Unamused Muse (Mt. Olympus Employment Agency: Muse Book 2) (4 page)

“What? Oh. Sure.” I pulled my lanyard from beneath my blouse and showed him my wretched picture.

He peered at it, then at me, then back again. “What brings you here today, Miss Greene?”

I dug around under my seat and produced the manila envelope Parker had given me. “I’m supposed to deliver this. I came from the front office.”

His eyebrows raised in surprise at mention of the front office. He took the package and read the words Parker had printed there in his crisp handwriting:

Nemesis Davidson

Suite B, Production Building

Tartarus

It meant nothing to me, but the security guy nodded his head and replaced the package under my feet.

“What you want to do is turn around and follow this road till you get to the building marked ‘Sound Stage.’” He held his arm out straight, pointing with two fingers. “Just before the sound stage, hang a left. The next building you come to will be Production.” He peered at the gauge on my dash. “Park right up by the front door. There’s a charging station there. Make sure you get yourself plugged in before you go inside or you’ll never make it back to HQ.”

I gave him a polite smile. “Thank you very much.”

“No problem. You’ll want the second floor.” He slapped the roof of my golf cart twice and walked away.

It took me a minute to turn the cart around. A troupe of gladiators jostled to get by me, then two carts, similar to mine but with
Tartarus
emblazoned on the side, crossed in front of me. After the second one passed, I slammed my foot on the gas pedal and darted around before an oncoming hydra could slither into my way.

I wove between pockets of creatures and people, never quite reaching my top speed of fifteen miles per hour, until I came to the sound stage and turned left as the security guy had told me to do.

After all the bad directions I’d been getting lately, I was relieved to find the production building exactly where he’d told me it would be. I pulled into a slot at the front, hopped out, and plugged in.

The building was only two stories, so I didn’t bother to wait for the elevator. Happy to stretch my legs after so long in the tiny cart, I took the stairs two at a time. There was only one door on that floor. I stepped inside, clutching the package, and approached the receptionist.

She tilted her head to the side and watched me without comment.

This made me nervous.

When I reached her, I held out the package I’d been crushing against my chest. “Hi. I’m looking for Nemesis Davidson. I need to deliver this package to her.”

The receptionist snorted. “Nemesis Davidson? You must be Kris’s replacement. Parker’s such a hoot.” Grinning, she climbed down from her chair and slithered toward the door behind her, using her hands to keep her upper body off the floor. “Come on back this way.”

I tried to keep my expression neutral as I followed. When the receptionist had been sitting at the desk, she’d looked perfectly human with her blonde curls and bright yellow blouse. The moment she dropped to the floor, a six-foot, gold-and-blue-striped tail uncurled from under the desk.

If I hadn’t seen similar people at Mt. Olympus, I might have thought I was losing my mind.

She stopped at the door and rose higher on her tail. “She’s in there with the production team right now, but I’m sure she’ll want to see you.” She knocked on the door. “I’m Roxy, by the way.”

I smiled. “Wynter.”

“Great!”

The door opened, and a woman with ice-blue eyes and platinum hair in a short, asymmetrical cut peered out. “What’s up?”

Roxy slithered backward a few feet and held her hand in my direction. “This is Wynter. She’s got the new-arrival roster from headquarters.” Roxy smirked. “It’s addressed to Nemesis Davidson.”

The new woman snorted. “Parker is such a chowderhead.” She thrust her hand out to me. “Wynter, it’s great to meet you. I’m Nemi.”

I shook her hand and marveled at her spotless white business suit and pointy-toed heels. “So, not Nemesis Davidson?”

She shrugged. “Nemesis, yes, though I prefer Nemi. But Davidson?” She shook her head, and one of the longer sections of her hair slid over one eye. “Gods don’t have surnames. Parker’s just messing with you.” She stepped back and waved me in with a hand that was clutching a pile of index cards. “Come in. Have a seat. We’re just finishing up.”

Searching through my memories of stories Mom had told me when I was a kid, I realized who this woman was. I swallowed hard as I followed the goddess of divine retribution into her lair. She seemed nice enough, but I’d done a lot of things in my life I wasn’t too proud of. Would she know? Of course she would know. She was a goddess.

I was doomed.

The room was not the dungeon I’d expected. There was a table in the center with several people sitting around it taking notes. In fact, I recognized a few from the book club.

Nemesis—Nemi—pointed to an empty chair and smiled. “Right there is good. Everybody, this is Wynter. She’s covering for Kris.”

Most looked up, but within seconds, any interest I presented was gone, and they all went back to staring at the wall and jotting things down.

The wall was covered in index cards. Each card had a drawing on it and a caption at the bottom. Nemi took a few more of the cards in her hand and pinned them to the open spaces on the wall.

