JON’S DAMP HAIR FELL into his face as he reached for his laptop to pack it into his leather messenger bag just as Tori walked into the kitchen behind him. Her head was tilted as she fastened her earring with her hair done up in a fancy bun and her heels clicking on the hardwood. She gave him a smile and bumped him with her hip as she walked by, jerking her chin at his lock pick set on the table.

“You’re packing the big set?” she asked while she poured herself a cup of coffee.

He tucked the picks into a pocket of his bag and flipped the flap closed. “I’m doing recon today. A jewelry dealer in the Garment District needs some help locating some lost goods from his ex-partner. I’ve got to look around the guy’s apartment to see if they’re there.”

“You’re sure he stole them? What if the guy who hired you wants you to steal them?”

“I’m not touchin’ anything. I’ll tell him if I find them, and he can hash it out with the cops.”

“Or with a Glock,” she said with a frown. “Sounds dangerous.”

“You know me. I’ll be careful; don’t worry.”

“You’d better be. How come you can’t have a job pushing paper somewhere?”

He locked the buckles and straightened up. “Because I’m addicted to adrenaline, and I’m pretty sure I’d go through some wicked withdrawals if I had to sit in a cubicle all day. Breaking and entering is way more fun.”

Lola ran in and stopped in front of him, her blue eyes beaming. “Daddy, you like my kitty-cat dress?” She smoothed her hand down the front of the dress that was covered in illustrations of kittens with big eyes and long eyelashes.

He knelt down and smiled. “I love it, baby. This one’s my favorite.” He pointed to one near the hem. “You ready to go to Gram and Pop Pop’s?”

She nodded with her pink little lips bending into a smile.

“Okay. Go get your backpack.”

“I’ll go get it!” She ran out of the room.

Jon shook his head as he stood. “Does she walk anywhere?”

“Nope.” Tori took a sip of her coffee. “You sure you’re good to take Lola to my mom’s?”

“Yeah. Your dad doesn’t scare me.”

Tori laughed. “He’ll never get over the fact that you knocked me up and didn’t make an honest woman out of me.”

Jon snorted. “Honest. Ha. Anyway, he knows we would have killed each other.”

“Yeah, well, our feelings on the matter mean very little to him,” she said with a shrug. “We’ve been living together all this time. I’m sure he thinks we’re still banging.”

“In your dreams, Victoria,” he gibed, knowing she hated being called by her full name. “It won’t be for much longer if I keep picking up jobs and you keep busting your ass at lawyer waitressing.”

“We can only hope, Jonny.”

Jon looked down, hooking his thumbs in his belt loops, his eyes tracing the seams of the wooden planks of the floor. “It feels like we’ve been living together forever. Wonder what it’ll be like to live alone.” And without Lola. That thought in particular cut to the quick.

She smiled wistfully. “It’ll be glorious. I can walk around in my underwear and pee with the door open.”

“You do that anyway.”

“Yeah, but I’ll be able to do it with no fear of retaliation.”

He chuckled and shook his head. “Hey, I meant to ask…do I always pick scissors when we play Rock-Paper-Scissors?”

“Every time. Why?”

“Josie said something about it the other day.”

Tori raised a blond eyebrow. “Ah. Still hung up, huh? You’ve surpassed your twenty-four-hour mourning period.”

“You think you’re so smart, don’t you?”

“Oh, don’t get your knickers in a twist.” Tori rolled her eyes. “Maybe your hands-off approach isn’t the way to handle it. I’d probably march over and plant a fat, sloppy kiss on her if I were you.”

“You’d probably perform heart surgery with a sledgehammer, too.”

“Probably,” she said with a shrug.

He slung his bag over his shoulder. “You do realize that your way isn’t always the best way.”

“But it usually is.” She punched him in the arm and waved as she rounded the corner. “Have a good day,” she called from the entry.

“You too.”

Jon let out a sigh.

He loved Tori—she knew him better than anybody did—but they weren’t meant to be together. They had both known that since before they broke up and before they found out Tori was pregnant.

For a couple of years before they’d broken up, they’d dated and lived together, and when they’d found out about Lola, it’d just made sense to keep living together. It was the easiest way for them to care for their daughter and the easiest way for Jon to take care of both Tori and Lola. It fulfilled him to do it, and he and Tori worked seamlessly together—as long as they weren’t trying to be together.

