Free NocC 007 - Stephanie Draven - Mythica 6 - The Fever and the Fury - Harlequin 2012-01 by Nocturne Page A

never know if it was the wine or the taste of him on the mouth of the bottle that made it so sweet.
    “It’s amazing,” she admitted, savoring the wine on her tongue.
    “I love that you’re so ancient, and yet the entire world seems new to you,” he said, then looked away abashed. “It makes me want to show you everything.”
    Her heart squeezed. If she let this go on one more moment, her heart would be lost forever. “Luke, you need to atone.”
    “You’re relentless.” Frustration knotted his shoulders. “Just when I think I’ve cracked that shell, you come back at me. Utterly, relentless.”
    “You won’t have to go to jail,” she said, hurriedly.
    Luke raised an eyebrow, dubious.
    “I’m the fury who has been set upon you. I’m the one who can forgive you. I get to set the terms of your atonement. I’ll make it something easy. Something simple.”
    His jaw clenched. “Like what?”
    “Say that you’re sorry, Luke. Tell me that you feel remorse for what you did.”
    “Well, I don’t. I’d do everything I did all over again, even knowing what I know. So I’m not about to start lying. Not even to you. Especially not to you.”
    Why was he so determined to make this difficult? Couldn’t he see how this was breaking her heart? “Then don’t say anything, Luke. I’ll set a simple task for you. You can stack a pile of fallen rocks or clean the graffiti from the roadway into town. You like to use your hands.”
    Luke stood up, drew her to her feet, and pulled her close to him. “Phaedra, listen to me. I can’t do it.”
    With a cry of anguish, she gave him a shove. “Let me help you, damn it! Here. Take this bottle. Throw it into the ocean. That’s how you can redeem yourself. That will end it.”
    “That’s the stupidest thing—Phaedra, what the hell are you trying to do?”
    “Take the damned bottle,” Phaedra said, shoving it into his hand. “Throw it.”
    Luke held the bottle in his hand, fisting it angrily. “What if I do, Phaedra? What if I throw it?”
    “Then you’ll be free. Or at least, as free as I can make you. It will wipe away your crimes and purge your guilt. I’ll forgive you and you’ll be redeemed. And not even Athena can punish you anymore.”
    “And what will happen to you?”
    Phaedra swallowed, trying to be brave. “It doesn’t matter.”
    Luke’s knuckles went white around the bottle’s neck. “What happens to you if I throw this bottle into the ocean.”
    “I’ll be released from my bond to you, no longer safe from the intervention of the gods. Athena will torture me, torment me, maybe even destroy me. But it doesn’t matter, Luke, because I can’t be a fury anymore so you’ll be doing both of us a favor.”
    His eyes went hard. “I’m not going to throw the fucking wine in the water.”
    “Yes, you are,” Phaedra said. “Just do it!”
    She’d wrench his arm if she had to. But he wrestled her away.
    “What’s wrong with you?” Phaedra cried.
    “We shared this bottle of wine,” Luke rasped. “And I’m not throwing away this or anything else that we’ve shared.”
    That silenced her for a few moments. When she spoke again, she could scarcely keep her composure. “Then I’ll find something else for you to do, or are you so arrogant that you won’t reach for forgiveness when redemption would cost you nothing?”
    Luke’s eyes burned as some of the spilled wine soaked dark and red into the sand, perhaps reminding him of things he would rather forget. “It would cost me you , and that’s a price I won’t pay.”
     
    Now that he’d said the words, the world made more sense to Luke than it had in a long time. He was feeling something other than rage and betrayal and hunger. He was looking at the woman who’d made him feel he could believe in something again. He wanted her and he was going to keep her.
    But she reeled back, her mouth falling open in a stunned gasp of surprise, “Luke, from the day we’ve met, you’ve wanted nothing