A man with a dark beard and a scar over one eye pointed to an open space on the far right. “What if we had the minotaur eat the cheese right before the Guilty managed to get to the mousetrap?”

Nemi stared at the empty slot, frowning. “Kind of overkill, don’t you think?”

The wall-climbing woman from book club shook her pen at the wall. “Maybe just have the mouse steal it. There’s no reason to pay for a minotaur.”

As Nemi pinned a new card into the space—one with a hastily drawn picture of a mouse stealing cheese—I understood what they were doing.

“You’re storyboarding the punishments.” I’d seen the process before when I’d worked for an ad agency for three weeks. They’d been planning out a commercial they were shooting for a new brand of toothpaste.

Several heads popped up at my interruption. One of the bowl-cut twins from book club sniffed and looked away.

I felt my face burn with embarrassment.

Nemi winked at me. “That should do it, folks. That was the last one. Make sure you get it all down, and I’ll see you at next week’s meeting.” She stepped away from the wall so they could see it better, then made her way over to where I was.

“I am so sorry,” I whispered. “I didn’t mean to blurt that out.”

She frowned. “No worries. Before you came in, everybody was talking at once.” She sat beside me and held out her hand. “Now. Let’s see the new list.”

I handed over the package and sat quietly while she ripped it open and read the contents. Her lips moved a little as she read, and her eyes glowed with enthusiasm. “Fantastic! This is going to be a terrific week.” She signed the bottom of a duplicate copy of the list, shoved it back in its envelope, then handed it to me. “There you go. Make sure Parker shows you where to file that. Sometimes mine goes missing, and I need another copy sent over.” She leaned closer and lowered her voice in a conspiratorial whisper. “I don’t run as tight a ship as I probably should.”

What could I possibly say to that?

Nemi patted me on the shoulder. “Good meeting you, Wynter. If you get here on time next week, maybe we can have a cup of coffee and chat. I’d like to know more about you.” She glanced at a delicate gold watch on her wrist. “But, that’s not going to happen today. I’ve got a meeting with the set designers in, like, two minutes.”

Roxy must have been listening. I heard her scales brushing against the tile floor before I turned around.

Her eyes lit up when she smiled. “If you’ll follow me, I have a package to go with you to headquarters.”

When I turned back to Nemi to say goodbye, she was already gone. I shrugged and followed Roxy to her desk, took the package she had waiting, and left the building.

I was halfway to the office when I realized someone had visited the golf cart while I’d been gone. I’d shoved the package under my seat to keep it secure and was more concerned with not hitting a herd of goats that poured out of a side door to the sound stage. Then I had to find my way back to the entrance to the maintenance tunnels. Once I’d made it out in the open following the river again, I relaxed enough to notice my immediate surroundings.

A single white rose lay on the passenger seat beside me. There was no note to say where it had come from. I either had a secret admirer or a stalker.

In the Underworld, was there any difference?

Chapter 4

Wednesday came and went without pulling any outrageous pranks on me. I answered phones, filed paperwork, and doodled flowers and vines on a notepad. Parker said some days were like that—uneventful.

No baby, either. Parker paced a lot, and he reported that Kris was feeling pretty miserable. If she didn’t go into labor by next week, the doctor wanted to induce her.

And still no Hades. I’d been right outside his office for three days and never once heard so much as a whisper through the door. Parker assured me on several occasions the god of the Underworld could arrive any moment, though.

It was almost as if he was avoiding me.

On Thursday, Parker and I spent most of the morning stuffing envelopes with the monthly Underworld LLC employee newsletter.

After the third paper cut on the same finger, I slapped the offending envelope on the table and scowled. “Why, exactly, are we wasting so much paper and time sending this out in hard copy? Why isn’t this an email list we’re sending it to instead?”

Parker shrugged. “Hades doesn’t like technology very much. He’d rather do it the old-fashioned way. His company, so we do it his way.”

“Fair enough.” I stuck my sliced index finger in the air and kept stuffing.

I’d read the newsletter before we started. It was light on news and heavy on filler. Recipes. Horoscope. Birthdays and anniversaries.

Nothing like a little mind-numbing busy work to make a girl long for the days when three-headed dogs knocked her on her ass.

By lunchtime, my fingers were in tatters, my stomach was rumbling, and my patience was gone. The office was filled with boxes of envelopes ready to go out, and we still weren’t finished.

“Dammit!” I shook my hand and shoved my pinky in my mouth, having sliced my last remaining unscathed finger.

Parker stopped and gave me a long look. “Okay. You’re done.”

I pointed my elbow at the last pile newsletters and talked around my finger. “We’re not finished.”

“I’ve got the rest. Go grab yourself some lunch. I’ve got an errand for you, too, if you’re up for it.”

As the senior personal assistant, Parker was kind of my boss. It was sweet of him to always ask before giving me a task. Sweet, but unnecessary, especially in this instance. I wanted out of there.