They’d driven each other crazy when they dated, fighting about everything, but once the pressure of romance had been removed from the equation, they’d been able to find a level of companionship and respect for each other that made them an excellent team.

“I’m ready, Daddy!”

Ruby, the stuffed dog, was cradled in Lola’s arms, and she had on her pink backpack with a giant white kitten on the back.

“Well then, let’s get going.” He held out his hand, and she grabbed two of his fingers.

They walked in the chilly morning to Tori’s parents’ house where he dropped off his daughter under the watchful eye of Tori’s father, who scowled at him from behind her cheerful mother.

As he walked out of the building and toward the subway, he marveled again at the vastness of New York. Growing up in Louisiana, he had known every kid within five miles, easy. In New York, you could live next door to a kid your age and not only never meet them, but not even go to the same school as they did. Tori and Josie had grown up just a few blocks away from each other but had never met, and that fact blew his mind on a regular basis.

Jon smelled roses, and he looked up, confused for a split second before realizing he was a few buildings down from the Midtown South Precinct. He decided to stop and check the board, and as he pulled open the door, he remembered seeing Josie for the first time since he’d moved back.

He was struck again by the deep desire to help her with Anne’s murder and wondered if maybe Tori was right. Maybe it was time he pressed Josie for information about Anne.

When he rounded the corner, he found her standing at the board like déjà vu, like he imagined so often, just exactly as she had been a month before. When he remembered to breathe again, he straightened himself out and put on the most charming smile in his repertoire, hoping it would be enough to blast a crack in her shell.

The station bustled around Josie, but her focus was on the Wanted flyers plastered on the police bulletin board. She flipped a page back and snapped a picture with her phone.

“Dibs on the meth head.”

Josie jumped at the sound of Jon’s voice, and once the rush of old desire passed—because it always showed up, every time, without an invitation—she found herself instantly agitated.

“You’ve got to quit sneaking up on people, Jon. One of these days, you’re going to get accidentally shot.” She didn’t meet his eyes. Instead, she kept them on the board and pretended to go about her business even though her brain had come to a skipping, grinding stall.

“Well, I only sneak up on you, so I’m pretty sure I’m safe.” He leaned against the wall at her side to face her, but she still wouldn’t look at him.

“Lucky me. And no, I’ve got the meth head. You can have the pedophile. I always have trouble not shooting them.”

He watched her. “How are you doin’, Josie?”

“Fine,” she clipped as she flipped another flyer out of the way. “Do you want the gas-station robber?”

Jon stuffed his hands in his pockets with his eyes on her like a couple of ten-pound weights. “Nah, you can have him. How about the missing girl?”

She stiffened. “That’s all you. I’m taking a break on missing persons.”

He searched her face. “I really want to know if you’re all right.”

Josie finally looked at him and found she’d been justified in trying to avoid it. His eyes were so blue, they were almost black, heavy and intent on her. His dark brows were just low enough to show his concern, concern that was honest and real.

That look hit her in the heart, reminding her of the time when she’d believed he would have done anything for her, the time before he’d abandoned her. And that feeling of longing flared into anger.

“I said I was fine, and I meant it.” The words were short and final.

He watched her, and when he spoke, his voice was a little softer, as if she were a wild animal. “Okay, Jo. I just wanted to talk—”

“Christ, Jon. Take a hint. I don’t want to talk about anything you want to talk about.” She gripped her phone in her fist to stop her hand from shaking.

Jon’s voice dropped, and a hint of irritation flickered in his tone. “Listen, I know you don’t want to talk about us—trust me, I got that message loud and clear—but that discussion will happen at some point whether you want it to or not. We have unfinished business, and you can’t ignore it forever, not if I have anything to do with it.”

She scoffed, but he didn’t give her time to respond otherwise.

“But that’s not what I wanted to talk about. I want to know what you think happened to Anne.”

The sound of Anne’s name from his lips was more than she could handle.

Breathing his air was stifling enough, but to discuss Anne with him was out of the question, beyond what she could bear. She wasn’t strong enough to hold herself together for that conversation.

But he wouldn’t take no for an answer. She knew him well enough to know that for certain. The only way out was to run.

