Page 14 of Taming Winter

"I knew—I knew I had met her before," I heaved. Ice pulsated from my palms, and a cold sweat had broken over my forehead and nape. A wraith afraid of fire was pathetic; I needed to get ahold of myself. I groaned and swallowed the terror that had built in my throat before crawling to my feet.

"She was the one who hired my cabal to kill you."

CHAPTER 15

HADES

"That makes no sense. Didn't she tell you a blade to the head would kill an immortal? She knows that wouldn't work. Why would she lie?"

"I don't know, but I promise it was her. I always remember clients' faces."

My confusion quickly morphed into palpable fury. That conniving little cunt, and knowing my brother, he was the puppet master holding the strings. Hera never had an independent thought in her life, much less the willpower to attempt something as brutal as murdering her sister-in-law. No, this had my brother's signature all over it.

My heart slammed against my ribcage, an enraged beast desperate to sow its wrath. The golden-stitched rug sizzled and curled underfoot as I marched toward the elevator. I reached for the button, only to realize flames had engulfed my body. I snapped my gaze to Wolfe. "Get the elevator," I snarled.

He obliged, doing everything in his power to avoid my heat as he pressed the button. My foot tapped as we waited, globs of fire dropping from me with every impatient stomp. It was too long before the eccentric ding of the elevator sounded.

By the time we stepped off the elevator, my patience had snapped. I marched through the gilded halls, toward the double-wide golden doors with my brother's likeness. Though he took liberties with his appearance, particularly with the bulge at his crotch. With a toss of my hand, I launched a fireball at the family jewels.

The guards shouted and rushed us, their gaudy armor clinking with every lumbering stomp. Flames rippled up my forearms in a violet wave, but Wolfe stepped in front of me. Frost stitched over his jacket sleeves until it bolted from him in a cloud of icy vapor. His power slammed them against the wall and enveloped them in a thick coating of immobilizing ice.

"You didn't kill them," I growled in distaste.

"Cleaner this way," he responded without pause.

It wasn't worth debating whether murder was the better option given the circumstance. We marched in with the sounds of desperate, enraged screams following us.

We walked into a plush room of gold and marble. In front of us stood a solid gold brick of a desk, carved with the twisting necks and open maws of a hydra dancing between bolts of lightning. Behind that desk stood the three gods I wanted to burn to a crisp.

Apollo stood with his hands folded in front of him. Hera stood next to him with wide eyes and trembling hands that clutched his shoulder. My fire roiled.

Zeus was the same as the last time I saw him. Sun-kissed skin led to dirty blond hair and piercing blue eyes like that of a hawk. His smile was that of a predator, hidden under suave arrogance and faux approachability.

"Well, if it isn't my fiery sister.”

I threw a fireball at his head, which he and Hera narrowly avoided.

"Why the fuck did your pet hire someone to kill me?" I shouted.

An agonizing silence built, second by second. Zeus leaned back in his desk chair and crossed his arms. "I invite you into my home, and you accuse my wife of something so heinous? You wound me, sister."

He leveled me with that smug expression that made me feel inches tall. Fury and hatred boiled underneath that insignificance. Of course he would lie—would take my power with a single utterance. I choked down the urge to burn the entire high-rise to cinders, though it felt like eating a hot coal.

I exhaled a breath like I intended to spit fire, hoping the simple action would steady me to endure… this. Helplessness ate at flesh and bone until there was nothing left but my ire.

Wolfe stepped carefully around my flames, consuming Zeus’s attention. "It’s not an accusation, because I’m the proof. Hera hired me to kill Hades."

Zeus’s jaw ticked and his veins flashed a shimmering gold that ended at his electric eyes. Wolfe continued, his voice dropping. "But I’m pretty good at reading people, and I get the feeling that you were the mastermind."

Silence slammed into the room with the weight of a sledgehammer. Each meager second dragged out for eons. The tension pulled tight enough to snap before Zeus responded. When he did, it wasn't to Wolfe. No, he looked directly at me.

"Who the fuck is this, Hades?"

The fury etched in his tone was a boon that spread satisfaction from my toes to my lips, curling them into a smile. "That's the challenge in hiring an assassin to kill me, brother. All wraiths come to me. You should know better."

He bared his teeth. "I did not permit you to buy a soul. It is a wretched, inhuman thing to do. You have your two servants; you did not need another."

The jagged stone of anger swelled in my throat. He was diverting the conversation to redirect the blame to me. He had done so my entire life, and it allowed him to dance out of the repercussions of his actions for an eternity. I knew what he was doing—I fucking knew it—and yet it hurt and enraged me all the same. He was scolding me, and the sickest part was a small sliver of that broken little girl within me that wanted to apologize for not accepting the shackles he had placed on me.