Scarlett's Letter (Touched by a God #1) (9 page)

Qui and Chelsea came to pick her up.  They all chatted like months had passed when only one night in their time had. It was always their way. Chelsea kept looking at Scarlett strangely as they made their way to the door of her house so they could leave.

“What Chels? Damn.  I can’t take you staring at me.  What the hell?” Scarlett asked as they were leaving to make their way to the car.  She was hoping that Chelsea didn’t know what her secret was.

“Somethin’s up.  You know it and I know it.  When she gets that look in her eye, you know something ain’t right. What you not sharin’, Scar?” Qui asked her, then quickly shut up any trivial response she was about to speak by giving her the momma look. 

“Either you’re telling or I am.  If I tell it, then there’s going to be some added features filled with intrigue, innuendo and…” Chelsea had begun to enunciate every syllable.

“I really would like to know what you think is going on.  I don’t know what your little “senses” are telling you and I’m not afraid of you, Chelsea Louise. Share what you think is going on.  See if I care,” Scarlett spewed while throwing her hands up.

“Oh, whateva it is must be good.  She is getting all worked up and her cheeks is all flush.  Girl, you betta spill, right now,” Qui exclaimed.

“I actually think I might be just a little bit jealous on this one. He must’ve laid it done something serious, Qui.  She is actually upset about it.  What did he do? Give it to you so good that you would be willing to beg him for it?  He did things to your body that would have you writing home to your mother if you knew she wouldn’t keel over dead to know what her daughter was up to in bed.  Now, the asshole won’t return your phone calls and you know no one else is going to lay it on you like he did?” Chelsea questioned while looking quite upset. 

What the hell was that about? 
She and Qui shared the same expression.  This wasn’t something that normally would come from Chelsea.  She was the one in the group that kept things clean.  Scarlett thought she was joking about the implied sex statement.  Boy was she wrong! Qui looked at her and she looked at Qui, then they both turned to Chelsea.  Miss ma’am had some serious explaining to do.  Plus, this was the perfect thing to allow her more time to gather her thoughts. 

“What? I have a vivid imagination,” Chelsea offered as a way of explanation. 

Scarlett and Qui shared a look just before they broke into a fit of laughter. 

“Bitch please
don’t
try and make that shit out to be some imaginary thing.  You do know when you lie your eyes water, right?” Qui accused.

Chelsea was wiping her eyes and immediately stopped.  Scarlett and Qui laughed even harder. 

“Oh, you two bitches have a lot to share and I am gonna enjoy every fucking minute of it.  I’m not drivin’ to the club.  I need to be comfortable enough to screech and express myself fully while you both spill your guts.  Scar you are going to tell us why that outfit is so tight in certain very key areas.  This bitch is going to tell us who fucked the shit out of her and didn’t call afterwards,” Qui stated, picked up everyone’s things and marched to the door.  “Now, let’s get this show on the road.  Lydia is going to be pissed the fuck off if we’re late!”

Scarlett watched as Qui pulled her front door open and waited like a mother waiting impatiently for her children to off to school.  She even went as far as holding their respective items out and shaking them in a “we don’t have all day” manner.  She and Chelsea shook their heads and made their way towards the door.  As they grabbed their belongings from Qui, she added one last barb.

“Such good little girlies.  You make momma so proud.”

“Whatever slut,” Chelsea tossed at her as they all made their way to her car.

“Pot meet kettle. Oh, by the way, you’re black,” Qui responded from behind Scarlett.

“Don’t you wish you were?” Chelsea threw back at her. 

Scarlett sighed.  She could see that the trip to Club Heinous was going to be filled with the two of them doing their usual back and forth.  It was going to be a very long trip.  Why the hell didn’t she drive herself?  The good thing was it had never gotten to the point that they were physically attacking each other.  The two of them acted more like siblings than they did friends.  On some days, you had to back them into their neutral corners.  Usually, five minutes later they would be chatting like bosom buddies. 

Scarlett watched as Chelsea slid into the driver’s seat of her car.  She’d opted for a sexy halter style shirt that fit to just below her breast then flared out and was sheer material to her waist.  When the right light hit her you could see her toned stomach and fit frame.  She’d paired the top with a pair of fitted hip hugger jeans.  Her red shirt matched the red shoes and reminded Scarlett more of something that Lydia would wear.  Chelsea was sexing up the wardrobe and coming out of the very conservative shell she’d been in for as long as Scarlett had known her. 

Scarlett was about to get into the back, but Qui stopped her by tapping her shoulder.  Qui was wearing her signature color: pink.  She always wore something with pink in it.  Tonight’s dress reiterated what was the new norm for Qui.  She was trolling for a man.  Her dress looked like a second skin and barely touched mid thigh.  The top of it looked like she was about to spill out of it.  Around her waist was a gold chainlike belt and similar chainlike earrings dangled from her ears.  Both of them wore their hair in cascades of curls.  Qui’s bangles clinked as she slid into the back seat. 