She turned without responding, but before she could take a step, he hooked her arm in his big hand, the sensation warm and comforting and absolutely heartbreaking. Because he couldn’t comfort her. She would break completely.

She set her jaw and glared at him, hating him for everything he made her feel, hating him for everything she couldn’t have.

“Josie, you weren’t the only one who cared about Anne. I worked with her just as much as I ever worked with you. She was my friend, too, and I want to know what you think happened to her. I’ve been looking, searched every lead I could find, which is nothing and you know it. And you and I both know you have information, information that, if you decided to share, I could maybe use to help you.”

Her cheeks burned as she jerked away from his hand, her voice trembling, her control gone. “Yeah, well, you fucking left us here. Some friend. I could have used your help, you know that? Maybe if you had been here, maybe if you had been on it with me, we could have nailed Rhodes before he got to her. But no, you were off playing house with your baby and your girlfriend. You never even looked back at what you’d left behind.”

The wounded look on his face was almost worth her pain, but she couldn’t even find it in herself to be satisfied as she turned to walk away.

The words Jon wanted to say climbed up his throat and stuck there.

Don’t let her leave! his mind shouted.

He reached for her again. She blocked his hand and knocked it away, turning to him again, accusing him with nothing but the look on her face.

His hand stung from the contact, and he looked down at her tearful eyes with an aching chest and said with his voice like sandpaper, “Josie, I’m sorry—”

“Don’t, Jon. Just don’t.”

He stepped closer, begging, “Please, Josie. Let me help. Let me in.”

“Never again. Leave me alone,” was her answer.

And she flew out of the station, her red hair swinging behind her like a pendulum, marking every step until she was out of sight.

Jon’s mind twisted around the exchange, shaken as he made his way toward the exit. Once again, he found himself smack in the middle of the worst possible outcome. He couldn’t reach her, couldn’t appease her, couldn’t soothe her. When he’d left, he’d thrown a grenade into the foxhole, and she was in so many pieces, he couldn’t put her back together. She wouldn’t let him get close enough to try.

He’d foolishly thought he’d gained ground, but he’d been wrong, so wrong. And that conversation had set him back by miles.

Jon’s eyes were on the ground, turned so far inward that he slammed shoulders with a cop walking by. When he snapped to and noticed who it was, he realized the collision had been no accident.

Josie’s brother, Paul, glared at him, jaw muscles twitching. “What’d you say to her?”

Jon smiled cheerfully, playing the jester as always. “Heya, Paul. I’m good. Thanks for asking. How are you?”

Paul’s eyes narrowed to slits. “Don’t be a dick, Jon.”

Jon took a wild shot, hoping he’d catch Paul off guard. “Who’s Rhodes?”

Paul folded his arms across his chest, his eyes somehow narrowing even more, his irises barely visible. “Corey Rhodes? She told you about him?” He fired the questions like nails.

Bingo.

“A little. What have you got?”

“Like I’d tell you, asshole.”

“Look, I don’t want to upset her, but she won’t even talk to me.”

Paul pointed at him. “You don’t have any right to talk to her.”

Jon shook his head. “Everyone keeps telling me that. Thing is, that won’t stop me from trying.”

Paul paused for a beat, watching him with suspicious dark eyes. “What’s your angle, Landreaux?”

“Don’t tell me you’ve never fought for what you wanted, Campbell. I’m trying to give her space, but I’m not gonna give up.”

It was the honest truth, the only way Jon figured he could ever win back everyone’s respect.

But Paul only laughed. “It’s too late for you, man. You might as well pack it up and go home. Josie doesn’t change her mind once she’s set it to something.”

Jon slapped him on the arm with a wink. He knew it was true. He also knew there was an exception to every rule, and he planned to be the exception to this one.

“Thanks for the tip, Pauly.”

Paul only scowled as Jon turned and left the station.

And, just like that, Jon was on top of the world, whistling as he headed down the sidewalk.

Corey Rhodes.

Jon had a name.

Josie made it all the way to her car before the hot tears in her eyes spilled over. She gripped the top of the steering wheel and rested her forehead on the back of her hands, unable to stop the sobs and fighting them all the same.

She’d known it was only a matter of time before Jon pressed her to talk about what had happened, talk about their past, talk about all the things she’d worked so hard to put behind her. But the second he’d shown up again, all her work had been undone.

