A Guard for the Titan: TITANS, #3

By Sotia Lazu

For the six months since he was fished out of the sea, the only bright spots in Atlas' still, lifeless existence are the moments the beautiful museum guard comes to talk to what she believes is his statue.

After hundreds of centuries in stasis, he regains control of his body, to save Iphigenia—a mortal of no significance in the grand scheme of things. 

Why does he need to protect her? Why does every inch of his body ache to touch her? 

Oh right. Because apparently, she's his soulmate. And he needs to bond with her, or boomgoes the known universe.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Acelette Press
• Release date: Apr 10, 2019
• ISBN: 9798201283339

Sotia Lazu

Sotia loves romances with a twist and urban fantasy novels, always with vivid erotic elements. Her favorite characters to write are not conventional hero-material at first glance, and she enjoys making them fight for their happiness. Sotia shares her life and living quarters with her husband, their son, and two rescue dogs, one of which may be part-pony. Sappy movies make her bawl like a baby, and she wishes she could take in all the stray dogs in the world. Also, she hates mornings!

Book preview

One

Mid-August in Athens was a drag. Well, not for other people. The city had much to offer when the crowds had fled to the islands, but Iphigenia wasn’t among the lucky ones who got to experience it. No. She was spending the night in the Acropolis museum. Alone.

Why did she even have to be here? Who in their right mind would break into this place? To steal what? Archeological stuff went for millions, probably, but they were hard to carry unnoticed, and it wasn’t like someone could rob the most prominent museum in Greece and get away with it.

But the job paid her rent, so she wouldn’t complain about it. Much.

She looked from one monitor to the next—again—and sighed. It wasn’t even midnight yet, and she barely kept her eyes open. The rest of the year, the night shift was taken by two people at a time, but nothing worked in Greece in August. She and Petros had flipped for who would stay back, and she lost. So she got to watch flickering screens and pray for morning.

Something caught her eye in the far-left feed. Movement in the Marble Conservation unit? She studied the image. Shifted the camera. Checked the other cameras in that room.

Nope. Nothing to see there, except for the incredibly lifelike oversize statue of her guy. The faint glow of the safety exit signs reflected off his eyes, making them shine.

Her guy. She had the hots for a statue. No wonder, when her sex life was nonexistent since she broke things off with Pavlos.

She checked the rest of the units, saw nothing, as expected—even crime seemed to go on vacation in August—and ducked to the mini fridge by the desk, for yesterday’s meatball pasta. No food or drink was allowed near the equipment in the security department, which worked out fine, because she’d rather eat with her guy.

She needed a life.

Iphigenia took her food to the kitchen, blitzed it in the microwave oven, and skipped down the stairs. Her pulse sped up as she approached Marble Conservation. It was silly, but the highlight of her nights this week was eating and talking to what was believed to be the statue of a Titan.

She was at work when they first brought him in, four months ago, and couldn’t tear her gaze away as they uncovered him.

Even down on one knee, he was larger than life, and he was gorgeous, despite the dirt, algae, barnacles, and marine debris clinging to him. The sculptor who carved him out of marble had done an amazing job. Iphigenia could see the tension in every corded muscle as he raised his head defiantly at an unknown enemy, and his eyes seemed to see right through her, though the irises were blank.

And she was in desperate need of an actual flesh-and-blood man to obsess over.

She pulled out a stool from the working bench and sat facing him, her dinner in her lap.

So how was your day? she asked, twirling her fork in the pasta. The camera would record her eating—which was a no-no here too, so she’d be careful—but its position kept her face hidden, so nobody would see her talking to herself. Mine was boring. Mom called, to tell me for the millionth time I should quit from any job that makes you come in on Dekapentavgoustos—the fifteenth of August, the Assumption of the Virgin Mary, was a major holiday in largely Christian Orthodox Greece—and go back home, to Ioannina. You know the drill. Find a nice guy, settle down, spawn a couple kids... Certainly not work for a living, and especially not as a security guard. Not what a woman should be doing with her life was her father’s mantra when her job was mentioned.

The flash of gold that brightened the statue’s eyes was gone so fast, she must have imagined it. And his jaw seemed clenched a little tighter. Or it was the fact that the scientists working on him had cleaned his face and upper body, uncovering more details she’d missed before.

