Apollo’s shoulders fell as her words sliced through his heart, through his rage, through his pain, and he was suddenly very tired. His anger drained out of him, leaving only regret for things he could not change as he wished for the thousandth time that he could tell her the truth.
“Dita, I know. You’re right. I was wrong to do what I did, but it doesn’t matter because words mean nothing. I don’t know what else I can do but try to win, and you would do the same if you were me.”
The air around Aphrodite stilled as her wrath ebbed, and his words sank in. He was right. He was doing exactly what she would do.
Her face softened, and she reached for his arm. “Apollo, I—”
He shrugged her off as he turned for the elevator. “Just don’t. You’re not the only one who’s been in pain all this time.”
And in that moment, as she watched Apollo walk away, she felt the truth in his words more deeply than ever.
Day Fourteen
Lex’s eyes were closed as she lay in bed that morning, feigning sleep, as Travis watched her. She kept her breathing even and slow, hoping he would leave, because she wasn’t ready to talk to him. She couldn’t.
Not yet.
She was certain he’d heard her crying the night before — she hadn’t stopped all night, and her drippy nose had been impossible to keep quiet. She’d drifted in and out of sleep, but Dean always made his way back into her mind, and every thought had broken her heart fresh. The moment when she’d told him she couldn’t do it replayed over and over again. The sound of her heart thumping in her ears through the silence as she begged him to argue, to tell her she was wrong, that he could never hurt her.
But he said nothing. Just let her go.
She wished he had argued and was glad he hadn’t.
Travis sighed and left the room. His keys rattled as he scooped them up, and the door closed. The click of the lock sliding home was the only sound in the quiet apartment.
Lex rolled over and watched the tops of the trees sway out the window for a long while before crawling out of bed to make coffee. While the pot dripped and sputtered, she walked into the living room, pulled a throw blanket off the couch, and wrapped herself in it as she curled up in the window seat.
She pressed her forehead against the cool glass and looked down into the street. People were going to work, walking their dogs, shopping for groceries, and though her world had stopped spinning, all the rest of the world carried on.
For the first time, she’d wanted to let herself go, let him in. She understood what she had been missing, what she’d never been able to feel or give. She understood what she’d lost. But it was better to stop it before it started and avoid the pain of sacrificing any more of her heart.
A hot, fat tear slipped down her cheek.
She had to stop. Stop thinking about him. Dean would only hurt her —the fact that a stranger had confirmed it during the freakiest tarot reading ever was only the catalyst to bring her back to reality. The circumstances of that alone had her one hundred percent spooked. Really, she had been fooling herself to think that Dean was someone she could trust enough to let in, even though she wanted to.
The coffee pot pinged, and she wiped her cheek with the corner of her blanket as she carried herself into the kitchen to try to figure out how to move on.
Dean sat up in bed and immediately regretted it.
The heel of his hand flew to his eye socket, and he pressed hard as his head exploded in pain. The sweet, heavy scent of whiskey hit his nose — he smelled like the bottom of a bottle.
When the room stopped spinning, he swung his legs off the edge of the bed and staggered into the kitchen to pour himself a glass of water. He swigged it like he had been stranded in the desert and set the empty glass down, gripping the counter with bent shoulders as hung his head.
Dean had earned himself a massive Karma dump and was currently sitting in the middle of it. Deep down, he’d known that someday his fucking around would catch up with him, but he hadn’t known it would hurt like it did. He hadn’t gotten it before, hadn’t understood what it would be like to care or how much pain he would endure when he lost the chance. The pain was so great, so deep, that he thought he might break apart from the force.
There was no way to convince Lex of what was in his heart. And no matter how much he wanted her back, he wasn’t worthy of her, and he never would be.
And so his hands fell from the counter like weights, and he stumbled back to his bed, lost in the dark.
Dita sank into her claw-foot tub until the steaming water reached her chin, sullen.
She was totally fucked.
Apollo had spoken — Dean was going to screw Lex over, and not in the way Dita had hoped. She was shocked that she’d been so wrong, so off base. The minute that tarot reader had said the word infidelity, Dita had known. Game over.
Damn Apollo and his prophecies. No wonder he had been so sure of himself.
She took a breath and tried to think positive. There was still time.
Dita’s mood sank deeper as she really considered the possibility that she might lose.
Her thoughts drifted to Adonis — he would be angry if Apollo won, but he couldn’t blame her, not unless he suspected that she had thrown it. But that would be ridiculous. She’d never forfeited anything.
Apollo was one of only a few things in thousands of years that had ever come between her and Adonis. Everything about their relationship was cherished because they had only ever been kept apart. Every meeting was a rush, exciting because it was forbidden.
Aphrodite had been taken when she found him as a baby at the foot of the tree that had once been his mother, before she’d been cursed. He was a golden child with bronze skin and wide, blue eyes the color of the sky, and when his plump little fingers had wound through her hair, when he’d cooed at her, she vowed she’d do whatever she could to keep him safe. His mortal mother had died in the transformation, and there had been no one to care for him, so Aphrodite had swaddled him and sent him to the underworld to be raised by Persephone.
