The King of Hearts - Jovee Winters Page 0,5
back the gates of Tartarus itself to ensure his safety above all else. Hephy had eventually seen I’d changed. My son would have to acknowledge that change soon.
I closed my eyes, cuddling into my gentle giant’s side and smiled my first real smile of the night. This nightmare would soon be over. I’d have my family restored back to me. We would be one big happy family.
No doubt in my mind.
Hephaestus
She slept.
Finally.
Her sleep had been fleeting at best the past several nights. My female hardly ate. All she did was worry. About me. About her children. Our newborn. She wanted to be seen as the woman she was today, not the nightmare her other self had been.
Recognizing the fact that this woman in my arms and the one I’d once known were two completely opposite individuals with different souls hadn’t come easily to me. In fact, I’d almost lost the single best thing I’d ever know in my life. If not for that damned divorce proceedings I would never have recognized the truth. I’d had the benefit of seeing my female’s true motives and heart, but Eros hadn’t gone to the trial. Not that I blamed him. Her son hadn’t had an easy road when it had come to the other Aphrodite.
That female had been petty. Vindictive. And just downright evil. I didn’t think she’d honestly known how to show love, or affection. Even for the one thing I think in her twisted mind she did actually care for. Her children with Ares. Of which there were many. But her bond with Eros had been stronger than with the other children. They’d still been young enough to have forgotten much of what she’d done and forgiven her for the rest.
Eros, though, had been her firstborn. She’d leaned heavily on him. Using him often as her gopher. Their relationship had been a twisted and complicated affair. She would kill anyone who dared tried to harm him, and yet she’d probably hurt him more than anyone else alive.
She’d kept him to herself, rarely letting him off the dog leash, or allowing him to get out of her sight unless she ordered him to kill one of her many countless enemies. He hadn’t had friends. And I highly doubted he’d had lovers, considering how tightly she’d kept him under lock and key.
Once, I thought the boy devoted to her in a way only someone suffering from Stockholm syndrome could be. But since the old Aphrodite had been supplanted by the infinitely superior and better alternate version of herself, I had noticed the boy had pulled away completely.
Which had made sense to me, I’d pulled away too. As much to protect myself as to hurt her. I’d not believed in Aphrodite’s changes. It had been something that’d taken me time and a lot of hope and faith to finally accept. At first, I’d thought Eros would follow a similar path to mine, but now I wasn’t so sure.
And that worried me.
What would happen to Dite if she lost hope that her son would see her for who she really was? She was a creature of love, one that gave and took. It was a symbiotic relationship for her, she needed to give it as much as she needed to receive it. I was desperately in love with my wife and all I wanted was to see her not only happy, but healthy. And part of the mental balance was knowing that she had the love of those she treasured most.
Looking down at her sleeping form I felt a warmth stir though my soul. She hadn’t slept well in days. She needed this rest. I would not wake her.
But I could not sleep now.
Gently, I eased out from under her. Holding my breath as I disentangled our forms, hoping against hope she would not wake. She must have been truly exhausted because she only stirred once and that was to mumble a sweet, “luv you, beast.”
I grinned, stroking my chest above the spot of my powerfully beating heart. Gods, I loved this woman. I would do anything for her. I would lie. Steal. Cheat. I would even kill for her. If the other Aphrodite had ever bothered learning that fact about me, she could have literally ruled Olympus with my might by her side, but she’d done the only thing that ensured she’d never have my loyalty, she’d treated me like trash beneath her heels. I’d had enough pride not to want to take anymore