Red Demon Read Online Free

obviously bothering you, and I’m figuring it has to do with Cecilia’s calls.”
    “We both know that’s not the only change in the past few months,” Ari said meaningfully.
    River frowned in obvious concern. “Are you referring to the power exchange? Are you having side effects?”
    Ari stared at the floor, wishing he’d kept his trap shut. What was it about River Kassandros that always made him blab the private shit? Well, not quite always. River had never caught even a clue of what the original Savannah mission had done to Ari.
    Ari shrugged noncommittally. “Maybe . . . I dunno.”
    River stared at him, hard, as if he could penetrate Ari’s mind with that single glance and know the truth. A truth River surely realized Ari would never own up to, not with the way they always watched each other’s backs. If River learned that their recent trade had begun to play havoc with Ari’s mind and soul, he’d go to Leonidas, the Oracle, and anyone else he could think of. All the way to heaven or Hades itself to reverse their situation, and Ari wasn’t about to allow that. Not when River finally had a happy, secure life; a free one, after millennia as a slave and berserker.
    “Dude, how’s ’bout bugging out of it, huh?” Ari tried to laugh. “I’m cool. No worries. Everything’s copa- fuckingcetic.”
    River glared at him. “So it is the power you assumed. Obviously, you’re having a hard time managing it.”
    Ari groaned and bit back what he wanted to say, which was that the timing of the whole thing was the real bitch. Juliana reentering his life at just this moment was an added complication to an already brewing shit storm. Every time Cecilia called him, the energy in his body screamed its defiant rebellion a little more loudly.
    Ari shifted under River’s intense study, but his best friend didn’t back down. “If it’s the power,” River said, dark expression intensifying, “then you need to talk to me. I had to shoulder it for more than twenty-five hundred years—”
    “You think I don’t know what you fucking lived with?” Ari barked bitterly, both hands trembling violently at his sides. “Guess what, brother ? I’m living with it now.”
    River’s usually warm eyes widened, his suspicions clearly confirmed, and then his entire expression became very sad. “Ari,” he murmured, grief in his voice. “Oh, gods, Ari, I’m so sorry. I’d hoped . . . believed the current would be different inside of you.”
    “Why would it? Because I’m a bigger jackass than you?” Ari tried to laugh, but River’s expression only grew more somber.
    “Because you are a better man than I,” he said seriously.
    “That’s bullshit, and you know it. If anything, I’m far too rash, rude, and blundering to deserve what you gave me. The power of life and death? Inside of me?” He pointed at his heart. “What a joke. I’m such a perennial fuckup, even my younger brother outranks me.”
    River shook his head with slow intensity. “You’re not yourself, and comments like that prove it. You’ve always been one of our bravest, most valiant warriors. That’s why Ares chose you after Thermopylae.”
    “Why did you choose me, anyway?”
    River seemed to think about the question, looking off to the side for a long, pensive moment. Finally, his gaze slid back to Ari, eyes bright. “There was no one else I’d have trusted. Not to remain uncorrupted by so much power.” River blew out a guilty sigh. “But I should have thought harder about what it might do to you.”
    Ari seized his friend’s arm. “I don’t regret my decision,” he rushed to say, but knew his reassurance was too late. “River, I promise. It’s not like this all the time. Not even a lot of the time. It’s this thing with Cecilia, how she won’t leave me alone . . .”
    “Her calls upset you, and you experience a power surge,” River finished knowingly.
    “Yeah, it’s like an explosion, beneath my skin, down in my muscles.” Ari