The Goddess Hunt by Aimée Carter Read Free Book Online Page A

heartless bastard?
    And an asshole. I am quite proud.
    The corner of James’s mouth twitched. Yet you took Casey back to the Underworld.
    Henry hesitated, and through the leaves, he found Kate. She leaned up against a tree a few feet from Pollux, her face crumpled and red and her cheeks glistening with tears. He hadn’t seen her so utterly miserable since the day she’d come to Eden Manor searching for a way to change fate.
    And once again, it was his fault.
    I know we have had our differences, but I need you to trust me.
    James raised an eyebrow. Oh yeah? And why should I do that?
    Because you care for Kate, and you care for the twins. I have made mistakes, as have you—but they should not suffer because of it.
    Several seconds passed. How do I know this isn’t a trap?
    You don’t. You simply have to trust me. Henry paused. You owe me that much.
    Silence again, longer this time. James glanced at Kate, and he must have seen the same thing Henry did: that keen sense of loss, as agonizing as it had been for her when she’d faced the inevitable death of her mother. The fact that it hurt her so badly when she barely knew the twins made Henry’s heart ache for her, and he was once again reminded how much he did not deserve her.
    All right. James’s gaze shifted back to him. What do you need me to do?

Kate
     
    The wait was agony. No matter how much a I wanted to believe that eventually Henry would do the right thing, I wavered between hope and despair. He had Casey. Hell, for all I knew, he’d returned him to his afterlife already. James wouldn’t lie to me about something like that. And if that were the case, then we’d already lost.
    That left me with only one choice: to believe Henry was good. That after all he’d gone through with Persephone, he would understand how badly it hurt to be ripped from the person he loved most in the world, and he would relent. It was a long shot, but I had to take it.
    Lux was oddly silent once Walter left. I expected him to rage, but he didn’t even struggle to undo his bonds. He just rested against the tree as if he’d accepted his fate.
    That was the worst part, seeing Lux give up. And that was why, when Ella turned her back to pet one of her massive slobbering dogs, I closed the distance between us and sat beside him.
    “I’m sorry,” I said softly. Lux didn’t look at me. “I should’ve done more.”
    “You stood up for us. That’s more than anyone’s done before.” His voice was hoarse and his eyes deadened, but at least he hadn’t shut out the world completely. Yet. If he hurt a fraction as much as he looked like he did, however, it would only be a matter of time.
    “It wasn’t enough though.” I frowned. “Could you petition the council to let you become mortal and join Casey in the Underworld? If they let Persephone do it, then—”
    “Their pride would never allow it.”
    He was right. Of course he was right. “Then—then once I’m queen, I’ll do something. Whatever it takes, I’ll help you find him, and you can either stay there or I’ll help you smuggle him back out or—”
    “It’s too late.” At last he looked at me, his expression void of anything resembling humanity. “Hades has him, and he would rather destroy himself than allow my brother to leave again. To him, this is a matter of everything he stands for. Once someone has entered the Underworld, they stay. Period. The few times he’s allowed the dead to leave, they’ve never made it.”
    “But he did allow them to try.” I leaned in closer. “We’ll find a way to fix this, okay? I’ll do whatever I have to do, but you can’t give up. Promise me.”
    As we stared at each other, his brown eyes seemed to thaw. Finally, a spark of life. “Why do you care so much? This has nothing to do with you.”
    “Yes, it does.” I couldn’t even explain it to myself, but the way he was looking at me—he needed some show of kindness. Some small amount of hope that the gods weren’t all