Chapter 26
Artemis
It turns out that working eighteen-hour days doesn’t outrun the feeling of being a piece of shit. Nor the sound Xavier made when he came all over the couch.
Despite the fact the people I traditionally sleep with are nameless…
faceless… I pride myself on aftercare, on making sure my lover is satisfied, and the more time that passes, the worse I feel.
The fact that I left him there—breathless, boneless, trying to catch the pieces I shattered—makes my stomach twist.
Because I was a bastard.
I rake my hands through my hair, pausing about six feet away from my apartment door. Apollo and Edith are out of town for a few days, but the sound of a TV playing and the scent of… is that LP Street Food?
Ay, dios.
One of my siblings is inside my apartment, and they’ve brought the big guns. For a stupid second I imagine Xavier inside instead—bare feet on my rug, smiling like he didn’t know he was wrecking me.
The hint of garlic in the air tells me they’ve ordered my favorite, everything pretzels.
My mouth waters more with each step closer to my front door.
If it’s Ares, he’ll have brought pizza puffs—dough filled with beef and sauce, topped with Cotija cheese and herbs—potstickers and poutine. He likes alliteration.
If it’s Hen, she’ll have brought the pimento cheese dip and the peel and eat shrimp—her taste is somewhat more refined than our youngest brother. I stare at the door.
For me? They’ll have also brought the buffalo cheese curds, pork belly street tacos, chilli cheese tots, and… ugh. Fuck. The thing that might send me over the edge and make me actually walk inside and face whoever is here to tell me to stop working and start taking better care of myself?
The cream cheese filled churro bites. I bite my knuckle to smother the building groan, but it does little to drown out my growling stomach.
I hate how well my siblings know me. It highlights how easy it would be for Xavier to know me too, if I ever let him closer than my hands on his hips and my lips on his.
And yet… I also kind of love how well they know me, almost as much as I love the spiced chocolate sauce that comes with the churro bites. I bet Xavier would fucking love the churro bites. And everything else that’s waiting for me behind this closed door. Fuck, everything reminds me of him.
Except, it’s no longer closed. It swings open, revealing my youngest, and most meddlesome brother. “Get the fuck in off the street.” He’s so dramatic.
“Hardly the street.” I gesture to the lavish hallway between my apartment and my twin’s. “Even a couch out here.” My whole body tightens, the kind of bracing you do before a hit on the ice that you know you deserve.
He rolls his eyes, stepping back to let me in as he coughs “pussy,” under his breath. I shoulder him as I pass, making sure he still knows I can kick his ass if I feel like it. Or, you know, if I had the energy.
“Can you at least let me eat before you lecture me?” I’d rather chew through cardboard than talk about Xavier with anyone carrying my last name.
I’m already ripping open the container of buffalo cheese bites and cramming them into my mouth like I’m playing fluffy bunny.
If my mouth is too full, Ares can’t expect me to answer him.
Instead of saying anything back, he saunters right into my space and flicks me between the eyes. This fucking guy.
“You’re a dumb fucker sometimes, Artemis.”
If he knew just how dumb, he’d drag me to a therapist himself.
Ares is the only sibling who can call me out on my bullshit without me killing him. It’s because he’s this perfect balance of Loki and Thor. Somewhere between cheeky chaos and loveable big brother, in a younger brother’s body.
I say nothing, closing my eyes to enjoy the hot-and-spicy cheesy taste.
He’s not ruining this meal for me. I refuse to let him.
He pinches me. Fucking pinches me. Right at my middle, making my eyes snap open, but I don’t look at him.
Instead, I look at the food. Fuck, he got a double portion of buffalo bites. He means business.
“I’m staging an intervention.”
I’ve half a pork belly taco shoved in my face so I only groan until my mouth is empty. “I see this. At least it’s a well catered intervention.”
“You always used to give me shit about letting my dick make decisions for me.”
I nod, because yes, I did that. We all did. For a while there, Ares’s dick was an unreliable narrator that led him to some questionable characters. I’m not sure how he maintained his sobriety before he met Eloise.
