6
GUNS AND OTHER FOREPLAY
ALEXIS: SIX DAYS UNTIL THE FIRST TITAN ASSIGNMENT
Nyx was a heavy, snoring scarf around my neck.
“Holy Kronos, I can’t do this,” Helen said as she sat on her bed, waving one of her bedazzled “emotional support” guns in the air.
Dragging my hands over my face, I closed my eyes and imagined Carl Gauss praising me for my work on the Riemann Hypothesis. Emmy Noether smiled as she looked over my calculations. Tension melted out of my shoulders at my heroes’ approval.
“What in Kronos’s land am I going to do with Ceres?” Helen wailed despondently. “What have we done?”
My eyes shot open—Carl and Emmy were dead.
Welcome to Hell.
“I did it, technically,” I said. “Not you.”
“We’re both in so much trouble.” Helen waved the gun at me.
At least everyone’s staying calm.
I took a deep steadying breath.
Knock. Knock.
I jumped and Helen pointed the gun at the door.
“Alexis, we have to go right now before Augustus murders us!” Drex shouted from the hall.
Funny story, Drex, you’re actually in more imminent danger than you think.
Helen stared up at me, face contorted with pure panic. She didn’t lower the
gun.
“It will be fine,” I lied.
“We can do this,” she lied back.
Nothing in life was more powerful than two women affirming each other’s horrible life choices.
A few seconds later, I ran out into the hall.
Drex grabbed me. “We’re supposed to meet in the villa’s training complex right now. If we don’t hurry, we’ll be late.”
“How far can it be?” I asked.
Our eyes widened with terror as we both realized I’d just cursed us. Crap.
We sprinted out of the villa into the rain.
Nyx sputtered on my neck. “Ughs—I’m melting.” She slithered underneath
my clothes.
Lightning flashed.
The electric fence towered thirty feet into the air. Small silver boxes protruded from its base. Spartan solar-powered generators. Sparks sizzled.
Drex pointed at a rock-colored hatch.
Fluffy Jr. pushed his wet nose against my leg. I glanced down at him.
What?
He picked up a twig and held it in his mouth.
Don’t you dare. I don’t have time for this.
He choked it down.
Wagging his tail, his tongue lolled out of his mouth—it was covered in bark.
Drex opened the door, revealing a dark stairwell that led into the earth. My kidneys twinged with phantom pain—bomb shelters in Montana were infamously used to store harvested organs.
Drex grimaced. “Ladies first.”
Fluffy Jr. sprinted down the dark creepy steps, tail wagging as he gagged.
I made the sign of the cross and followed him down.
Finally the dark stairwell opened up and I stumbled to a stop.
Drex ran into me. “What is it—”
He gasped.
A cavernous concrete bunker bigger than multiple football fields spread out before us.
Flickering overhead lights covered everything in shades of green, as a chrome Spartan generator sputtered loudly in the corner.
Pockets of fake trees, mimicking a dense forest, were positioned around piles of junk cars, and a quarter of the room looked like an old movie set, crumbling brick buildings standing as tall as the trees.
It was a training course, designed to kill (literally).
Case in point, on closer inspection, the dotted pattern covering everything wasn’t a design choice—they were bullet holes. Oh nice.
Five masked figures stepped forward from the fake trees.
Each of them held a short dagger.
White tank tops, white exercise pants, and white ski masks completed their ridiculous ensembles. If they were trying to disguise themselves, it didn’t work.
Agatha crossed her arms, propping up her boobs, one of which was bigger than both of mine combined (a devastating observation).
Next to her, Poco sat on Augustus’s shoulder, eating his long two-toned hair.
Kharon’s skeleton tattoo stretched across his right arm, and gruesome chest scars peeked out from beneath the scoop of his tank.
At the other end of the line, Patro was wrapped possessively around
Achilles.
He winked at me.
Does he have something in his eye?
Achilles only wore the top half of a mask; his lower face was covered by
the muzzle.
They stared at us, creepily silent.
Drex shuffled closer to me as he cleared his throat. “So, what are we doing —”
“Pick up your weapons and strap on your holsters.” Augustus pointed at the Spartan guns lying at the bottom of the steps. “NOW!”
We both jumped and obeyed.
“Oh—this is going to be so much fun,” Nyx hissed (our ideas of fun were not the same).
