Free The Goddess Hunt by Aimée Carter

again: escapades in Paris with supermodels, all-night parties on the beaches in the Bahamas with rock stars—every student vied for attention with exploits that got wilder every year.
    But my story was always the same. My mother worked as a florist, and because most of her income went to paying for that school, we never left New York City. On her days off we spent our afternoons in Central Park soaking up the sun. After she got sick, my summers were spent in the hospital with her, holding her hair back as the chemo attacked her system or flipping through the television channels looking for something to watch.
    It wasn’t the Hamptons. It wasn’t Florida. It wasn’t Europe. But they were my summers.
    The one after my first six months with Henry, however, blew every single summer my classmates ever had out of the water.
    “I can’t believe you’d never swum with dolphins before,” said James as I drove down a rough dirt road that didn’t see much use. We were back in the upper peninsula of Michigan and surrounded by trees taller than most buildings. The closer we got to Eden Manor, the wider my grin spread. “It’s not like we had a ton of them in the Hudson River,” I said, nudging the accelerator. We were so far from civilization that there weren’t any posted speed limits, and the last time I’d been down this road, my mother had been too ill for me to risk taking advantage of it. But now, after the council had granted me immortality, the only thing I risked was my old beat-up car. So far, I liked the perks. “I’m more impressed with the volcano erupting.”
    “No idea why it did that,” said James. “It’s been dormant for longer than some of us have been alive. Might have to ask Henry about that when we get back.”
    “What would he have to do w Vxer, hoith a volcano?” I said, and my heart skipped a beat. We were so close now that I could almost feel him, and I drummed my fingers nervously against the steering wheel.
    “Volcanoes run through Henry’s domain. If an old one’s going off like that, then something’s up.” James bit off a piece of jerky and offered me the rest. I wrinkled my nose. “Suit yourself. You realize you’re going to have to tell him about everything we did, right?”
    I glanced at him. “I hadn’t planned on otherwise. Why? What’s wrong with that?”
    James shrugged. “Nothing. I figured he wouldn’t be too thrilled with the idea of you spending six months in Greece with some handsome blond stranger, that’s all.”
    I laughed so hard I nearly drove off the side of the road. “And who was this handsome blond stranger? I don’t remember him.”
    “Exactly what you should say to Henry, and we’ll both be in the clear,” said James cheerfully.
    It was a joke, of course. James was my best friend, and we had spent the whole summer together touring ancient ruins, vast cities and breathtaking islands in one of the most beautiful places on earth. Maybe one of the most romantic, too, but James was James, and I was married to Henry.
    Married. I still wasn’t used to it. I’d kept my black diamond wedding ring on a chain around my neck, too afraid of losing it to wear it properly, and now that we were only a mile or so away from Eden, it was time to put it back on. I’d struggled to pass the seven tests the council of gods had given me to see if I was worthy of immortality and becoming Queen of the Underworld, and because I’d won—only barely—Henry and I were now technically husband and wife.
    With the silence between us for the past six months, however, it didn’t feel like it. I hadn’t admitted it to James, but I’d spent the summer glancing around in hopes of seeing Henry in the crowd, there even when he wasn’t supposed to be. But no matter how hard I’d looked, I hadn’t seen any sign of him. Granted, half a year was practically a blink of an eye for someone who had existed since before the birth of humanity. But surely a sign that he missed me