She’d also known he’d eventually push her, and she’d known she wouldn’t be able to handle it when he did.

But Anne—that was unexpected. All he’d had to do was say her name, and the house of cards had fallen. That single question had thrown her off her axis, sending her flying into the sun.

Why did he have to come back?

It had been three years since he left her, three years of hatred and hurt and bitterness that had changed her so deeply, there was no going back.

On the outside, she was fiery and irreverent, but in her heart, she was broken, hurt far worse than she could even admit to herself. She hadn’t been able to understand how he could do it, why he had left her so cruelly.

But underneath it all was the truth, under so many layers of hurt, it could only reach her in whispers.

Josie had believed she found love, a forever love to carry her through the end of her days, only to discover her love wasn’t returned.

All her old memories, memories she’d thought were dead and buried, had climbed out of their graves and were out for blood. She could fight them with every weapon she possessed, but they wouldn’t stop.

They’d never stop.

Seeing him again had shocked her, but learning the truth about why he’d left cut her off at the knees. She felt betrayed and angry, but worst of all, she felt like a fool. Her anger had cooled over the years, turned hard and black as stone, but his return had split her open again, and she found that the pain had never left her after all. It had been there all along, just under the surface, boiling and rolling and waiting for the time it could break out and take her over.

Josie took a deep breath and sat up, wiping her tears away with the flats of her index fingers.

Jon didn’t really want her. If he did, he would have handled things differently so long before. Maybe he wouldn’t have left her so easily, wouldn’t have chosen someone else. It didn’t matter that he and Tori weren’t together. The bottom line was that he’d left. He’d made a choice, and that decision had left her no choice at all. She’d had no say; she had been left to deal with the fallout on her own, all alone.

If he had only told her from the beginning why he left. If only she’d had a choice. She imagined how different things could have been, but it only broke her heart again.

Josie sniffled and turned on her car, pulling away to take off across the river where she would tail Rhodes, hoping maybe, just maybe, the routine would bring her peace.

The stars were bright, the infinite pinpoints against the black of night a sight Apollo had set his eyes on hundreds of thousands of times, and they would never lose their mystery and wonder.

He sat on Artemis’s perch, waiting for her, missing her company. He and his twin had always been close, though less since they’d moved Olympus off Earth. She’d secluded herself in the expanse of her domain, and he didn’t know if he could blame her. She was a huntress; her home was the forest and the moonlight, her companion. Never would he expect her to wear modern dress and live in an apartment building. It went against all that she was.

Apollo had been particularly absent since Dita returned Daphne to him. For a thousand years, he had waited for her, and now that he had her, he’d not let her go, not for a second.

But, with Artemis and Dita competing, he found he didn’t know his place. He’d always sided with his sister against their common enemy. The feud was so old, it had never been a question. But now, after everything Dita had done for him, he found himself caught somewhere between the two goddesses—his sister and the goddess who had given him back his love.

He produced a lyre from the air and lay back, eyes still on the stars, considering how much his life had shifted. Daphne was his again, released from the curse that had kept them apart. His rivalry with Dita was dead and gone, and the price she’d paid to help him was high, as she’d lost Adonis and Ares both.

His guilt over being the cause of her pain, the reason that she’d ultimately lost both her lovers, was almost more than he could bear. And so, he would do his best to bridge the gap between the goddesses. It was the least he could do.

Apollo owed Aphrodite so much, and he was determined to pay that debt in full, with interest.

He pictured Dita’s face as Ares had pinned her to the wall with his hands around her neck, her eyes closed and face dark, the shade of her skin gray and blue and wrong as she lost consciousness. Ares, bulging and red, the look on his face speaking clearly—he would tear her apart before he would lose her.

And the whole circumstance had been Apollo’s own doing. If only he hadn’t entered into an oath with Ares so many years before. If only Adonis had lived. If only—

He jumped when Artemis laid a hand on his forearm.

“Brother.” Tears filled her dark eyes. “Are you all right? That song…”

Apollo took a breath, letting it go with the past as he sat, laying his lyre beside him before turning to her with a smile, his heart still heavy in his chest. “I’m fine. Just thinking, that’s all.”

Artemis sat next to him and leaned back to look at the moon. “Have you been waiting for me long?”

“No, just a little while.”

