Joy In Love (Daughters of Cupid Book 1) Read online

  “You mean Marisol and Arthur will be there.”

  His nod was answer enough.

  I had to give him credit. He didn’t give up easily. I tossed down my cloth napkin, the one I didn’t remember putting on my lap, and got to my feet. Agatha returned. “Finished?”

  “Yes,” I said. “I’m done here.”

  11

  Love was a universal language. It’s the one thing all people of all nations spoke. Whether in words, tongues, or gestures, it had and always would be indestructible.

  Damen’s accent was a muddle over the centuries, but no matter the language, most all immortal beings could speak them all. Which was why it baffled me. Damen couldn’t see Marisol was in love with Arthur.

  If only I had one of my father’s arrows to use on him. Except, it’s not really the arrow, but the drop of Eros’s blood he put on the tip. Eros was love, his essence, his everything. Long ago, he made a pact with Nyx, Erebus, and Tartarus when he and Chaos unleashed mankind on the world.

  I wish I knew all the details. Seeing that Damen was one of Chaos’s creations, it might become a problem. My problem. There was no way Cupid’s arrow was coming anywhere near Damen. Not that it mattered. I knew his heart.

  I bet the fates were laughing now, holding my thread in their hand. My thread. Damen’s thread. My hand pressed to the chill around my heart. No wonder Damen could find me.

  I had to get him to cut the dark thread inside me, or I’d never be able to go anywhere without him tracking me.

  Kiss him.

  What? Umm. No. Kissing Damen would make things worse. So much worse. My heart couldn’t take that kind of pain.

  I got a mental picture of Faith rolling her eyes.

  You know you want him to kiss you.

  Hope.

  I don’t think so.

  Joy. We know your heart. He’s your one.

  Are you all coming to get me or what?

  Working on it.

  Great. My sisters could have flown here by now. What was keeping them? Maybe they were trying to find Giles. I swear if Jace did something to him…

  Found him.

  He’s fine.

  I sighed.

  At ten o’clock, I found a pair of blush pink boots on the ornate round table. Having excelled in and adopted a bit of fascination for history, I knew this table had to be one of Benetti’s Italia Dynasty pieces.

  I had to admit, my man had taste. No, not my man. I couldn’t even blame it on one of my sisters for putting the thought there. Snatching the boots, I went over to the stairs. Sitting on the third step, I slid one on and then the other. They were like the first lick of chocolate a girl ever takes. Pulling them on slowly, extending my leg as they came up over my skinny jeans. These boots had been made for me.

  Down the hall, I heard the pad of shoes across the tiled floor. I never took much time to notice them before, but like the rest of this place, I would have been disappointed if the marble tiles weren’t some extraordinary fancy design.

  By the intricate pattern laid out across the foyer, Damen De Santis didn’t skip out on the details. I couldn’t imagine why a woman who had everything she could want, including a man who loved her more than anything, would turn away from all this.

  Love isn’t about the material things, Joy.

  I forgot how intrusive my sisters could be. I might have been better off taking that shot of bindweed-laced espresso. Then I shook my head to keep it clear. A girl could hear her own thoughts when they came from the heart, couldn’t she?

  Since I turned sixteen, my inner harmony and happiness often gave me direction. Call it a second or third sense, or a love angel’s intuition.

  Standing up, I wiggled my toes in the boots. Faith would be so jealous. Glee filled me. Nobody, but nobody was going to take my footwear from me this time. I tugged on the tops where they came over my knees.

  “The boots suit you, Cherub. Shall we?” Damen offered his hand. Holding my breath, I tried to fight back the spicy words heating in my mouth. His eyes danced with anticipation.

  Too bad, I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

  Love is kindness.

  Damen opened the front door. Outside, Jace waited by a small car.

  “I’m not getting in the back of that.” My legs would ram into my chest the whole way.

  “Correct. You’ll get in the front.”

  Jace held out the keys to Damen. “You’ll take care of what we discussed while I’m gone.”

  Nodding, Jace stepped back. Damen moved over to the passenger side and opened the door. “What, no bodyguard today?”

