Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 89763 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 449(@200wpm)___ 359(@250wpm)___ 299(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 89763 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 449(@200wpm)___ 359(@250wpm)___ 299(@300wpm)
I scrub at my chest, but it does nothing to alleviate the thickness there. “I didn’t think you remembered.”
“Of course I did.” Her heart is in her eyes. It’s the way that I’ve always wanted Ariadne to look at me. The foundation has been there, but it’s always been overwritten with fear or guilt or lust. Even now, my mind shies away from labeling it.
I don’t know what else to say, so I speak the first thing that bursts into my mind. “You never said anything. When I showed up, when he put me to work, you acted as if it was our first time meeting.”
“For a little while, I did think that. You looked so different when he introduced us that I wasn’t entirely sure you were the same boy I’d seen in the courtyard.”
I smirk. “A bath and haircut can do wonders.” To say nothing of clean, expensive clothing. Or at least the new clothes had felt expensive and downright decadent. In hindsight, I recognize them for what they were—disposable in Minos’s eyes. The cost might have been world-changing to me as a kid, but they were one step above trash to Minos.
Just like me.
“I suppose so.” She presses a kiss to my wrist. “It took me a couple days, but no matter what else changed about you, your eyes were the same. They’re still the same.” Ariadne smiles, looking almost self-conscious. “By that, I mean you looked at me the same.”
I shouldn’t ask, but I can’t seem to help myself. “How did I look at you, Ariadne?”
For a few moments, I think she might not answer. But she finally lifts her chin. “Like I was your everything. Like I was some goddess who wandered into your life. It made me uncomfortable as a kid because I didn’t really understand it.”
“And now?”
She smiles. “I still don’t really understand it. I’m no goddess. I’m human and flawed right down to my bones.”
I stroke her fingers with my thumb. “Not to me. To me, you’re perfect, sweetheart.”
That manages to fluster her when nothing else did. She sputters a little and won’t quite look me in the face. It’s incredibly fucking cute. Finally, she blurts out, “I like it when you call me that.”
“I like calling you that.” Sweetheart. Mine. It all amounts to the same thing.
She’s still shifting and not quite meeting my gaze. “How are you so good at all this? I feel like I’m fumbling my way through the sex, to say nothing of this…relationship.”
It’s tempting to avoid answering, but she’s given me a priceless gift, and at this point, it’s everything I can do not to fall to my knees before her. “I read your books.”
She blinks. “What?”
“Your books. The ones you only read in your room so no one else knows.” Now it’s my turn to shift, my skin hot. “I was curious, so I grabbed one of them. Then I’d just switch it out for the next one. Plus, sweetheart, your favorited fanfics are public. Between the two, I got a good idea of what you might like.” Both in the bedroom and out of it.
“I mean, I knew it was public, but you’d have to know my screen name and…” She snorts and shakes her head. “Of course you do. How many times have I read fanfic when we spent time together over the years? I never thought you were paying attention.”
“I was.” Her tastes are varied and occasionally shocked even me, but I liked the little window into her fantasies. “Even without all that, it’s not like you’re subtle about what you like—at least when someone knows how to read you.”
She kisses my knuckles. “After all this time, you’re just full of surprises.”
“Yeah, I guess I am.”
“Asterion?”
I swallow hard at the look on her face, at the way her eyes got hot, and she licks her lips slowly. “Yeah?”
“If we’re talking about firsts, I’ve never sucked a cock before.”
Suddenly, there’s not enough air in the room. I think I make a sound, but it’s hard to tell over the rushing blood in my ears. “I, uh, have never had mine sucked.”
Her grin lights up the room. “Well, then. I have a brilliant idea.”
20
Ariadne
This morning, when I woke up well rested and slightly peeved at Dionysus for drugging me, I couldn’t shake the conversation we had. Or the truth within it. Dionysus was right. Doing this now, for me, might be a leap of faith, but is it really a leap of faith when Asterion will be there to catch me?
Our conversation this morning, the way he’s looking at me now, has made things even clearer. He was never going to kill me. What he said in the maze is the truth between us.
And now he stands before me, as vulnerable as I’ve ever seen him. There is no wall of coldness and violence between us now. Only the truth. It’s going to take some time to process all this. But I don’t have to do it right now. Not when I can offer this experience, not when I can give us both something pure and free. All our challenges will still be waiting on the other side.