“I have not seen you as of late. Is all well?”

“Quite,” Apollo answered. “I just wanted to check on you. How goes the competition?”

“Well enough. Josie wants nothing to do with Jon, and each time they see one another, her agitation grows and festers. He set himself back today by pressing her. I do not believe that Aphrodite will have enough time to convince Josie to overcome her feelings.”

Her certainty irritated him, and a flicker of defensiveness for Dita flared. “You’d be surprised.”

She shrugged. “Perhaps. Perhaps not.”

“What’s your plan for Josie?” he asked, not wanting to argue but sensing the inevitability.

Some plan. Bridge the gap, ha.

“My plan is to watch. To do my best to keep her away from Jon. I can get her out of New York if he should happen to gain any ground with her. But I care little for the humans or their relationship. My only motivation is to beat Aphrodite.”

“You never have liked her.”

“No, and until recently, I was not the only one.” Artemis didn’t look at him but shot the words at him still. “I cannot understand how you can forgive her. She kept Daphne from you for eons.”

“Because I killed Adonis.”

“No, you didn’t.”

“I did by proxy,” he volleyed.

“He was a thorn in my side.”

“Ares would say the same. Still, he didn’t deserve to die. Aphrodite gave Daphne to me and paid a great cost to do it. She did right by me, knowing she would lose so much.” He wanted her to look him in the eye, to see the truth. To convince her, though he knew better.

Artemis said nothing, only scowled up at the stars.

“What else do you blame her for?” Apollo asked, knowing the answer.

Her lips pressed together, and he wished she could be honest with herself. With him.

“Orion?”

“Please.” She finally glanced over at him, though her words were full of contempt. “It has been thousands of years.”

“That wasn’t really an answer.”

“Love is a ridiculous sentiment, fueled by hormones. It compromises you, creates a weakness that wasn’t there before. No,” she scoffed, “I have no need for love.”

“Some would say that love is instinctive, which is something you value quite highly.”

Her lips bent in a frown. “I do not wish to discuss this, Apollo.”

“I know you don’t, Artemis. But I think you should.”

She sat and hooked her arms around her knees, turning her eyes back to the stars. For a long time, she said nothing, but when she did, she was far away, long ago, the admission quiet and still and honest. “He was taken from me with no warning, taken from me too soon. And, when I lost him, I lost a part of myself—the part that loved him. Had I never loved him, I would not still feel the sting.” Her eyes were empty when they met his again. “So, forgive me for not feeling as you do about Aphrodite. Her games do not interest me, but I will beat her and be justified.”

He shook his head, trying to understand. “What good does it do to blame Aphrodite?”

“It gives me comfort.” She stood and looked down at him with an outward calm that he knew to be a facade. “I can see where your loyalties lie, and they are not with me.”

“Artemis, you are my sister. Nothing will come between us.”

“That is not a promise you can make.”

She turned and climbed down the rock, and he watched as she nocked an arrow and disappeared into the woods.

Apollo stood and tilted his face to the moon. He knew each ring and shadow that marked its surface by heart, just as he knew his sister, the bullheaded creature who lived in a self-imposed prison under the illusion of happiness in solitude. But he remembered another Artemis, the goddess before Orion who had been joyful and compassionate, full of youth and life, and he wondered how he hadn’t noticed until far too late that she was gone.

Artemis pushed through the brush, not caring how much noise she made.

She had been betrayed by her brother.

As glad as she was that Apollo had Daphne again, she mourned the loss of her partner against Aphrodite. Artemis couldn’t fathom how thousands of years of anger could be wiped away with a single act, no matter how noble. It should have been set to rights long before, though that infraction was forgotten by all but Artemis, it seemed.

And Aphrodite. They were as separate as the sea and the sky, the two goddesses. Neither valued what the other held dear. Aphrodite put her stock in love, nebulous and vague and unpredictable. Artemis believed in logic, what she could see, smell, touch. But logic rarely applied to love.

At least she still had the competition. Aphrodite had been absent, and Artemis could only hope that the goddess of love was spending her time obsessing over the mirror and not on the game. She had somehow managed to nudge Jon into the station, but that had ultimately worked to Artemis’s advantage, sparking a fight, pushing Josie over the edge. Jon had no chance, and neither did Aphrodite.