  “Afraid of me?” Damen asked.

  There wasn’t a wavy dark hair on his head out of place. I wanted to reach up and tussle it just to see how long it would take him to fix it. I got in with a huff.

  Damen came around, and at first, I gave myself a fright, then remembered people here drive on the opposite side of the road. I wasn’t on the wrong side, well… I wasn’t, but I was.

  I crossed my arms, waiting. The car was running, but Damen stared at me. I gave him a glare back. He grinned. “Naughty Cherub, do you think you can get away without a seat belt?”

  “That’s your problem?”

  “Would you prefer I help you? Do they not have them where you come from? I can show you.” He reached over, and I quickly beat him to it.

  It was bad enough I had to be squished in a tiny car with him for who knew how long. I didn’t want him touching me. I wanted to go home. I wanted out of here. And the last person I wanted my heart beating in unison with was Damen De Santis.

  Watching the Tuscan hills and valleys pass, I couldn’t help often glancing at Damen. All business watching the road, he finally asked, “What?”

  I shrugged, spotting rows of grapevines in a field.

  Dressed a bit more informally than I’d seen him, he had on black jeans and a collared shirt. In the back, he tossed a jacket.

  “Tell me, Cherub, and I’ll share with you a secret.”

  “I’m waiting for the tunnel,” I admitted.

  “Tunnel?” It didn’t take long for the twinkle to return in his eye. “Sorry, my angel. Today we travel the old-fashioned way.”

  “What, no secret passages into the winery?” I taunted.

  “The inhabitants are all mortal.”

  In other words, I would not find any help there for my plight. Which, in hindsight, explained why Jace hadn’t come along. I was flattered Damen thought he needed another hand to keep me in line.

  Good thing, since I formulated a new plan last evening. All I needed to do was convince Damen to move on. Fall in love with someone else.

  My heart said that someone else needed to be me. I slammed a big fat red stamp across it—denied.

  Not going there. Sure, Damen could be a great guy, if not for the part of him filled by Chaos, or the fact he was tripped up over another woman, and to him, I was just a pawn. In fact, I’d never have met him if not for him losing the love of his life.

  Which circled my thoughts back to the bridge. What happened on the bridge? My fingers tapped my lips, feeling I was missing something important.

  “We’re here, Cherub.”

  True to Damen’s word, we came to a castle. I’d never been to a real castle before. My sisters and I lived in an old colonial in one of the oldest historic districts in the eastern part of the United States. Not precisely love central, but it’s where Cherish’s mother put down roots to raise her daughter.

  Damen allowed me to wander. Far as the eye could see, the land dipped and rolled. In the distance, villas with red-tiled rooms winked under the sun. I smelled the olives ripening in the fields and the grapes fermenting along the ground.

  “Come, this way.”

  Inside, we entered a little courtyard. A wagon with plants sat near the tall double doors where a man stood to greet everyone. A dozen couples clung to each other and whispered. It lightened the soreness in my heart. I knew I had a crack in my heart when it came t
o Damen. I wasn’t sure if I’d ever be able to repair it, not unless he ever loved me back. That, and admitted it without rejecting me first.

  I had options. I had to be careful.

  There, standing at the far end of the courtyard, beneath the castle crest, Marisol and Arthur held hands, her blonde hair bouncing in anticipation, while poor Arthur put on a tight smile. I appreciated how he felt.

  To my left, a few couples ahead, I spotted a familiar tall blond satyr with horns. I glanced around, but no one seemed to point out the obvious. His companion, a thin young woman with green-tipped hair, stood shoulder height beside him. My happy meter pinged to the next level. Giles was here. He had his horns.

  I squeezed Damen’s hand, grinning at him.

  Damen’s brow rose. “You’re bouncing, Joy.”

  I stopped. I tried to remember him ever calling me by name. It tickled me to hear it, and I knew it shouldn’t. Damen was still the bad guy. You’re not supposed to like the bad guy. Even if he still looked twenty-nine, tops, and had his eyes set on someone else.

  I only wanted him because he was taken.

  I couldn’t even convince myself of that lie.

