Page 61 of Hercules

They were all still there, only in gentler shades. Blending into each other like a rare watercolor, inviting her to get lost in all the silky hues.

“Deeper levels,” he carefully repeated, threading his strong fingers between hers. “Like how?”

She let her eyes drift shut for a long moment. Anchored her nerves in his perfect grip. He wasn’t going to let her fall; she was as sure of it as the calmer cadence of her heartbeat.

“Like levels of memories,” she confessed. “Happier times…from the past.”

His other hand, sliding from the crown of her head to the space behind her ear, carried no overt command. Only the steadiness of his intense observation.

“Then why do you look so sad, talking about them?”

The answer came too swiftly—and agonizingly. “Because they’re gone forever. Gone…with my only living family. My father and mother.”

CHAPTER 17

The jab of her soul’s pain was like nothing Herc had experienced before.

It wasn’t a god thing—Eleos was the only one among them with the empath wiring for that—but a tangible force in all the energy around her, as recognizable as an aura. Just not so pretty.

At once, he longed to peel it off her. Scrape it away and wad it up like the awful muck it was on her spirit. Roll it tight and then hurl it into the depths of the Styx, so she’d never be dragged by it again.

This was what it felt like…to love one’s parents to these depths. Only now did he realize that he’d never actually comprehended the stuff, nor stopped to consider the loss of it in his life. Not after the awareness had hit, much too early in the days when he still played with wooden swords and battled thorny shrubs. Even then, he’d seen that look across Metera’s face. The eyes that saw only his sire—and the deception Zeus had used to put Herc in her belly. In turn, that’s all Herc considered whenever Zeus summoned him. But it went beyond, turning into the only factor he focused on whenever his Olympian siblings and cousins acted out. Which was, sadly, a lot.

Right now, having been away from that game all these years, he had even clearer insight to it all. Why he’d always liked spending more time in the human realm, where most mortals only donned masquerades for fun. Where he’d fallen in love with a woman who’d given him the honesty of her heart and soul. Truths he’d grieved with the entirety of his being and swore he wouldn’t seek again.

Until now.

With this female’s sorrow jolting him like the Amorgos earthquake all over again. But he had nothing to fight her desolation except words. For that matter, not even that many. Yet he offered them with all the force of his spirit and the air in his chest.

“Tell me.”

Lois’s head lifted. Only by a fraction of an inch, but it was enough. Sometimes simpler really was better, making him feel better about his lack of a grand soliloquy.

In the extra moment she took to collect a response, Herc swiveled his body more, changing their positions from sideways twists to a more equal match of fully facing each other. If he needed her to know anything else, it was his presence here with her. For her.

“You’ve probably guessed that I’m not a full-bore all-American kid,” she finally uttered, halfheartedly attempting to rope in some of her default humor. This was one of the few times Herc dredged up a clever comeback.

“Show me someone who is.”

Annnd it sounded much better in his head. He was still grateful for Lois’s playful jab at his shoulder.

“My birth name is actually Yamaneko. Lois got applied after I moved to the States. I was born in a suburb of Tokyo, where my mom had met my dad years earlier. She was born in Missouri but went to Japan for an internship in college and fell in love with everything there, including my father. I came along a few years later, and once I started private school, Mom went back as a contractor for the telecommunications company she’d originally worked for.”

She took her first significant pause: not surprising when her features darkened as if an invisible thunderhead had parked itself over her. Herc shifted again, conveying his stronger support by securing both his hands around hers.

“I wasn’t even seven, so I believed my parents when they said her extra income, along with my dad’s promotion at his corporation, were why we got to move to the middle of the city and into a penthouse condo that’d blow even your dad’s mind.”

Herc grunted. “My father isn’t interested in having his mind blown, matia mou.” But his own thundercloud was easily dissipated by her little smirk from the new endearment. It was an obnoxiously growing list, but she was clearly fascinated by the expanding vocabulary—with those smiles that were glorious reciprocation all by themselves.

All too quickly, the expression vanished. With the gates of her memories now pried open, she seemed determined to let him all the way in despite the discomfort creeping back into her posture.

“It was an idyllic life,” she confessed quietly. “For a while.” Her eyes slammed shut again. Herc waited, his grip just as firm, for the twitches beneath her eyelids to settle. “I think it was right after my twelfth birthday when the bigger truth started to crystalize. That I realized my mom’s paychecks had nothing to do with our lifestyle and had been going into something the two of them called ‘the escape plan’. They never knew I was listening, of course, but I had big dreams for that money. I was positive they were getting ready to surprise me with a whole summer at a resort like Kellerman’s.”

A smile brimmed on his own lips now, courtesy of the twinkle storms in her eyes over the reference. He’d never been more grateful that Meg made him sit through several rewatches of Dirty Dancing.

“So you’re an archery, basket weaving, and lawn games kind of girl,” he quipped, instantly answered by a cute arch of her right eyebrow.

“You’re forgiven just once for forgetting the nose-in-a-book part. And, of course, the talent show scene.”