Chapter Twenty-One
If birds could sigh like doctors about to impart shitty news, Kaw donned that figurative doctor’s coat and did just that.
Damn it.
Thankfully, he got over himself just as fast. After her blood donation to Natasha Korra’s chandelier, a couple of dimension jumps via hellfire hurricanes, and a flyby with the yakuza she never wanted to repeat again, Wen had no more psychological energy for the never-ending night—least of all, wondering how to wrestle a confession out of a bedraggled bird in a gingko tree.
It’s possible your sister and a member of her security detail have become enamored with each other. And because of that, the smitten young buck has taken advantage of Ito’s distraction about meeting Ms. Korra, and sneaked Miss Genny out of the kumi’s custody.
She stepped back but not by far, taking care not to narrow her eyes. This wasn’t a moment for dunking Kaw with dubiety, especially because he might just be right.
The expression on Apollo’s face didn’t just beg to differ. His own gaze, furious as a celadon storm, was topped only by his irked sneer. “Kleos, I’ve put up with doozies that’ve made me wonder what substances you gobbled off the street and threw down your gullet. But this—”
“Isn’t that long a pass to bring to the end zone,” she butted in, slamming a silencing hand across the O of his stunned mouth.
“Suck it up, Sweet Stuff. Regrettably, the logistical details from Quil’s team add up.
” But as hard-assed as she kept the rejoinder, no way was that possible when she added, murmuring to prevent her voice from cracking, “Also regrettably, so does my sister’s psychology. ”
Apollo’s greens roiled like heavier cloudbursts. “She’s pulled this kind of shit before?”
She winced. Only a little. Or so she hoped. “Not exactly this kind . . . ”
“What does that mean? Then what kind?”
Perhaps we can shelve the Eugenia Steed docu-reel for another time. As we’ve already determined, seconds count right now.
Kissing a crow on the lips had never sounded more like the right thing to do. If their time crunch and his lack of actual lips weren’t factors, she’d have found a way to show her gratitude with more than a fast glance at the bird, which would have to suffice for now.
“He’s right,” she said, turning back to reach trembling fingertips for Apollo’s. As soon as he turned the touch into a full handclasp, she found the strength to utter the rest of the words pressing so deeply on her heart and mind. “He’s right, Glow Worm . . . and I’m desperate.”
It was agony to emphasize that by looking and directly into his eyes, but she clenched her teeth again and made it happen.
“I—well, I have to ask for your help again. Just one last time. Apollo . . . I have to beg for it.” An aching gulp consumed her throat. “You have no reason to say yes. I know that. I know what I said about tidy goodbyes and clean breaks—”
Whoa, whoa, whoa. You said what, now? Kaw turned the intrusion into real sound, repeating his annoying squawks until she almost gave up and hoped Apollo would get the general gist. But apologies, especially sincere ones, weren’t like doing the dishes.
Giving up before things were done just meant a colder, dirtier mess later.
You’re welcome, Grandma. See; I remembered that one.
“I know I wasn’t graceful or tactful, okay?” Hiding the stress-bumped pace of her tone had grown totally impossible. “But at the time, I really did think it for the best. Still, tacky is tacky and ham-fisted is—”
“Irowen.” Apollo gave back as good as he got this time, with his strict fingers across her lips but his eyes doing waltzes of quiet delight.
She barely refrained from glowering back.
What the hell could possibly be so amusing?
And did she even want to know? “We’re talking about your family here.
Your awesome Genny. If there were no other reason than that to help you, I could and I would.
And as for your ham fists”—he took advantage of their tangled fingers to lift her hand between their chests then use his other one to coax hers into an awkward ball—“this is a hell of a weird ham, but I’m sure it’s delicious. ”
It took a megaton of willpower to avoid bursting into a laugh. Oh yes, despite the pit of acid she still called a stomach and the stressed mess of her brain. Also yes, right here on a turbulent airport sidewalk in a land she hardly knew, with a chortling crow as witness to his master’s show of—
What?
Honestly, what was the man going for here, especially now?
Not just right now-now, with Genny in the wind.
But the larger now, as in his Jack Harkness act getting him anything past a fast roll in the sheets before he moved on to Olympus business and she went home to catch up on grocery shopping and toilet cleaning?
Granted, said roll would be a trillion dollars’ worth of fireworks fantastic; they’d already settled that point with blazing clarity.
