and accepting the cup.
“Come on.” He jerks his head toward the door. “Let’s walk outside for a minute. I’ve bought sandwiches.”
I pause, casting a glance over my shoulder at my work. It’s not going anywhere, of course. I know that.
But my brain is still stuck on the same question. What is it about that seal that’s inauthentic?
Other than the fact that I am trying to replicate it in a darkened warehouse hundreds of miles away from Tunisia, of course. I wrinkle my nose and sigh.
“Okay.”
Hades reaches for my elbow, thinking I guess to steer me out of the warehouse.
But I shoot him a sharp glance, just shy of a glare, and sidestep him altogether.
He lets me lead the way outside without comment, but I can feel his heavy gaze on the back of my neck as I roll aside the heavy warehouse door.
I suppress a sigh and walk outside into the dying heat of the day.
It’s nearly twilight, the sun drunkenly beginning to disappear behind the broad sweep of the azure ocean.
The breeze picks up as I walk toward the shore, breaking what was probably an unbearable heat.
I wouldn’t know, as I was utterly absorbed in my work all day.
Hades sips his coffee, watching me out of the corner of his eye. I suck in a deep breath and taste the drink he brought me.
To my surprise, it is a creamy, milky chai latte. I tip the paper cup up and chug a little, realizing only now that it’s been forever since I have eaten or drunk anything.
He doubles down, pulling a paper bag from his pocket and offering me a piece of baguette layered with cheese and butter. I walk along the shore, practically inhaling half the sandwich and chasing it with the sweet spice of the latte.
The wind picks up, clawing at my dress, whipping the waves into a froth. My footsteps sink into the sandy shore as I walk down to where the waves crash onto the beach, skittering up the already wet ground until it just reaches my feet.
I take another bite of the sandwich and mmm a little, appreciating how buttery and cheesy it is.
“Like that, do ye?” Hades asks.
I slice him with a glance. I finish chewing, swallow, and then retort.
“I’m sorry. Did I miss something? The last time I checked, we were not exactly on speaking terms.”
He glares at me. “That was certainly not my intention. I just wanted to make sure that we were both on the same page about… what happened.”
“What happened,” I repeat, my voice sharp. “You mean how you fucked me and then acted like I went out of my way to personally harm you?”
His brow descends. “Dinnae be a child.”
“I would say I have acted completely appropriately, and you are the one being a little kid about this whole thing.” I smack my lips, glancing out over the coast. “We’re both consenting adults. We both— “
The words snarl up in my mouth, stopped by what I see just up the shoreline.
A few hundred feet down was an old parking lot, its pavement crumbling, its markings all but faded.
A cheap little car stands there, its hood raised.
A young man dressed in an expensive-looking outfit of designer denim and a Supreme hoodie leans over the engine, barking orders at a very young woman.
The woman can’t be more than eighteen and wears a long, pink halter dress that falls to her sandaled feet.
She looks terrified, nodding and jumping every time that the man barks something at her in a language I don’t understand.
Pressed against the woman’s legs are two children, girls that are maybe four and two, respectively. They are dressed in matching pink sweatsuits and they look at the man with something like terror written on their faces.
I don’t even have to say anything. Hades tenses, his hands curling into fists as he watches the scene for a few seconds. I watch the play of emotions as they filter to the surface; right now, it is easy enough to read Hades’ expression.
He’s near-violent, just watching this little operetta play out. The young man closes the hood of the car with a slam and points at the woman. Even from here, I can make out his vehement, angry words.
“Do you know what he is saying?” I whisper.
Hades shakes his head slowly. “No. They’re speaking a Slavic language, I think. Maybe Ukrainian or Russian.”
He hisses in a breath as the man bucks at the woman, a move meant to intimidate her. It works, because she takes a step back, dropping her head and holding up her hands defensively.
Just like that, Hades stalks toward the couple. I am not surprised in the least, but I still follow on his heels, my heart pounding.
I really don’t want him to beat the man to a pulp the way he did to that stranger back in Valencia. Maybe someone should intercede, stop the man from hurting the woman… but that’s a far cry from the energy that Hades is carrying as he approaches them.
Mayhem and violence are bleeding off of him, falling behind him in crackling waves. His expression is stiff and full of malevolence. Shoulders flattened, he storms up the beach, making it all but impossible to stop him.
I run, catching his hand and tugging on it.
“Hades…”
He freezes, turning his glare on me. When he speaks, his voice is gone to gravel and his teeth clenched. “Let go of me.”
“I’m not going to let go until you take a deep breath.” I grip his hand, beseeching him. “Please, Hades. You’ve got to take a beat.”
Hades stares at me, violence crackling in his very bearing. “Let. Me. GO!”
I’ve never heard Hades raise his voice before. My heart pounds, my mouth goes dry as the Sahara on a hot day. I flinch.
I know that this man has the strength to hurt me. Hell, Hades could easily kill me with his bare hands if he felt compelled to do so.
But I don’t let go of his hand. “Think about what you’re doing,” I tell him, trying to keep my voice from wavering. “One deep breath in is all I am asking…”
Against his will, Hades drags in a deep breath, his angry gaze still pinning me in place. The breath loosens his shoulders a fraction and he draws himself upright to his full, imposing, impossibly tall height.
His fists don’t unclench, though.
“Let me go, lass.”
I release him, having done what I could to mitigate whatever damage he might cause. Ahead of us, the young man takes note of Hades and I with mild interest. As soon as I let Hades go, the young man’s face grows red.
He barks something at the woman, who throws a look over her shoulder at us. She pales and hurries the two little girls toward the car.