But, if the tide did change, Artemis would be ready, armed, and waiting. There was comfort in that, if nowhere else.

Dita shifted on the couch, re-situating her stiff, creaking body. For the last twenty-four hours, she had barely moved, the mirror in her lap and her heart split and cracked and aching. She had run the gamut of emotions from joy to tears to tear-inducing joy as she watched Adonis live his ghost life, moving from one task to the next, all the things he loved.

All the things he loved, except for her.

She touched the glass of the mirror.

Adonis lay in the sun, his skin wet from the dip he’d taken in the river. His eyes were closed, a content smile playing on his lips, his hands tucked behind his head. The broad muscles of his arms and chest were perfect, and she could see every ripple and line.

It was the perfect distraction really. It scratched two itches—her loneliness and her denial.

Her neck ached, and her legs burned when she flattened them out. She wondered absently when she had eaten last. She hadn’t slept either, only nodded off a few times to be awoken by her nightmares.

But she couldn’t bear to put the mirror down, couldn’t even tear her eyes away, not for a moment, not unless the need was too dire to ignore.

Her stomach rumbled at the thought of food, lurching when she considered going upstairs to get something to eat. A feeling of disconnected unease hung over her, the kind that accompanied a binge, especially a forbidden binge. It was the feeling brought by the knowledge that what she was doing was wrong but doing it anyway and in private, in secret. Because, if anyone knew, she would be judged, and that judgment would sting even worse because it would be justified.

But she couldn’t stop, mostly because she didn’t want to miss a single moment. She didn’t want to face anyone out of fear that they would somehow know what she’d done, what she was doing.

Of course, there was also the threat of Ares that had kept her confined to her apartment. She hadn’t seen him since the first day; the stress of even being near him for a moment had been so much, she’d been nearly paralyzed by fear, and that was with Perry and Heff at her side. If she went up now, she’d be alone. And, if he got her alone, he would take advantage of the fact. She couldn’t even consider what he’d do.

She wasn’t ready to find out.

But she had to eat, and by the noises her stomach made, it would need to be soon.

Just go upstairs. It’ll just be a few minutes. Eat, and then you can come right back. Maybe the break will do you good.

Dita took a long last look at Adonis before she laid the mirror on her coffee table, tossed her blanket off, stood, and made for the elevator. She stepped inside, and her finger hovered over the lobby button as she contemplated heading to the underworld to ask Perry to go with her.

It’ll be fine. I’m sure he won’t be there. And, if he is, I’ll just leave and come back later. So stop being a pussy, and hit the fucking button.

She rolled her eyes and hit the L.

Dita didn’t remember a time when she’d been more needy, though that knowledge didn’t really do much to help her combat it. She was doing her best to handle her shit.

Her best was not even close to good enough.

The elevator opened up to the lobby, and she made it to the refrigerator just as her stomach folded in on itself. She walked to the island with a plate of ambrosia, turning it into a huge hamburger and spicy fries. She was salivating. Until the elevator dinged.

Her eyes flew to the door as it opened to Ares and Hera chatting, too lost in their conversation to see her.

Dita froze for a nanosecond before grabbing her plate and hauling ass around the corner, just outside a small sitting room.

The sound of her heart in her ears was almost deafening, and she took a deep breath, trapped in the hallway, anxious and feeling strung out. She supposed in a way she was.

I have got to get sleep and food before I have a nervous breakdown.

She caught another whiff of her burger, and her eyelids fluttered in ecstasy. Figuring that the sitting room was unoccupied, she could duck in and hide for a few minutes while she snarfed her food, and hopefully in that time, Ares and Hera would have moved on so she could slink back to her room in peace.

As she neared the archway, she heard her name and stopped dead.

“You don’t say.” Pistis, the goddess of trust and good faith, sounded appalled.

“That’s what I heard. Ares was mad because she was boning Apollo,” Zelos, god of jealousy and zeal, said.

Dita could hear he was smiling, that dick.

“Get out,” she heard Pistis gasp. “Poor Daphne.”

“One of the maenads told me Dita’s been going to the big orgies they have in their quarters,” Zelos added.

“Oh, I heard that, too. Those parties get so weird,” Pistis added.

“Well, Dita always has gotten around,” Pheme, the goddess of fame and rumor, said with a snicker. “I mean, with everyone except her husband, that is.”

