She disappeared. Popped herself right out of the court and onto her planet Earth to think. She had a lovely view of Lake Louise in western Canada. If she wanted to, she could stay here all day.
Unfortunately, she had to be mature. Damn it. And she suspected her sister might be right. She’d never thought to make herself or her deities immune to the sex drive she’d given every other species. In fact, the gods would have beenreallybummed out if she’d done that—they were such a randy bunch. Especially Zeus! What a man whore!
She took a few deep breaths, remembering the few times she’d experienced sex. Yeah, it was awesome…kind of. The actual loving was wonderful. It was the best part. Birth, however, sucked. If she hadn’t made it painful, overpopulation would have become a huge problem much sooner.
She had given birth to some of the gods and Titans. The Giants nearly killed her, and that was when she’d sworn off sex. How many centuries ago was that? Or was it millennia? Oh, wow. She hadn’t had sex in several thousands of years!
Maybe Karma was right. She needed to get laid. But how? She was related to most of the gods. She couldn’t just pick some random human and risk falling in love—then revealing her big secret. That was what the paranormals were on trial for right now! Mother Nature knew she could be a bitch, but she refused to be a hypocrite.
“Fuck. I’m screwed, and not in the good way.”
* * *
Dr. Aaron Samuels was just finishing a heart transplant when the fingers of his right hand began to shake. He immediately pulled his hands away, took a deep breath, and tried again. When the shaking reoccurred, he looked up at his colleagues, another less experienced but very competent surgeon and two OR nurses.
“Can you take over for me, Erik?”
“Of course,” the surgeon said. He jumped right in and finished attaching the final artery.
Aaron surreptitiously glanced at the nurses’ eyes. Facial expressions could be hard to read in the OR since everyone wore masks. However, after years of working together, these nurses were like reading a book. Their eyes spoke of concern for him and possibly fear for the patient. When they glanced at each other, he saw an unspoken agreement. Without words, they managed to communicate something like “Did you see that?” and “I sure did.”
As soon as the other surgeon had finished closing the patient’s chest, Aaron strode off, hastily removing his bloody gloves. Without a word to anyone, he went straight to the hospital administrator’s office.
The woman’s door was closed, but he smiled at the secretary and asked if he could go in. “It’s important.”
She buzzed her boss.
“Dr. Samuels is here and would like to see you. He says it’s important.”
When the secretary gave her okay, Aaron hurried into the inner office and closed the door behind him.
“I’m sorry to interrupt, Marge. This will only take a moment.”
“Of course, Aaron. What can I do for you?”
“I will be speaking to my director as well, but I’ll need a leave of absence immediately. My hands began shaking in the OR. Erik took over for me, and everything is fine with the patient, but obviously, I’m not fine. I need to speak to a neurologist.”
“Has this happened before?”
“Once. I chalked it up to fatigue. Tom finished for me that time. I don’t want to push my luck.”
“No. You shouldn’t. I’m glad you spoke up, and I’m glad you’re going to get someone to look into the problem. I’ll place you on leave of absence immediately.”
“Thank you.” As Aaron shook the woman’s hand, the look on her face spoke of pity. He hoped to hell there was nothing happening to him that would elicit that look again.
* * *
Someone joined Gaia, but she didn’t look up.
“Sister…”
“Go away, Fate.”
The quiet deity chuckled. “If I had a nickel for every time someone made that wish…” She gracefully moved next to Gaia and rested a hand on her shoulder. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“Then what do you want?”
“It’s whatyouwant, Sister—and how I can help.”
