Chapter 32 #3
He pauses. A dark, infuriatingly smug look crosses his features, and he slowly takes a step back, breaking the contact. His hands leave my skin, leaving me cold, trembling, and unfulfilled on the edge of the marble.
“No,” he says softly, a wicked, dangerous smile spreading across his face. He adjusts his trousers, his dark eyes dancing with a terrifying look. “Not yet. I told you before, Dolcezza… the next time we do this, you’re going to be the one begging me for it. Completely stripped of your little rules.”
The arrogance makes me want to scream, my body clamoring for the release he just cruelly stole away. I am left exposed, breathing heavily, my skin flushed and my mind ruined by the phantom sensation of his touch.
Before I can find my voice to curse him, someone clears their throat from the doorway.
I freeze. Zagreus’s entire demeanor shifts instantly, the playful, seductive warmth vanishing, replaced by a lethal stillness that makes the air in the room turn to ice. He turns slowly, shielding my exposed body from view with his massive frame.
Standing in the doorway with her arms crossed and her eyes dripping with disappointment is Mama.
Zagreus’s jaw tightens, his fists clenching at his sides. The apex predator is back, and he looks ready to tear the throat out of anyone who dares interrupt him.
I swallow hard, my hand reaching out to gently touch his forearm, feeling the rigid, vibrating tension in his muscles. “Zagreus,” I whisper, my voice still breathless but steadying. “Let me… let me talk to her. Please.”
I scramble to fix myself, hands shaking as I fumble with the buttons of his oversized shirt, pulling the crisp cotton down to cover my bare, flushed legs. My skin still burns from his touch. The ache of being left on the edge makes my chest heave.
He stands over me, his dark eyes tracking my frantic movements.
Step by step, he closes the remaining distance until his shadow swallows me whole.
He reaches out, his thumb catching a stray smudge of flour on my jawline, before his hand slides firmly to the back of my neck.
He pulls me up into a hard, deep kiss, tasting of the unspoken promise he just left between my thighs.
When he breaks away, his voice is meant only for me. “I’ll be in the study.”
Without sparing a glance toward the doorway where my Mother stands, he walks past her.
Adjusting the cuffs of the shirt, I finally look at my Mother. She doesn’t say a word inside; instead, she turns on her heel, her shoes clicking sharply against the stone floor as she leads the way out to the sun-drenched patio. The salt air crashes into us.
She studies me far too carefully.
“You look healthier,” she says quietly.
“I do not.”
“You do.”
“No, I don’t.”
“Your eyes aren’t tired, Stina.”
I look away, staring out at the vast blue horizon. My stomach twists into painful knots. Here it comes.
I wait for her to tell me I am failing the plan, that I am letting a monster slip beneath my skin.
When I finally look back, her expression softens. Just a little. “He’s taking care of you,” she murmurs.
Then, the cold, vengeful matriarch I have known for weeks shatters right before my eyes. A broken sigh escapes her lips, and a tear tracks down the lines of her face. She reaches out, her hands trembling violently as she takes mine.
“I’m so sorry, Selene,” she sobs. “I am so, so sorry. I’ve been forcing you to play this game, forcing you to try and hate the man you loved… and it’s killing me to see what I’ve put you through.”
I blink, stunned, my mind struggling to process the sudden shift. “Mama…”
“I forgive him,” she whispers, her voice cracking as she presses my hands against her damp cheek. “I forgive Zagreus. He… he never intended to kill your Father. I know that now. The grief, the rage… it blinded me. I needed a villain, and I chose him.”
A breathless clarity washes over me. The memory, the one I have twisted and buried beneath layers of fabricated hatred just to survive the guilt, finally breaks through the surface.
He didn’t do it.
I recall the exact moment of the shooting.
The chaos, the smoke, the blinding terror.
I remember the roar of gunfire, and then Zagreus’s voice.
He hadn’t been aiming at my Father. He had shouted my name.
He had fired his weapon at the assailant—but the bullet meant for my Father was already airborne.
My Father had stepped into the line of fire and caught the bullet meant to end a war, not start one.
I needed someone to blame at that time. The pain of losing him was too vast, too agonizing to bear without a target, and so I painted Zagreus as the monster. I let myself believe the lie because hating him was easier than accepting the brutal, random cruelty of the life we lead.
Seeing my Mother sob, taking the suffocating self-loathing with everything I feel. The monster isn’t in the study. The monster was the hatred I was forcing myself to feed.
I stand up and pull her into a tight hug. I hold her against my chest, feeling the frantic heartbeat of a woman who is finally letting go of a ghost.
“Everything will be okay, Mama,” I whisper into her hair, tears blurring my own vision.