Zelos giggled. “And I heard she’s been sneaking up to Ares’s room ever since she came back from Greece.”

Pistis said sadly, “How could she ever be with him after what he did to her?”

Pheme laughed. “Have you seen him? He could take his anger out on me any day of the week.”

“Maybe she’s just not woman enough for him.” Zelos’s voice dripped with contempt.

Dita stepped into the threshold. “For fuck’s sake, you assholes don’t honestly believe that, do you?”

Three faces turned to her.

Innocent, naive Pistis turned the color of a spring bloom. “Gods, Aphrodite. No, of course not, not if you say it never happened.”

“It never happened,” she said through her teeth.

Zelos crossed his long legs and pursed his lips, eyeing her.

“You don’t believe me, Zelos? Because I will wrath that look off your face so fast—”

He pointed at Pheme. “Pheme started it.”

Pheme shot him a look before she stood and flipped her glossy blond hair over her shoulder, stepping closer. “You know how it is, Dita. The rumor mill never stops.”

“How could it when you’re fueling it with your fat mouth?”

Pheme gave her a tight smile. “I’m going to assume that your distress made you say that—”

“I know you’re not about to threaten me because I will end you.”

The threat rolled around in Pheme’s empty head for a moment before she smiled like a movie star. “Now, now.” She touched Dita’s arm, her face soft and tone soothing. “Let’s not be hasty.”

Dita looked down at Pheme’s hand and back to her eyes. She was certain her own were glowing, and when a breeze smelling of roses blew through the room, Pheme dropped her hand and took a step back.

“Listen up, all three of you, and especially you two.” Dita made a V with her fingers and pointed at Pheme and Zelos. “You had best shut your mouths, or I will make you so miserable, you’ll wish you weren’t immortal so you could just die already.”

Zelos didn’t look swayed. He looked smug.

“If you think I’m bluffing, you’re dumber than I thought. Don’t think I don’t know about your little penguin phobia.”

Zelos turned to Pheme, whose mouth hung open.

“What? Penguins are unnatural. It’s like a fish-bird.” He shuddered.

“I wonder,” Dita said, “is bestiality your kind of thing. Because I can make it your kind of thing.”

He swallowed hard.

“And, Pheme, just remember that I can make you fall in love with anyone. Like maybe Priapus?”

Pheme’s eyes went wide.

Priapus had the biggest penis, proportionally, of any god or beast. It actually dragged the ground. He couldn’t even wear pants.

Dita watched her reaction and continued. “I’m pretty sure his giant dick would split you like a melon. What would the rumor mill think of that, I wonder?”

Pheme tried to smile, but she looked more like she was sucking on a lemon.

Pistis’s eyes were big and wet. “Aphrodite, I’m so sorry. I can’t help but see truth everywhere. It’s my curse. I am literally the goddess of gullibility.”

“I realize that. I’d advise staying away from these two shit-talkers or else you’ll end up at the wrong end of a curse.”

Dita glared at the silent trio for a moment. She had the good sense to hang on to her plate rather than throw it, which she would have preferred had she not been starving. Instead, she turned on her heel, but when she exited the room, she found Eris leaning against the wall, inspecting her chipped black nail polish.

“Having problems, Dita?”

“Oh, go fuck yourself, Eris,” Dita said as she blew past.

“Good to see you, too,” the Godess of Discord called after Dita.

But she didn’t stop, barely registering her fear of Ares, who was nowhere to be seen, thankfully. When she stepped into the elevator, she mashed B4, and the elevator closed. When it opened again, she stormed through the entryway of the underworld, calling Perry’s name.

“Hey,” Perry called as she walked out of her bedroom. “Whoa.” She pointed to a barstool at a black granite counter. “Sit.”

Perry walked behind the bar and pulled out a bottle of ambrosia, poured some into a wine glass, and turned it into deep burgundy wine. She slid it across the counter to Dita. “What happened?”

Dita took a huge bite and said with a full mouth, “I need to eat. You’re gonna have to deal with this.” She motioned to the bottom half of her face.

“Payback for trailing crumbs everywhere I go. It’s fine. Tell me.”

Dita took a drink and set her glass down on the granite with a clink. “Pheme and Zelos were talking shit about me.”