So why did he now bend his head toward her knuckles as if ready to double down on the seduction by caressing them with his lips?
And why, for half a conflicted second, did she want to let him?
“Kaw.”
Probably for the same ineffable reason she stabbed that at his godship and herself, simply using the bird as a handy target.
“Did you say you could use some more actionable details about Genny? Shouldn’t we be getting on with that now?”
Okay, and that part too.
The most important part.
Yes, Kaw replied, adding a nod toward Apollo. Though be assured, I’ve already dispatched the whole squad throughout ōta. But we’ll be more efficient about it with the advantage of further intel.
“Excellent,” Apollo returned. “And agreed.” He was succinct—and too damn sexy, without even trying—about it, already clicked back into his corvid commander-in-chief mode. “Except I’m not comfortable continuing this briefing where we stand.”
He made nothing easier for her libido by enforcing his point with a protective arm around her shoulder, let alone how he leaned in and shielded the proximity of their faces with his hair.
All of that prefaced his ultimate weapon against her ability to form words: the return of his voice to its low, enthralling music of a cadence.
“Those three black town cars, idling asoko no akai enseki . . .” He nodded imperceptibly, including Kaw in his speculation. “What do you think, Kleos? Shiny-pretty yakuza storage tanks?”
“Asoko no akai . . . ” Wen quickly decoded his Japanese phrase. “Over on the red curb? What red curb?” she demanded. “Where?”
“Do not turn,” Glow Worm instructed, adjusting their positions so it appeared like they were snapping a couple’s selfie.
Sure enough, his flipped-around camera phone screen showed only the tops of their heads—with a background of four sizable SUVs back-to-back along an illegal curb about fifty yards down.
She groaned and fought to keep her shoulders from sagging. “Well, goody. Anyone order up a shit sandwich?”
Or a KPop group arriving from Incheon? Kaw ventured.
No disrespect intended, Anax. But we have had at least one sentry out here since you and Irowen transported inside, including your dip back to the Underworld.
In all that time, not a single person has exited or entered those vehicles.
If the cars truly belonged to Nao Ito’s goons—
“He and the henchmen would’ve left the terminal by now,” Wen finished on the same logical trajectory. Still, Apollo didn’t slacken his tension.
“Unless they had to figure out what to do with Natasha.”
The blood drained from her face. When it kept heading south, leaving nothing but shivers in its wake, she fought back with equally cruel logic.
“What to do with her? Come on, smart god guy. You know as well as I do that movies are mere mortal constructs, and dumping a body in a luggage chute isn’t as easy as—”
“Of course I do,” he bit out. “Though even if I didn’t and decided to steal the pleasure of ending the woman away from Ito, vaporizing a world-famous pop idol in the middle of an international airport concourse isn’t something the Acropolis would overlook.”
So much for preventing a chill in her bones.
“Shit,” she blurted, as more realization struck her synapses.
This male, so touchable and relatable in so many ways, was a child of Olympus itself.
If he messed up, he faced the wrath of his father: the highest god of them all.
No wonder he was such a testy tight-ass sometimes.
“But that bastard obayun is crippled by the exact same rules,” he went on with the hunts of a smirk.
“Ito can’t just drag Korra into a random corner and eliminate her.
Too much footage from too many security cams now, showing them in conversation.
But he doesn’t have the option of leaving her behind either. ”
“Because she knows too much by now.” The new epiphany, hitting with as much force as its predecessor, nevertheless brought a lower mutter of acceptance. “well, damn. Though the woman made her own bed, it’ll be quite a mess to lie in.”
A moody hmmph from Apollo. “As long as she doesn’t dirty the sheets with my lyre string in her hand, I don’t care if Ito puts her in a baby crib with a hundred yellow scorpions.”
A rhythmic avian laugh had them both looking back to Kaw. At least that would make a colorful corpse.
“Or material for a hit single.”
Wen didn’t hesitate about backhanding the man’s chest. If he insisted on staying close, he could get used to the toll price too.
“I’m all for morbid takes when the occasion calls for it, but right now can we focus on my sister not becoming a corpse?”
Kaw swiftly settled his laughter. She’s right. Let’s do this.
The god turned in and dipped his head low toward her. Then in a murmur just as intimate, “Just not here.”
Also very right, Kaw interjected. So, I’m meeting you two at Yamaterasu, then?
Apollo nodded. “Affirmative.”
“Yamater . . . what?” wen asked. “What are you talking a—”