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They hadn’t known that every word out of her mouth was a lie, that for centuries, she was behind all the horrible things that happened to them, from the deaths of their servants, to attacks by demons.

But eventually, they’d worn her down with their affection and their constant support and protection. And then one day she’d found Thanatos standing over the body of a slave who had died saving his wife from their master’s lust.

“Are you sad for that human?” she’d asked, her question almost a taunt.

“No.” Thanatos’s voice was hollow. “I’m sad that we will never know what it’s like to love like he did, or have someone love us like that.”

“We have each other.” Another taunt. She was a bitch. And she liked it.

“And I’m grateful beyond measure.” His yellow gaze lifted, and burned right through her. “But it’s not the same. Who would die for you when the time came, Limos?”

Something in that conversation had stuck with her, and later, she’d gone back to the scene, unsure why. She’d grabbed the slave owner’s wife and threatened the woman to see what he would do if given the choice of saving her life or his. He’d chosen his. He could get another wife.

In that moment, she’d realized that the marriage she’d chosen would offer the same results. She would be the queen of the underworld… and a brood mare that could be replaced.

Screw that. She’d killed the man and gotten a whole new outlook on life.

Arik’s warm palm massaged her neck muscles, which had grown tight at the memories she despised. His other fingers stroked her right arm, tracing the lines that formed Bones.

“Can he feel that?”

“Mmm-hmm.” Right now Arik was caressing the beast’s leg, and her thigh tingled in response. “He likes it. I think you might be one of the few people he won’t try to eat.”

“Good. Cuz that would suck.” Bones stomped his foot, letting Arik know he’d had enough, and Arik took the hint, settling his hand over hers. “You grew up in Sheoul, right? Raised by Lilith?”

Ugh. Not a subject she wanted to discuss. “Yes.”

“I’m guessing it wasn’t pleasant?”

“It was horrible,” she murmured, and the fib spread through her with a familiar warmth. “But I escaped, and here I am. Now, let’s talk about you, because that’s much more interesting.”

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And because if he was talking, she wouldn’t have to worry about lying.

Twenty

Arik did not want to talk about himself. Limos was much more interesting, but when she rubbed her palm in a slow circle over his chest, he fell into a lulling sort of trance and forgot why he didn’t want to talk.

Limos cleared her throat. “Can I ask you something?”

If that wasn’t a prelude to a question that was going to be hard to answer, he didn’t know what was. “You can ask, but I can’t guarantee I’ll answer or that you’ll like what I say.”

She nodded, cleared her throat again. “Runa said you wouldn’t like yourself if you knew what you’d done to her, and Shade said your father was abusive, that you used to protect Runa and your mother.”

“So?” He knew he was being defensive, but this was one of the very few subjects he didn’t like to talk about.

“So… tell me.”

He eyed her sideways. “That’s not a question.”

“You sound like Ares,” she grumbled. “Okay, let’s try this. Where are your parents?”

“Dead.”

“Did you kill them?” She asked with such matter-of-fact innocence, as if killing your parents was a normal thing to do. What different worlds they’d grown up in.

“Suicide and cancer took them.”

Limos resumed the circling of her palm over his chest. The sensation was amazingly intimate. “How did you protect your mother and sister? I mean, you were a child, right?”

Seriously, he did not want to talk about this. But Limos worked him like a master interrogator, except she got him to talk with pleasure instead of pain. As her fingers traced a tingly path from one nipple to the other, he cracked like a thin-shelled egg.

“I ran interference,” he said, gruffly. “When my old man was beating on one of them, I pissed him off so much that he turned on me.” Oh, but that wasn’t all. By the time he hit his