Passion of the Vampire King (Blood Fire Saga Book 5) by Bella Klaus (best motivational books txt) 📗

Panacea water had been great, but I needed more. Preferably something magical to offset the bone-deep hunger to take the edge off my desire for Valentine. I pushed myself off the chaise and hurried through the bath chamber and toward the door. “Do you have—”

The dining room had now changed from a romantic table set for two to a four-legged cornucopia. It was twice as large as the night before, with every inch of its surface covered in bowls and dishes and baskets.

Danish pastries sat among plates of scrambled eggs on toast, and bowls of chopped and sliced fruit, along with every cold meat imaginable. There were servings of avocado toast, granola and yogurt, bowls of hollowed-out hummus with olive oil floating in its center, olives, baby plum tomatoes…

I shook my head, marveling at the flagrant waste of food. My entire coven could have breakfasted on this for an entire week and still suffered indigestion.

“Hurry up.” Hades lowered himself into a dining chair and pulled out the other seat with his magic

I stepped into the room, clutching my cramping stomach. When I’d said earlier I would be able to keep my food down, that hadn’t exactly been the truth. It had been ages since I last ate, and there was nothing to eject. How would he react if I threw up in the presence of all this food?

Namara placed a gentle hand on my shoulder and guided me to the table. As I slumped onto the soft seat, I offered the imp my most grateful smile.

My gaze swept over the coffee, tea, and hot chocolate pots dotted among the feast and skipped over the jugs of juice, “Do you have any ginger tea?”

She tilted her head to the side and beamed. “Which recipe?”

I gulped. Istabelle had one that was just ginger, lemon, and honey, which she used to help human clients with nausea. It was delicious and worked, but I needed something heavy-duty such as the brew Healer Calla had made to settle my nerves before the big ceremony that had stripped me of my phoenix flames.

Dredging my mind for the ingredients, I said, “Do you know the one with papaver honey, cinnamon, cardamom, cloves, lemon and black pepper?”

She tapped the side of her chin with a talon. “I could ask around.”

I nodded, not wanting to be callous and tell her that the originator of that recipe had recently been dispatched to Hell.

“Make that two.” Hades plonked himself onto the other seat.

Namara inclined her head and sashayed away, her long, leathery tail swishing in opposition to the movement of her curvaceous hips.

“What am I going to do with you?” Hades said, sounding thoroughly fed up.

I turned toward him, meeting bloodshot eyes set within slackened features, and tried not to grimace. “You could let me go and pretend I don’t exist?”

“You’re a liability who needs to be kept behind bars,” he said, completely ignoring my suggestion. “If anything happens to you, I get the brunt of it.”

“That’s not how it works.” I turned to the table, looking for something that wouldn’t aggravate my nausea. My gaze landed on a bowl of miso soup with sliced green onions and tofu squares bobbing within its depths.

“Explain.”

“You felt alright when you shoved me in that bathroom, didn’t you?”

“Bath chamber,” he said.

“Well, you did.”

Hades reached across the table and picked up a piece of blackened toast. I raised my brows, wondering if that was the way he preferred his bread or if he knew about the healing effects of activated charcoal. The burned bits of toast weren’t exactly charcoal but carbon, which could also soak up poisons and impurities.

He took a delicate bite, chewed, and paused as though waiting to see if his insides would rebel. After several heartbeats, nothing happened, and he took a more generous bite.

Hades turned to me with his brows raised. “Do you find me that mesmerizing, Miss Griffin?”

My gaze dropped to his exposed pecs, and heat flared across my cheeks. “Of course not.”

“Then please bestow me with your explanation as to why you’re not such a calamitous liability.”

I licked my dry lips and picked up a slice of browned toast. “If you inflict any kind of injury on me, it backfires, right?”

“I’m following you so far,” he said with a tone that suggested he was ready to prove me wrong.

“What happens if you lock someone up for days without food or water?” I bit down on the toast with a satisfying crunch that made the corners of his eyes tighten. “Because of you, I couldn’t leave to get anything to eat or drink. I also couldn’t get help for my addiction to thrall, and some of the pain I felt transferred to you.”

Hades didn’t look the least bit surprised at my admission, but then he’d witnessed Valentine biting me and had spent ages trying to get through to me while I’d been high on thrall.

He reached for one of the toast slices already topped with scrambled eggs, and added a sliver of salami and a heavy sprinkling of black pepper. “How do you explain the explicit images? If you were that cock-hungry, I would have obliged—”

“Will you shut up,” I snapped.

Hades’ head snapped toward me, his eyes wide enough to show the whites and his irises flaring with flames. He pulled back his lips, exposing his teeth, and snarled, “You would do well to remember that you’re talking to the King of the Demons.”

My pulse quickened, and rapid, shallow breaths whistled in and out of my nostrils. All the benefits of the Panacea evaporated, leaving me nauseous and feverish. Why had I opened my big mouth? Hades was one of those people who were overfamiliar to underlings, but the minute they felt a touch of disrespect, they lashed out with an unforgettable flare of fury.

There was no point in cowering. Cowering would only encourage him to think I was someone to dominate and disrespect. I smoothed out my features, straightened my