Chapter Twenty-Three Aphrodite
Chapter Twenty-Three
Aphrodite
“And now you want to take your clothes off,” Aphrodite purred.
Really, it was a shame saying those words under such circumstances, but she needed to get back before Julia suspected her friend’s absence.
Eyes glazed from the spell Aphrodite held her in, Abby obediently unbuttoned her pants and stepped out.
The two women were in the restroom of the Four Seasons bar, which was thankfully an individual bathroom, with its own marble sink, pressed linen hand towels, and a candle in the corner.
Not an Amour candle, Aphrodite was peeved to note, but an ordinary one from Nest.
As Abby undressed, Aphrodite began to do the same. For a moment, she stood in the bathroom wearing nothing but her underwear, a sight that so many would have killed for. But Abby was too entranced to notice.
“Now you want to trade clothes with me,” Aphrodite murmured, and handed Abby the dress she’d been wearing.
She took another long look at the mortal woman, considering her features, the slope of her eyebrows, the freckles on her forearms. And then she concentrated. Hard.
When Aphrodite pulled on Abby’s pants, she no longer looked like herself. She was a perfect clone of Abby, down to the little wisps of hair that wouldn’t stay tucked behind her ears.
None of the other gods had the ability to shape-shift.
Aphrodite could do so thanks to her girdle, an enchanted object that allowed her to adopt the form of any woman, mortal or divine.
Lately, she wore the girdle as a thin gold necklace, though it had taken other forms: a brooch, a cuff, and even once a pair of spangled Manolo heels.
It felt like such a small thing compared to the other gods’ objects of power—Hades’s Helm of Darkness, Poseidon’s trident, Zeus’s thunderbolt.
But shape-shifting could be quite useful, if you were clever about it.
“Now you want to give me your earrings. And your purse,” she commanded. Once Abby handed over the items, Aphrodite fished the woman’s keys from her bag and gave them back. She would return everything else before Abby awoke the next morning.
“A car is waiting for you at the hotel’s valet stand. All you want right now is to get in that car, give the driver your address, and go home to sleep. You want to forget everything that happened after you left the table.”
Aphrodite started to drop her own phone in the purse next to Abby’s, only to notice that the screen had illuminated with a new message. She hesitated before opening it.
Wish you were here, Hephaestus had written, with a photo of the Eiffel Tower.
A strange pang shot through Aphrodite’s chest, and she tucked the phone away without composing a reply.
She couldn’t afford regrets or second-guessing now.
She’d been working on this plan ever since the Curator’s Circle event, when it became clear that Julia wasn’t just a source of annoyance but a real threat.
Clearly, she hadn’t succeeded in breaking up Julia and Ares. It was time for another approach.
Aphrodite had known that Julia was planning to see her best friend in London; Julia couldn’t shut up about it.
So Aphrodite had come to the Four Seasons, too.
She’d enchanted their waitress, giving her a desperate need to go out back and smoke, then shifted into the woman’s mirror image and began waiting on Julia’s table.
She had lingered near the duo, listening intently.
When things sounded juicy, she’d given Abby an insistent urge to run to the bathroom, so that she could then become Abby.
“Goodbye,” she singsonged as the real Abby left the bathroom and stumbled in a daze down the hall.
It was always a bit thrilling, becoming someone else.
Sometimes Aphrodite thought that she, not Melpomene, should have been the goddess of actors and drama.
She thrived on this—the sensation of stepping out of her own life and into someone else’s, of occupying a different-shaped space in the world. Of pretending.
“You okay?” Julia asked when Aphrodite-as-Abby slid into the opposite chair. “You were gone a while.”
“Oh, thanks for getting us more drinks!” Aphrodite reached for the cocktail before her. Really, couldn’t these women have ordered a vodka martini, or at least a nice Sancerre? Did it have to be a ginger margarita? Well, she would choke it down, if only to encourage Julia to keep drinking.
“Sorry. Before I left, we were talking about…” Aphrodite trailed off, and to her relief, Julia filled in the rest of the sentence.
“We don’t need to talk about Preston,” Julia said swiftly.
“But you’re still upset about it,” Aphrodite ventured, because Julia certainly didn’t seem happy.
“Of course I’m still upset! He dated me for a year, only to use me for my application essay and steal my spot at Harvard Law!”
A romantic betrayal—interesting. Aphrodite could work with this.
“Are you worried that Harry might do something similar?” she prompted.
“What? No.” Julia blew out an angry breath. “Look, I know it isn’t fair of me to draw similarities between them just because they’re both wealthy. That’s what you meant when you said I was pinning Preston’s sins on Harry, right?”
“Right,” Aphrodite said uncertainly. “That was an entirely different relationship.”
“Harry’s money scares me,” Julia went on. “I know he’s not Preston; he isn’t trying to use me. But I worry that he and Preston share the same sense of entitlement, a sense that they’re more important than the rest of the world. How could Harry not feel that way with a family like his?”
You stupid mortal, Aphrodite thought. We are more important than the rest of the world.
Still, she was caught off guard by Julia’s comment. The woman had sounded sincere when she said that Ares’s money scared her.
