Chapter Eighteen
Iwake the next morning with my stomach in knots, despite Callie's usually calming presence at my side. She stirs shortly after I do, snuggling closer into my side. I bury my face in her hair and squeeze her tighter to me with a sigh.
As much as I'd like to pull the covers over us both and stay here forever, we've got shit to do. I press a kiss to her forehead and slip out of bed.
She comes out to the kitchen just as I set coffee and eggs on the table.
We eat in silence, and I can feel the tension emanating off of her from across the table.
She’s building up the courage to say something, so I stay quiet and let her.
Halfway through her second cup, she finally turns to me fully and takes a deep breath, sucking in all the air in the room with it.
“If something happens today,” she begins, sitting on her hands to hide the shaking. “I… please don’t be a hero.”
“Hey, didn’t we already cover this?” I keep my voice as light as I can, hoping I can ease her nerves. “I’m in it to win it, baby.” I stretch my arm out across the table, palm up, and wait. She huffs out a tiny laugh and lays a trembling hand in mine,
“Ok, but seriously. If something… if anything happens to me, promise me that you won’t get yourself killed over it. Just run, hide, whatever. Don’t try and follow me down.”
“I won’t,” I promise, lying through my teeth.
I can tell she’s got something up her sleeve, and I’m trying to trust her, but I’m not letting her throw herself to the wolves alone.
“But only if you promise not to go where I can’t follow.
” I finish my coffee in one gulp and wink at her over my cup.
She scowls at me, but it loses all its bite when she tips her head down, giving me a predatory gaze through her lashes.
Suddenly, I know exactly how to ease those nerves.
I stand and round the table, eyes locked on hers.
I lean down to wrap my palms around the backs of her knees and haul her up against me.
She loops her arms around my neck, and her lips find mine.
I walk us toward the kitchen and prop her up on the counter, releasing her knees to step in between them.
“I promise,” she lies, because how could she promise that? But now is not the time, and currently the right place is on my knees, so I bite down my protests and settle in for second breakfast.
Hours later, we're ready to meet Apollo again. Well, as ready as we can be.
"Don't forget," she stresses as we walk to the car.
"Stick to the plan. Do. Not. Deviate." She punctuates her words with quick little claps that would be significantly more adorable if we weren't potentially headed to our deaths.
"Do not go rogue. Do not improvise. Do not pass go, do not collect two hundred dollars. Stick to the plan."
She morphed our clothes into a new set of matching outfits.
Today's theme is forest green, apparently.
My suit looks relatively the same, but her dress today is testing my self-control.
It's dark green silk, cut low in the front and lower in the back.
The mesh straps hang off both shoulders, and there are slits up both thighs that reach dangerous heights.
When I don't respond, she stops walking to pin me with a glare. She plants one hand on her hip, and the position separates the fabric all the way up, straining it against her thigh. My eyes zero in on the bare skin, the faint bruises already forming from my fingertips this morning.
Suddenly, my suit is uncomfortably tight.
I drag my gaze back up to hers and nod. "Got it," I confirm, and her face softens. "Stick to the plan." She lays a hand on my cheek, and I lean down to meet her lips with mine, pulling her into me with a hand on her back.
"I promise, I got it," I assure her. "Come on, troublemaker. Let's go piss off a god."
The drive to the park is quiet, her hand resting on mine over the shifter.
When we walk up to the gazebo, Apollo is already seated on the same bench in the same spotless suit.
He scrolls through his phone again, clearly bored with this waste of his precious time that he insisted on in the first place. He doesn't even look up as we approach.
The plan is to appeal to his mercy, appear pathetic, make him lose interest in us, and go home safely to plot another day.
Unfortunately, I simply cannot be trusted to keep my cool around this asshole.
The way he looks at Callie, like she's an object that he can possess or some peon that he can command, makes my blood boil.
So really, the most important part of this plan is that I keep my hot-headed mouth shut.
I wasn't like this before her. I was calm, always level-headed.
I never spoke out against anything or made any waves.
Not because I was afraid to, but simply because I didn't care.
I don't know when I went from living to simply existing or if it was a gradual degradation, but I was just barely floating through my life until she dropped into it.
I care now. I care about her, and caring about her woke up all of those dormant parts of myself that I had forgotten about.
Not just the writing, either. I'm excited to wake up now that it means waking up next to her.
As much as I love hiding from the world in my apartment with her, I want to take her out to fun places and experience the world together.
I want to eat at fancy restaurants and walk through holiday displays with her while she marvels at all the decorations.
Before her, I can't remember the last time I actually wanted to even leave the apartment. To be honest, I can't remember the last time I wanted to wake up.
I really hope today wasn't the last day I get to be happy to wake up.
We stand in front of Apollo while he continues scrolling through his phone. I follow Callie's lead, hands behind my back in silence. Waiting to be addressed, as if he means anything. As if he deserves our reverence. My eye twitches but I keep my mouth shut.
Of course he looks up at us at that exact moment.
Apollo's lip curls. He definitely caught me. I've fucked this up before we even started and he's just going to kill us both and-
"Good morning," Callie greets him quietly, head bowed. His gaze snaps to her, and his grin becomes hungry. Keep your mouth shut keep your mouth shut keep your mouth shut...
"Good morning, my dear. What a lovely sight." His eyes roam hungrily over her dress, and I can practically hear him begging for x-ray vision. Wait, does he already have x-ray vision? Nope, not going there right now or I'll lose it, and he'll turn my insides into outsides.
She gives him a little bow, and I hate every second of this. She shouldn't have to pretend to respect this petty piece of shit just so he forgets about us. She shouldn't have had to beg him for her freedom in the first place.