“Sure. What can I do for you?” In my head, I was already out the door.

Parker slid a piece of paper out of his desk drawer, along with two small slips of purple paper and the keys to the golf cart. “I wrote out the instructions ahead of time so I wouldn’t forget anything.” He handed everything to me. “First, go to the dry cleaners and give them the claim receipts. Then, I need you to take everything to the mansion and drop it off.”

“The mansion. There’s a mansion?” I glanced at the directions. They didn’t look too complicated. That didn’t bode well. Parker was bound to have left something off.

“Of course there’s a mansion. Hades doesn’t live in a shack.”

I didn’t know what kind of expression to have on my face for this information. Shock? Disbelief? Excitement? I kept it neutral while I tried to decide. “So, you’re saying, I’m picking up Hades’ dry cleaning and dropping it off at his mansion.”

“Yes.” Parker gave me a hopeful smile.

“Should I do anything else while I’m there? Walk his dog? Water his plants?” I was only half joking.

“He has people for that.”

“But not for picking up his dry cleaning?”

“We’re his people for that.”

I nodded. “Fair enough. Okay then. I’ll be back soon.”

I didn’t think to ask until I was in the golf cart whether the boss was in the office or at home.

~*~

The downtown area of the Underworld was more like a town square than a bustling business district. All the essentials were there—a drugstore, dry cleaners, mom-and-pop grocer, a small department store, barber, beauty shop, and a few cafes and restaurants. That was about all, though.

Parker had shown it to me over the weekend during his initial tour, but I hadn’t been back since then.

I pulled into a cart space and hopped out. The dry cleaner was at the far end of the square on the right. I walked around the grass and followed the sidewalk as far as it would go until I reached Mo’s Dry Cleaner.

Inside, a tiny woman greeted me the moment the bell above the door jingled. “Welcome to Mo’s!” Her exuberance was a little disconcerting.

I smiled politely and handed her the purple claim tickets. “I need to pick these up, if they’re ready.”

“Excellent.” She took the tickets and paced back and forth with them for a few passes before disappearing into the back. Her cheerful voice drifted through the beaded curtain. “You must be covering for Kris. How’s she doing? Baby here yet?”

Yelling back at her seemed inappropriate in the small space, but not answering her would’ve been rude. I’ve always hated appearing rude, especially to nice people. So, I yelled back at her, hoping nobody would come in. “Still no baby. She’s doing fine, but feeling really uncomfortable.”

The woman reappeared at the counter carrying two garments in their plastic covers. “No need to shout. I’m right here.” She grinned at me and handed over the items. “I’m teasing. Here. I’ll add these to the account. Do you have anything to drop off?”

I shook my head. “Nope. Just picking up today.”

“Well, then. Welcome to the Underworld, Wynter. If you need anything cleaned, you come see Mo. I’ll get you all sorted.”

She knew my name—whether that was because word got around or she had mind-reading or other powers, I didn’t know. Mrs. Moros, my trainer at Mt. Olympus, had been a mind reader. Anything could be true in this place.

I thanked Mo and left quickly. I’d learned from my time with Mrs. Moros how much work it was to guard my thoughts non-stop. If the dry cleaner lady could hear what I was thinking, I was sure to embarrass myself simply because I was trying
not
to think about anything inappropriate.

On the other hand, if she knew my name because everybody was talking about me, I didn’t want to be around to feed gossip. But I didn’t really believe that was the case. My ego wasn’t big enough to think anybody gave a damn about some nobody from the human world on loan here for six weeks.

So, it was probably the mind-reading thing.

The golf cart had a hook on the inside that may or may not have been intended for hanging up clothes, so I hung the garment bags there and took off. In my haste to keep from thinking the word penis over and over in the presence of a potential mind reader, I forgot about my rumbling stomach.

So much for grabbing lunch.

The directions to the mansion weren’t complicated, and the drive wasn’t far. To my delight, I didn’t get lost. Of course, you couldn’t miss the place. It took up enough real estate to cover a city block. Black and gold marble pillars thrust into the sky in the front, and golden serpent statues flanked the walkways on the roof.

Of all the gods and goddesses I’d met so far, none had been particularly intimidating—or even godlike. This guy was one of the big twelve in Greek mythology. And he seemed to embrace his godhood in a way the minor gods didn’t.

Sweat broke out on my upper lip, and I consulted the next set of instructions.

According to Parker’s neat handwriting, the front door would be unlocked and I was supposed to go right in. I braced myself, took a deep breath, and boldly walked into the lair of the god of the dead as if I belonged there.

The front doors—enormous by any standard—slammed shut behind me. A quiet
snick
came from the lock. I refused to lose what little dignity I had by grabbing the door handle and jiggling it. Proving to myself that I was locked in would cause my composure to snap. No need to freak out and look like a thief. I had every reason to be here.

