Hair of the Dogs (The Hounds of Hades #3)

Chapter Sixteen

“She'll be safer with us,” Darius said.

“This is her home. I'm not taking her out of it before she regains consciousness,” Dominic snapped. “And what about Binx? He doesn't like you two.”

“He's a cat. He'll deal with it,” Declan said.

“Yes, he will,” Dom agreed. “If you give him time to accept you here, in his territory first. Cats aren't like dogs. They're tricky. If you take Binx out of his home without letting him get used to you first, he's going to be too scared to think of you as anything but a threat. Then he's never going to be cool with you, and then Amélie will never want to live with us.”

“When did you become the Cat Whisperer?” Darius asked.

“Oh, fuck you, Darius. You know I'm right. That cat is like her child. We have to treat it with respect. Plus, he's cool. I like him. So, we're staying here. She's safe here. She has a ward as strong as ours.”

“And a fucking god next door! A god who kidnapped her!”

“I wonder which god he is?” Declan murmured.

“A small one. But a god is a god, and I don't want my mate anywhere near a god who isn't Hades,” Darius said. “I don't trust any of those fuckers.”

“She isn't our mate yet, and she won't ever be if you keep acting like an alphahole around her,” Dominic said. “Fuck, I knew you were a dick, but with all the pussy you get, I figured you at least knew how to treat women.”

“He relies on his looks,” Declan said. “It gets him in their bed long enough to determine if they're our mate. That's all he's ever needed. But now, he's starting to see that you can't treat a woman like a military campaign.”

Dom snorted. “Yeah, that's about right.”

“An alphahole?” Darius finally responded.

“Don't act as if you don't know what that is,” Dominic said. “The definition is in the word. Figure it out.”

“I know what it is, you fuckhead. I just can't believe you called me one. I thought only women used that word.”

“That is exactly something an alphahole would say. You've proved my point. You don't know enough about women to make this decision. Shut up and let the real men talk.”

Declan chuckled.

“What I know is that we need to get Amélie as far away from here as possible,” Darius snarled.

“No, we don't. She's strong. A fucking badass witch. We need to trust in her ability to take care of herself.”

“Yeah, because she did such a bang-up job of it tonight.”

“See? This is what I mean. Alphahole. Complete alphahole. We're staying right here. And we're going to have a talk about your fucked up attitude. You cannot ruin this for us, Darius. She's our mate. The woman who will make this all worthwhile.”

Darius made an annoyed snort. “And what if our magical mate wakes up and tells us to get the fuck out?”

“Then we get the fuck out,” Declan said. “You don't win a woman's love by forcing her to do what you want. And if we took her home with us without her consent, we'd be just as bad as that god.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Darius snarled. “That son of a bitch wants to hurt her. We want to protect her. We just saved her life.”

“She was in danger because of us,” Dominic said. “I don't think we get credit for saving her. And we weren't the ones who helped her earlier tonight. That was Dionysus.”

“What was he doing in her bar?” Declan muttered. “Of all the gin joints.”

“You know, I've been wondering that myself,” I said as I sat up.

The Hounds of Hades stood before the couch I was stretched out on. They turned toward me as one—Dominic grinning, Declan smiling softly, and Darius scowling.

“Welcome back, angel.” Dominic wedged his butt in the open curve of cushion made by my bent knees and belly, then leaned over and pulled me into a hug. “I was so worried about you. Are you all right?”

“I'm fine. Thank you for coming to my rescue.” I cupped his cheek. “And it does count. I don't blame you for all this. You didn't force me to help you the other night.”

“Amélie,” Dominic whispered and held my hand as he turned his face into it. “I'm so sorry I didn't tell you everything sooner. I was scared.”

“It's all right. I forgive you.”

Dominic whooped and pulled me onto his lap. “You do? Then you'll—”

“Slow down, cowboy.” I pushed off his lap and wedged myself in the corner of the couch. “That doesn't mean I want to be with all of you.”

“We understand,” Declan said, then glared at Darius. “Don't we, Darius?”

“Yeah, we understand,” Darius muttered. “I'm glad you're okay, Amélie.”