“Here are the rules.” Kharon stepped forward, a dagger swinging between
his skeleton-tattooed fingers. “We hide … You shoot.” He lazily stretched his
arm. “Simple. Any questions?”
My mind blanked.
“Why are you all in white?” Drex asked as he glanced down at the plain black exercise togas we’d both been given to wear. “Why the dagger?”
Kharon spun his knife. “Your goal is to hit us—white will show the blood.” He grinned evilly. “The knife is my Titan claws. Boo.”
“But … what if we hurt y-you?” Drex took a step back.
The Chthonics burst into laughter.
Augustus shook his head. “You won’t hit us. That’s why we’re here … We
have a lot to cover in only six days.”
He smiled.
“This simulation is about shooting accuracy. When it comes to Titans, a Spartan gun is your best defense. Your powers are secondary.”
He lifted Poco up from his shoulder and gently placed him on the ground.
“Protectors head over there for safety.” Augustus pointed to the dark alcove behind the stairs we’d come down.
Poco screeched and put his hands in the air like he wanted to be picked up.
Nero and Poppae trotted over obediently. Hell and Hound followed, their bony skeletons appearing every couple of steps.
In contrast, Fluffy Jr. jumped high, wildly throwing his back legs up into the air in a full donkey kick. Apparently, the motion got things moving—he
hacked loudly and threw up a twig.
Everyone stared at it.
“I’ll get that later,” I mumbled (I wouldn’t).
Nyx sighed as she slithered off my shoulders. “I’ll go make sure the obese horse doesn’t choke to death.” I was both grateful and offended.
While Fluffy Jr. chased his tail (it was hard to watch), Augustus gave Poco a treat. He waved his cookie at me as he waddled past.
What a cutie patootie.
I waved back and he chittered while covering his crumb-covered face.
When all the animals were safe behind the stairs, Kharon pulled his mask up and held the hilt of his dagger between his teeth. He clapped loudly and everything plunged into darkness.
Drex and I both gasped with awe. I thought clapper lights were just a myth.
“This is a level-one simulation.” Augustus’s silky voice echoed strangely in the pitch-black. “We will not harm you—we are only using evasive
maneuvers. This is to assess your shooting accuracy in the field.”
“THREE,” Kharon yelled abruptly, and lights flicked on in the floor, casting strange shadows across the room.
“TWO.”
There was a loud hum and fog billowed out around us.
“ONE!” Kharon (Karen) cackled.
BOOM.
BOOM.
BOOM.
Explosions flared all around the course; the floor shook; fires raged in all directions; smoke mixed with fog.
All five Chthonics disappeared like ghosts.
There was a loud staticky noise as Titan screeches echoed over speakers.
Drex looked at me with panic. “These people are actually mental.”
“Cults!” I yelled louder as the sound of machine guns popped. “I told you.”
Another explosion rocked the room.
“Run—or I stab the boy.” Breath blew against the shell of my ear.
“Carissima, you better hunt us down. Now.”
Whirling around, I aimed, recoil vibrating through my arms as gunpowder burned my nose.
A tattooed hand with black painted nails waved mockingly ten feet away.
“Come and get me,” Kharon taunted.
He made a V with his fingers and held it up to his lips. He wiggled his
tongue suggestively.
My face heated.
Pervert.
I lunged forward, firing at Kharon as he disappeared into the ruins.
What felt like hours later, but could have been minutes, Patro’s voice rang out from behind a car that was on fire.
“Are you even trying, Alex?” Patro taunted.
“Don’t call me that name.” I raised my gun.
Patro moved in a blur into my blind spot, too quick to track.
He leaned a few feet away. “So—now that you’ve chosen us as partners, we should probably get to know each other.”
I fired.
He chuckled.
The scent of ice filled my nose.
“Why are you d-doing this?” I whispered, feeling off-balance with his personality switch.
Emerald eyes were shockingly vivid behind his mask as he stepped in front
of me.
“Doing what?” he taunted.
“You know.”
He cocked his head to the side, mask gleaming in the firelight. “Know
what?”
“Stop with the games!” I waved my gun.
“Grow up—Alex,” he sneered. The cruel man who’d tormented me was back. “There’s a lot at stake. Stop pretending you don’t feel it too.”
Wait? Feel what?
I fired, but he’d disappeared.
Time dragged on as I ran through the course.
Two rows of buildings, in what appeared to be a movie set, towered around me.
I walked the path between them, scanning the darkness.
White flashed.
