AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“A story for another time.” Kane dragged his fingers along my bare arm, sending pleasant shivers down my spine. “What’s your favorite drink?”
“Talk about a non sequitur.”
“I’d like to discuss lighter topics.”
“Fine. A gin called Puck’s Pleasure. It’s a fairy-made brand you can only get in certain supernatural circles in London. It isn’t even for sale.”
“Aren’t you going to ask mine?”
“I know yours. It’s Yamazaki.” I’d seen him drink the Japanese whisky enough times to identify it as a favorite.
His smile suggested he was pleased by my knowledge. “And now I’d like a more extensive answer to my music question.”
It seemed only fair, given how much he’d divulged. I knew it couldn’t have been easy for him to loosen some of those emotional bricks.
“My love of music came from my human family. It was something I excelled at that had nothing to do with being a goddess.”
“But your family knew what you are.”
“My parents didn’t. They died when I was a baby, before I showed any signs.”
“How did your grandparents discover the truth about you?”
“I displayed strange abilities from an early age. I walked and talked before I should have, which wasn’t so crazy, but then I started talking to ghosts and discovered I could make them do whatever I wanted. I’d make a game of it. Order them to dance a jig, silly things like that.”
“Dance a jig?”
“I was a little kid. What do you expect? My grandfather was the one to figure it out. He trained me to protect myself, and to learn everything I could about my goddess self and the not-so-mythological world. It was hard for him. The most fighting he’d ever done was in the bunk of a submarine over comic books.” Pops had served in the Navy before I was born. He’d grown up hunting and fishing, though. When it came to survival skills, he’d been a topnotch teacher. What he didn’t know, he learned for my sake.
“What happened to your parents?”
“Car accident.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay. I was only a baby. I have no real memories of them.”
He stroked my arm with long, slow movements that revived those lustful feelings that had dissipated with my trip down Kane’s memory lane. I did my best to ignore them.
“Do you think things would have turned out differently for you if they’d lived?” he asked.
“I think that’s inevitable. Whether better or worse, though, I have no idea.”
“Worse than foster care?”
“I try not to give it much thought. Can’t change the past, so I don’t see the point.”
“Your family was musical, and when you hear it, you can’t help but remember them.”
I nodded. “Both my parents and my grandparents loved music. After Pops died, it pained me to listen and remember what my life had been like when I had people I loved and with whom I felt safe. I knew I’d never have that feeling again.”
“You assumed,” Kane corrected me.
“No. It’s a fact.”
“When you were fighting in the ring, music seemed to give you strength.”
During the god elixir experiment, I’d been knocked down by my opponent. Kane had remembered my fondness for Debussy and played a song to help me rally. His idea worked, and I won.