“You nasty cow.  I wish I would’ve gotten in the back.  I did not need the sight of your ass, tonight or any other night for that matter,” Scarlett said as she climbed in the front.

“My ass is perfect.  You wish you had an ass like this.  Don’t be jealous, boo boo.  I’m sorry you only have a handful, but somebody likes it and likes it a lot,” Qui stated as she looked up from the back seat. 

Scarlett met her eyes in the rearview mirror.  Yeah, this trip to Club Heinous was going to be interesting to say the least.  She wanted to share her news with all of her friends at once.  It didn’t seem as if that was going to be situation.  Maybe going to the club wasn’t such a good idea.

“Hey, I think we need to go to Lydia’s and call everyone to have them meet us there, instead,” Scarlett suggested as Chelsea stopped at the light at the end of her street.

“Dammit, are you serious?  Do you know how long it took me to look this fucking hot?  Not to mention how long it took that one to decide on that outfit.  If we were just going to Lydia’s then I didn’t have to fix my face and my hair! You suggested we go to the club in the first place,” Qui was practically screaming from the back seat. 

Chelsea looked over at Scarlett and gave her a puzzled glance before turning her attention back to the road. 

“What’s up, Scar?  Why the sudden change of plans?  You seemed excited about going out earlier.  What changed since this morning or even about a half hour ago,” Chelsea stopped at the stop sign and turned her gaze back to Scarlett.

Scarlett sat back in her seat, then took a much needed breath. 

“I’m pregnant,” she blurted.

Chelsea slammed on the brakes and everyone jerked forward with the unexpected gesture. Chels had just begun to release the brake and apply pressure to the gas pedal when Scarlett made her announcement. They sat in the middle of the street with Chels gaping at her for about five minutes before Qui broke the silence. 

“I’m making the call.  The boys are going to need to get some snacks because I know Lydia ain’t got nothin’ good at her place.”

With that, Chelsea turned the corner and they made their way across the one street to get to Lydia’s five bedroom house.  Scarlett prepared herself to share the words that her own mind had trouble accepting.

Best Laid Plans, Not (8)

ΨΨΨΨΨΨ

the depths of hell: Hades

He’d hatched a plan to get her.  Never let it be said that he wasn’t resourceful when going after something that he wanted.  So many of those beings that were supposed to be his kin were out to make sure that he wouldn’t get what he wanted and he knew it, was beyond aware of it.  Some had every right to be a little upset with him.  Okay, if he were being honest, then he knew that there were at least a handful that would willingly hang him by his gonads, have a bird feast on them, kill the bird then feed the innards to him raw and he would actually deserve it.  Hades chuckled to himself because he’d actually previously set that little plan in motion for one of them.  He didn’t get an opportunity to follow through with it, but he would like to have seen just how Bartong took that. 

Hades knew that he was an evil prick, but that bitch’s wart wasn’t worthy to suck the shaft of an A.I.D.s infested slug.  One thing that he could never tolerate would be harm brought to a child.  He could be a cold, ruthless, black hearted man, but he could never harm a child.  He’d never ordered harm be brought to one and he never would.  Hercules didn’t count.  That “child” was a half god at the time. There were certain things that just shouldn’t be.  In his book, that little wonderful should never have been.  He knew he should really move on from that train of thought.  Hey, he never said that he was a saint.  Besides, that wasn’t about Hercules.  That was always about getting back at his brother, Zeus.  The age old story of the older sibling having issues with the younger sibling was one of truth for him and Zeus.  The younger sibling being contradictory just because he could be was made worse because of the fact that they were gods.  He would digress from that, for now. 

Brock was set to make an appearance and Hades had things that he needed to do.  Watching Scarlett with her friends had been entertaining, but it was time for him to make sure all the pieces of his plan were in place. His phone chimed. Yeah, he got a signal even in his dungeon.

Wardrobe updated. Car is in garage. Mansion furnished and kitchen stocked.  Appearances scheduled. Demon checked in. Sliding into wet heat.  Off for the night.  Hermes out.

Hades shook his head at his horn dog of a nephew.  He had a one track mind when it came to women: sex them, test them, leave them and repeat.  He tossed the phone onto the bathroom counter.  There was no need for him to respond, especially since he knew that his nephew wouldn’t be available until the next morning.  Hermes would be plowing through a line of women for the night.  His philosophy was there was only so much time in the day and too many women in the world.  The boy had no patience.  He’d already worked his way through Japan and Central America.  He was steadily working through the West Coast.  The god was bound and determined to find his woman in his youth instead of spending as much time as his uncle had.

Hades stripped off his shirt and turned the taps on for the shower, manually.  He wanted to feel a little human today. Normally, he would’ve used his ability to take him to an already preheated shower.  As he thought about Rouge, he wanted to take things a little slower and see how she dealt with some of her every day activities.  Yeah, he was starting to lose it.  Hades usually didn’t care how anyone, especially not an earthbound, handled day to day actions.  What was this woman doing to him?   He actually found himself looking forward to getting to know the woman that she was on the earthly plane.  Who would’ve thought that Hades, Big Kahuna of the Dead, would ever be excited, actually excited, about something as trivial as spending time with a woman? He would’ve never put it down in the books. 