A large shadow sat atop a building.
I pointed my gun at it.
Achilles kneeled on top of a structure, the first one in a row of ten. His burning eyes smoldered as he stared down at me silently—the muzzle obscured his features. A sharp dagger glinted in his hand.
I fired.
He leapt impossibly fast, crouching on a roof three buildings down.
I pulled the trigger as quickly as I could.
Achilles stood on top of the tenth building, hair escaping his man bun as he slowly shook his head like he was disappointed.
Annoyed and exhausted, I lifted my middle finger.
He lifted a square device, pressed a button—the building next to me
exploded in flames.
Concrete chunks flew everywhere.
I was flung back.
Blinking into awareness, I slowly took in my surroundings.
My left ear was ringing painfully, and I was lying on the path under a pile of—I picked up a slab of the building and brought it close to my right eye —Styrofoam painted to look like concrete.
Rolling my eyes, I got to my feet and kicked the material away. Little white pieces drifted in the air around me like snow.
Heat warmed my face—the rest of the buildings were on fire.
A muzzle filled my vision.
I screamed.
Achilles loomed before me.
He cracked his neck like he was preparing to attack; Patro’s name was tattooed down it.
Is he mad that Patro keeps talking to me? Everyone knew how possessive he was.
I stepped back, terror clawing at my lungs.
Achilles took a step forward.
Smoke billowed around him, the scent of fire and ash filling my nose.
He’s going to attack me. No one’s ever going to find my body.
Titan screams echoed over the speakers and another building exploded in a
spray of Styrofoam and fire.
I turned and ran for my life.
An indeterminate amount of time later, I leaned against a metal pole in the fake forest and panted.
I couldn’t hit any of the Chthonics. They were too fast.
Metal scraped.
I whirled around.
A white mask stood a foot away.
“Do you need water?” Augustus asked, his long black and white hair blowing in the fog, voice drifting in and out as my ear rang. “Are you feeling,
okay? Please, let me know if you need—”
What a thoughtful, nice man.
I fired at his face.
Not.
Augustus moved in a flash.
He was gone.
Groaning, I resumed jogging around the course.
Heaving for air, vision blurry, lungs aching from exertion, I stared down at my gun and turned it so the gold WSDL flashed: War, Sex, Death, Lies.
“Make them fear you, daughter.” Hades frowned down at me. “No one fears the weak.”
These people were highly competent monsters.
Unlike them, I’d never been particularly adept at physical fitness. I was good at calculating obscure mathematical problems and writing scintillating (inappropriate) fan fiction. I was a true Renaissance woman.
Gunshots echoed.
A tall figure jumped down from above and landed silently in front of me.
Skeleton-tattooed fingers raised a knife.
It was pointed directly at my heart.
“It’s like you’re not even trying, carissima,” Kharon drawled, his tone
cruel.
My gun clattered to the ground.
Kharon grunted with surprise as he clutched at his stomach.
“You’re supposed to shoot it—not throw it at me, darling.” His eyes went
cold. “Pick it up.”
I raised my chin. “No.”
Kharon held himself unnaturally still. “You have three seconds to pick up your weapon and apply yourself to the simulation that I spent hours creating
just for you, or else …”
I scoffed.
“Three.” His voice vibrated with violence.
Does he have a counting kink or something?
“Two.”
My breath caught and I pressed my thighs together.
Wait … Do I?
I raised my arm up, opening my hand like a puppet. “One,” I said, before he could, chuckling at my joke.
Icy fingers wrapped around my throat—he pushed me back until I was pressed against rough metal. He wasn’t laughing.
Kharon squeezed the delicate pulse points of my neck as he held me against a fake tree.
In slow motion, his masked face moved to eye level.
He pressed harder and cut off oxygen to my brain.
Foreign thoughts filtered through my head, a mix of emotions and images in a confusing jumble.
Mine. She’s mine. Need to claim her. Control her. Possess her. Own her.
Destroy her. Taste her cunt. Tie her to me. Protect her. Punish her. Need to watch her submit to Augustus. Devour her.
Scarlet-filled eyes contrasted with the white of his mask.
I gasped.
Kharon was using his Chthonic powers—I could hear what he was feeling.
Blood rushed from my face.
He was more animalistic than I could have ever imagined. The level of obsession flowing from him was incomprehensible.
Karen was truly feral.