  “You’d better hope your horned friend is here because he delivered my message.”

  “Message?”

  “The one on the gold feather.”

  Gold feather? How did he know about the gold feather?

  “Relax, baby Cherub, think all those lovely thoughts you do for me. Remember, you love me.” He slid his hand around my waist.

  Horrified, my jaw dropped. He doesn’t know, does he? He couldn’t, but the dark thread swirling around my heart said he very well could. “Have you given up on breaking the spell?”

  It took me a moment to realize what he was talking about. He still thought we could make Marisol jealous and snap her out of the effects of Eros’s arrow.

  I regained my composure as his finger hooked below my chin and brought it up to close my mouth. His thumb brushed over my bottom lip. “Would you like to go down to the dungeons with me?”

  It was not so much a question as it was his way of telling me I was going.

  Dungeon. Darkness. Bars, and tight places. My heart raced. I placed my hand over it, afraid it would pop out any minute. I couldn’t go down there. Darkness. The Abyss. Tartarus and eternity. I stepped back.

  Everyone else had moved toward the stairs leading beneath the castle.

  Damen drew me against him. “Come. I wish to be close to Marisol during the tour.”

  Several times my legs threatened to lock up and freeze. The passage down the stairs was too narrow for my liking. I needed light and fresh air, not dark, damp, cramped spaces. I heard the tour guide speaking. I was surprised that, at the bottom of the stairs, cords of light ran down the middle of the ceiling. White mud-plastered walls attempted to brighten the space, but we were still going down, and it was still making my ribs close on each other.

  While the tour guide gave his talk about the barrels of wine and the terracotta pots of olive oil aging down there, I hugged myself and held my breath. It was too closed in. Too many people. I needed to get out of here!

  “Breathe.” Damen had his hand around me. A ripple of awareness brushed across my skin. I obeyed him. I didn’t want to, and as I felt about to scream and run, Damen’s breath tickled my ear. His words froze the squeezing of my lungs. “Breathe. We’re almost done down here, Cherub.”

  I breathed, my heart skipping a beat to get back in rhythm with his. Damen brushed his hand over my hair. We walked two couples' length behind Marisol and Arthur. “She’s claustrophobic.”

  I tried to smile and clung to him. Kidnapper or not, I needed him to get me out of here. I searched the group, and Giles was no longer in sight. I wondered if he came down or if I saw him at all.

  Metal rings hung from the stone ceiling of the next room. I tried to focus on one instead of Damen’s hand entwined with mine or the fact we were below the castle in a dungeon crammed with giant barrels.

  “Three hundred years ago, I would have brought you down here and chained you with those rings.” The way he said it both thrilled me and scared me.

  I hurried ahead, bumping into Marisol. “Oh. I’m sorry.”

  She moved closer to Arthur, a worried but friendly smile on her face. “We’ve met. You’re with Damen.”

  She said it as if he and I were a thing, and she was happy for us. I sensed she really was, and I sensed Damen really wasn’t. She turned to Arthur, murmured something that caused him to glance over his shoulder at Damen, and I started to wonder if there was more going on than I was aware.

  12

  At the end of the tour, we ended back up in the courtyard. Thank you, Creator of the Heavens! I wanted to drop to my knees and kiss the stones, but I held back. Many of the couples headed into the great hall. Tables with chairs lined in rows filled the area and at the sidewall there was a buffet with pasta, salads, and tiny slices of Italian bread with a green paste or chopped tomatoes spread over it. My stomach quivered in want. I was pretty sure I’d like it whatever it was; there couldn’t be any bindweed. We sat across from Marisol and Arthur. Damen and Marisol, in perfect timing, picked up their wine glasses and swirled, tasted their drink before the guide launched into the proper way to taste wine. A woman came around pouring wine into each of our glasses. I held my hand over the top of mine and declined.

  “You’re not a wine drinker?” Marisol asked, surprised, her brows wiggling at Damen.

  “By American standards, my little cherub isn’t old enough. I assure you, my angel, it is quite alright if you wish to partake.”