I lifted my chin and followed the curving stairs to the second floor as the instructions told me to do.

Honestly, it was a brilliant defense against thieves. Of course the god of the Underworld wouldn’t lock his front door. Who would be stupid enough to come in uninvited? Who would steal from him? But if somebody did, locking them in to be dealt with later was genius.

If I hadn’t been locked in myself, I’d have been a hundred percent behind it. Since it currently affected me, maybe I liked it a little less. But I was supposed to be there. Somebody had to let me out eventually. I’d worry about it when the time came.

At the top of the stairs, I turned right and followed the long corridor to a second set of stairs. The walls were covered in gorgeous tapestries showing familiar and unfamiliar stories from mythology. Portraits and paintings hung between them, many of a stern-looking man with dark red hair and a closely trimmed beard. I suspected, based on how many pictures there were of him, they were all of Hades.

Other paintings were of nymphs dancing, centaurs fighting, or people in togas having a picnic. Oddly, many of the paintings were covered in black cloth.

Looking under the cloths was out of the question. My nerves far outweighed any curiosity I might have had to see what was covered up.

But there sure were a lot of them.

The second set of stairs led to the north wing, a much more homey section. Portraits surrounded by stuffy gold filigree gave way to photos and prints in more modern frames. Even these were often covered by black fabric.

I passed warm rooms with overstuffed chairs and fluffy throws, a library filled with musty, leather-bound books, but also stocked with pulp paperbacks and recent bestsellers. I wanted to stop and nose around, but I kept moving. The hangers were digging into my fingers. I needed to drop off the dry cleaning and get the hell out of there before I ran into anybody.

I turned a corner and found the heavy, carved door that led to the bedroom of the lord of the Underworld. The door was wide open. I swallowed hard and moved past the huge bed with its heavy, embroidered curtains, past the cold, stone fireplace and leather chair, and past the door to the enormous bathroom. The walk-in closet was at the far end of the room, and I only went in a few steps so I could hang the dry cleaning and make a quick getaway.

The quiet was unnerving. How could I have come this far into such a giant house without encountering another living thing? No servants. No pets. No plants.

Creepy.

I bolted out of the closet and across the room to the hallway and stopped short. A tall, thin woman wearing a black dress, sensible shoes, and an apron blocked my way. Her white hair was pulled back in a severe bun, and the tip of her nose looked like it had been shaped with a pencil sharpener.

I drew up short and let out an unintentional yip.

The woman’s sharp features softened into a smile. “Hello, Wynter. We’ve been hoping to meet you all week.”

~*~

The kitchen was on the first floor at the rear of the house, past the first flight of stairs I’d taken to the hall of portraits. I didn’t have to go all the way back the way I’d come, though. Lita knew a shortcut through the fireplace and ushered me through before I’d said a word.

The spatial distortion of walking through a third-floor fireplace to reach a first-floor room on the other side of the house in two steps didn’t surprise me. In the last few months I’d been traveling through portals to get to all sorts of places. It delighted me, of course—I hoped I’d never get used to this sort of magic—but it didn’t surprise me.

What did surprise me was that Lita and her husband Otis had lunch waiting for me.

“What can I get you to drink?” Otis was as short and round as Lita was tall and thin. He scooted around the kitchen getting me a napkin, dragging a stool to the counter for me to sit on, and setting out salt and pepper shakers. He had a tuft of gray hair over each ear and one on top of his head. Tiny glasses perched on the end of his bulbous nose. “Milk? Lemonade? Ooh! How about some chocolate milk?”

Lita shook her head in disgust. “She’s not a child, Otis. Poor her a glass of wine. She’s probably scared to death.”

Otis flicked his gaze from Lita to me, then frowned a little. “I suppose you are, poor thing. White or red? Would you like a glass of ice water, as well?”

I opened my mouth, but nothing but a timid squeak came out.

Lita put her hand on my back and gave it a pat. “That’s what I thought. Come sit down. Eat first. Talk when you’re ready.” She guided me to the stool and waited for me to get comfortable before she removed her hand and went to the walk-in refrigerator to pull out a chilled bottle of white wine.

While she poured, Otis set out a platter stacked high with a variety of sandwiches, followed by a crystal bowl filled with fruit. There was so much food in front of me, I wondered who else was coming.

Otis gave me an empty plate, and Lita handed me an embarrassingly large glass of wine. Then they stood there, watching me with expectant smiles.

I gave them a polite smile back and took a sip of wine. The cool, dry liquid rolled down my throat, warming and calming my insides. My lips curled up in a more natural smile. “That’s very good, thank you.”

Otis clapped his hands in delight. “Excellent! She can talk. Have something to eat, love. I didn’t know what you like, so I made a little of everything.”