Chapter 22
twenty-two
I lay motionless, staring into the dark. The giant heater next to me falls asleep immediately, his brawny arms and legs wrapped tight around me. Like I’m something he’s decided to keep forever.
But I’m wide awake. Blinking into the dark room.
What just happened?
He was…
Sweet?
Caring?
How can I have a moment with this strange guy in my bed?
He’s not my type. And I won’t dare tell him what his penis did to me.
Shifting my hips to get more comfortable, I relish the stretched feeling between my legs. I’m not that experienced, but mmm…he felt good. Huge. Able to reach spots I didn’t know existed.
Maybe that’s why I was able to come. That must be it.
It couldn’t have been the way he was looking at me while he…
I shiver and tug the comforter up higher.
Daylight filters through the windows, and Apollo huffs out a few deep snores right in my ear. Fantastic. My new husband snores.
Separate bedrooms are inevitable.
I wait until I can’t any longer, then shimmy toward the edge of the bed, but his fingers dig deeper into my waist. He tugs me back into his downy chest. “M-waffle gunning,” he mumbles.
My eyes widen as I try to slip away again, but he lifts his head.
“Wh-where you goin’?” His voice is deeper than normal, vibrating the mattress beneath us.
I clear my throat. “To study.”
He blinks several times, as if he’s still asleep. “What?”
“I need to go study,” I say firmly. “Let me out.”
“M-waffle schnudy?”
Flipping around, I finally get enough room to ease out from the covers and step onto the floor. But this just makes him sit up in bed like he’s been shot. He rubs his hands through his hair and across his face, fists digging into his eye sockets.
“Where are you going? To study? It’s… Why?”
“I’m a college student, Apollo. And pre-med. I need to get a jump on next week.”
“But it’s our, uh, honeymoon? I know it’s probably not what you were thinking it would be, but maybe the university will pitch in for something better. I can ask.” His hand reaches for me, and I creep a step back toward the bathroom.
He sighs heavily, and the covers fall to his waist, exposing his incredibly cut physique. Damn. My pussy flutters.
“Didn’t you have fun last night?”
“Sorry, no.” The lie snaps easily off my tongue. Just as the one about my birth control did. I’m not exactly sure why I said it. Maybe because I’m too used to guys like Ayan thinking they know exactly how to please and not caring if they don’t.
Instead of getting upset, Apollo just smirks. “Then let me try again.” He pats the bed. “All day. I’ll get it right.”
My belly flip-flops as I think about staying in this room. With him…doing what he did to me in the restaurant. Or at the tattoo parlor. On our wedding night.
Which would lead to me having more orgasms. Then more oxytocin would be released, and I’d find myself attached to this guy who I happened to marry under threat of death, and then I’d have to miss him when I move for medical school. Worse, what if I just gave up and decided to stay?
His face falls. “You’re really going to study.”
I cross my arms. “This is how it is. I’m pre-med now. I’ll be busier as a medical student and even more so as an intern and resident. Then, a surgeon. Get used to me being gone.”
Dark eyes bore into the wall across the room for a long moment, and I think of turning around and heading into the bathroom, but he finally nods slowly. “Okay. I was hoping to set up our apartment today. When do you want to do that?”
“Apartment?”
He blinks a few times, studying my posture.
“Uh, the university gave us one of the married apartments across from campus? It’s furnished, thank Vengracurus, but we’ll need groceries.
And…” He shrugs, like he already knows I’m going to say no.
“I thought you’d do whatever it is girls do to new places. Make it nice for us.”
“Sorry, this girl doesn’t have a feminine touch. You’ll have to figure it out on your own.”
I flip toward the bathroom, and he stops me one last time.
“You know, I also signed up to be in Greek life at Northview, knowing that I’d get an appointed I may not have chosen. But I want to make this work with you.”
A tear burns at the corner of my eye. I instantly regret treating him poorly this morning, but I’m too embarrassed to know what to say.
During my hot shower, I scrub off all the clown make-up Evie caked on my skin, then change into normal clothes from my bag. My Omega sweatshirt and jeans. When I return to the bedroom, there’s a knot in my stomach.
But Apollo’s not in the bed. My shoulders relax because, despite taking my time, I didn’t come up with a way to apologize.
A ruckus of deep voices murmurs through the double doors, and I tense up once again. Wheeling my small suitcase to the living room, I freeze when I open the door.
Apollo’s still in his boxer briefs, but his three brothers laze about the kitchen area. Including Nico. They all stop and look up as I enter as if they were just talking about me.
“Hey, Scoutie!” Leo says with a shy smile. Nico gives me a nod. Atlas turns toward the fridge and grabs a drink.
“Hey.”
Apollo takes a bite of something that looks like room service under a silver tray. “They sent us breakfast, if you want some before studying.”
