Apollo's Gift (The Greek Gods Series) (23 page)

A cough hacked in the next room.

Apollo hugged the ground and listened. He willed his body to move through heat scorching his lungs in the direction of the sound.

Another cough.

A body huddled on the ground. Apollo coughed and latched on to the older man. His face smudged black and his hands burned, but he was alive. Apollo dragged his thin body into the hall.

The building crackled with heat like Hades’ furnace. Each breath a struggle. Heaving the man onto his back, Apollo crawled with his burden toward escape.

Another blast.

The widows exploded.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

“He’ll make it. He has to,” said Jason at her side.

Cassie watched from outside as fire engulfed the building. The structure shuddered. Part of the roof collapsed with a roar and a wave of white heat. Her throat clogged with tears. She fixated on the inferno. Flames threatened the trees, their orange tails leaping thirty feet. She must have been in shock. People moved in slow motion. Smoke belched into the night sky. The acrid smell burned her nose.

“No chance of survival,” said the fireman. 

She couldn’t look away. Horror and disbelief kept her focused on carnage. “No chance of survival,” she murmured. The world swirled around her. Voices jumbled into a low hum. Embers floated like gray snow and then everything faded out.

* * *

Cassie sat in a hospital room. Light shone through the window and filled the room. She’d collapsed at the scene. Her parents had admitted her for observation after her constant rant about marrying a Greek god and needing to find him. Then followed her three days of silence. She lifted her hand and tenderly caressed the gold band on her finger. A tear slid down the side of her nose. 

Days after the attack when the ashes had cooled, bones of one grown male were found a few feet from the door. Another was extracted from the ruble, burned beyond recognition. Due to the explosive force, a number of body parts scattered the area, making identification a gruesome and painstaking task. She couldn’t even bury him.

The media applauded Cassie and Jason for saving fifteen people, but Apollo deserved the credit. She swallowed hard as each painful thought cut through her like a razor. This wound would never heal.

Cassie’s parents were bursting with pride. Her mother had made Jason her pet project, and arranged for his travel, his lodging and education in the US. At least some good had come of all the misery.

Fifteen people were saved, but not the man she loved. Cassie pressed her face into her pillow. Her shoulders shook. Silent as a knife, grief wracked her body and sliced her heart.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

I must be dead.

Light surrounded Apollo. His singed clothing traded for a white toga appropriate for his judgment before Zeus and the gods. He rubbed his hand over his bald head, his golden mane gone, melted in the scorching inferno. It didn’t matter. Nothing did without Cassie.

Hades would collect on their wager. To serve that walking corpse in the land of smoldering brimstone brought back the agony of his last moments. Apollo shivered. He could still smell smoke and taste ash on his tongue. And Cassie…his heart broke for Cassie.

Apollo stood in the court of the gods. Hades licked his thin, chalky lips in anticipation of his prize. Muffling a growl, Apollo turned to his father.

Zeus wore a deep red robe and stared at him, stern as ever. “I have something to say to my son.” His father rose from his golden throne, his arms outstretched to the gods and goddesses that would hear Apollo’s fate.

Apollo knelt, bowing his naked head before Zeus, and awaited the chains he’d be forced to wear as Hades’ slave.

“You’ve done well,” said Zeus.

Apollo jerked his head up. His father smiled at him and then turned toward Hades. “You have lost our wager. My son saved lives and gained Cassandra’s love.”

Hades snarled. “The bet between Apollo and myself was that he would save the embassy. He failed in that.”

Zeus shook his silver head at Hades. “The embassy is not only a building, but also the ambassador and his people. Apollo saved most of them. My son is the victor. I have spoken.”

Apollo couldn’t fathom what happened. He was dead, but not in servitude to his uncle. A great mercy from his father.

Hades’ mouth twisted. . “You cheat me, brother,” he muttered upon his bronze throne and shook his bony fist at Zeus. 

Zeus waved him off. “Stop your cursing and don’t touch Apollo or Cassandra in a vengeful tantrum.”

Apollo couldn’t believe it.