“If you don’t take this seriously, shoot me.” His fingers tightened mercilessly. “You won’t sleep for a week—we’ll hold you hostage in this training room.”
“Physical … Nothing m-more,” I whispered.
His feelings took a dark turn.
Kharon ripped himself away from me with a strangled sound.
“You’re wrong.” He pressed the gun into my palm.
Fuck you.
“No, I’m not.” I aimed for his handsome face.
Kharon twisted to the side and dodged; the fake metal tree exploded where his head had been.
“Closer, baby,” he taunted. His raspy laugh echoed, and it had a cruel brittle edge. “If it was just physical, I would have fucked and discarded you
like I’ve done with dozens of other—”
Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop.
I fired, dread crawling up my throat at the mere thought of him with other people.
Kharon laughed louder as I stalked after him, fire, explosions, and Titan yells echoing all around.
Screaming, I followed him deeper into the darkness. It was where we both belonged.
“Alexis, where are you going?” Augustus’s voice cracked like a whip.
To go drown myself in the shower. Obviously.
“Stop!”
I halted. Drex and Agatha disappeared into the bunker’s locker room.
Slowly, I turned.
Kharon glared at me. “You’re not dismissed, darling.” He said the endearment like an expletive. “They get the showers first, and you get to explain yourself. Drex grazed one of us—you hit none.”
Patro and Achilles stood beside them, both staring at me with angry
expressions.
Wonderful, everyone’s mad at Alexis. It’s a party.
I flipped them all off in my head.
“Do you care to explain your performance?” Augustus asked slowly, the
harsh planes of his face unmoving.
I didn’t want to speak, so I didn’t.
Kharon narrowed his eyes, and Augustus twitched like he was having an aneurysm.
Sure, I had the potential to be physically fit and athletically competent. The problem was, I didn’t want to be. I enjoyed sitting. A lot.
Also, I was partially blind and deaf, so there was that.
“ANSWER ME!” Augustus bellowed.
“Don’t speak to my mentee that way,” Patro snapped as he crossed his arms over his chest. “We’ll deal with her performance issues in private. She
chose us after all.”
I choked at the double entendre.
Kharon turned with a snarl. Achilles cracked his knuckles, DEATH tattooed across them.
“Do you people ever shut up?” I asked with a mumble, genuinely curious.
Kharon stilled. “What was that?”
I turned and walked away from all of them, collapsing on the bench outside the locker room to wait in peace.
Augustus followed and sat down on my left, in my blind spot.
I stared straight ahead.
Kharon chose that exact moment to aggressively shoot at a target across the training room. My bad ear rang with sharp feedback as a headache pounded in my temples.
“How come your aim is so off?” Augustus asked quietly.
I kept my expression blank. “No idea.”
Augustus made a noise of disbelief, and the side of my face prickled under
his intense gaze.
I glanced over.
His midnight eyes were narrowed with suspicion.
It felt like he was staring through me, straight into my soul. He doesn’t know about your eye and ear. Don’t panic.
Patro and Achilles were having a tense conversation at the edge of the metal forest. Achilles signed something about “Alexis, patience, trust” and
“needing a plan.”
Do men think they’re subtle?
When Agatha and Drex finally emerged clean and in fresh clothes, all five of us awkwardly moved toward the showers.
Patro and Achilles glared at my husbands.
Kharon raised his gun.
“Careful,” Augustus said darkly. “I’m still the eldest heir.” His eyes filled with blood, and a few droplets dripped down his cheek, trailing across his
scar.
Tension increased.
“Fine—” Patro spat after what felt like an eternity. “We’ll wait … this time. But don’t forget, she chose us.” He smirked mockingly.
I made a face at him. Stop antagonizing them.
Achilles scowled.
Kharon elbowed Patro as he stomped over and shoved past him into the changing room. Augustus and I followed.
The room was smaller than I expected. About a dozen lockers filled with folded clothes faced a bench with towels.
The other side had a narrow hall with two shower stalls positioned across
from each other.
I stared at them suspiciously.
Showers were a luxury I was still getting used to, but I was pretty sure they normally had doors—only the one on the left did.
Augustus saw where I was looking and explained, “It’s because Hermos is a Gorgon. They’re notoriously bizarre about their privacy. We added the door for him so he’d stop complaining about nudity.”
It took a second for me to process that he thought the one with the door was the weird one.
Maybe the sirens are right, and I am a prude?
