Page 87 of Hercules

Herc surrendered a chuckle. “And pulling out a George Herbert quote after what you just helped us do…impressive.”

He breathed a little easier when the man ticked a respectful nod. Stress reclaimed it the very next second as Lois wrestled against his hold like a kid being sprung with a pop quiz.

“George Herbert,” she echoed, again like the student who knew tipota about the subject at hand. “But also…” Yet then turned, the rest of her demeanor clearly lost to a new dimension of mystification. A level of magic Herc couldn’t have planned even if he’d tried and was so damn glad he hadn’t. “My father.”

Just like that, it was back to ordering his lungs to stand down on breathing—as he acquiesced to his wildcat’s squirms with a full and joyful heart. But as soon as Lois was free, he had to reach out again to help with her wobbly steps.

Not far away, Apollo released an auspicious grunt. “Zeus’s mangy toes, I live for moments like this.”

“Shut up,” Herc snapped, but not without a twinge of affection. His brother could have the best and worst timing within a single moment—but here and now, all the moments belonged to the two people in front of them. His gorgeous Yamaneko and the person she’d never expected to see again.

And then to touch, her hands lifting to the sides of his face.

And then to examine, her head tracing a ragged figure-eight as her stare raked his features.

“Sakkachan. I thought I’d never see you again.”

And then to gasp, as that endearment clearly permeated her understanding.

But her head didn’t fully stop. It moved with more purpose as she blatantly struggled to reconcile her past and this present.

“Me neither. I—I mean…” She dropped her hands into conflicted fists. “In my heart, I want to believe this…but you’re so…different. Your face…”

“Is different,” the man filled in, his nod now torqued by obvious remorse. “I know. I do.” He pulled in a heavy breath. “After I eluded Ito to get you and your okaasan out of the country, he said he didn’t believe in my loyalty anymore. And that the only way he ever would again…was to let him wipe away everything I once was. That included our apartment and everything in it, along with my very name and face.”

Lois splayed a hand over her lips. “Oh my God. Oh…Otousan…”

“Neko-chan.” He pleaded just as fervently to her, adding a long press of his forehead to hers. “There, there. Yamenesai. Stop. It was for the best, I think.”

“You think?” She stepped back so violently, Herc oofed from the impact on his sternum. The woman didn’t notice. “What part about any of it did you think was best? That I struggled every day to keep remembering your face, which wasn’t your face any longer? That I listened to Okaan sobbing herself to sleep every night, missing you? That your name was the last thing on her lips when her dead hand fell from mine, five years ago?”

Itsuki Maita—or whatever handle he was going by now—bent his torso into a distraught bow. “I know,” he whispered. “I know, child. I heard it…as I heard the suffering and solitude in your tears when she crossed to the next realm. And I still do hear her,” he asserted while straightening, “so many times, in so many ways. The brush of the wind on the ocean. The songs of the temple bells along my street. In the music of your own voice…”

He rested there with obvious purpose, perhaps—probably—hoping that his daughter’s skeptical stare would soften on its own. But at this point, Herc had spent more time than Maita with the person Lois had become, and he highly doubted that possibility.

The guy was going to have to close this deal on his craziest claim.

And did.

“I also heard your mother when Hercules and Apollo transmitted their message across that terminal.” He gestured toward the spot where the atmospheric hatch to Haneda had just been. “When she joined their petition for help, filling my head so fully with her sweet voice, I knew I wasn’t losing my mind.”

Lois still didn’t move—but Herc perceived the shifts beneath her cautious crust. Her tiny chews on the insides of her lips. The slow blinks of her eyes, turning her irises from umber to sienna by fascinating degrees.

But her gaze gained more than a different color.

By those same tiny steps, she inched her way back to the things he adored most about her.

Compassion. Caring. Openness.

Most of all, the ability to trump l’œil the hell out of the situation and understand everything differently in the space of seconds.

To look up at her father…and now see him.

To know that what he had to choose wasn’t often a choice at all. That sometimes fate poured out the blessings but added blood to the spigot. That good men were often forced to life’s poker table but dealt dirty cards. And somehow, in some way, they had to deal with the pair of deuces against a cosmic royal flush.

She saw all that now. And she reached for her father, pulling him into a hug that said she wasn’t going to let go. Not until the cards were burned and he was checking into life’s VIP suite again.

The same way she’d embraced Herc. And told him, in every second she’d followed him and fought for him and believed in him, that he deserved the table with a view too. The velvet cushions. The fine wine. The winning hand.