Page 70 of The Little Shop of Grand Curiosities

Apollo removed his fingers to slip his hands under my knees. “Well, you did want me to grovel…” With one sharp pull, he brought me to the very edge of the counter and pushed my legs further apart.

Then he got to his knees. He knelt, and I just knew that there was no god or force in this world powerful enough to save me from this man now because the way he stared up at me with his tousled hair and swollen lips and rumpled shirt, was so feral and hungry that I felt utterly and thoroughly consumed.

But he was patient as he seized my left calf and traced his lips up my leg, kissing, tasting, savoring. That was the thing about Apollo. He was a head-splitting paradox of harshness and gentleness, and he had this way, this effortless way of making you crave both at the same time.

“Gods, you’re so beautiful,” he murmured against my skin before leaving two slow, reverent kisses on each of my bruised knees. “I’m so sorry you got hurt today.”

I stared down at him, breathless and mesmerized at the softened sight of him in the flickering firelight. “I just stumbled. It’s not a big deal.”

“It is to me,” he said as he lowered his mouth on the inner side of my left knee and began trailing up my thigh. I closed my eyes and braced my hands on the counter, my heart pounding, my core aching, my whole body clenched and ready for him.

And then someoneyelped.

“Oh gods!” Isa exclaimed at the same time as Apollo growled, “Oh fuck!”

Quickly, he helped me off the counter and bent to straighten my skirt while Isa clamped her hands over her eyes, hurling all kinds of curses at him.

Apollo, to my further mortification, winked at me as he smoothed his shirt and brushed back his hair. “We’re both decent, Isa. You can open your eyes now.”

Isa split her fingers apart and took a peek, hissing, “There is nothing decent about this.”

“I am so, so sorry,” I mumbled, wishing for the floor to crack in two and swallow me up. “We… we just got carried away.”

“No, you didn’t,” Isa sighed. “It’s that damned potion I’m making. I was looking everywhere for you to give you these annulets.” She held out the two golden bands identical to the one she wore as a potion-maker to protect herself from the magical side effects of her concoctions.

Every muscle in Apollo’s body tensed all at once. He stared at her, pale and alarmed. “What are you talking about?”

Isa gave us a guilty look. “I’m making a potion for a couple with… marital problems. It exudes a certain amount of lustful energy. That’s why I was looking for you to give you these. I knew you’d be affected. It’s quite strong. Gods, I’m so sorry. And Nepheli, I’m sorry for earlier, too. I have such a big mouth…”

She went on with her apologies and explanations, but I couldn’t listen anymore. My heart plummeted to the pit of my stomach. I felt as though I’d been dunked into a pool of ice-cold water, a drowning voice inside my head pleading inconsolably,It wasn’t a lie. It wasn’t a lie—

“Of course,” I heard Apollo whisper to himself, his whole face sinking. He turned to Isa, cutting her off mid-sentence, “Can you give us a moment, please?”

Isa closed her mouth and nodded shakily, looking apologetic. “I’m just going to leave these here,” she said as she left the two annulets on the long, wooden table in the middle of the kitchen.

Apollo waited for his cousin to exit the room before he faced me again. “Nepheli,” he sighed. “I didn’t know. I would have never touched you if—”

“It doesn’t matter,” I choked out, covering the distance between us to brace my hands on his chest. “I don’t regret it—”

He stumbled away, grabbed one annulet from the table, and came to put it on my ring finger, each movement curt and precise. “Do you regret it now?”

A horrible sense of disenchantment befell me. It swept over me like a veil being drawn back to reveal a piece of art. A strange groundlessness, the sort of feeling you got when you accidentally looked yourself in the mirror late at night, and didn’t recognize the person staring back at you. It was not the pang of shame that made every nerve in my body tug inward as if to hide from the world, but the lack of regret that was more shocking and shameful than any mistake.

Yes, my senses sharpened to register things beyond my physicality. But the need was still there. Maybe not as immediate and consuming as a fire, but imperative and effortless as a breath. I still wanted him to take me into his arms. I still wanted him to get me upstairs to his bedroom and make love to me all night long, and let me bury my face in the slope of his back and tell me how it did not matter that he had no heart. That my heart was enough for the both of us.

But that was the problem, wasn’t it? Apollo wouldn’t do any of those things. He would take me on that counter, make me feel wonderful for a few flitting moments, and then put me on a ship tomorrow morning and promise to write me, although we both knew he never would.

I didn’t want to be the kind of person who endured such coldness while secretly waiting for the other person to change. Change was a personal journey. I knew that now. And so I understood that Apollo was in no position to share anything meaningful with me while still looking for himself.

“Go to your room, Nepheli,” he said, cold as the rain. “Lock the door. Forget this happened.”

My heart stuttered in my chest as it tried to reconcile his words with what had just passed between us.

I could not accuse him of playing with my emotions this time, like at Walder’s. This time, we were equal in responsibility. So I swallowed around the boulder in my throat and looked him in the eyes, clinging to my last shred of dignity. “For what it’s worth, it wasn’t just the magic,” I said.

“I know,” he admitted coldly.

It was so easy for him to slip a mask of indifference on his face. Here I was, a trembling mess, and there he stood, cool and collected and looking almost relieved.

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