There’s a pang in my chest at the thought of my brother and his fiancée. She’s the quiet to his loud, the calm to his storm, and the two of them are so sickeningly fucking perfect for each other it makes my teeth hurt. Or maybe that’s all the clenching.
“My dick’s not making decisions.” Anymore. Two days ago, it made the decision to fuck Xavier Martinez over the arm of a couch in the house I bought solely to be able to fuck him without being seen.
Extreme? Maybe. But it’s a good part of the city and will bring in a steady rental value… assuming I turn it around. My realtor has been up my ass about getting it on the rental market ASAP, but I couldn’t do it until I’d had Xavier. And now I can’t do it because the couch needs cleaning.
At least that’s what I’m telling myself. It’s not at all because a fissure has sprouted and spread across the beating organ in my chest. It’s not at all because I want him again. Or want to stay in the house because it’s close to him, and now he knows where it is he might go back to visit?
The truth is uglier: I’m terrified he won’t. And even more terrified he will.
Fingers snap in front of my eyes drawing me out of my potential Xavier spiral. “Earth to Arte.” Another snap of Ares’s fingers makes my hand shoot out to capture his.
“Fuck off.”
“Not until I get through to your thick skull, Hermano.”
“About what? I’m not fucking anyone.”
He arches his eyebrow at me. “I know. But you should be.”
My heart stutters. Wait. What? He might have tried to set me up with one of our rivals, but did he do it as a practical joke? Or as something more? The ache in my chest throbs enough that to stop myself grinding the heel of my hand through my ribs to massage it. I cram another taco into my mouth.
It’s all too raw. The sex I swore I’d never have has wrecked me, and now I want more. And my younger—enabling—brother is here telling me to go do just that?
“You deserve someone who actually sees you, Artemis.”
Being seen feels too close to being known, and being known feels like a fucking liability. I blink, going through the catalog of reasons as to why I can’t be with anyone let alone let someone in who sees me.
What the hell is Ares on? If he didn’t treasure his sobriety almost as much as his beloved Eloise, I’d think he was off the wagon saying shit like that. I sigh, getting two non-alcoholic beers from the fridge, popping the tops, and handing one to him.
“I set you up with Xavier for a reason. I thought he’d be good for you. He’s interested in you, he’s hot, he’s a hockey player so you have shit in common, and he’s far enough away that you’ll have space but close enough that you can see him.” He drains half his bottle while what he says sinks in.
“It’s fucking perfect.” He pinches his finger and thumb together and pops them from his bottom lip. “Chef’s fucking kiss, Arte. And you’re just…” He shakes his head. “My Cupiding is lost on you. Wasted. You’re undeserving.”
I shake my head, but he counters with an aggressive nod before reaching for a pizza puff that he rips apart and crams both halves in his mouth.
“I don’t know what’s going on in there.” He taps my head with his greasy, pizza fingers.
“But you need an intervention.” He gestures to himself.
“So here I am. Could you wake the fuck up before this amazing opportunity passes you by?”
“Opportunity?” Opportunity is my middle name. Seems it’s the middle name for all of my siblings. There’s a reason we are all successful independent of our piece of shit father.
He has the audacity to flick me in the face again, so I dig him in the ribs. “Ow. The fuck was that for?”
He looks at me like he’s so completely over it, like I’m the biggest idiot in the whole goddamn world. “My dude, you need fucking therapy.”
Tell me something I don’t already know. But if I start unpacking all of this, I’m afraid the whole damn structure of me, myself, and I will collapse. I open my mouth to tell him I don’t have time, see also: the eighteen-hour day I just worked, when he shoves a potsticker in my half-open mouth.
“No. Make the fucking time, Arte. The rest of us do. And don’t tell me you’re too enlightened for therapy.” He grunts. “You’re the most fucked up of all of us.”
I almost recoil at his words, because my siblings are pretty fucked up.
“None of us are chasing the absolute annihilation of our father because he hurt our mother. Do I want him to step on Lego? Yes. Do I want him destitute and on the streets? No. He’s an asshole, but I don’t want to destroy him.”
The furnace of fury in my chest flares like he’s thrown a gallon of accelerant on it. Ares covers my clenched fist with a warm palm. “Easy, Hermano.” He pats my hand, but my fists remain tight, my nails digging into my hand.
