The King of Hearts - Jovee Winters Page 0,3

didn’t understand how it was that he could always so easily calm me, but I was grateful he had that ability with me. All the nerves and tension, the stress of months of worrying began to slowly ease out of my body with each exhalation, until finally I could smile a genuine smile at him.

“How do you do that? Every time?” I asked, a tinge of awe in my tone, not bothering to conceal how very much he meant to me.

His smile was soft, small. “I can’t seem to do it with anyone but you. Though, if I could only share my calm with one person, I am glad it is you.”

Then he pulled me into his body and kissed the top of my head. A feeling of being cherished and loved came over me like a warm blanket. Closing my eyes, I felt my heart beat align to his own, in moments I’d gone from being a tensed and crazed being to one full of peace.

Snuggling my nose into his chest I felt a tiny stab of guilt that I got to be home with him again. For a while at least. Because Caly was still fighting the good fight. It hadn’t dawned on me just how stretched thin I’d really been, as a goddess of love I not only gave love, but I probably needed to feel love more than any other being on Olympus. It was what fed me. Probably why no one person could satisfy me before Hephy, it would have taken a being so much more than most to give me what I needed.

Thinking of that, I wondered about Eros again. He was my son. My blood ran through his veins. So did Ares’, but I didn’t detect Ares’ warring nature in him. His powers were much more closely aligned to my own.

If he was like me in the obvious ways, was it possible that he was also like me when it came to needing love?

I frowned.

“You’re tense again,” Hephy rumbled in that gravelly tone of his, and I quickly shook my head, assuring him that it wasn’t what he thought. I patted his chest, looking up at his beloved face once again.

“It’s not what you think,” I said.

He lifted a brow. “Then what is it?”

I shrugged. “I was just thinking that so few people know how much I need to feel love to feel whole. It’s imprinted in my chemical make-up; I need to know that I am not only wanted but that I am loved beyond all sense and reason.”

His full lips thinned. “And you’re wondering if Eros is the same?”

Again, I shrugged, but nodded. “It would make sense, right? Of all my children he and I are the most similar.”

Hephy nodded, but didn’t say anything for a moment, just simply mulled on my words. Finally, he blinked, and looked at me. “It does make sense, love. But I’m not sure if trying to set him up with anyone right now is the right thing to—”

I shook my head. “No, and I don’t even think he’d accept my help right now. He can barely stand to be in my presence.”

I thought of my last disastrous meeting with him. I’d invited him over for tea and cakes with Caly to mediate between us. At first, I’d had such hope, he’d been calm and seemed like he was trying. But then Caly had mentioned an issue with a recently deceased maiden in Elysia who was crying every night of a broken heart because she couldn’t bear to be separated from her mortal and living lover and something in Eros had just snapped. I’d never seen him so angry, growling at Caly and calling her and Hades heartless bastards for not restoring her soul to the land of the living. Which was obviously not possible. The dead stayed dead. That’s how life worked. We were not in charge of the strings of fate anyway, the fates were. He’d known that. But he’d been almost animalistic in his fury and not knowing what to do or so I’d simply stared at him in shock. Fully expecting my friend to go ape on him and maybe turn him into a pretzel for his daring to speak to her in such a manner, but she hadn’t. She’d simply let him speak his peace. I’d never seen her so calm in the face of such obvious fury.

Then Eros had simply vanished and neither of us knowing what to say had