fuonlyknew

Aphrodite pointed her gun at me again, kind of casually. “Your problem is you’re too hung

up on the past. You gotta move forward with yer life.”

I heard Hannah give a smothered laugh.

“You got this cutie pie in love with ya, and instead of enjoying his company, all you do

is whine.” With a quick flick, Aphrodite opened the cylinder to reload.

“He’s not in love,” I said.

She peered at Kai. “Whattya talkin’ about? Sure he is. Everyone knows Kyrillos loves Persephone.”
“I’m Sophie,” I ground out.

She waved the gun around. “Ya ya. That too.”

That too?

I took a deep breath, folded my fingers over my palms and looked slightly to the

left of her in case I accidentally started blasting. Didn’t want to go down in history

as the girl who killed the Goddess of Love.

“Nope. It’s just desire,” I said with faked calm. “Kai is so resistant to the idea of being

in love with me that your arrows don’t work. Besides which, when he actually does

fall so hard for me that he doesn’t know which way is up, I want him to know he

chose that of his own free will. That he chose me.” I threw him a sweet smile.

“Chose you?”

Kai got this look of “have we had this conversation before?” on his face. My smile

got tight.

Aphrodite scooped up a saclike pink purse laying on the ground. She rooted around in

it. “Desire is part of romantic love, silly,” she said to me.

She pulled out a handful of bullets and dumped them in Festos’ hurriedly outstretched hands

before turning back to Kai. She gestured with the still-open chambered revolver

toward him. “Your body knows what’s what. Stop fighting it.”

Kai glowered at her.

She laughed it off, reloading. “And you,” Aphrodite said to me, as she plucked more bullets

from Festos’ hand to load into the chamber. “Yer just as bad with your own issues.”

She couldn’t know about my insecurities around Persephone could she?

Aphrodite narrowed her eyes at me.

I gulped.

Aphrodite shot me a look of disgust and popped the final bullets into the chambers.

She gestured at each of us in turn with one pink, sparkly manicured finger. “I’m gonna start

gettin’ real mad about how youse is all dealin’ with love.”

“There’s a whole bunch of drags around here where love is concerned,” Festos agreed.

“Thanks so much for inviting him along,” Theo said to me.

I grimaced an apology at Theo, then shot back at Festos, “Seems there’s a whole bunch of dogs

here, too.” I looked between him and Kai.

“Oh don’t forget Pierce,” Festos replied cheerfully. “He’s a total mimbo.” “He is not,” Hannah

defended. “He’s pure love.”

Aphrodite threw her a fond smile. “I like you, girlie.” “Love in name, hormones in game,”

Theo countered. “Look at us all in agreement,” Festos replied.

“No, because you’re talking about lust,” I protested.

“Lust is pretty good too,” Aphrodite said, “but it ain’t nothin’ like the real thing.” She

clicked the cylinder into place and looked at me. “We got a deal? You’ll get Jack

to kill the campaign?”

“You’ll undo the love thing?” I asked.

“Nope. You could do with a little love in your life. Kyrillos is obviously brimming with love

for ya now,” she ignored Kai’s snort, “so you’re gonna enjoy it.”

“Meaning what?” I asked.

“A date,” Kai piped up. “I’d say I’m ready now.” He arched an eyebrow as if to say “ball’s

in your court.”

“I think it’s a great idea,” I slid my arm around his waist and pressed myself up against

his side.

A look of surprise flashed across his face. “Perfect.”

I could outdate him any place, any time. I brightened. This was going to be fun. The touching

part wasn’t a downside either.

“The fate of the world does dee-pend on you loving each other,” Aphrodite said. “So, good.

We’ll start with a date.”

“Still say it’s a euphemism,” Festos burst out. “And Kai doesn’t date.”

Kai snaked his arm around my waist before pressing his fingertips into my hip. “Never wanted

to before. Sophie’s the exception.”

“The euphemistic exception?” Festos asked. “Shut up,” Kai and I fired at him in tandem.

Festos took it in stride, waggling his eyebrows cheerfully at Theo who pretended to    look disapproving but totally wasn’t. Even Hannah didn’t bother to hide her smile.

“Only thing is,” I told Aphrodite, “I have to be back at school by Sunday morning. I have a

meeting I can’t miss. So I’ll have to get this thing with Jack done quickly to have

time for the date.”

“Going together to find Hermes is the date.” Aphrodite looked at me like I was an idiot.

“You two need as much together time as possible.”

No way. I needed all my wits about me to handle Kai. Something that couldn’t happen if I

had to track down Hermes at the same time. I tried a new tactic. “A date involves

dinner and a movie. Something romantic. Finding Hermes hardly counts.”

She pinned me in her gaze. “Had so miny of them, Miz Expert?

All a date is, is two people spendin’ time to deepen their attraction.”

“Or kill it,” Hannah piped up.

Aphrodite scrunched up her nose. “Huh?”

“There are far more first dates than second,” Hannah explained.

“Which means that after spending time, those people realized they were not a match.”

“What she said,” I seconded.

Aphrodite narrowed her eyes at Hannah. “I don’t get ya. You talk like that but you’re so brim

up with love.”

“I’m a confounding enigma,” Hannah replied cheerfully.

Aphrodite threw her hands up. “Enough’a this nonsense. You’ll go together to find Hermes.

And you’ll be date-like doin’ it.”

That sounded like a threat.

“Almost like you planned it that way,” I said to Kai.