“I'm glad we put up cameras,” Declan said. “Without them, we wouldn't have known you were taken.”

“What took you so long?” I asked. “I didn't think you were coming.”

“We didn't see the footage right away.” Dominic grimaced. “We were arguing about you when the alarm went off. It goes off every time a car passes the camera, so we didn't check it immediately. It happens so often.”

“When we did, we saw you in the car with that man,” Darius said. “Do you know who he is?”

“He called himself Silas. But he told all those people that he was the one true god. You know, the Christian one.”

“Oh, him .” Dominic rolled his eyes. He still held my hand and was rubbing his thumb over it.

“I watched him drown one of the Host and then bring the man back to life. At first, I thought he was making a zombie, but the man came back normal, and then Silas told me it was a resurrection.”

“What now?” Declan crouched beside me. “He resurrected someone?” He looked from Dominic to Darius. “Why would he do that?”

“He said the guy would belong to him, like a slave.” I frowned as I recalled the resurrection. “Oh, he also told the guy that he'd be strong enough to fight demons now, and he'd heal as fast as you.”

“He bound the man through death,” Darius murmured. Then he looked at Declan. “Can all the Gods do that?”

Declan shrugged. “That's a question for Hades. Before tonight, I would have said no, that only our god had power over death. But now, I have no fucking idea.”

“Yeah.” Dominic went grim. “We need to tell Hades about this. It was bad enough when we had a rogue soul to deal with, but now there's a god involved. This is bad.”

“I think Michael gets his unusual powers from the god,” I said.

The men exchanged a dark look.

“So, it's been him all along,” Darius said. “That makes sense.”

“Does Hades have a lot of enemies?” I asked. “I got the feeling this was personal.”

“It must be,” Dominic said. “Gods don't randomly decide to come to Earth and pit humans against the Hounds who protect them.”

“Do you think it's Zeus or Poseidon?” Dominic asked.

“No,” Darius and Declan said together.

“They support us,” Darius went on. “They know we're needed here.”

“This Silas guy did drown a man,” Dominic said. “That's Poseidon's M.O.”

“But not his style,” Darius argued. “He wouldn't do this shit. Frankly, he doesn't care about dry land enough to bother.”

“We need to speak to Hades,” Declan said. Then he looked at me. “Will you come back with us, Amélie? We don't want to leave you here. I promise you'll be safer with us.”

“It doesn't have to mean anything,” Dominic said. “You'll have your own room and you can bring Binx. Bring whatever you want.”

“Binx needs to get used to Darius and Declan first,” I said.

Dominic shot the other men an I-told-you-so look.

“Fine,” Darius sighed. “Where's the damn cat?”

“Probably hiding because there's an alphahole in his territory.”

Dominic hooted in laughter.

I got up and headed to the kitchen as I called out, “Binx! Binxy, you hungry? You must be. Come on, baby. It's all right. These are Dominic's brothers.”

“Not exactly brothers,” Darius said as he followed me into the kitchen.

“You said it wouldn't be wrong to call you that.” I waved at the floor. “Now, sit down and be quiet.”

Dominic snickered as he came in. “She just put you in your place. Like literally.”

“I'm not sitting on the floor,” Darius said.

Declan came in and sat down on the floor, crossed his legs, and leaned back against the counter. “We need to look as small as possible. If you loom over the animal, it will only make it harder for him to accept you.”

I waved at Declan as I stared at Darius. “Listen to your not-brother. He's smarter than you.”

“What is your problem with me?” Darius suddenly demanded. “I told you why I slept with all those women. Dominic wasn't exactly chaste either, you know? He fucked as many women as I did.”

“Hey!” Dominic snapped. “You leave me out of this, asshole.”

“I know Dom slept with a lot of women,” I said. “But I didn't have to watch him smugly go through them like they were tissues and he had a bad cold. You would come into my bar with the attitude of a movie star and whisk some woman away, only to dump her a week later and come back to pick up another woman—often in front of your last, heartbroken victim.”

“Dude, you did that?” Dominic asked. “Rude.”

“I didn't . . .” Darius trailed off as his gaze skittered away. “All right, maybe that happened once or twice, but I wasn't trying to shove anything in their faces. I thought I ended things nicely with them.”

