Or was he? He’d barely touched any of the drink Zeus had so lavishly supplied, at what was supposed to be a celebration of not only the Peace, but also his return to England. Of the fact that for the first time in years, all four of them had the liberty to meet up. As though the poor fellow felt he couldn’t trust himself to hold it down. Nobody had said anything, though. They’d all been too shocked at the sight of him to do more than squirm a bit as they drank his health. Health? Hah! The best that anyone could say of the gaunt and yellow-skinned Atlas was that he was alive.
‘I tell you what, though,’ he said aloud. ‘You are still my hero, Atlas’
Atlas started, looking taken aback.
‘No, really. After all this time, you are still the best of us. Always was.’
‘You paid too much attention to the letters I wrote when I first went to sea,’ he said, looking uncomfortable. ‘I made it sound far more exciting than it was. Didn’t want you all to...pity me, for having to leave. Didn’t want to admit that I was seasick, and homesick and utterly wretched.’
‘B-but,’ said Archie, looking shocked, ‘you were a hero. Read ab-bout your exp-ploits in the Gazette.’
Atlas made a dismissive motion with his hand, as though banishing the Gazette and all that was printed in it to perdition.
‘Just did my duty. No choice, when you’re in the thick of action. You either fight like a demon, or...well, you know how it is, Jack. Same in the army, I dare say.’ He sent Jack a beseeching look, as though begging him to divert attention from him.
‘Only too well,’ he therefore said. ‘Which is why your homecoming is worth celebrating. Glad you’re alive. Glad I’m alive. Even glad Zeus is alive,’ he said, shooting his godship a wry grin. ‘Since he got us all together again, for the first time since...what year was it when you left school, Atlas?’
‘You are foxed,’ said Zeus with exasperation, before Atlas had a chance to make his response. ‘If I’d realised quite how badly foxed, I would never have let you attempt to ride Lucifer.’
‘Attempt? Pah! I did ride Lucifer.’
‘Not very far.’
‘Far enough to prove your boast about being the only man to be able to do it was patently false.’ God, how he’d wanted to knock the sneering expression from Zeus’s face when he’d made that claim. Which was why he’d declared there wasn’t a horse he couldn’t ride, drunk or sober.
Zeus shook his head this time as he stood over Jack where he lay sprawled.
But Jack didn’t care. For a few minutes, directly after he’d made the wager, all four of them had shaken off the gloom that had been hanging over them like a pall. They’d even laughed and started calling each other by the silly names they’d given each other at school as they staggered round to the stables. They’d sobered slightly when Lucifer had rolled his eyes at them and snorted indignantly when they’d approached his stall. Archie had even suggested, albeit timidly, that he was sure nobody would mind if Jack withdrew his claim.
‘Draw back from a bet? What kind of man do you think I am?’ Jack had retorted. And Zeus had grabbed the stallion’s halter and led the animal out into the streets before anyone could talk sense into either of them.
Good God. Zeus had been as intent on carrying through on the wager as Jack himself. Did that mean...?
Was there still something of the old Zeus left? Deep under all that sarcasm and sneering? He’d certainly been the one to arrange this reunion. And he’d also made sure they’d been given a chance to laugh at Jack’s antics, the way they’d done so many times at school. They’d certainly all been roaring with laughter as Lucifer had shot off, with Jack clinging to his mane. And so sweet had been that sound that Jack hadn’t cared that the beast had unseated him before he’d managed one circuit of the park.
‘I still maintain that girl was not flirting with us,’ he said defiantly. Was he imagining it, or was there an answering gleam in Zeus’s eyes? As though he was relishing having someone refusing to lie down and roll over at his bidding.
Ah.
Was that why he’d become so jaded? Because nobody challenged him any more? It would explain why he’d jumped at the wager, ridiculous though it was. Why he’d whisked Lucifer out of his stall before the sleepy groom had a chance to fling a saddle on his back.
Perhaps, even, why he’d gathered them all together in the first place.
‘She may not have been a lady, precisely,’ Jack continued. ‘But I stick to my guns about her not flirting with us. Else why would she have set about us with her riding crop?’
That had come as a shock, too, he had to admit. One moment she’d been melting into his arms, the next she was fighting him off. And she’d been kissing him so sweetly, after that initial hesitation, so shyly yet...hang on...shyly. With hesitation. As though she didn’t know quite what to do, but couldn’t help herself. As if she was catching fire, just as he’d been.
One moment she was with him, and then...it was as if she’d come to her senses. As though she realised it was a stranger with whom she was rolling about on the grass.
‘I would wager,’ he said, a smile tugging at his lips as he recalled and re-examined her every reaction, ‘that not only was she not flirting, but that she was an innocent, to boot.’
That would explain it all. That gasp of shock when he’d first started kissing her. Her inexpert, almost clumsy, yet uninhibited response. Until the very moment when she’d hauled up the drawbridge and slammed down the portcullis. The moment when she remembered she was dabbling in sin.
‘And I don’t care what you think, Zeus,’ he said with determination. ‘We owe that girl an apology. Well, I do, anyway. Shouldn’t have kissed her.’
‘She shouldn’t have put her face in the way of your lips, then,’ retorted Zeus.
‘No, no, the girl was only trying to see if I was injured.’ Which had been remarkably brave of her. Not many females would have come rushing to the aid of a stranger like that. Nor would they have been able to bring Zeus’s bad-tempered stallion under control, either.
‘Which is more than any of you have done,’ he finished pointedly.
‘You are not injured,’ said Zeus pithily. ‘You are indestructible. And I have that on the best authority.’
‘Must have been speaking to m’father.’
‘Your brother,’ Zeus corrected him.
‘Oh? Which one?’
‘I forget,’ said Zeus with a wave of his hand. ‘He did tell me he was Viscount Becconsall when he walked up to me in White’s and presumed friendship with me because of my friendship with you.’ His mouth twisted in distaste.
‘Could have been either of them, then,’ said Jack, who’d recently acquired the title himself. ‘Poor sod,’ he said, and not only because both his brothers were now dead, but because he could picture the reception such behaviour would have gained them. They hadn’t started calling him Zeus without good reason. From the very first day he’d attended school, he’d looked down on all the other boys from a very lofty height. He didn’t require an education, he’d informed anyone who would listen. He’d had perfectly good tutors at home. It was just that his father, who had suddenly developed radical tendencies, had decided the next Marquis of Rawcliffe ought to get to know how the lower orders lived.
Jack chuckled at the vision of his bumptious brother attempting to take such a liberty with Zeus. ‘I can just see it. You gave him one of your freezing stares and raised your eyebrow at him.’
‘Not only my eyebrow, but also my quizzing glass,’ said Zeus, leaning down to offer him a hand,