Page 90 of The Best Trick

“Plush bathrobes,” I said.

Thor just picked up a stone and chucked it into the woods.

“Room service,” Zeus said.

“Badass takeover robberies with awesome fucking afterwards,” I said.

I waited for Thor or Odin to add something positive, but they remained quiet.

The four of us had a subdued dinner together—grilled shrimp and squash risotto, a recent favorite, but even that didn’t lift the mood.

I kissed Odin goodnight, saying a silent prayer that he’d have a peaceful sleep for once, and headed off to the room that Zeus and Thor and I shared, snuggling deeply under the covers of one of the big beds that we'd pushed together.

Thor came in with his book soon after and started reading by the light of the little table lamp. I could hear Zeus locking up for the night with Odin. They would’ve checked the perimeter traps and alerts and deemed us safe.

I sighed and grabbed my ereader, flipping through to find something that would match my melancholy mood.

Zeus came in and got on the other side of me. I tried not to let myself dream of the four of us in that bed.

Our time was up soon in this place, so Zeus was looking through travel websites, thinking about where to make our next move. The whole world was our oyster in a lot of ways, but that could sometimes feel overwhelming. Too many choices could sometimes be as bad as too few.

“How do you guys feel about cross-country skiing? Or maybe snowshoeing?” Zeus asked.

Thor groaned.

“Don't knock it until you try it!” Zeus said.

I said, “If there’s an outdoor hot tub and plenty of hot chocolate, plus a nice sauna, I might be into that.”

“Picky,” Thor said.

“Here’s a place that’s an igloo,” Zeus said. “But it looks really posh. An igloo Airbnb—”

“Dude!” Thor said. “I'm drawing the line at an igloo.”

“I’m drawing the line at an igloo, too!” I said. “Gimme that!” I tried to wrest the phone from Zeus’s hand. He held it in the air, and I kept trying to get at it. Eventually the two of us were standing on the bed, laughing, with Thor complaining about the bouncing.

“What's this about staying in afucking-gigloo?”

We all stilled.

Odin stood at the door in his pajamas, wrapped up in some kind of giant puffy thing that I quickly recognized as one of the Paris Hilton comforters.

Come over, come to bed with us!—the plea was on the tip of my tongue.

I kept my lips zipped. I’d asked too many times. Begged too many times.

“Hey,” Zeus said.

Odin stood there, looking unsure. Then, “Got room for one more?”

My pulse raced. “Of course we do!” I got back down and patted the spot on the other side of me from Zeus and Thor, Odin’s traditional place to sleep from the beforetimes.

“If we could use this…” he said, bringing the quilt. “It’s the one Thor had made.”

“Of course!” I said.

Thor sprung up from the bed and tossed aside the plain quilt. “Get in,” he said. “I’ll put it over you.”

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