Series: Willow Winters
Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 94417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 472(@200wpm)___ 378(@250wpm)___ 315(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 94417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 472(@200wpm)___ 378(@250wpm)___ 315(@300wpm)
I reach for her wrist.
She draws her hand to her chest and then flings it out as if to strike me.
I catch her wrist as if it is nothing—it is nothing—and hold it halfway between us, my eyes locked on hers and her tension radiating through me. The heat of her skin on mine is electric. The fire raging between us. Persephone’s breathing quickens. Her glare is like a torch, bringing fire into the shadows at my core.
Does she feel this too? The heat that dances between the tension. Her eyes boring into mine and mine to hers. She pulls away, and it’s then I realize just how little power she has.
Every heave of her breath rings in my ears.
I tighten my fingers around her wrists.
Persephone gasps, her lower lip dropping ever so slightly, fear reflecting in her eyes. This is only a prelude to my true strength, and that gasp is only a prelude to the sounds I’ll draw out from her.
“Your magic is weak,” I tell her, keeping my eyes firmly on hers. She could close her eyes in an attempt to shut me out. She could try to look away, but she doesn’t.
“It’s not weak,” she snaps, her voice cracking with defiance. “It’s as strong as yours. Your chains prove nothing.”
It’s not her words that strike me, but her bravery. I smirk at her, unflinching.
“Weak,” I repeat.
“I’m not.” Her voice drops. “I’m not. You don’t know what I can do. You don’t know me.”
A huff of a laugh leaves me. I know everything about her. I’ve watched her for years now. Pined for her, obsessed with her.
“Show me your power,” I command as I release her and take a step back, “Free yourself.”
Her eyes narrow. After a beat, she turns her face away. A pain I haven’t felt before is sharp in my chest.
Of course she could not free herself. If she had that power, she would have done so already.
I reach forward with my other hand on her chin, I turn her face back to mine.
“Your power is weak,” I coax. “But I will help you.”
My whispered promise flashes in her eyes. I can practically see her thoughts change before me.
“Who are you?” she asks.
“Hades, Lord of the Underworld and your taker.”
Her breath seems to leave her. “I will aid you and your powers,” I promise her, allowing my admission to sink in.
“In exchange for what?” she whispers although she already knows.
Persephone is no fool. She knows that nothing in the Underworld comes without a cost.
I lean closer. Her eyelashes flutter. When my breath kisses her cheek, her body arches toward me ever so slightly.
“If you submit.”
Persephone sucks in a shallow breath. She cannot know that her body arches toward me more with every moment that passes.
The tension steals my breath as much as it is stealing hers. It would be a matter of a moment to lean down and capture her mouth with mine. I let her feel the closeness growing taut between us, alive with heat.
And still she fights.
All she would have to do to submit is to lay down her arm. All she would have to do is stop pushing against me. It is the most delicate fight.
And yet she resists.
“Submit to me,” I tell her. It is an order. Anyone else in the Underworld would know it for what it was, but Persephone bares her teeth.
“Never.” Her voice is cold. “I will never submit.”
It takes great restraint on my part to do nothing, because I want to kiss the pulse at her wrist, but I turn my back on her and stalk away.
Persephone does not call after me.
The silence stretches between us, charged with the tension of her every breath.
I can feel that tension behind me and within me—the heat of her defiance—but I ignore it and throw the windows open. Her powers… she will need time to regain them.
Time. Patience, I remind myself.
Cold from outside gusts in. The icy cold dispels the heat on my face.
It will do far more lovely things to Persephone’s body.
I inhale the fresh air and let the cool fill my lungs.
Then I turn and leave the room, leaving Persephone exposed to the frigid chill of my absence and the assurance that the room will turn cold as ice.
I will force her to need me. I will force her powers to return as well.
I do not crave her weak. I demand that she be mine as promised. The powerful queen by my side.
PERSEPHONE
The chill is barely a thought as I grasp at my wrists and then my surroundings. My throat is tight and my body stiff. How the hell did this happen? I can barely remember the chain of events that led me here.
The shackles that bind me are not metal, but magic. That much is obvious. From deep in the pit of my womb I attempt to gather my power, praying for it to course through me and yet I feel nothing of it. A faint semblance of what used to flourish is managed and it is useless against the chains.