Perry leaned on the counter and shrugged. “They talk shit about everyone.”

“Pheme actually threatened me.” Dita took another bite of her burger.

“No one ever accused her of being smart. What did they say?”

Dita swallowed and raised a brow. “That I was fucking Apollo and going to maenad orgies.”

Perry rolled her eyes and laughed. “That was the best they could do?”

“Zelos said I wasn’t woman enough for Ares.”

Perry’s mouth hung open at that. “He did not.”

“He did so.” Dita took a gigantic bite, so big that she struggled to chew it.

“Well, he and Pheme have to be the biggest gossips in Olympus.”

“Today sucks,” Dita said around a wad of food.

“What else?”

Dita sighed and dropped her half-eaten burger on her plate. She dusted her hands off and slumped, reaching for her wine again. “I don’t know. I just…I mean I do know, but…” She shook her head. “I’m not sleeping, and it’s fucking me up. I think that’s the short of it.” That, and she had obsessively been watching Adonis on an enchanted mirror, but there was no way she could tell Perry that.

“Is there anything I can do?” Perry asked with furrowed brows. “Maybe I can help.”

Dita looked into Perry’s dark eyes. “I don’t know if anyone can help me.”

Perry moved around the bar and hugged her friend, laying her cheek on the top of Dita’s head. “Time. You can’t fast-forward through it.”

“I know.” Dita’s throat was tight and burning. “I just want it to be over.”

“It will be—eventually. Want to talk about it?” Perry pulled away and sat next to her.

The words stuck in Dita’s throat, so she shook her head.

“That’s the other part of healing. You know that. I’m here for you as soon as you’re ready.”

Dita nodded and took another long pull of her wine.

“So,” Perry said with levity, “what have you been doing? I saw you got Jon into the station today.”

Dita set her glass down and spun it on the bar. “Fat lot of good that did. I almost missed it, too. He was walking right by. That would have sucked.”

“At least he got Rhodes’s name, right?”

“Yeah, but without Josie, he’s not going to get very far. Josie had nothing on Rhodes until she went to Montana. I can’t imagine Jon would have some magical information source to pull from.” Dita looked down at her food, no longer hungry.

“No, but he has you.”

Dita huffed. “Yeah, because I’m doing a bang-up job so far.”

“It’s day three. Give yourself a break.”

“Ugh. I feel nasty. Seriously nasty,” Dita said as she sank even further into her chair.

“You know what I was wondering? What happened with the note Jon left Josie?”

Dita frowned. “I don’t know. Why? I haven’t really thought about it.”

“I mean, how many things could have happened to it?”

Dita considered it for a second. “It was early in the morning, and he left it on her doorstep. Neither Josie nor Anne saw it or knew about it. Would someone really have walked by and picked it up or thrown it away? There’s no kind of accident that makes sense.”

“Right? That’s what I was thinking. Do you think any of the gods had anything to do with it?”

They sat in silence for a moment, but then they met each other’s eyes and said at the same time, “Hera.”

“That bitch,” Perry said under her breath.

“I mean, who else? Just how much do you want to bet she was hoping to get Tori and Jon back together so they could be the perfect little family? I fucking hate her. No one else would do something that blatantly cruel.”

“Well, okay, maybe there’s some other reason, or it was someone else. Devil’s advocate, and all that.”

“Maybe, but probably not.”

Perry eyed her.

Dita put her hands up in surrender. “Don’t worry; I’m not going to go hunt her down or anything. What’s done is done, and she can’t interfere at this point. Artemis certainly wouldn’t work with her. It’s just fucked up.”

“So basically like everything Hera does.”

“Pretty much.” Dita stood. “I should get going.”

“You sure? I can hang for a while. Hades is working.”

The thought was appealing, but the mirror called to her, her obsession. She felt like Gollum, but she just didn’t have it in her to fight the addiction.

She smiled at her friend. “I’m okay. Take your time decompressing from me.”

Perry laughed. “Okay. I’m here.”

“I know,” Dita said as she hugged her friend before leaving the underworld.

Her anticipation grew in the few minutes it took to get to her apartment. When she held the mirror in her hands, she felt herself sink into fixation again, and she absently sat down on the couch, breathless as she watched Adonis, the anxiety from what she’d missed snaking through her like poison.