He smelled like the color red, I noticed, sensing the similarity for the first time. Strong, imposing, beautiful, and intriguing.
“Well, to be prepared. You never know when you need to cuss someone.” I shrugged, enjoying the befuddled expression on his face. “How do you cuss here?”
He thought for a moment, then he spoke as if the words had always lingered on the tip of his tongue, ready to be said out loud. “By the gods, may you end up in the Underworld and?—”
“No, that’s absolutely horrible.” My laughter, a sound both unexpected and involuntary, filled the space. Eros gazed at me, drinking in the sound of my laughter for the first time, and savoring the moment as if it were a fine wine savored after a tiring day before he allowed his own lips to curve into a smile.
“You will frighten no one if you talk like that,” I continued, wiping the tears from the corner of my eyes. “Anactualthreat sounds something like this: if you don’t listen to me, I’ll cut off your dick, feed it to Hades’ dogs and make you watch, while I tear your limbs off piece by piece.”
Although I hardly ever cursed, I found that picking up curse words in a new language while watching TV was surprisingly more simple than learning other phrases, so it became routine whenever I studied a language.
Eros’s face contorted, his eyes widening in surprise before he shuffled his feet.
“You imagined it, didn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Was it bad?”
He glanced at me as if I had grown a second head. “Yes. I shall admit I don’t like the word cut being placed next to male genitals.”
I snorted. “Like any other man,” I pointed out. “Now, your turn. Threaten me.” I knew it shouldn’t have sounded as sexual as it did, but I couldn’t take it back now.
With a dangerous look in his eyes, Eros leaned against the bookcase, trapping the book between his chest and arm as he let his gaze travel down my body, recklessly low.
“If you don’t . . .” he began, picking his words carefully, “button your shirt, then I will ensure there will be no shirt for you to wear tonight.”
My lips parted, shuddered breaths rolling past my tongue. I fixed him with my eyes, searching for any change in expression to communicate that he was joking, but Eros remained stern, unmoving. A warm shiver traveled from the tips of my toes to the place between my thighs. I instinctively squeezed them together, and he didn’t miss the movement, his eyes landing right on the place hidden under the oversized shirt. How did the conversation get to this?
I tried to deflect, to laugh it off but his unwavering gaze, that intense and possessive look, had trapped me. Each flicker of my eyes, the deep inhales I took, the way my fingers fidgeted with the hem of my clothing—he saw it all. He absorbed it and analyzed it. The room itself seemed to shrink, and my attempt at nonchalance crumbled under the weight of his scrutiny.
A gulp made its way down my throat. “That was . . . a good try.”
It would be a first for me to be at a loss for words, and his next words didn’t help me regain them either.
“A threat,” he corrected.
How could a man look at a woman like this? Like he was ready to tear her apart with one single blink?He was the God of Love.
With each step, I distanced myself, feeling the sweet freedom of easier breathing as I moved away from him. Eventually, Eros removed himself from the bookcase and sat on a chair without another word—a moment that I took as a chance to pick out my next read.
I didn’t know how much time had passed while I looked through the titles. All of them sounded captivating enough for me to read them, making it hard to settle on one.
“I recommendThe Abyss. I believe it would be a pleasant experience for you.” Eros’s voice traveled the room, and when I glanced back at him, he was nose deep into my favorite book, paying me no attention.
After finding a copy, I pulled the book off the shelf, and my eyes widened at the sight of the cover. In the middle of it, a small female figure swayed through the fog, barely visible. I moved to a plush chair, feet under my bottom as I made my way through the first chapter.
From time to time, I glanced at Eros, his eyebrows furrowed. He was already halfway through the book since I had last looked at him.
I found it unsettling that sitting in the room with him felt so normal, comfortable enough that I didn’t bother to stifle my audible reactions to my book.
Eros chuckled when I let out a gasp and a small “No way”.
“Did you get to the scene in which Nikoleta reveals Kostas’s death?”
I nodded, pressing the open book to my chest as I spoke. “Yes! I mean, it didn’t make sense why his parents wouldn’t speak to him anymore. Of course, he was in the wrong by not telling them he had accepted to be the Hand of the King, buttheir ignorance was too much. They wouldn’t give him food, clean his sheets—but I didn’t expect for him to be dead! Does that mean that Nikoleta is some kind of Queen of the Afterlife? Poor guy—he was a ghost, fell in love with another, and had no idea.” I gestured with my hands more than I had my entire life, then flopped back on my chair,tsking. “I can’t believe I didn’t figure it out sooner.”
I always longed for someone to discuss my books with, and while Maggie’s mother was generous enough to lend her books, she never had the time to truly connect with me over them.
