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“Did your painkillers stop working?”
“No.”
“Don’t lie to me.”
“They didn’t.”
“Baby,” he whispers. “Don’t lie.”
I come on his cock instead of saying anything at all.
* * *
A person shouldn’t besex-obsessed just because the man living in her house to protect her is basically a god.
Actually, I’m not sure what the rules are about that. My parents have never said anything to make me believe that they’d mind if I was sex-obsessed. My dad, however, has said plenty to make me believe that he would murder any man who hurt me, which presents…a bit of a conflict.
I have not yet sat down with my father to chat about consensual hurting, because I think that discussion might kill him.
Then again, maybe he’d be cool about it.
I laugh into my canvas. My dad is cool about a lot of things, but I don’t think the mental imagery would work in my favor.
I’m not done laughing when my heart breaks.
The thing I haven’t told Hercules—the thing I haven’t told anyone—is that I don’t think I’ll ever be home to have an awkward conversation with my dad, and all at once, I desperately want to.
It’s just that the nightmares feel like dying. They feel more like death every time I have one. When I seize, I can feel my brain powering down, but I’m still there, minimized. In front of the gates, it’s more like I feel a tug on my very soul.
Hercules’s voice filters in from the living room. He went to take a shower without me, which I teased him about until he went so far as to forbid me to come with him.
That felt unfair.
It’s easy to hear him, though, because I keep the studio door open now. For a long time, I kept it closed out of habit. Shane was in and out of my house. Sometimes other people from my security team. I didn’t want them to know I worked in the dark, so I left the rest of the house light.
Hercules hates when any door is closed between us, so it’s dark all the time now.
“No.” He uses a clipped, guarded voice on the phone with Zeus. “No.Three people went after him. I was—I was otherwise occupied, Zeus. I’m not leaving her anywhere alone while I chase some asshole down the beach.”
There’s a heavy silence.
“Do you think I’m not frustrated? Do you think I’m not searching? This isn’t any of your business.Please.If you want somebody better to guard your niece, then I can recommend—no, thatiswhat you said.”
A few more beats.
“Are you so sure that this isn’t about you? Or your brother? She’s your weak spot. It wouldn’t be hard for some asshole to find that out.”
I don’t see the brush move over the canvas. I don’t feel it. I might as well be in the other room with Hercules. As soon as that thought registers, my hand grips the brush like I’m going to throw it. I could be naked with him right now instead of painting nightmares.
I close my eyes against the low pool of light around my easel.
“I’m going to fix this,” Hercules barks. “And I’m not doing it foryou, I’m doing it for her, so why don’t you fuck off?” A shorter pause. “I’m fine,” he insists, and my heart aches again. “I’mfine. Nothing’s wrong inside the house.”
He’s lying for me, and that feels worse than lying on my own behalf.
“No, I do not needhelp. I’m ending the call now. Have a great night.”
I pry my eyes open as his lips meet the curve of my neck. Hercules wraps himself around me like we’ve been fucking for years instead of days. Frustration heats the air around him, or maybe that’s the strength of his pulse.