Zeus grinned and a spark of sea-green and blue lit his eyes. “Hades and I had a small side bet. If you gained Cassandra’s love and saved the embassy as a mortal, then you’d win and I’d gain Hades’ service.”

Apollo thought to point out that the original wager was that Hades would serve Apollo, but he thought better than to bring up any petty grievance. Besides, Zeus would prove a much harder taskmaster. Cassie would live her life, as she should have three thousand years ago. Apollo swallowed the lump in his throat.
Without me.
A fair trade, his life lost so Cassie might live hers. Gratitude welled up inside. He bowed to his father. “Thank you. I am forever in your debt.”

Zeus chuckled. “You have earned my favor. I return your full rights as a son of Zeus, a god, bringer of light, prophecy, music and all the other gifts you possessed before your wager with Hades, including your golden mane.”

“I’m not dead?” Instantly his scalp was covered in thick blond waves that brushed his shoulders.

“How could such a valiant son be left to dwindle in the underworld?” His father’s gaze dimmed and his brow furrowed. “Cassandra is suffering over your loss. It’s time you went to her.”

* * *

Cassie dressed in black and stood beside the olive tree where they’d made vows to each other. Tears clouded her vision, but she didn’t need to see clearly. The spot was etched into her memory. She rubbed her tired eyes. Apollo visited her in dreams, a blessing and a curse. When she dreamed she felt him, tasted his lips and breathed in his honeyed scent.

But when she woke…. her mouth quivered. The loss of him hit her all over again.

She sniffed and spoke to Apollo as if he were with her. “Sometimes I think I’ll die from missing you.”

A flash of light.

Cassie squinted and shielded her eyes with her hand. Apollo’s golden form stood before her. She lowered her gaze to the ground. “When am I going to stop imagining you?”

The vision reached for her, pulled her into his arms and took her mouth with passion.   She melted against him. He couldn’t be real, but at the moment she didn’t care.

Apollo released her mouth. “I am real,” he breathed against her lips.

“But you can’t be.” She shook her head to chase away the illusion.

“Touch me.”

Cassie blinked and stretched out her fingers to his face, caressing his skin, the hard planes and valleys, then his shoulders and his white toga edged in gold. She trembled. “But you were mortal. You died. How?”

“Zeus rewarded me. I’m again Apollo, god of prophecy…and your husband.”

She stared at him. Desperate for it to be true and fearing it was a delusion. “I can’t believe it.”

“Must I convince you each time of my existence?”

Those same words he’d said to her in a classroom weeks before shook her. “It’s you. It’s really you.” She wiped her stinging eyes. “You know, when most people die, they don’t come back.”

“I’m not most people.” He stroked the side of her face with the tips of his fingers, leaving a trail of warmth.

Cassie pressed her cheek into his palm. “No, you’re not.”

It had been weeks since the attack. She’d been crying her eyes out thinking she’d lost him forever. Cassie lifted her head and pinned him with her gaze. “Where the hell were you? Gallivanting around Olympus?” She stabbed his chest with her finger. “You’re a god who thinks he’s a freakin’ hero. No more of that. I can’t take you dying on me again.”

“Beloved,” he whispered as he held her. “You won’t have to. We’ll live a long life, have children, and spend eternity together.”

She stared at him through blurriness. “Children? But what about Hydra? That maniac is still out there.”

“Don’t worry.” Apollo kissed along her hairline. “Zeus is sending Hermes to deal with him.”

THE END

Thank you

For purchasing APOLLO’S GIFT.

Watch for the second book in the Greek Gods Series.

Available in the winter of 2014.

BETRAYED

Trust is required for betrayal to flourish.

Betrayal has made Bram a swaggering vampire with something to prove. Unfortunately, his opportunity for vindication arises when his brother is kidnapped by Bram’s enemy and held in Rome’s catacombs. If Bram fails to free him, his brother will suffer torture and die. Bram would never forgive himself. His only chance of success may be a human.

Beautiful Angela Russo, has polish, connections, and a grudge. The vampires have stripped her family of power and position, destroying their lives. Forgiveness isn’t one of Angela’s virtues. She is used to getting what she wants, and what Angela wants is revenge.