“If you won’t talk to us, you need to talk to someone.” His voice is low and quiet, soothing almost. He’s right, I just… there aren’t enough hours in the day, and yet, if it was one of my siblings…
“If it was one of us, you’d sit on top of us until we went to see someone. Or worse, you’d bring a therapist to our homes. In fact, you did that for Hen after her attack, remember?”
The painfully infected splinter under my skin from my sister’s rape throbs, reminding me of its presence.
Despite the fact none of us were there that night, we all shoulder responsibility for her being attacked.
There’s no rhyme or reason to it, rapists rape, but we all feel like we could have done more, like we should have done more.
None of us walked away from that night whole, least of all me.
Ares squeezes my hand. “Nope. You’re not sliding back to that time in your brain.
” He pinches the back of my hand. “But you do need to talk to someone. You’re fucking this thing up with Xavi on an epic scale.
” He eats a potsticker, washing it down with a slug of beer, and looks as though he’s very proud of himself.
He should be, it’s not often my siblings get one up on me. The fact he was able to get in under the radar and has stayed in—largely because of the food offering he brought to keep me occupied—is pretty unprecedented.
“Fucking what up? The merger is going ahead as planned—granted there have been a few hiccups, teething problems really, but it’s on track. I’m passing all my classes. I’ve got the C on the ice.”
My brother’s hand slaps across my mouth. “Yes, yes, you’re a very dull and responsible grownup, Arte.” He doesn’t let go of my face but taps my chest with his free hand. “What about this?” He stares into my eyes; concern etched into his features. “What about fun?”
Fun? Who has time for fun?
“What about love? Or sharing everything… sharing you with someone you enjoy spending time with? Like. Xavi.”
I roll my eyes, but he pushes harder.
“I won’t stand by and watch you fuck this up, Artemis. Fucking him and fleeing? That’s cold, even for you.”
My brows shoot up.
“Yeah.” He nods. “I know exactly what you did.” He points the neck of his bottle at me.
My pulse spikes like I’ve been caught with blood on my hands. Did Xavier tattle to my brother?
“No. Martinez didn’t tell me anything. But I still know.”
I almost snap that it didn’t mean anything—but the lie catches in my throat like broken glass.
Get the fuck out of my head, Ares. That sentiment must show on my face because he smirks, shaking his head.
“No, I won’t get out of your head either.
” He squeezes his hand still cupping my mouth, making my cheeks squish.
“You always wanted us to be close; you don’t get to grouse when I can read your mind.
I know I’m not Apollo, but I know you well enough. ”
Neither of us speak for a long moment.
“It’s taking all my strength to not shake sense into you right now. Xavier’s a good guy, Artemis. And he’s interested in you. You’re worthy, loveable, and by all accounts a catch—not as good a catch as me. Obviously.” He pretends to flick his non-existent long hair over his shoulder.
“You’re clearly compatible.” He waggles his brows at me.
“I don’t remember the last person outside our fam you’d drive across state lines to see.
But you’re fucking it up because you’re afraid.
Or feeling unworthy. Or you’re too busy—which is bullshit by the way.
You’re being too responsible, and it’s going to destroy you. ”
The tone of his voice is simmering with concern, and something close to disappointment. That strikes deeper than any disappointment our father figure could show in me. To let down my siblings? Oof. The wind is firmly sucked from my lungs like a vacuum.
The worst part is, deep down I know he’s right about everything. I just don’t know how to stop.
“There’s still time.” He boops me on the nose as he finally retracts his hand, then turns back to the table and snags another potsticker and pizza puff and shoves them both—at the same time—into his mouth like a fucking animal.
“He’s still interested. And from the look on your face, in your eyes…
you are too. Don’t let it get away from you because you’re focused on revenge and proving our father wrong. ”
His words strike like arrows in my chest, slicing through my defenses and hitting me where it hurts. Somewhere along the line, I traded softness for survival, and vengeance for purpose, and now I can’t remember who I was before I sharpened myself into a weapon.
“Don’t turn into someone you’re not because of him, Artemis.”
As we finish our meal in pensive silence, it occurs to me, that I may have already.