Poisoned Kisses Read Online Free PDF Page B

forever . She’d become, for Kyra, a shade in truth. A beautiful stranger.
    “I won’t use my torch that way again,” Kyra insisted. “Marco Kaisaris sides with the war gods every time he sells a gun so he deserves to be destroyed, but he doesn’t deserve to live as a raving lunatic. It’s kinder to kill him.”
    “That’s the bloodlust in you. Perhaps you really are your father’s daughter.”
    It wasn’t fair that Hecate knew exactly how to shame her. Fine, Kyra thought. Maybe she could just chain Marco Kaisaris in some dungeon, hide him away, so that none of the war gods could harness his powers. Maybe keeping the man at her mercy was the humane thing to do. Still, the thought of shackles on those strong wrists brought an unexpectedly uncomfortable sensation to Kyra’s stomach. “Hecate, if I promise not to kill him, will you help me find Marco Kaisaris again?”
    “Beware the obsessive nature of nymphs,” Hecate warned. “I don’t want you anywhere near this man. He’s a danger to you!”
    In more ways than one. Most nymphs just had to worry about broken hearts, but just touching Marco’s blood had felled her. What if the poison got into her bloodstream? Into an open wound? If Kyra were wise, she’d never come into contact with this mortal man again. But then he might fall into her father’s hands and if Kyra had to live forever, there had to be some meaning to it. Otherwise, she was a power without purpose. She had to find some point to her long life other than the bloodlust Ares said she was born to.
    Besides, she and the hydra had unfinished business between them. More than just his poison had gotten under her skin. His kiss, his touch, his voice…oh, that voice. “I’ll be more careful this time,” Kyra promised. “Help me find him. I knowyou can still work some magic and you don’t need a crystal ball to do it.”
    As one of Hecate’s black hounds settled at her feet, the older woman took on the more imperious stare of her gloried past. “I don’t want to risk your father’s wrath. Think of Ares, won’t you?”
    “I am. If I don’t find the hydra before Daddy does, imagine the damage he’ll do. He could use hydra blood to poison whole armies. Whole countries!”
    The ancient goddess had always been a benefactress of mankind. She didn’t relish human suffering. Kyra knew she’d relent, and she did. “You’d have to get on a plane—I know how much you dislike flying.” Kyra hated flying. Nonetheless, she was determined. “I’ll manage.”
    “Very well.” Hecate sighed. “You’ll find the hydra in the New World. He’s on his way home, because he’s about to lose someone very dear to him indeed.”
     
    Niagara Falls in winter, with its thundering gray river, was gloomy as the Styx. Kyra watched the netherworld entrance of mist below the tumbling water of the falls, and waved to the receding shade that had been Marco’s father. Kyra hadn’t killed him, but she’d guided the stubborn old man a little ways when he died. Giving him some light between the threshold of this life and the next had seemed like the least Kyra could do. She even let him see her as a sweet angel, because it seemed to comfort him.
    He spoke of his estranged son, how heartbroken he’d been to lose Marco to a world of weapons and war. Kyra didn’t add to his burden by telling him that Marco had become a monster in truth and that she planned to cage him for the greater good. She’d built a dungeon to contain him. Now she just had to find a way to lure him there.
    Of course, Kyra couldn’t just put on a sexy outfit and pickup the hydra in a random nightclub again. He’d be wary of strangers now, and twice as dangerous.
    Fading so that none of the mortals could see her, Kyra made her way to the funeral home. That’s where inspiration struck. Marco’s ex-girlfriend made only a brief appearance—just long enough to express her condolences to the family. Long enough for Kyra to study her face and