“Thanks, but I’m not hungry.”
I scamper across the room, feeling every bit of the awkward tension in the air.
Apollo jumps up before I can reach the door and strides over to me. He thrusts a white envelope into my hand.
“Here. It’s the spare key to our apartment. Number one twelve. My brothers are going to help me grab some of my things to take over. Is there anything we can get from Omega House for you?”
Humility splashes across my face until I pale like I’ve been dunked in ice water. He’s so fucking nice. What am I supposed to do with that?
“I wouldn’t even know where to begin. I’ll have to deal with my stuff over the weekend. But I got it.”
Sheepishly, he ducks his head and lowers his voice. “You’ll, uh, be at the library?”
And just like that, the guilt curdles into rage. Now he wants to keep tabs on my whereabouts.
“Yep. Library. Have a nice day. Thanks for everything.” I pat his firm chest and leave.
I lied again.
Tucking the key to my new apartment into my suitcase, I forget it as I venture toward my room after taking a rideshare to campus. I don’t have plans to pack up. I live here.
Apollo snores. And, really, is it necessary for me to move? I’m an Omega sister, and this is my home. Where all my stuff is.
It’s also getting on in the semester, and I don’t have time to be switching locations. What if the new bed is rickety and stiff? I won’t sleep, and then I won’t get good grades.
Plus, Sorority Row is close to both the library and the best food trucks. I’d have to walk an extra mile from the married apartments just to get there.
So, I unpack. And try not to look at the bare, empty space across from my bed. The one that used to belong to Ellis. Before the familiar hollow feeling invades my chest—the one where it feels like I’m eternally missing something and can’t find it—I head back out with my backpack and books in tow.
After a coffee, I scope out my favorite sneaky spot on the top floor of the library’s reference section. I settle in, take a deep breath of the leather-scented air, and then relax.
This is where I’m most at home.
Between dusty tomes and mahogany wood.
Most people study on the updated floors below in the open areas at the modern tables with all the windows.
Not me. It’s either the creepy basement with dim lights or the top floor where no one visits, except clandestine lovers.
The old metal desks with tall sides built like cubicles line an abandoned room.
A few other pre-meds or engineering students end up here occasionally. Otherwise, it’s quiet.
I crack open my poetry book for Ritual Language and the Poetics of the Sacred Body. The class I’m least interested in. And, of course, one of the humanities required by the university.
Several times, I accidentally lean around the divider to tell Ellis how bored I am. And my heart aches every time I do.
She was supposed to be at my wedding.
I was supposed to attend hers.
Me
Ellis. I miss you.
Wish you were with me now.
It’s unlike me, but I shatter. A sob rips my chest open as thoughts of my best friend flood my mind.
Memories from high school. Soccer. Boys.
Vacations together. That time we sneaked out to go to a concert and narrowly escaped a group of men that was breaking car windows along the alleyway we parked on.
I get up and head to the bathroom in search of tissues to blow my nose. Sadness almost overwhelms me, and I sit in the stall for a while. Just crying.
Is this my life now?
One devoid of friendship and stuck in a marriage I didn’t ask for?
Where did I go wrong?
If I’m making such bad decisions at twenty, is there any hope for my future?
Apollo’s words about making the best of a situation ring back to me, and I grimace. I’m not one to do that. I take the logical approach. What is most likely to happen? And when it comes down to it, I think the worst. It’s hopeless.
After splashing water on my face, I take a long moment to clear my head, then return to my desk.
I freeze.
There’s an open book on my laptop.
One with ancient and disturbing sketches inside.
I flip over the front so I can see the title: Aeschylus: Prometheus Bound.
The page that was left has some sentences underlined neatly in ink.
He then set a great winged eagle upon him, and it fed on his immortal liver.
He now must suffer, till he be taught to accept the sovereignty of Zeus.
Hand to my throat, I flip around in time to spot a shadow disappearing into the darkened stacks. Like they were just standing there. I’m too breathless to scream. So I hurry toward the figure, ready to fight. To shout. To kick… Something.
Is it him?
The man from Thriller Thursday?
Ellis’s murderer?
But when I reach the threshold of the doors to the staircase, there’s no one. Not even an echo of a footstep.
I creep slowly back to my spot. Every bookcase I pass, I’m tense. Ready for someone to jump out at me.
It’s time to leave.
Hands shaking, I stuff everything I have into my bag and scurry down to the first floor. Before I reach the exit, Isa Montez, a third year Omega stops me.
“Hey, Scout!” She never talks to me, so I freeze. I must look terrified.
“Hello.”
“You looking for Ayan?”
Nausea makes my throat tighten. “No, why?” I squeak out the question.
Her brow furrows with confusion. “Oh. I thought he was looking for you.” She points to the doors and shrugs. “Well, he just left.”