“I might never leave,” I say.
He lets out a laugh. “And I might never let you.”
He takes my hand, and we again walk down the tunnel. The warmth grows with every step we take, but the breeze continues, making it almost balmy. Soon the tunnel begins to grow lighter, and I see flickering, like flames of a fire, ahead in the distance.
“We’re almost there.” His hand snakes up to my neck, and he gives it a quick squeeze. And then we turn a final corner, and the world erupts in light ahead of us.
I turn to Shayne and laugh. “You live here?” When I thought of Hell in the past, I always figured it to be black and fiery.
He leads me down a couple steps into the room before me. The smooth, white walls look like they get polished hourly. The pristine floor is decorated with a giant mosaic in tiny black and red tiles stretching the entire distance of the room. It’s a design of red flowers growing off black vines. A design which reminds me of drawings I made as a child. In the center of the room sits a coffee table with cut gems inlaid in the circular top and red and black chairs surrounding it. The colored gems of the table are arranged in bouquets of flowers—lotuses and orchids, with stems twisting around each other, forming a continuous design.
“Did you expect something else?” Shayne asks.
I turn to him, dragging my eyes away from the table and the amazing mosaic floor. “Well, yeah. Look at this place.”
He looks around. “You don’t like it?”
“Of course I like it. How could I not like it? I mean, it’s fantastic.”
Shayne smiles and sits on a black chair. “Someone with impeccable taste designed it.”
An enormous pang of jealousy rockets through me when I realize he must be talking about Persephone. And I think that even if she is gone like he’s said, I may never be able to compete with any memories of her. I close my eyes and stem the envy running through me.
He gestures at a red chair, and I sit down, sinking into the plush leather, letting it swallow me like I want this whole world to do with each second that passes. Shayne waves his hand over the table, and a bottle of wine and two glasses appear on the bed of colored flowers.
“Isn’t there some myth about eating or drinking in the Underworld?”
Shayne picks up the bottle. He uncorks it and fills the two red crystal wine goblets halfway. At this point, I don’t mind drinking it if it means I could stay here with Shayne forever.
“Yes, a myth.” He smiles and hands me my glass.
I take it but don’t put it to my lips. “Is it true?”
“Do you want it to be?”
I smile and put the glass to my mouth, taking a long drink. “Yes. I want it to be.” I think about my mom for some reason, right as I drink it, and try to imagine her reaction to what I’m doing. Sitting with Hades in the Underworld drinking wine. And she told me to stay in all weekend.
“Something funny?”
It’s not really funny. “I was just thinking about my mom.”
Shayne takes a sip of his own wine. “Your mom has issues.”
It’s funny he should realize this after knowing me for such a short period of time. But it’s not like I can deny it. “She’s not that bad.”
“Maybe we shouldn’t think about your mom.”
Shayne’s right. Thinking about my mom and what she would do if she saw me now is laughable but also a mood dampener. So I push her out of my mind.
I motion down to the floor. “I love your mosaic.” It’s complicated, and the flowers sort of shift depending on what angle I look at it from.
“I can’t take credit for the design.” His eyes meet mine when he says it, and my jealousy resurfaces. He seems like he wants me to ask more about it, but I decide against it. I vow not to think about Persephone again because I’m here and she’s not.
“Well, it is beautiful.” I look around the room, away from our chairs. The far wall holds a bookcase stacked with volumes of leather bound books. I stand and move toward it, bringing my glass of wine with me. It’s so different than the wine I had with Reese last night. Sweeter and warmer.
When Reese pops into my mind, my heart races. I turn to Shayne who’s looking at me but doesn’t say a word, and I pray mind reading is not a skill the Lord of the Underworld possesses. I look back to the books.
“You have a nice collection.”
Shayne gets up and joins me. His hand touches me at the nape of the neck, sending a shiver down to my toes. “I like to read.”
It’s an amazing response from an amazing guy.
Inset in the bookcases is a framed map. “What’s that?”
“The Underworld.” Shayne traces his finger over the network of rivers on the map. “There are five rivers in the Underworld. Boundaries between the lands.” He points across one of the rivers. “And here are the Elysian Fields…”
“The what?”
“Elysian Fields. They’re kind of like the nice place,” he says. “The place you get to go when you’ve been really good.”
“Like Heaven?”
“Some people call it that.”
A lump forms in my throat before I can stop it. “Is that where Chloe would go?”
Shayne’s hand settles on mine, and he nods. “Of course.”
“I don’t want her to die.”
“I know,” he says. “But you promised you’d at least consider.”
The lump stays in my throat. Chloe is my best friend. But I did promise. “I want to see it.”
“Anytime you’re ready.”
I reach for my glass and take a final sip of wine. It seeps through me, tickling as it goes. “I’m ready.”
Shayne sets my glass on a shelf along with his own—two red glasses on a shelf of black. He reaches out his hand, and I place mine in his. His hand is so large, it wraps entirely around mine, reminding me of Reese’s hands. But I push Reese far from my mind. Shayne brushes my cheek with his other hand. “Then let’s go see paradise.”
Chapter 15
Paradise
When we come out of the tunnel and reach the shore, tree limbs hang low, covered in ice crystals which sparkle everywhere, bouncing off the snowy ground under our feet. Dampness is thick in the air. This river is frozen, and even though we’ve entered a winter wonderland, I look at Shayne, now bundled in a sweatshirt and jeans, and frown.
He waves his hand in front of me, and my clothes change. I’m now dressed in jeans, boots, and a Shearling wool coat covering to my knees. They say there used to be stores that carried nothing but winter clothes, but now the only places that sell them are indoor resort areas. Back when I was like eight, my mom took me and my friend Charlotte to a resort in Virginia. Once I got past the awe of seeing fake snow fall from the ceiling, we spent the day skiing and skating and making snowballs. My mom even skated though she spent most of her time falling on her butt. It was only years later that I realized the day must have cost her a small fortune, but she never said a word about it.
Shayne takes a step from the snowy ground out onto the ice. “It’s solid. You can jump on it if you want.”
I look down at myself and then stare at him. “You can change my clothes?”