“If you’re having second thoughts about Harry, I’m here for you,” she offered, but Julia shot her a surprised look.
“No, that’s not it. I love Harry. I’m just…this has all been a lot, and I’m still processing.”
“Of course,” Aphrodite said soothingly.
She wanted to know more about this Preston character, the one who had so wounded Julia that she mistrusted all rich men. “What ever happened to Preston, anyway?” she asked, trying to sound casual.
Julia frowned. “You’re the one who told me to unfollow him, Abby. As I recall, you wanted to hire that voodoo woman in New Orleans to put a curse on him.”
“I’m just curious,” Aphrodite amended. “He was such an asshole, I hope he got what he deserved.”
“No chance. He’s probably campaigning for office already. Remember what he used to say, that he’d be a senator by thirty?” Julia shook her head dismissively. “Just like his father. He thinks politics are for people who want to bend the world to their will, not people who want to actually do good.”
Aphrodite sensed that she wouldn’t be able pry anything more from Julia, at least not now. Time to move on to the main part of her plan.
She smiled and noisily slurped the last of her margarita, then waved at the waitress, who appeared a little dazed after her magically prompted smoke break. “Should we get the check?” she asked Julia. “I was thinking we could go dancing.”
“Dancing?” Julia sounded startled.
“You told me you don’t want a real bachelorette, but can’t we go out, just the two of us? The night is young, and I want to celebrate that we’re reunited!” Aphrodite pleaded.
Julia stared at her, and Aphrodite wondered if she’d laid it on a bit thick. Perhaps Abby didn’t talk like that.
But then Julia laughed and said, “Why the hell not. If this is the only bachelorette I’m going to get, we should make it count.”
· · ·
To her relief, Julia got into the spirit of it all relatively quickly, proving Aphrodite’s theory that all women love to be the center of attention, to act like the Bride with a capital B, if only once.
Aphrodite led them to a tacky sex shop, where they giddily purchased Julia a white sash and rhinestone tiara that would have made Hera shudder, as well as a matching sash for Aphrodite that said Bride Squad.
Then they went to a club, the sort of place that catered to twenty-somethings in tight clothes, dimly lit with funky purple spotlights.
Aphrodite sailed over to the bar and ordered a pair of vodka Red Bulls, caught off guard when the bartender asked for payment.
When she was in her own perfect body, everyone gave her things for free.
“Red Bull? Really?” Julia exclaimed once Aphrodite returned with the drinks.
“I wanted it to feel like college again,” Aphrodite guessed.
Julia burst out laughing. “We never drank this in college!”
“Then we’re making up for lost time,” Aphrodite insisted.
Moments later, the DJ started playing Lady Gaga. Aphrodite inwardly cringed, but Julia tugged at her hand. “Remember when this was our song freshman year?”
Julia and Abby had a different song for every year? As Hera would say, that felt excessive, but a part of Aphrodite was jealous. She wondered what it felt like, making that sort of memory with a friend.
Julia’s brow furrowed, and she reached for her bag. “I think Harry might be calling—”
“Let him wait! This is your night,” Aphrodite protested, pulling Julia onto a table. “Come on, you’re getting married!”
Julia played right into her hands. She downed the vodka Red Bull and then a tequila shot; she laughed alongside Aphrodite, bumping her hips and tossing her sweaty hair in dance moves that were more ridiculous than suggestive.
Aphrodite hated Julia a little bit, for being so beautiful and carefree even in her drunkenness.
She glanced to the corner and caught the gleam of a camera lens in the dim light. Perfect.
“I love you so much, Abby,” Julia half-shouted, throwing her arms around Aphrodite. “Thank you for tonight. I needed this.”
With her arms around Aphrodite, her heartbeat elevated from the alcohol and adrenaline, Julia seemed so painfully human. So frail. Was this how Aphrodite had felt to Hephaestus back when she was mortal—her body so breakable, so small?
Why does Ares want to marry you? she thought in bewilderment. What makes you special?
Then she remembered that she was a goddess and could get answers.
“So. What is it about Harry?” she asked, over the thump of the music.
She wasn’t Hermes, able to coax humans into spilling their secrets with the magic of his voice, but she could reach into Julia’s mind, could make her want to share secrets with her best friend.
She cast her powers toward Julia, seeking the knot of her desires—
Nothing. She felt like she was hurling her power toward a smooth, blank wall.
“What do you mean? What is it about Harry?” Julia repeated.
Aphrodite tried to focus. Human desires were so easy to find, a pulsating knot of need and craving and envy all tangled together in their chests. She reached for Julia again, but still, she felt nothing.
She’d depleted her powers today. Aphrodite couldn’t remember if she’d ever shape-shifted twice in a single evening. She was going to have one hell of a magic hangover when she woke up, her immortal body stuttering to refuel after she’d pushed it to the breaking point.
But she couldn’t go home yet. The night was young, and Julia was being so obliging, embarrassing herself in ever more incriminating ways.
Aphrodite reached to tug one of the straps of Julia’s dress down over her shoulder. The woman was so oblivious that she didn’t even notice. Perfect.
“Should we get another drink?” Aphrodite suggested.