Page 7 of Perfectly Matching Again

Demeter slammed the now newly empty glass on the cabinet.

“Not happening, so what’s two?”

Erato grinned.

“You mentioned my mouth twice. I take it that I left a mark, so to speak?”

Demeter growled. Erato’s stomach clenched with anticipation.

“Why. Are. You. Here. Muse?”

This time, her exasperation was no longer tinted with anything except exhaustion.

Erato uncocked her hip and took a tiny step back. Knowing when to retreat was a useful skill and Demeter did not look good. Erato’s heart did the unpleasant thing it had never done until Vegas two months ago. Back then Demeter had looked lonely and sad and, well, Erato was so very good at making women less sad and more satisfied.

“Aphrodite sent me to fix this.”

Honesty was always the best policy, except Demeter’s eyes flashed and Erato reconsidered the wisdom of age old adages.

“Aphrodite can go fuck herself.”

Hades’s earlier contempt for Erato had nothing on the level of dismissal and disparagement Demeter’s voice suddenly took on.

“The Goddess of Love should stick to her own business, having narrowly escaped Zeus’s wrath, despite making a complete mess?—”

“Pardon resorting to numbers again, but for one, Athena is taking care of the fucking. Two?—”

Demeter lifted her hand and effectively shut Erato up.

“Stop with the enumeration. Since you seem intent on being an errand girl, be so very kind and tell your mistress that there is nothing to fix, to mind her own affairs, and to leave me alone. There. This should be simple enough for you to accomplish, right?”

Hades had dismissed her, Aphrodite pretty much made decisions for her. She was used to the Gods being superior to her and behaving accordingly, so why did this particular one hurt? Why did Demeter’s dismissal feel especially acute?

Yes, they had shared a night for the ages, for the books, and Erato was sure she’d write some amazing poetry and stories once the disappointment faded, but it seemed like this one should’ve ended differently. Why? She couldn’t say. It’s not like anything ever ended differently for the Muse of Erotic Poetry.

And so she lowered her eyes, mindful of not letting Demeter see the flash of hurt she couldn’t conceal. However, Demeter did see it and despite her cutting words, she took a step forward and her warm fingertips lifted Erato’s chin.

The sensation was electric, earth shattering. Erato half expected Poseidon to rise from the depths and complain about the unscheduled tsunami that was sure to follow such an earthquake in the middle of the sea.

But Poseidon did not rise. And Demeter continued to look at her with those deep, soulful eyes, full of secrets and pain.

It was Demeter’s pain that made Erato gulp and try to free herself from the barely there hold of the warm fingertips. Fingertips that turned into a steel grip and refused to allow her to escape the penetrating gaze.

Erato peered into the ageless ache of disrespect.

Well, Erato knew what it meant to be alone. Shunned occasionally. But not to the level of “we will take your daughter and give her to the Goddess of the Underworld and there will be nothing you will be allowed to do about it and if you try to rebel, we shall pacify you with empty platitudes and useless promises.”

No, Erato was just a muse, an often forgotten one, despite how deep her influence and authority went.

“And isn’t that a kick in the teeth?”

She said it out loud and watched Demeter’s eyes darken with confusion, followed by regret. Then, with something sharper that edged the sorrowful veil to the side and replaced it with hunger, one that Erato had felt firsthand months ago.

A pause, another, a breath, two, and their lips met with enough force to dunk Poseidon back into the sea had he had the unfortunate curiosity to come up earlier.

The kiss was everything it had been in Vegas. Ravenous and deep, all-consuming, unrelenting. Erato drank like a woman possessed, giving Demeter no quarter. But the Goddess wanted none of those quarters. If this had been anyone else, and if the last two months had gone any other way, Erato would say that Demeter desired her. But then again, it had already been established that she wasn’t the sharpest trident, so this couldn’t possibly be the explanation for the undeniability of the kiss. Nope. That wasn’t it. Something else was and just as Erato lifted a hand and caressed her gorgeous cheekbone, so soft she wanted to lay her own next to it, to feel it, the door banged open.

Erato half-expected her earlier invocations of Poseidon to actually bring him in, curious putz that he was, but as both she and Demeter whirled towards the noise, she began to wish it had been the God of the Sea. He’d mope and be a nuisance along with his mermaids and in the end leave them with some second-hand wisdom borrowed from the thousands of self-help books he secretly devoured to overcome his inferiority complex when it came to his thundering brother.

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