  “No, thank you.” I don’t know what bothered me more, the fact he knew my age, or the way Marisol seemed to go a bit peaked.

  Damen lifted my hand away for the woman to pour the wine, and I repeated, “No, thank you.”

  “Perhaps then you’ll try the white,” Arthur jumped in. He had been quiet and watching the guide with extreme interest. I guessed this wine-tasting thing wasn’t new to him.

  Damen set down the glass. “The white then.”

  The women moved on. Damen and Marisol did their swirl thing and sipped. They talked about bark and taste, and all I thought of by the time their discussion ended over the red Merlot was I’d be better off licking a tree.

  Which had me looking around the room for a certain blond-haired, horned man. Disappointed. I hadn’t seen him since before we went below in the dungeon.

  “Would you like me to get you something? You shouldn’t drink alcohol on an empty stomach.” Arthur spoke my language, and I fluttered my lashes at Damen. “I’ll get you something if you’d like. We can share.” I tried not to give him any sappy looks, as I felt my heart stretching in reaction. Too many rejections to my advances and my heart would split in two.

  Arthur rose and appeared to wait for me. He was sweet. He had a thinning hairline, but his eyes were kind, and they shined with love. The same shine and feeling I detected between the couple from the night before.

  Marisol gazed at him, his hand on her shoulder. He leaned and gave her a kiss. I leaned to do the same to Damen. A little zing rose under my skin, but Damen turned his head, and I got his cheek. Not a complete rejection, but it hit my heart the same.

  No matter, the power of a love angel’s kiss could land anywhere on the human body. Damen may not have been completely human, but neither was he immune. I followed Arthur to the food table, glancing back to witness Damen blinking and staring at Marisol. She laughed about something, but as quick, her lips turned down in a frown. In his eyes, I noticed the small break in the dark ring around the pupils of his eyes, so slight, I’m not sure if any real color was there. Leaning closer to Marisol, he blocked me from seeing his eyes to confirm it was there.

  Should I have risked the kiss?

  I picked up a plate, giving in to my appetite.

  “First time?” Arthur asked.

  I dumped a spoonful of pasta salad on my plate. “Obvious?”

>   Arthur chuckled. He, too, had his eyes on Marisol. After he had put a little of this and a little of that on his plate. walking around the table, he said, “I’m not much of a wine lover, but Marisol is.”

  “That makes two of us.” I couldn’t help asking, “How did you two meet?”

  Arthur gazed over at her again. They’d brought the white wine, and my glass sparkled with the ivory liquid. There was no way I was this close to coming of age and was going to blow it. What other game was Damen playing at?

  Not once had Damen glanced in my direction. I took a deep breath as a sharp jab hit my heart. Inside, wrapped in my center, was the dark thread. It stretched as if to say Damen wasn’t looking because he knew where I was.

  And poor Arthur had been talking, his voice filled with pride and adoration. “She came every Wednesday to read to the kids. She brings them lovelies, each little poppet. She hugs and loves them, and it took me years to finally look up from my charts to see her.”

  “You’re a doctor?” I asked. Why hadn’t I noticed before? Arthur had this sterile scent on him, and at first, I thought it was the hand soap in the water closet, but as I observed the tailored pants and the black polo shirt, he looked like a doctor.

  “A phlebotomist, actually. I work in the children’s unit of Malades.”

  France? His accent didn’t match. “What brings you to Italy?”

  What took Marisol from Florence to Malades? And she’d been doing it for months, it sounded. Perhaps even years. Interesting. I grabbed an extra napkin. Glanced over at Damen. He caught my eye, and I blew a kiss toward him. A little flutter erupted in my belly as he caught it. To anyone else, it would look cute, romantic even. He pulled his hand under the table where no one could see him burn the kiss with his dark shadows in the palm of his hand. Or I assumed, since the flutter died as quick as most likely crushed it.

  That nineties remake song, “Killing Me Softly,” played in my head. Damen was killing me, strumming my pain with his fingers.

  “Marisol. She wished for a tour of Italy before we wed. Her family is originally from Lucca. I assume this is how she knows your other half.”