It’s just business, he says.
Doesn’t feel that way, however.
Even if I wanted to talk to him, I wouldn’t right now. I ignore the flashing screen, tuck my phone back into my pocket, and glide my fingers over Edith’s cheek. “After Eloise’s accident she started experiencing occasional arm pain. Doctors couldn’t find anything wrong with her, and I guess her therapists said it was psychosomatic or something. But Ares found a doctor who believes that she’s got this pain sometimes, and I think they found something.”
I clear my throat. I’m overstepping, but I do it anyway. “I don’t know all the details, that’s not my point. My point is, I can take you to that doctor if that’s what you need. Tell me what you need,princesa.” Desperation claws at my chest as I cup her face, cradling her porcelain skin.
Her whisper is so quiet I barely hear when she speaks. “I need for you to kiss me again, Apollo.”
So I do.
I’d move heaven and earth to help this woman recover, to find her strength, even if it costs me everything I have.
CHAPTER14
Edith
(JANUARY 15TH – DAY 19 POST OP)
Aheavy arm bands across my waist, and a warm body presses against my back. Apollo’s warm breath flutters my hair with each measured exhale. Everything hurts, a constant ache in the very core of my being. But for the first time since I got out of the hospital, I’m well rested. I slept. No nightmares, no night sweats, no bone-deep, skull-piercing agony, or emotional breakdowns.
When Apollo slipped me between the sheets, climbed in next to me, and pulled me to his chest, I passed out, hard. My arm throbs in my cast, my skin itching to feel the air sweep across the tiny hairs on the broken limb.
I shouldn’t have flapping wings in my stomach as my best friend’s thumb runs unhurried strokes back and forth on my arm, but I can’t help it. He’s warm, and strong, and solid. Oh... ohhhhhh. All of him is firm.Allof him.
Holy shit. I don’t need to shift my weight to check. That’s most definitely his boner pressing against my ass.
This is weird. This is so epically fucking strange.
For most of our childhoods I was convinced Apollo had cooties. He’d pull my hair—I’d pull his right back—he’d chase me with worms, so I’d go find spiders. When he turned into a gangly teen, we made fun of each other, and for a while I thought I’d lost him to the gaggle of teenage boys he was friends with, and hockey.
Never once, in all the years we’ve been best friends, have I thought about Apollo de la Peña’s boner. And now it’s nestled against my ass.
I’m not sure when he filled out into this attractive... thing from that gangly thing he used to be, but I think I put it into the memory box right next to making mud cakes together when we were little. And watching him prank his siblings with his twin brother.
It’s like I’m seeing him with fresh eyes, like I’m coming out of a weird friend-zone stupor and an Adonis is waiting for me.
“Don’t make it weird, Edie.”
I bite my lip to stop the groan aching to escape. His morning voice is gravelly, low, and right next to my ear. Don’t make it weird, he says. Dude, your hard dick is against my ass, and I’m lying in your arms. In my world, it doesn’t get much weirder.
It’s as if last night was all a dream. He touched my clit. Actually, that’s not true. He owned my clit. As soon as his fingers sank into my pussy, I belonged to the big spoon curled around me. His fingers sent me to places I’ve never been before, and I’m fighting really hard to find a reason why we can’t be together.
I don’t trust it. I’m not sure what’s changed. Am I so blinded by a need for closeness and comfort that I’m ignoring warning signs that this isn’t a good idea?
He’s still here, right? That’s something. He’s literally seen me through the worst of times, and he’s still here. In fact, he’s more here than ever.
He hasn’t moved against me. His stroking hasn’t stopped, and there’s a throbbing between my thighs that’s driving me closer to moving his hand where I need it to be.
That’s what it is. Rational thought has left the building, and I’m running on vagina brain alone. The Lady Garden has taken control, and it wants a repeat performance of last night.
There isn’t anything Apollo de la Peña puts his mind to that he doesn’t conquer. He’s a master of chess, he’s a top scoring hockey player, and unless he does something to immensely fuck up his degree, he’s going to graduate at the top of his class. No matter what he says.
His idea of a “passing grade” isn’t the same as everyone else’s. If he’s “just” passing, he’s failing.
He’s an achiever. And last night I realized, he’s an achiever in the bedroom too. A shiver rattles through me, followed by his low chuckle next to my ear.
“You’re making it weird,princesa.”