And raise him she had. She’d loved him as her own son, but as he’d grown into a man, Aphrodite had taken notice. The gods always spoke of him, impressed with his skills as a hunter, and would gather to watch him hunt, wagering on how long it would take or how he would take the kill.
She’d been enamored. He was so skilled, so lovely, easily the most beautiful man she had ever seen, and she’d wanted him.
But Persephone had kept Adonis locked away in the underworld, to keep him safe, she’d said — only releasing him to hunt. When it had come time to give him up, free him to live on Earth, Persephone had refused, and their feud began.
And so, Aphrodite had devised a plan to win his heart. She had watched him for so long, and one day, she’d waited in a valley, one of his favorite resting places after a hunt.
Adonis had held back the brush and stepped into the clearing where Aphrodite waited for him. He’d frozen, watching her as she moved toward him, her red robes flowing behind her as she glided to him, her bosom spilling out of her enchanted corset.
“Do not be afraid. I am Aphrodite, the Lady of Cyprus, Goddess of Love. When you were only a babe, I saved you. Did Persephone tell you?”
He shook his head.
“No, I suppose not. We in Olympus have watched you grow so fair and brave, and I wished to meet you, to know you.”
His blue eyes had been wide as he took a step toward her. “Are you real?”
She’d laughed, and the sound was music. “I am real. I am flesh, just as you.”
Aphrodite had reached for his hand and pressed it to her cheek as her eyes roamed his face, holding on to every detail. He’d taken a step toward her, the space between them gone, and cupped the back of her neck, pulling her to him until their lips met, and her heart rang out.
Persephone would never stop her. Not as long as she had breath.
They’d met in that way for several years, and each time it’d become mo
re and more difficult to part. He always chose Persephone, always wanted to return to the underworld, stoking the flames of her jealousy with bitter wind. Aphrodite had known that if Persephone discovered them meeting, there would be Hades to pay, so she and Adonis only had their small time together, which made it more thrilling. And more dangerous.
Only a few years after Zeus released Adonis from the underworld, he had been killed. They had never been together in a real, true way, but still she was fiercely possessive of him. They had gone through so much to be together, even through death and eternity.
Her heart sat heavy in her chest. He had been ripped from her when they were still new, but he was hers, in all ways. And he was the one she’d chosen, that she wanted, although they were not the same. In fact, they had little in common, but the regret of responsibility for his death had weighed on her for thousands of years, and the Fates seemed bent on keeping them apart, which angered her to no end. And because of that, she had never, ever been able to let him go.
She loved him — how could she not, after all they’d been through? But Adonis’s love was conditional. It was driven by possession, and she realized for the first time, having never questioned it before, that he had never chosen her, not when it mattered. He had chosen Persephone over her. Chosen mortality over her.
He wanted everything but gave nothing.
Dita slipped under the surface of her bath, her hair floating around her, her tears mingling with the water as she began to understand that her life, her love, was not what she’d believed it was.
Apollo leaned against the rail of the elevator with his hands in the pockets of his slacks and his feet in oxfords crossed in front of him, wishing he felt better about being ahead. But he wasn’t.
It is a means to an end, he told himself, as if that would absolve him.
When the door opened, it opened into a copse of trees, the mountains stretching up around the valley of his sister’s domain. He stepped onto the lush grass and made his way down the trail to the pond where Artemis and her band of merry feminists were usually to be found.
Artemis sat high above him on a rock that hung over the pond, clad in short blue robes, her fair skin glowing like moonlight, her dark hair pulled back in the old fashion with a silver crescent diadem placed on top. Zeus, their father, had frozen her in time at her request, and she was forever a maiden at sixteen. Her legs in doeskin boots were tucked in next to her, and he could see her quiver of silver arrows on her back, the leather strap lying between her small breasts. A fawn lay asleep next to her with its head in her lap, and her hand paused on its track down the animal’s back.
She smiled when she saw Apollo, and he could only smile back.
His twin was the night to his day, the moon to his sun, and his closest ally.
“Hello, brother.”
Apollo gingerly climbed up the boulder, conscious of his expensive pants. “Hello, sister.” He dusted the knee of his slacks and ran his hand down the baby deer’s spotted torso, over its soft tan fur, before sitting shoulder to shoulder with Artemis.
He hooked his arms around his bent knees and looked out into the vastness of her domain. They sat in a wide valley surrounded by lush green mountains, stretching up into the sky. In the distance, he heard the rush of a tall waterfall as it streamed from a break in the face of a cliff, and a clamor of Harpies screeched from some distance away. A unicorn drank from the pond below, and a pack of centaurs thundered behind them and off into the thicket.
He leaned forward to look into the dark pool, the edges dotted with lily pads. “Where are your little nymphs?”
“They have gone on a hunt.”
“Without their goddess? Needed a little time alone?”
Artemis was as solitary as he was social. “You know me well, brother.” Her palm ran between the fawn’s ears. “How goes the competition? I witnessed your prophecy. It seems you might have found a way to beat Aphrodite.”
