Author’s note: Hello to everyone reading this! 😀 There was much love put into writing this pov and so I hope you love it!! <333

Make sure to leave your thoughts as comments as they always make my day XDD 

Fingers glide through my hair, and I feel the irresistible urge to rip them out of my scalp and break each one individually. To revel in the echoes of her fragile screams. Women and their urge to cling has me wanting to pull my own hair out.

Just because she has nothing to do except nag me doesn’t mean I don’t either. But that problem will be solved soon—since I’m about to put her to very good use.

I reply to something Callista just said, though my brain is too focused on what I’m about to ask of her. And how to make it sound innocent, as if it comes from a place of good intention.

My muscles lock in place from repulsion when Callista drags me by the arm toward the garden. Soft morning light from the sun shines down onto her globe-like eyes as she continues babbling nonsense about how she can help me. Oh, she will help me. Or she’ll burn in the regret of not helping me when I leave her. I’ll make sure of it.

“No, I promise I’ll help if you tell me,” she insisted, tugging at my tunic’s laces. The action produces a wave of irritation so potent I have to physically repress the urge to strangle her with the same laces she keeps pulling at like a child. Indignation keeps chipping away at the edges of my sanity as I try to rein it in. There’s not much control needed to fool a woman.

You just need to make her feel as if she owes you her life just because you showed her enough love to count as charity work. I force myself to calm my slightly erratic breathing. Soften my eyes and mold myself into a man I’m not.

I look around—an unfamiliar feeling of fear gnawing away at the already rotten core of my soul—as I put my plan into action. “Could you. . . ” I pause, breathing in again, wondering how to make this believable as my hands find her face.

The warm skin scorches my hands like the fire of Hades’ home, and I tighten my hold on her face just slightly to stop myself from jerking away. “Could you manage to steal the Queen’s mirror for me?”Her eyes widen, and a look of uncertainty passes over her face like a sinisterly grinning shadow of my looming failure.

I’ll be damned if I can’t convince someone as gullible as this one. Words tumble out of my mouth in a frantic rush—desperate promises and twisted dreams all spilling in one ragged breath. I scan her eyes for a change, a reaction, a softening—something that would tell me she’s ready to become a pawn in the game no one is going to win. Except me.

“I don’t think it’s magical, Theron,” Callista says hesitantly. “It is,” I press, and she shrinks.

No. I can’t scare her. I need her on my side—be a pretty little, gullible woman who plays to my tune before I discard her. If she were a man, I’d have shared the coin with her. But what good is money to a woman who’s going to end up at the mercy of a man anyway?That’s how it will end. That’s how it always ends.

I decide the ending. I have the power. Not her. Not her kind. So easily moldable and utterly replaceable. So easy to manipulate and dance around however I want—just because I look like the angel she dreamt of marrying as a little girl.

Breaths pass, and so do words—my eyes remain locked onto hers, trying to coax out of her what I want.

When she finally nods, my heartbeat picks up. Though I don’t feel the smothering emotions of love and admiration. It’s excitement that flares up inside me. It’s a mass of bright gold sparkles and silver swirls of anticipation brightening up my darkened soul. After all, that is what brings happiness. Money. Luxury. Not some woman who believed I was going to be the man of her dreams just because I had the hair she likes and the eyes she wanted to drown in.

Oh no. So very easy to manipulate. So very replaceable. So very gullible.

And now, for as long as she stares at me with hearts in her eyes and that bright pink haze of love clouding her sanity—the pen and parchment of her fate will remain in my hand. And I won’t be writing anything she likes onto it.

So let her be—fighting her handmaidens while she defends me against their suspicions just because I’m so very charming. But she’ll never see under the mask. And when she does—It’ll be too fucking late. And she’ll wish she’d never fallen for me.

After all, that’s all a woman is good for. Fall in love with a man she thought was everything she wanted and let him ruin her life. The game was always mine to win. . . .