"We spent the night considering your offer.
While we appreciate your kindness and generosity, we humbly decline.
We would like to spend the time that we have left together on this assignment, and then I'll return to the muses for my next assignment.
I was wrong to wish to be released from my duties. It's an honor to be considered-"
He interrupts her speech with a loud, barking laugh and my stomach drops. I know in this moment that we are well and truly fucked.
"Oh, my dear. What a performance! Bravo," he exclaims, clapping his hands together slowly. "Do you think I can't feel the contempt radiating off of you two in waves? Your pretty words don't hide your audacious intentions, sweet girl."
Her face falls at his words and she glances at me, begging for forgiveness with her eyes, before turning back to Apollo.
"Do you think I'm naive enough to believe that you would change your mind in one night?
That you would just see the light and return home?
I know that look. That sparkle in your eye, the invisible string that ties you two lovebirds together?
The second you little creatures feel that tug to another, you lose all sense of reason.
" He stands up now, taking slow steps to close the distance between them.
"I've seen it before. Orpheus following that thread straight to Eurydice in the Underworld. Pyramus jumping headfirst into death like a fool, his beloved Thisbe following after him. Patroclus donning Achilles’ armor and dying as nothing more than a distraction to save his love.
Helen and Paris started a war that killed hundreds for their own selfish love. "
He leans in close to her face, a finger trailing along her jaw. I might actually jump out of my skin.
"And here you two stand, convinced that I would just release you to live out your days with your mortal over something as trivial as love? You belong to me, sweet girl." He grips her jaw tight, and she winces when he jerks it up to meet his towering gaze.
How the fuck are we getting out of this?
She glares at him, taking in a deep breath before her face shifts into a saccharine smile. Her eyes narrow on him and when she speaks, it's dripping with unadulterated contempt.
"What would you know of love," she asks him with a scoff.
"No one has ever loved you in your long, miserable life.
Your father couldn't care less about you, and he'll probably kill you one day so you don't kill him for his throne.
Your mother raised you out of duty, feeding your ego and inflating your sense of self-importance, and then dropped you off in Olympus the moment you were old enough to survive on your own.
" She spits her words at him with intent to maim, but his face is a stone mask.
"You couldn't possibly understand why I would want to be free to live and love as I please because you've never been able to prove yourself worthy of the love of another.
You wouldn't know what it's like to be loved so wholly that it fixes your broken parts, because you're damaged beyond repair. The only person who loves you is you."
She spits the last word out like poison. Apollo is still staring at her, emotionless and silent, but I'm about to have a full-blown panic attack. I'm screaming at her in my head. What the fuck are you doing, Callie? Are you trying to get us both killed? Are you giving up?
Finally, terrifyingly, his mask cracks.
It starts as a huff. The corner of his lip tilts up, eyes narrowing on her. His eyes are cruel as he barks out a laugh that seems to never stop. When he throws his head back, instinct pushes me into action. I grab Callie's hand and yank her out of his reach, running for the stairs with her in tow.
Before I even make it to the stairs, my hand squeezes around nothing.
I spin around just in time to see Callie suspended a foot off of the ground, Apollo's hand outstretched like he's using the Force to hold her up.
He squeezes his fingers into a fist, and, with a sickening crunch that I can feel in every cell in my body, Callie's neck twists at an angle that simply cannot sustain life.
All of the air whooshes out of my lungs and I crumple to the floor. I'm screaming, but I don't know if it's out loud or in my head. My forehead pressed to the floor is the only thing keeping me from sinking into the ground and disappearing altogether.
Apollo's black leather shoe appears next to my face, and I jump back before he can kick me, but he doesn't move. He just stares down at me, his grin dripping with malice.
"She was a hateful, ungrateful little bitch who didn't deserve your sacrifice or your mourning.
You're better off without her," he says, his voice as cold as his words.
I want to scream at him that he's wrong.
I want to tell him that every word she hurled at him was true, but before I can even try, there's a pop and then he's gone.
It's over.
I scramble across the gazebo floor and lift her limp body into my lap. Her neck is bent at a horrifying angle, her body still warm but not for long. I let out a sob that shakes my whole body, smoothing her hair back so I can see her face before it starts to pale.
What do I even do? Do I call the cops? She has no identity, and they'll think I took her out here to kill her myself.
Do I hide her now and come back to bury her under the cover of night?
I'll end up getting myself caught hiding a body and definitely go to prison.
Or will she just dematerialize or something?
What happens to muses when they die? Do they return to wherever they live when they're not on an assignment? Do they-
Callie gasps as her eyes shoot open, emanating a purple glow. There are no pupils, but I swear she's staring at me.
"Callie?" I gasp, turning her face back and forth by her chin. "Are you-... No fucking way. Come on, troublemaker. Come back to me." I tap her cheek lightly with my fingertips and her eyelids flutter, the light flooding from them blinking on and off with the movement.
Slowly, she turns her head to face me, and I take my first real breath since her last. I lean forward and press my forehead to hers.
When I feel her fingers tangle into my hair, the relief is visceral.
I plant a kiss on her forehead just as it dawns on me that her neck was in two fucking pieces 30 seconds ago.
When I lean back to check the injury, I'm more surprised than I should be to find that she looks like nothing ever happened.
The glow is fading, and her eyes are a normal mortal light blue now.
I check her over, poking and prodding around her neck to see if there's any damage, but she just laughs at me.
I'll never take that sound for granted again.
"I'm okay, Devon," she insists, placing her palm flat on my chest. "I promise, I'm okay." She pushes out of my hold and sits up.
"I see that," I say, eyebrows knitting together. "But how?"