Hades stood before the mirror and looked at his hair and body. He was going to miss the light brown of his eyes that he knew so well.  Taking on the persona of Brock meant being that man twenty four hours a day.  The beach boy with the wavy blonde hair and the sky blue eyes was the polar opposite of who and what Hades was.  Hades knew that he was the one to invent the guy.  Hell, he even chose the look.  He just liked looking in the mirror and seeing the dark, russet color of his hair.  Just recently, he’d taken a blade and lopped off the ponytail that he’d worn for as many years as he’d had Cerberus. 

He knew that the disguise was just a means to an end.  The truth of who he was lay beneath the façade.  Hades taking and putting on the Brock mask was just him donning his “suit” to impress his girl.  It just so happened that his suit actually came with a new face.  It was a face that he was going to have to get comfortable with again because without it he might just lose the chance to have what he’d secretly desired for so long he couldn’t even pinpoint when it began.  The singular existence wasn’t one that he thought he would ever live.

Hades looked up again and the face that he would sport moved to the surface.  The blue eyes appeared first. The next to come was the blonde hair then clean shaven face.  The perfect smile came with perfect teeth.  It was something that the two had in common.  Brock’s only imperfection was the scar that was above his right eye.  The scar ran from the middle of his forehead to midway through his eyebrow.  The story was that he was riding a massive wave and washed out.  The water was so fierce that he couldn’t keep control.  He lost his balance and the weight of the waves split his board in two.  When he came back to the surface it had been right between the two halves of the board.  The gash took just about 20 stitches to close and permanently disfigured his face. 

Brock also had a scar along his side that was from another such accident.  The last scar that he bore was a knee injury.  There were just certain things that went hand in hand.  If you were a part of any form of sport then you had battle scars to contend with.  He took pride in ever created scar.  All of the stories had been spur of the moment things that he just thought of at the time when he was questioned.  He perfected the art of recalling those random facts over the years of playing the role.  He found that the earthbound tended to accept the scarring if it came with a quality story.

He’d done the research to perfect the man that Brock was.  The professional surfer took a page from all of the other sports aficionados and turned his career into a business.  The surprising business savvy of the “pretty boy” took the world by storm.  He had made himself a brand and a household name by the time that he was 23.  When he turned 25, he was running a very successful company and training up and coming surfers.  By the time that he turned 28, he’d signed on with his good friend, Todd Frieman, to launch a new business venture. The business venture came to be known as Touched by Us, Inc. 

Hermes had been so excited about how receptive people were to Brock that he created Todd Frieman just to find out if people would be as accepting of his guy as Hades’ guy.  When the panty dropping and bold sexual overtures began, Hermes was through the roof and could barely be reined in.  All of the extra attention and available ass had detoured Hermes from the goal until Hades pulled him back.  Hades sometimes was concerned that his nephew was having more fun being Todd Frieman than he was as himself.  He would deal with that shit after he dealt with his own. 

He stood over the counter again looking in the mirror at his body.  His standard frame was one of solid muscle with larger arms.  Brock had more of a svelte, lean body.  This was the part that always bothered him.  Even though he’d been told that Brock exuded power and strength, he liked the fact that as Hades or Aides he had the body to back it all up.  He knew what and who he was because it was reflected in the size of his arms.  He looked forward to this time being like all the others and him not having to be in the role for long.

The one thing that he refused to change was the size of his package.  He wouldn’t believe that any man whether god, earthbound or other would ever willingly shrink his manhood.  That shit was unheard of.  Enlarge his piece? Sure, he would be more than willing to.  The only way that he could think of that a man would ever willingly, voluntarily shrink his piece would be if he had some illness or he was stung.  So, Brock and Hades shared that.  He was wrong when he thought about the smile being the only thing that they had in common.  The smile and the package were the only things that carried over between the two. 

After the transformation to Brock was complete, Hades stood in the mirror looking at himself.  He watched the way his new/old body moved.  It would take some getting used to as he acclimated himself to this body.  He called for the water then hopped in.  He stumbled slightly.  The transition was usually a bit much and he would usually have those types of moments the first few hours.

Shower completed, he stepped from the white and gold colored bathroom.  The room was designed with the Greeks in mind. It was completely white and gold and reminded Hades of the arenas and museums of his youth.  Once he toweled off, he slid into a pair of slacks, then grabbed his shirt, but didn’t button it. 

He called forth his pants, socks and his shoes.  He walked out to the main area, then lifted the jacket and hanger that were resting there.  Hades went to the dining table and called up the image of his Rouge.  She and her friends were still in deep discussions at the leggy ones home.  He checked in with the peanut gallery.  He wondered if they would be as accepting of him as they had been of her.  He doubted that.  For now, he would watch and try to practice being patient.