Do you want to go back home?

Where did that come from? As far as she was concerned, back home was only for Christmas and Easter. Summer was for Mykonos and Santorini and Milos, and any of the dozens of Greek islands with stretches of sandy beach.

The sense of relief that flooded her felt foreign.

She looked around, a nervous chuckle escaping her lips. She was alone. Of course she was alone. She and her Titan.

Wish you were real, she said. You don’t seem like the kind of guy who’d be intimidated by a woman who speaks her mind. Or by anything, judging by the fierceness in his blind gaze.

I’m not. I like a strong female.

The answer came in a deep male voice. In her head. Lovely. Now her fantasy guy talked to her too.

She speared a meatball with her fork, securing the pasta, and brought it to her mouth. Not bad, though it could use more grated cheese. Her culinary skills were far from enviable, but she was improving. Mom would be proud.

This is nice, she said with her mouth full. Not like her Titan would mind.

She studied his stiff shoulders and tight chest. He looked like he worked out, but not at a gym. It was easy to picture him building a house with his own large hands.

Was all of him big?

Naughty. She smirked to herself.

The crew hadn’t fully uncovered him from the waist down. She’d heard he was found half buried in the bottom of the sea, near Rhodes. He could be a water deity—Poseidon himself—but a different name clung to her thoughts. Atlas. The Titan forced by Zeus to hold the sky in place.

Zeus couldn’t force me to do anything.

Her breath caught, as the mental image of him naked filled her head. His feet were planted at shoulder width, legs slightly bent at the knee and muscular thighs straining. His stomach was ribbed, his pecs and biceps bulging as he raised his arms over his head, balancing his invisible precious cargo. Even half-erect, he was long and thick, and when Iphigenia licked her lips, it wasn’t to taste the tomato sauce.

She shook off the thought and its effect, stuffed more pasta in her mouth, and swallowed it only half-chewed. Petros is right. I need to get laid. Only her work-buddy meant with himself, and serial daters weren’t her style.

She tilted her head at the statue she’d decided was Atlas—it had to be him; it felt right. "You’re not a serial dater, are you? Of course you’re not. You’re... a hunter. A provider. You bring home the bacon, but you don’t expect your little woman to be the one who cooks it. You like her to challenge you. To be smart and funny. And sexy. It doesn’t scare you when she tells you what she likes." Even if it leaned a little toward kinky.

It was getting hot in here. The collar of her shirt felt constricting. If there were no cameras in the room, she’d pop a couple of buttons, but it wouldn’t look professional if someone decided to browse through tonight’s footage.

Neither would rubbing against Atlas’ hard body.

Okay, she needed to eat and go back to her station, before she did something more stupid than talking to a piece of marble.

The statue’s eyes shone again, and this time it was definitely not a reflection. Maybe there were gems or pieces of glass inset in the irises? Had glass been invented when the statue was sculpted?

She stood, placed her dinner on the stool, and approached to take a closer look. God, his face was breathtaking, with the square jawline and chiseled cheekbones. His lips looked generous even drawn in a snarl, and his wild, long hair was uncharacteristically unadorned, compared to the other statues she’d seen around the museum. He looked like a man ready to take on the world. And his eyes were now purely gold.

Two

Up close like this, she smelled even better than the food that had him pining for his sense of taste since she set foot inside this chamber. She carried with her the scent of flowers and ripe, plump fruit. And she was gorgeous. Her midnight-black curls were begging to be loosed from that tight bun, and for him to dig his fingers in them.

There were two problems with that fantasy—he was currently five meters tall, and he was encased in marble.

No matter. He shouldn’t be having the urge to touch a female that didn’t belong to him.

When the archeologists fished him out of his watery grave, he’d thought his punishment was over. That he’d finally be taken out of stasis and allowed to catch up on all he’d lost. He’d find his Pleione and be complete again.

But Pleione hadn’t come to him, and he was still here, on a land that was the same yet different, listening daily to people speaking a mangled version of the Greek he once knew.

His mind-reading power had returned to a degree, and he’d absorbed the knowledge those who touched him had of the current world—a world for whom Titans and Olympians were creatures of myth. Still, he couldn’t touch Iphigenia’s mind except for the few occasions she opened her thoughts to him.

Like now.