When Bram and Angela are forced into a reluctant alliance, the secrets they uncover shatter everything they have believed to be true.

Can they learn to forgive the past and work together before blood runs in the streets?

Available in the summer of 2013.

Enjoy the following excerpt

from the Kivronian Vampire Series.

CONQUERED

~CHAPTER ONE~

Earth

Twenty-years in the future.

It shouldn’t happen like this. A man has a right to his dignity
. Rafe Nucretah narrowed his sharp eyes in the moonless autumn night and surveyed the damage. Utah’s southern desert stretched before him, parched red dirt and wild sage littered with massacred flesh. He strode toward a rumpled mass on the sandy ground. His jaw clenched as he stared into the tender face of a murdered child, five years old maybe, round cheeked with golden curls. Human. Her sweet visage reminded him of his sister. He swallowed and turned away.

“Dante,” Rafe croaked, then coughed to clear what lodged in his throat. “How many?”

His younger brother stood tall and slender, dressed in the jet-black uniform of an Enforcer. Dante’s dark eyes flashed with rage “Eighteen. Three are my men, the rest human.”

Rafe shook his head against the loss.
How could this happen?

“Were there signs of the madness?” Dante’s dark gaze narrowed hard as obsidian.

“None that I detected last week.” Rafe’s stomach knotted.
Surely some nervous laughter and rambling didn’t mean anything. My recent fatigue is nothing. I’m not at risk. Not yet
. “Where is Hebric?”

Dante moved closer, silent. “Skulking around The Devil’s Garden. Follow the trail of blood with caution. I know he’s your friend, but I doubt he’ll recall that fact before he tries to fry you with his Nova sword.”

Friend.
When the
Rosh
madness hit, there were no friends, but Rafe owed Hebric his life. Frustration grew in him, rising like a demon. Too late to save his childhood friend, the best he could manage was a dignified end, a warrior’s death in battle.

Rafe swore to himself in the ancient language. This shouldn’t happen. Hebric was close to a thousand-years-old, but he should’ve had fifty years before the madness hit
. I should have that much.

Pressure crushed Rafe’s chest. The thought of killing the man he loved as a brother brought the bitter taste of bile into his mouth, combining with the reality before him. If Rafe failed, Hebric would have his name and deeds expunged from the annals, as if he’d never existed: the worst fate possible.

Rafe clenched his fists.
I will not fail.
Hebric must die with his weapon in hand to maintain his place of honor and continue in the other realms. Rafe determined he’d give him that chance.

Rafe lifted his nose to the air. The coppery smell of blood mingled with death to fill his senses, familiar and unwelcome. For a moment, Rafe’s thoughts lay chained on another world. His heart pounded and he shook himself violently back to Earth. He breathed through the wrenching memory.

“I have the Enforcers cleaning up this mess. Bram won’t arrive for another week,” said Dante. “If the media gets a hold of it this time, there will be real trouble.”

“Trouble? A tame word for insurrection. If the rebels hear of it, I doubt if even Talon can dissuade revolt. Our existence depends on maintaining control.” Rafe felt the weight of decision and rolled his shoulders. If humans learned the truth, they’d fight, and every drop of their blood was precious. “Don’t worry. I’ll post the dead as having transferred to Kivron, as usual. I can handle the heat from the High Council.” Rafe clenched his teeth. He hated the politics, the lies, and the senseless end of life.

Rafe pulled his Neutron Eliminator from the loop on his belt and followed the carnage across the sun-baked ground. His black leather boots crunched against sand over stone until he stopped at the next rise, grateful his battle suit hid him in the darkness.  Even crazed, Hebric would be difficult to overcome. “This way.” He beckoned Dante and the Enforcers to back him up, and pushed down the despair threatening his focus.

The trailhead loomed ahead, towering rock walls with scrub oak eerily gray in the night. The cool desert wind rustled his hair and Rafe brushed it back from his wary eyes. His claws lengthened in preparation. Rafe knew the vampire’s talents and steeled himself against what might lie ahead, waiting for him in the shadows.