“And wouldn’t you be elated?”
“Yes, frankly. Thrilled. I cannot stand that she constantly wins at her ridiculous games of love.”
He smiled. “Well, sister, I’m fairly certain she feels the same way about your games and wants.”
“This is true,” she conceded.
“The competition goes well, and yes, I hope that I have found a way to finally get my wish.”
“And how do you expect Adonis to take this news?”
Apollo sighed. “He will likely be less than pleased.”
“Fortunately for you, he is in Elysium and cannot reach you. And fortunately for me. When he was alive, he was always stealing my glory. What is the modern phrase you use?”
“Stealing your thunder. Zeus loves that one.”
“Yes, I suspect that he would.” Artemis’s eyes twinkled.
“I find it forever ironic that Aphrodite, who is the goddess of love, has held on to Daphne for all these centuries because of Adonis. She’s throwing a tantrum over a man whom she does not even truly love.” He released his knees and leaned back on his elbows as he stretched his legs out in front of him.
“You know she cannot stand to lose. Letting go is not something in which she is well versed.”
“She will have to learn this skill — and very soon.”
Artemis turned her deep blue eyes to him. “Have you had a vision?”
“I have, and I will win. I saw Daphne. In my apartment.” It was almost too good to be true, too close to lose.
“Brother, you have waited so long. I am pleased,” she said reverently with a smile.
“Dearest, a smile? For me? So rare.” He placed a soft kiss on her flushed cheek. “Thank you.”
“You have earned this, Apollo.”
“I don’t know about earned, though I have paid my penance. But I do feel for the humans — they suffer. I’m repaying them with a deluge of creativity. I hope it helps to ease their pain.”
“All that comes from love is pain.” Her dark brow dropped, and she looked away.
“That is not all that comes of love, and you know it.”
Artemis turned her gaze back to him. “Has it been worth the pain you have been through over Daphne?”
“Artemis, the moment she is in my arms, all will be worth the price I have paid.”
She sighed and moved the small deer’s head from her lap. When she rose, she ran her hand through Apollo’s hair. “I do hope so, Apollo.”
Artemis turned and climbed lithely down the boulder. She trotted to the unicorn and grabbed its mane as she jumped and swung her leg over its back. And when she turned to wave, her face was serene as she gave the animal a small kick and flew into the woods, a pearly streak through the dense green of the forest.
Day Fifteen
Dita ducked under a branch as she ran through Elysium after Adonis. His bow and arrow were drawn as he chased a stag through the brush, never faltering as he cleared a fallen tree in their path. Her muscles burned as she bolted through the woods, her sandaled feet flying and blond hair streaking behind her as the tension left her with the sweat that rolled down her body.
She burst into a clearing and found him, strapping and hot-blooded, panting over the deer whose tall antlers reached her waist. He loved to hunt deer — Dita suspected it had something to do with the fact that they were sacred to Apollo. She sat down on a fallen tree and rested her elbows on her knees to catch her breath. Adonis gave her a wild-eyed grin as he pulled his knife from his belt and turned to clean his kill.
They hadn’t hunted together in ages. Sweat rolled down his back as he worked, pausing occasionally to rub his brow with the back of his forearm.
Hunting was not Dita’s favorite pastime, not by a long shot, but while Adonis lived, it was all he’d wanted to do. So, in an effort to spend more time with him, she’d don short robes and hunting gear to learn the art that gave him so much joy. It was another difference between them, a sacrifice she willingly made because she wanted to understand him, wanted to be a part of his life, even tho
ugh he’d never expressed any interest in hers.
When her heart stopped racing, she moved onto the grass and leaned against the log as she watched Adonis. She could stare at him through eternity, and she practically had.
His hands were covered in the buck’s blood, and her breath hitched at the memory of his death. It had been thousands of years, but she still felt the loss. She would never wish her pain and regret on another soul, not even Apollo for killing him.
Her relationship with Adonis had never been easy, always heavy with the many years that had passed, through betrayal and murder, love and lust, lies and deceit. She felt them all in that moment, pressing on her from all directions as she watched the man before her, the man she loved, the man she had fought through heaven and hell to be with. The man she wasn’t sure truly loved her in return.
But was her love true? Her heart was wrapped in so much pain and loss, had she mistaken that for love for so long? They had never been able to be together, never without the fear — or knowledge — that they would be torn apart.
Her thoughts circled like vultures over her sick, aching heart.
She found a way to brush them away — though she knew they would be back — and turned her mind to Lex and Dean, longing to find a way to fix the damage that Apollo had caused, knowing they were each other’s best chance at happiness.
Dita didn’t know if she could repair her own love or if it was lost to her, but she could salvage the chance at it for someone else.
Apollo looked in on Dean, who sat on the floor of his apartment with his head bent over his notebook. He’d filled up an entire book and moved on to a new one, all his hurt bleeding onto the pages as he tried to get through every minute, every hour, every day. His pen flew across the page, and Lex was in every word he wrote.