Page 54 of Apollo

The actuality he’d wrest out of her now, damn it. Either that, or she’d have to donate her arm to her cause.

Shit. He meant that less than she’d pretended her stuffed stomach. She didn’t have to know all that, though the stubborn lift of her bottom lip declared her awareness to his frequency anyhow. But why did she have to be so adorable about the whole thing? Especially now, with her curls tousled by the early morning bay breeze, then every angle of her peeved frown highlighted by the gold and mikan orange shades of the approaching dawn. Her glittering greens exposed a host of other conflicted feelings, confirming one inescapable truth in his own psyche.

She was better than adorable.

Beautiful blazed into his brain first, but certainly not last.

She was incredible. Unfathomable. At times, completely and wonderfully dependable. But at others, outrageously uncontrollable.

Times like now.

“Irow—”

Then like the next second, as she stepped back from him in full.

Then the next, as she swept up her newly freed hand.

But unlike her motion, so determined it was daunting, her lips noticeably quivered. “So . . . Apollo . . . let’s not make this more of a bad-bathos-boo-hoo moment than it has to be, okay?”

He released a heavy sigh. Yet somehow managed, “Sure. All right.”

She gave up the quivering for a tight frown. “So now you’re just going to growl about it instead?”

Or maybe he hadn’t.

“I’m not growl—”

“You are. And we’re both grownups who benefited from this deal, right?”

She might as well have asked it of the wind, since the gusty bastard stampeded across the bay again and turned his own hair into a wild mess. For some reason, the sight of it made the Little Monster wince. She subdued the expression with perturbing speed, lowering her hand and balling it against her waist.

“Fine. You’re right.” He managed to murmur it and not reach again for that sweet little fist, no matter how shitty she was at hiding the new trembles beneath her white fingers. And the twin lagoons of soft sadness in her suddenly wide eyes . . . “Let’s just move forward and talk about practical next steps from here.”

He had to admit, the pivot back to his perfunctory pitch was a perfect start for the effort. Though he had a great deal more to learn about how the woman’s brain worked, one of them was not her appreciation of solid tactical focus. Now that they were back in her personality wheelhouse—

“Let’s? As in, conjunction for let us? Errrm, you’ve got a definite typo there, Glow Worm.”

And when was he going to learn there was no such thing as a perfect direction for this human? Or a right way to predict her?

Especially in the next moment.

When the maddening Little Monster abruptly stepped forward, re-closing the distance between them for herself. Then exacerbated the shocker by reaching and wrapping her hands around his.

He wanted to be pleased about the move, except that her hold seemed more soothing than sultry. A maternal cuddle instead of how she’d caressed him at the condo a few hours ago. And stroked him. And exchanged a lot of hot saliva with him . . .

“But you’re right about one thing, Mr. Phoebus on high,” she ventured with a mix of mirth and melancholy that tugged deep at his chest. “It’s probably best to move forward, so let’s just do this now. Something tells me you hate goodbyes, so I’ll go first, okay?”

And there was his cue to take a turn at backing up. For that matter, the one to swear and ask questions of the wind. “Really? You don’t think I’m used to fucking farewells by now?” Because he’d endured plenty in this damn eternity of existence. Too many. Mom’s banishment. Daphne’s curse. The entire shit show of the Trojan War.

Why was he so irked about the inconvenience of one more?

“Hey. Listen to me. I’m five thousand shades past grateful that you pulled that arrow out and healed me. Because of it, I’ll get to see Genny again. It’s a debt I’ll likely spend my life repaying . . . ”

And that settled things.

He wasn’t irked. How did she phrase it? He was a thousand shades past it.

Because this wasn’t just an inconvenience. It was . . .