"She’s nice," Hades said flatly, like it was a fact he didn’t particularly enjoy admitting.
"You should be grateful she likes someone as deranged as you."
Gavin leaned forward, smoke curling lazily between his fingers. He looked at Hades with disbelief. "Since when do you care about familial ties? Last I checked, you were too busy nursing a crush on your wife to care about your cousin."
"Crush? Have you... lost your mind?" Hades asked, his voice calm but edged with warning.
Gavin didn’t flinch. He raised a brow with that unbothered tilt of his head. "Care to explain why you’re sitting here, glaring at the door when you have better things to do?"
Hades stared at him. Cold. Unmoving.
But Gavin didn’t stop. "Heard you personally called. Twice. Yet you don’t want to track her down?"
There was a pause. A long one.
"And that means I have a crush?" Hades asked coolly.
"Say something that makes sense." Hades stated in an uninterested tone as he fetched his own cigar. "I don’t like her."
Another pause lingered.
"Good," Gavin grunted, puffing smoke. "At least I won’t have to watch you two do any disgusting couple things."
The conversation was abruptly cut short by the intercom’s buzz like it had been holding its breath all day just to deliver this one announcement.
"Everybody," Rowan’s voice crackled through. "Miss Boss just drove in."
The lighter on Hades’s hand paused and he slowly removed the cigar from his lips.
Milo and Rowan, who had been gossiping instead of doing anything remotely useful, glanced at each other. This was their cue. Without needing to say a word, they ditched their posts and bolted downstairs. They weren’t about to miss this... whatever ’this’ was. The apartment had become a live-action drama set, and they were fully invested.
They hovered near the staircase, pretending to be checking something on the wall, hanging back like nosy shadows.
This was the scene Clarisse met. She looked at the two like they were having their usual episodes again but she said nothing about it.
Then the front door opened.
Alice stepped inside.
But something was wrong. Very wrong.
Everyone could see it immediately.
She looked... gone. Like something inside her had caved in. Her shoulders slumped, her steps barely holding her up. Life had drained from her eyes, and it wasn’t exhaustion. It was defeat. A hollow kind.
Rowan’s gaze dropped to her outfit. He remembered what she had left the apartment wearing. He remembered because it had screamed sharpness and control. But now she was in a simple, almost mournful black dress.
Well, it did have some style but not exactly... that stylish.
What the hell had happened?
Alice didn’t even notice them at first. Her eyes floated over the room like they didn’t belong to her. Then she saw them and froze.
For a split second, her eyes widened with something close to fear. Or shame. Or dread.
Her eyes were swollen, red and puffy, like she’d cried until her tears had run dry. Her lashes stuck together, skin around her eyes irritated, raw. Her hair, once neatly done, now clung to her face in damp tendrils. There were faint bruises blooming on the side of her neck.
And she was holding her arm again. The one that had been injured before. She held it to her chest like it hurt all over again.
Like life had drained out of her on the way home.
That was all Hades needed to see.
He was on his feet in an instant.
His movement was silent but swift. Like gravity itself responded to her entrance. He crossed the distance and stood before her, his brows furrowed, mouth set into a grim line.
"You..." His voice was quiet, low. Measured. "What does all this mean?" His eyes scanned her from head to toe.
She didn’t answer. Her lips trembled.
"I... I just... I want to go to my room," she whispered, voice strained and tight, as if even speaking hurt.
His hand hovered near her shoulder before it settled gently, hesitating first, like he wasn’t sure if he was allowed.
Then he looked at her again, really looked. He tilted her chin upward with two fingers and peered into her face, his expression darkening by the second.
"Who was it?" he asked, still soft, but there was steel in his tone now. Like a sword had been drawn behind his teeth.
Her shoulders jerked. Just a little. Then again. A tremble. The kind that didn’t stop. Like her body was remembering something even she wasn’t ready to face.
And then the first sob cracked out of her.
It was so sudden it shocked even her. A loud, breathless sound that broke past the silence like a scream with its throat cut.
Hades’s eyes flicked sharply behind him.
That look was enough.
Gavin looked like he wasn’t even up to watch this shit but was also tiny bit curious to know what happened. But he didn’t give any comments and simply went up. Rowan and Milo melted off the staircase, footsteps swallowed in the stealth. Clarisse was the first to leave.
Only the quiet sound of her crying remained.
She stood there, breaking piece by piece. Her face was downcast, tears hitting the floor in hot streaks, breath shaking with each sob.
Hades didn’t speak. He didn’t rush.
He just stood with her for a moment like he understood that saying nothing was the kindest thing he could do. Then, slowly, his arms encircled her.
And the second he pulled her into his embrace, she melted into it.
Crying harder, louder. All of it pouring out of her. The fear. The rage. The shame. Everything. She clutched onto him like the world was ending and he was the only thing tethering her to it.
And Hades just held her. Quietly. Firmly. Like he wouldn’t let go until she told him who needed to be buried.