“You were an asshole,” I said. “And it pissed me off to no end that women kept falling for you. They just didn't seem to care about your arrogance or cruelty. They saw your pretty face, and that was all that mattered.” I shook my head. “Well, it takes more than outer beauty to win me.”

“I was searching for you!”

“I get that. But you didn't have to be such an arrogant dick about it. A man's character is shown in the ways he deals with others. You showed me that you didn't care about anyone but yourself.”

“Oh, please.” Darius rolled his eyes. “As you said, they knew what they were getting into. I was looking for eternity, but they were after a quick fuck with a good-looking guy. All of them had sex with me on the very first night.”

“What are you trying to say? That a woman who sleeps with a man on the first night is a slut?” I growled.

“Oh, fuck. Retreat, retreat,” Dominic hissed at Darius.

“No, of course not,” Darius said to me. “I'm saying that they weren't looking for forever with me. But I was looking for it with them. I wanted each of them to be you. They weren't. So, I moved on as soon as I realized it. Two weeks tops. Never long enough for them to fall in love.”

Dominic cleared his throat.

Darius stared at him, something passing between them. Then Darius cursed and ran his hand over his face. “All right. Fine. You can fall in love faster than that. But I tried my best to avoid that with them. I was polite but never charming for that very reason. If I had found you, I would have become more earnest in my pursuit, but they weren't you, Amélie. They weren't you.”

“Meow!” Binx said.

I cleared my throat, turned away from Darius, and exclaimed brightly, “Hey, Binxy!” I'd been getting his food ready while I argued with Darius. So, I just set the dish down on his mat. “Come eat, baby.”

“Sit down!” Dominic hissed at Darius before he crouched to pet Binx. “Hey, my man. They're all right. I promise. Go on.”

Binx purred for Dominic, then eyed the other two men. While Binx had been distracted, Darius had sat down. Binx hesitantly stepped forward, then went past Darius, who was sitting like a statue. Cats like stillness, so Binx passed by without issue. Then he went to Declan. He ignored Binx. So Binx was comfortable enough to ignore him. He went to his dish and started eating.

“Well, that's a good start,” I said as I sat down at the kitchen table. “Now he'll associate you with food.”

“How long is this going to take?” Darius asked.

Binx paused to look at Darius.

“As long as it needs to,” Declan said softly. “Hey, Binx. It's all right. You can eat. We won't disturb you.”

The cat went back to eating.

“We need to talk to Hades,” Darius said.

“And you can't do that here?” I asked.

“No,” Dominic said. “Hades would have to physically come here, and the other gods don't like him coming to Earth. He only does it for emergencies.”

“Then how do you speak to him at home?” I took a seat at the table.

“We have a special room that's enchanted to serve as a neutral zone. It's here but not. Hades can appear to us there or send us messages.”

“Or we can go to him,” Darius said. “But then we'd have to leave you here. Unprotected.”

“I'm perfectly safe,” I said.

“And we don't all have to go,” Dominic said. “One of us can go to the Underworld while the other two stay with Amélie.”

“That's a great idea, Dom,” Darius said and grinned.

“Not me,” Dominic said. “I'm the only one she likes.”

“That's precisely why you should be the one to go. We need to get to know her better.”

“And Binx,” Declan said. “We need to bond with Binx so Amélie will feel comfortable enough to come home with us.”

“Damn it, Deck,” Dominic growled. “I hate it when you're reasonable.”

Darius snorted.

Meanwhile, Binx finished eating and strode over to me, casting looks of superiority over his shoulder at Darius and Declan. It was kitty speak for, “She likes me, not you.” He jumped up on my lap and curled up, but continued to watch the interlopers.

I stroked his silky head. “You're my brave boy. Good job, Binx.”

Dominic sighed and came over to pet Binx too. “I'll see you later, buddy. I gotta go talk to the King of the Underworld.” Then he kissed my cheek. “Thank you for being patient with us.”

I nodded. “Tell Hades I said hi.”

Dominic chuckled. “Oh, he'll love that.” Then he walked away, going transparent as he did. Before he reached the doorway, he vanished completely.