Аполлион

“And all I could think about was getting you back.” He pressed his lips to my temple and then the hollow of my cheek. “But you’re right. I haven’t been herecompletely.”

“You’re not going to feel guilty over that, too?”

He grinned against the side of my neck, his lips moving against my wildly pounding pulse. “You always have to be such a smartass.”

Looping my arm around his neck, I smiled. “Maybe…” Hope dared to spark. “Are you okay, now? Are we okay?”

“We’re okay.” Aiden kissed me softly and kept on kissing me as he lifted me just by one arm and turned me around. Within seconds, my back was pressing into the cushion and he was over me, fully-clothed and covered with weapons. “I’m okay.”

“You are?”

He smiled and it revealed those dimples. “I will be.”

I started to say something, but his hand drifted down my side, tracing the line of my ribcage and then higher, and I totally forgot what I was going to say. I felt dizzy with expectation, of want and need, and a hundred other things as my heart pounded and my breath grew short.

“Thank you,” he whispered, and then brought his lips to mine again, pressing me closer, until our hips fitted together tightly. Crazy-insane sensations rushed over my body. “Thank you.”

I wasn’t sure how we went from arguing to this, or what he was really thanking me for, but I wasn’t complaining, and in a really twisted way it seemed normal. Aiden worshipped me as if I’d been born worthy of such a beautiful, complicated man, and over the course of that night, he truly showed me that wewere okay, that hewas okay, and, for now, that was what I needed to face tomorrow.

CHAPTER 17

I had a stupid grin on my face for the most of the next day. Even though I was chilly, covered in mud from training in the warded area, and tired from using akasha and the elements, I looked like I’d been smacked with a silly stick.

Only a few times did it slip, and that was when I thought about Seth and the stunt he’d managed to pull yesterday. After Aiden and I… well, when we’d started actually using our mouths for words again, we agreed to keep what had happened between us and Marcus. There was no reason to freak everyone else out, and going by the way Marcus had reacted, it’d been a smart decision.

Marcus hadn’t thrown anything, but he’d been as angry as Aiden.

And I knew that was why Marcus had switched out with Solos when it came to training today. But it was weird beating up my uncle.

Whenever our ragtag group took a break, Aiden was by my side. There were moments when he’d become unbearably quiet and Broody McBroodsters, and I knew he was thinking about what he had done with the Elixir. He was trying though, and that was what mattered.

We ended the day and hobbled back inside, greeted by the scent of the stew Laadan had cooked up. I went upstairs to wash the day’s worth of grime off, and Aiden followed.

Once inside the room, I tossed him a coy look over my shoulder. At least, I thought it was coy, but I probably looked like I had something in my eye.

Aiden grinned nonetheless.

“Are you following me?” I asked, kicking off my boots.

He prowled forward, moving like one of those caged panthers we’d seen at the zoo. “I’m just being here for you, and I think you really need me right now.”

“Ha. Ha.” Out of my shoes, Aiden towered over me, I felt like a hobbit standing in front of him.

Aiden’s grin spread and a dimple in his left cheek appeared. He tucked a strand of my hair back, then his hands dropped and he tugged the shirt out of my cargos. “I think you called it ‘manning up’.”

This wasn’t the kind of manning up I’d been talking about the night before, because even with my limited knowledge of such things, he excelled in that department. But I said nothing as I stared up at him.

Lowering his head, his lips brushed over mine. I was sure I tasted of dirt and sour apple, courtesy of the Blow Pop I’d been nursing earlier, but he made this sound against my mouth, part growl and part something deeper. As the kiss deepened, like he could just devour the taste and feel, I melted against him.

“I really like your idea of manning up,” I murmured, clutching at the front of his shirt.

Aiden chuckled as the tips of his fingers skimmed over my stomach. Heat followed, chasing away the chill in my skin. I reached up, wanting more, always needing more—

“Don’t stop on my account.”

I shrieked at the sound of Apollo’s voice and jerked back, tripping over my feet. Aiden caught my arm, steadying me before I face-planted the floor.

“Gods,” I muttered, placing a hand over my pounding heart. I’d been so caught up in Aiden I hadn’t even sensed Apollo’s presence.

Apollo sat on the edge of the bed, head cocked to the side, one leg crossed over the other. His blond hair was loose, framing a face that was eerily perfect. Vibrant blue eyes stared back at me instead of the creepy all-white eyes of a god. I was surprised that he remembered how much they freaked me out.