Total pages in book: 102
Estimated words: 95458 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 477(@200wpm)___ 382(@250wpm)___ 318(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 95458 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 477(@200wpm)___ 382(@250wpm)___ 318(@300wpm)
Dionysus flinches. “Please restrain yourself. They’re a friend, and I take it poorly when my friends fight.”
“Are we?” Hermes holds herself so still. She thinks it means no one can see what’s going on behind those luminous dark eyes, but there’s a brittle edge to her stillness. “Friends? Even now?”
“Friends fight, Hermes.” He sighs and glances at his phone. “I’m very angry with you for a number of reasons, but that doesn’t mean I stopped caring.”
I would very much like to be excluded from this conversation. For many reasons. I hate seeing Hermes so lost; it makes me want to dunk Dionysus’s head in a bucket of water. But, even more than that, I hate the intimacy they share. They are friends. He wasn’t a mark she got close to because she needed information. He might never have seen the truth of her, but she doesn’t show that to anyone. Not in full. Not even to me.
Hermes. Hecate. The same and not the same. Circe’s laughter circles my head, again and again, promising that no matter what happens, I’ll lose Hermes in the end. Because I will kill Circe. And that just might be the one thing Hermes won’t forgive me for.
A knock on the door has everyone tensing, but Dionysus checks his phone again and waves Hermes down. “It’s Iaso.”
I blink at the device in his hand. It’s a testament to how fucked up I am that I didn’t register what it means. “Get rid of that. Right now.”
He blinks. “Excuse me?”
“Circe is hunting the Thirteen and the legacy families. You think she won’t have hacked into the necessary systems to track their—your—phones?” I’m so tired. I just want to close my eyes for a little while. “It’s too late to toss it, at least here. You have to lead them away, pull out the SIM card, and circle back.” Even that might not be enough, not when we’ve lingered in one place for a little while.
Hermes curses. “She’s right.”
“Darling, I’m wounded that you think I would wander about with my main phone when members of the Thirteen are being executed.” He rises and walks to the door. “This is one of several burner phones. I left my main one at the penthouse.”
The doctor who walks through the door is a short white person with a shaved head, tattoos up their thick neck, and a barrel body that looks like they could bench-press a car. They barely glance at Dionysus before setting down their bag by the bed I’m currently trapped on. “Well, the good news is that if the knife hit something vital, you’d already be dead.”
“Great, they can state the obvious,” Hermes mutters. “And have a shitty bedside manner, too.”
“I don’t get paid for smiles and sweet words.” They glance at Hermes. “You’re hovering. Back off.”
I don’t see if she obeys because they slap on a pair of gloves, pull a few more things from their bag, and then tug the knife from my body. I don’t make a sound. There’s no air for screaming, just blinding, white-hot pain flashing a panicked rhythm against the backs of my eyes.
Iaso peers down at the wound. “Lucky.”
“I hate you,” I wheeze.
“I get that a lot.” They pull out a set of bandages and take my hand to press them to the wound. “Hold this. We’re going to stitch you up, get some clean bandages on you, and then you’re going to ignore all my advice about resting and taking it easy until this heals.” They start laying out the stuff to put me back together. They’re quick and capable as they begin to stitch my wound.
This isn’t the first time I’ve been stabbed. Not by a long shot. I suppose, on the bright side, at least this injury won’t fuck up my face even more. Not that my facial scars are something I think about overmuch. I’ve had them for so long—since I was sixteen and still charging into fights I knew I couldn’t win because at least I’d feel something. They’re a sign of strength, of what I’ve survived and overcome.
So, yeah, they don’t bother me much, but I can’t get Circe’s freakish perfection out of my head. I knew she was beautiful, of course. Even without a digital footprint to speak of, Hermes has let comments slip over the years. But seeing the delicate features, the big green eyes, the cruel tilt of her lips… And she can fight, too. I didn’t expect that, though I should have.
It’s all making me feel extremely inadequate.
Iaso finishes their stitches and wraps my shoulder in a bandage. “The longer you can go without doing something dangerous and athletic, the better. I can see you’re ignoring me, so I’ll lay it out like this. You lost a lot of blood, almost enough to need a transfusion. Reopen this wound and you’ll probably end up unconscious and as a burden to whoever you’re fighting with.”