Kharon muttered about Hermos being ridiculous as he walked past me— butt-ass naked.
A small smear of blood contrasted with the pale, unblemished skin of his left thigh.
But his right leg was a patchwork of burns, welts, and ruined skin. The scars were different from the ones across his chest, but no less painful looking.
Kharon was a shocking amalgamation of fury, tattoos, and old wounds.
He stepped into the open stall and turned on the water.
His expression became guarded as he saw me looking at his leg, and he roughly grabbed bottles.
Guilt filled me, because I’d noticed his limp back in Corfu, but I hadn’t thought much of it. I never could have imagined the awful extent of his injury.
Augustus sauntered past, also sans clothes, and I momentarily lost the ability to think. Black and white hair hung loose against his bronze skin.
His chest was unbranded, smooth with a light smattering of hair, but there was also blood streaked across his thigh, and silver glinted in the head of his
thick penis.
Wait—what?
My gaze shot to his face.
Augustus arched a dark brow as he stepped into the shower beside Kharon.
God save me.
The drawings of genitalia on the Spartan Lifestyle Page were clearly fabricated because none of them had a piercing—I would have remembered.
Shaking my head, I ran into the stall that had a door and closed it tightly behind me.
Being the world’s first introverted perverted prude is surprisingly
exhausting.
I hastily stripped down.
The divinely hot spray almost made me forget about the two naked men an
arm’s reach away.
Almost.
“Are you okay in there?” Kharon crooned mockingly, an edge to his tone.
I shouldn’t have stared at his leg. He was clearly self-conscious about it, even though, if anything, the scars made him more impressive.
“Is the shower up to your standards, princess?” Kharon called out, clearly trying to get a reaction out of me.
“Don’t c-call me that.” I furiously rubbed soap all over my sweaty skin.
“But it’s true,” Kharon said. “You’re the princess of the great House of Hades.”
“We know,” I muttered under my breath. “It’s why you married me.”
The silence that followed was charged.
“That’s not the only reason,” Kharon said sharply.
I scoffed.
Kharon’s pale feet appeared outside my door. “Alexis, you’re being a coward hiding from—”
“And you only married me b-because of my heritage.”
“I married you—” Kharon’s tone was dangerous “—because when I saw you, I immediately wanted to ruin you … body and mind.”
A primal part of my brain recoiled with horror.
Save yourself; get away from him.
“Is that what you wanted to hear?” Kharon asked harshly. “Does that make
you feel better, princess?”
“No.”
It really doesn’t.
Turning off the water, I quickly wrapped myself in a towel and wrenched the door open.
“It’s not just physical.” Kharon bared his teeth as he glared down at me, his naked skin glistening with water.
If he was trying to look remorseful, he failed.
He looked cruel.
I pushed past him, my arm tingling where we touched as I grabbed the first training clothes I found in a locker and pulled them on. When I was fully
dressed, I turned back to him.
Kharon had found pants.
I was a devastated woman (read: pervert).
“I admit the urge to stalk you is—” Kharon wet his lower lip “— unbearable.”
I took a step back. What was someone supposed to say to that?
“When it comes to you, my desires are even … darker than usual.” His
voice was gravelly.
The queasy sensation returned.
Augustus stepped out of the shower in a cloud of steam with a towel slung low on his hips. “We both enjoy control,” he said casually. “I tend to praise— while Kharon is more viciously inclined. One could say he’s … cruel.”
I choked.
WARNING: DANGER.
Red lights flashed in my mind.
Kill them and run before they can hurt you.
“Do you understand what we’re saying?” Augustus asked, his voice velvet wrapped in steel.
Praise?
Cruel?
“Carissima,” Kharon said with sinister gentleness. “Tell us that you understand.” Tendons strained across his tattooed neck. “Now.” He pinned
me with his gaze.
My mouth went dry.
Shadows clung to Kharon’s sculpted face as his expression turned sinister.
A vein bulged in his forehead as he pointed at me. “TELL ME RIGHT NOW THAT YOU—”
“I GET IT!” I yelled back, desperate for him to shut up.
Augustus stepped toward me. “Oh, Alexis,” he whispered darkly. “I’m so glad you comprehend what’s happening here. That’s … my good girl.”
Kharon seethed and Augustus smiled.
My nervous system shut down.
Acute full body paralysis, all systems failure.
There was no cure.
Never, in all of history, had a woman ever been so unequivocally screwed.
