Heart of Fire (Blood of Zeus #2) - Meredith Wild Page 0,62

God.” She clamps her free hand across her eyes. “He found you. Damn it. I’ve been so careful!”

The new tears in her voice compel me to lean closer. “This was inevitable. He told me he’s been searching for me. For a long time.” I accept the damp cloth Regina brings and press it to my mother’s forehead. “And the storm just sped things up a little.” I shrug and manage half a smile. “Or maybe a lot. But Mom…I’m glad it did and that I finally know. You made some tough calls, all in the name of keeping me safe. Both of you did.”

I circle my gaze out, including Regina as much as Mom. But while Reg answers with a respectful nod, Mom yanks the cloth away and sits up.

“Tough calls,” she reiterates, doubling down on her agitation. “Is that what Zeus told you too?” She swings her glare, full of bitterness, up at Reg. “Or was that the part you filled in?”

“I walked in less than fifteen minutes ago,” I interject. “And since then, Reg has been making tea. What are you getting at?”

“There was nothing ‘tough’ about my decisions. Desperate? Yes. Terrifying? Oh hell, yes.”

From the waist up, fury and mortification make me stiff as a statue. “Z told me we were living in a nice place. That he was keeping us comfortable and safe.”

“Of course he was,” she says. “It was all those things and more—but it was also surrounded by very high walls and very set perimeters.” The faintest wisp of a smile breaks through before she reaches to me, rubbing my cheek with soft, adoring strokes. “But have you ever tried telling an eight-year-old boy that he can’t go somewhere?”

Heat collects behind my eyes. I dismiss it, and the string of profanity it coaxes in my mind, with gritted teeth. “Yeah,” I mumble. “I’m beginning to get it.”

“One day, you finally outsmarted us all. You were only outside the estate for a few minutes…but that was long enough for several of Hera’s maids to see.”

I grind my teeth harder. “Hera,” I echo. Of course. Fuck.

“I knew it that very moment,” Mom whispers. She retracts her hand, guiding my gaze to the unmistakable sheen in her eyes. “The life that had been my semi-bearable quarantine would lead to your death by her hand.”

“So we got out of there.” Regina fills it in before I can. “As fast as we possibly could.”

I drag in a long breath, looking to both of them with the same somber purpose. “And now, I’m damn glad you did.”

I hope that lends Mom some validation, yet she’s just as jittery as before. “But how did Zeus ever find out? How did he know where to follow you? Where to come? We were so careful when we left. So thorough about making it look like—”

“We’d been killed already?”

Reg chuffs. “You were never a daft boy.”

Instead of taking the bait to banter with her, I reach for Mom’s hand again. “He found out how and why you left at the same time I did. Yesterday, at Labyrinth—when I met Po for the first time.”

“Po?” She turns whiter than before as comprehension clearly strikes. “Poseidon?” Her fingers are icy and shivery against mine. “You met him too?” Before I’m done nodding, she blurts, “Was anyone else there?”

No sense lingering over a bandage that has to be ripped off. As my mother succumbs to heavy tears that might as well be that spilled blood, I force myself to push on. “He’s the king of the underworld, Mom. And Kara is one of his subjects. At least partially. And we pissed him off.”

“Royally,” Regina puts in.

“Just…stop for a second. Both of you. Please.” Mom pushes me away and lurches back up, framing her forehead with her hands. “I have to think. I have to think.”

She starts circling the coffee table like an electron around a neutron, propelled by an unseen but real—and powerful—force. Her apprehension is intense. Trouble is, I’m no better. I came here and then called her because I’m in equally crappy shape. With more questions than answers.

“Maybe we can all think together.” It’s my awkward form of assurance, for myself as well as her. A dialogue means I can work in some questions.

But not yet.

Mom’s think-tank mode has an unmistakable look. I’ve seen it too many times to be mistaken. Though she doubles her pace, she scans her intended path like it’s full of landmines. “This isn’t good. Not at all.” She takes several