Bonds of Hercules (Villains of Lore, #2)(66)

The groundskeeper was going to murder me.

You need to stop stalking her.

Knowing something was technically wrong was one thing, but actually stopping the behavior was another.

Alexis discarded the roses I left on her pillow every night, but she still bothered to pick them up. She touched them. She looked at them. She gave them attention, and that had to mean something.

I still had a chance.

If she didn’t care at all, she wouldn’t bother to look at them. She’d just ignore them.

I can still win her over.

Mine. My woman. Mine.

The primitive part of my brain had latched onto Alexis Hert, and it couldn’t let her go. I needed to watch her sleep just like I needed air.

Augustus understood the obsession.

We both felt the pull.

I needed to know that she was safe, especially at night. My protective instincts were screaming at me that it was the most dangerous time of day. She was unguarded. Anyone could sneak up and attack her, and there would be no way to react in time.

But when I watched her, no one could hurt her because they’d have to get through me and my hounds first.

I was her shadow. The monster that stood behind her.

Augustus said Helen told him that people who loved each other gave each other space when they needed it.

Those people sounded like actual idiots.

I wanted to crawl under Alexis’s skin and learn everything about her. I yearned to hear every thought she ever had. I needed to ask why she slept with her calculator on her pillow next to her head, and how she came to have a pet echidna.

It physically hurt to be parted from her.

Mine. Mine. Mine, the voice chanted in my head.

Maybe I’d spent too many hours in the forest hunting prey; maybe I was born messed up; maybe my parents’ lack of affection had broken something inside of me; maybe it was just how I was.

Space was not something I could give Alexis. Ever.

Pink bedding rustled as the object of my every desire sighed heavily in her sleep, an errant curl blowing off her lips.

Stop being a coward. Do it.

I stepped out of the shadows and leaned over Alexis.

Her face twisted as she whimpered in her sleep.

I wish I could take away your pain.

This time, I had another gift besides the roses. Perhaps they weren’t flashy enough for her, weren’t enough of a statement of what she meant to me.

It was time to do more.

I pulled the long glittering strand out of my pocket and carefully draped it around her neck. The strand of priceless blue diamonds danced in the moonlight. Gently, I hooked the fastener.

Alexis mumbled, turning her head to the side—I held my breath—she pursed her lips together and made an agonized sound, but didn’t wake.

She hadn’t had a nightmare this bad since she’d fought the Titans.

What’s wrong, carissima?

I traced my fingers gently over the row of glittering gems.

Dark possessiveness filled my chest.

My woman.

The rare blue diamond was the official stone of the House of Artemis. Our vaults were overflowing with them, and since the jewel matched my eyes, it was the only type I ever wore.

Seeing my stones around Alexis’s neck made something primal and unhealthy rear up inside of me, even more so than usual.

Augustus could give her calculators and books. He understood her love of academia in a way I never could.

I was a simpler man.

Diamonds, roses, weapons, and blood were my love language.

Amor gignit amorem.

I laid the black-and-white rose next to her pillow, hoping it was true that love begets love.

Augustus’s headache abruptly stopped as I stepped back into the shadows.

I barely noticed the lack of pain because nothing in life compared to the agony of of my unrequited love for Alexis.





24


THE ELDEST HEIR




AUGUSTUS: THAT SAME NIGHT

Marble cracked beneath my fingers as I gripped the sink, the bathroom spinning.

Drip.

Drip.

Drip.

Scarlet splattered violently across the white sink as it fell from my lashes.

The madness of the House of Ares was breaking free, and it only wanted one thing—Alexis.

When I’d crawled across the floor toward my wife with regret, lust, and emotions smoldering inside my chest, my headache had sharpened into a razor blade.

Now a dagger’s edge hovered behind my eyes. The point was slowly scraping across the front of my skull, demanding to be released.

Panting, I raised my head.

I didn’t recognize the man in the mirror.

The scar across my face was a deep maroon, dark circles rimmed my black eyes, and my hair was disheveled.

Pressure mounted and it felt like the invisible dagger was pushing through my forehead and cracking bone.

Unblemished skin mocked me.

The marriage bond zapped hotly inside my chest, and it was all too much.

With a shout, I pulled my fist back.

Crack.

Shards of mirror exploded outward. In slow motion, they flew toward me, a hundred broken versions of myself reflecting in glinting silver, each man more ruined than the last.

Abruptly, the pain in my head vanished, gone as if it had never existed.

The shards dropped to the floor with a clatter.

I stood amidst the ruin, chest heaving, as I waited for the pounding to start up again in my head.