The young man is rounding the vehicle with a sneer curling his lips. He looks at Hades, his expression spiteful as he climbs in the car.
Hades starts to jog. “Hey!”
The doors creak closed. The woman arranges the little girls on her lap and throws another harried look at Hades. Her expression says that she’s very worried about the stranger jogging straight for their car. She locks the doors, all the blood draining from her face.
“You’re scaring her!” I call to Hades. “Please, come back!”
I stop at the edge of the parking lot, my heart in my throat, my voice sounding panicky.
There is a grinding mechanical sound as the man tries to start the car. Hades reaches the vehicle just as the young man manages to turn the engine over. He throws an angry look at Hades and puts the car in drive.
Hades, running up to the passenger side window, watches as the young man begins to pull the car away. In a fit of I suppose frustration and anger, Hades moves back, winds up, and throws a punch at the car.
He manages to hit the back window, his solid fist smashing into it, the safety glass cracking into a million tiny pieces and leaning inward with a shattering sound. But it doesn’t break; it’s not meant to.
The girl gives a shriek. The guy yells something at Hades and steps on the gas. In a second, their tires squealing, they are hauling ass out of the parking lot.
Hades stands, watching them go, his breathing ragged. I trail after him into the parking lot.
His knuckles are scraped and bloodied on one hand. He doesn’t seem to notice, though. His eyes are fixed on the car, watching it drive away, tracing it across the highway until it disappears around a curve.
I move closer. Hades only notices me when I pick up his wrist, examining his injury. His eyes tighten and he pulls at his hand.
I don’t let go, though. Instead, I shoot him a look and bring his hand closer, trying to see it better. There is a particularly wicked shard of glass sticking out. I wince, looking up at him.
“Let’s go,” I say, taking him by the elbow.
“Go?” His cheeks are still flushed. “Go where?”
“You are going to sit down and let me clean up the mess you’ve made of your knuckles.”
Hades stops me, resisting. When I look back at him, he’s giving me the most puzzled look.
“How could ye?”
“How could I what?” I tilt my head, narrowing my eyes on his face.
“Ye stopped me from saving that woman!”
I shake my head. “No. I stopped you from pounding that man’s skull in. She could’ve refused to get in his car if she thought it was dangerous. Instead, she didn’t even think twice before hopping in the passenger seat. She was too scared of you.”
That seems to knock some of the wind out of his sails.
“Scared of me?” he repeats. As if it’s a foreign concept or something. “Why would she be scared of me?”
He really doesn’t get it. I draw in a deep breath, making myself expel it fully before I answer.
“Because you are a big, strange man who looks like he’s going to beat the shit out of somebody.
You don’t know the situation; you couldn’t even say for sure which language they were speaking.
Yet you had already decided exactly what was going on and how you were going to handle it.
” I suck my teeth, looking at him. “I would’ve been scared, too. Actually, scratch that… I was scared.”
He scrunches up his face. “What did ye have to be scared of?”
Heat blooms high in my cheeks. But I know that a moment of embarrassment is worth it, in this critical moment.
“I was scared for you,” I say, keeping my words quiet. “What if he had a gun? Did you even stop to think about that?”
Hades swallows, his green eyes hard on mine. He stares at me for a beat. Then he jerks his gaze away, out over the ocean.
“He didn’t.” His voice is a mere whisper. His expression is blank, but I can read that by now.
He’s thinking about what I said. Imagining what kind of chaos could’ve broken out if the stranger had pulled out a weapon.
“It was pure luck.” I slip my hand around his elbow, tugging him in the direction of the warehouse. “Now come on. You are bleeding like crazy. Let me get the glass out and try to wrap the hand up.”
He gives me the tiniest shrug, letting me pull him along. I tug my black sweatshirt off, wrapping it around his hand.
If Hades notices, he doesn’t say anything. He’s definitely on a different planet than me, sorting through his thoughts silently.
We trudge back to the warehouse in silence. He doesn’t say anything as I spread out his hand on the table or douse it with a gallon of rubbing alcohol, purloined from my piles of art supplies.
He grits his teeth as I use a pair of long handled tweezers to remove the glass from the car’s window. It isn’t until I am wrapping his hand in strips of a shredded black sweater that I have the nerve to ask.
I crinkle my face, peering up at him. “Why do you always have to jump in?”
He looks at me, as if I’ve grown another head or something. “What?”
“When there is a seemingly violent man and a seemingly scared woman, you need to separate them. You play the white knight. It’s clear that you’re ready to pound the guy into the ground.” I swallow, scrunching up my nose. “My question is, why? What makes you do that?”
His gaze flits to me, his green eyes all but on fire. “Maybe I just hate bullies.”
“Hades…” I stare at him, tying the last strip of cloth over his injured hand. “You have a lot of qualities that… could be… desirable.” I flush but I refuse to drop his gaze. “But that… that willingness to be violent? To jump in, to mix it up, knowing that there is going to be physical danger?”
I stop, pushing out my cheek with my tongue. Hades’ gaze burns into my face.
“Yeah?” he asks quietly.
I suck in a breath. “It’s not reassuring. I don’t feel safe around you, knowing that you are going to fight every single guy who so much as looks at you wrong. So…” I shrug a shoulder. “Maybe think about that before the next time you almost beat the tar out of some guy.”
He stands up, knocking his stool back and glaring at me. “Dinnae be such a fucking coward.”
Then he turns on his heel and stalks out of the warehouse. I sigh and start cleaning up the bloody bits of cotton left from my first aid, shaking my head.