Layla's POV:

"Why did you take me here?" I demanded as we materialized into the empty throne room on Olympus.

"Layla, calm down hun." Apollo said, leaning down, grabbing me by the shoulder and looking into my eyes. "This is what you want, trust me,you want to be with me, you always have. I have seen it. You admitted it that you're in love with me, I don't understand why all of a sudden you have changed your mind."

His colbolt blue eyes bore onto mine, he was trying to manipulate me. He wanted me to give in, to just stop fussing around and say 'I do' already. And for me to get out of here, out of this wedding, I would have to do exactly that.

I slowly smiled a big smile, "I think I need to go dress shopping."

Apollo grinned back, knowing he had conquered me, "Aphrodite will take you right away while I make some... arrangements."

Next to us there was a bright flash, "I heard my name?" Aphrodite was dressed in heels too high and a gold sequence mini dress.

"Layla needs a dress, and shoes to match her new ring." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a velvet box. Inside was a moderate sized diamond on a silver band, he knew I didn't like flashy things, the ring was perfect. His hand shook as he slipped it onto my left ring finger. He looked back into my eyes and smiled again.

Not the manipulative kind, but the real kind, the kind that reminded me why I had loved him in the first place. Or love him. I didn't even know anymore.

"Fifth Avenue is calling!" Aphrodite squealed. "Maybe we'll hit up Paris too!"

She grabbed my wrist and before Apollo could kiss me goodbye we were in a dress shop, and I was already looking into a mirror and in a puffy white dress that was absolutely hideous. I shook my head wildly, Aphrodite pouted. But snapped her fingers and another dress appeared on my body.

"Okay, I could get used to shopping like this." There was no hassle of taking clothes on and off, the gods had it easy.

"I know right?" Aphrodite agreed, "But this dress is not doing you any favors."

I frowned, I kind of liked it, the halter made tamed the intricate bead work at the bottom.

"With you slim body, small shoulders, and big chest, you're definitely going strapless."

Before I could protest I was already in a strapless dress that hugged my body and was lined with pearls and diamonds across my chest, they faded out down the dress. She was right. Something about this dress was just me. I tilted my head and turned so I could see the back in the mirror, I tried to find something wrong with it.

I walked over to the chair next to her and slumped into into it, before my butt hit the cushion I was changed back into my regular clothes.

"Let's not ruin the dress sweety." She said with urgency.

I looked at her, "What am I doing? Why am I shopping for a dress so I can get married to someone that I don't even want to marry?"

Aphrodite looked away, "Because that's the way it goes." She slowly.

"But I'm just sixteen."

The goddess was silent was silent for a long time, "Which is why you're going to walk out of here."

"Wait-what?"

"Let me tell you a little secret Layla," Aphrodite started, "They call me heartless, my daughters, my sons, my aunts, my uncles, my cousins, my brothers, my sisters, my peers, my enemies, my lovers, my husband. I'm heartless to them. I've spent two thousand years in a loveless marriage, cheating on Hephaestus with someone I still don't truly love. It's possible that the goddess of love has never truly fallen in love. It's easy to make someone fall for you, but it's hard to fall for them too though. Apollo has been the same way for years, until he met you. I've never sensed his love so strong for someone before. But you have to go, you have leave now."

"But this is-"

"Uncharacteristicly nice of me?"

"Well... yeah."

"No one deserves to end up like me Layla, I may be heartless but I'm not not evil."

"But-"

"Go before I change my mind." She was back to her old self.

"Um, thanks."

I walked towards the door, "But one more thing."

I was waiting for the catch. Aphrodite stood up and narrowed her eyes at me.

"I can't let you leave without cursing you just a tiny bit." An invisible force lifted up my left hand, the ring floated off of my hand without her touching it and a silver necklace chain appeared. "You will forever wear this ring around your neck, the chain will never unclasp, it will never slip over your head, and no saw or machine can ever break it apart, you will wear it in your coffin at your funeral. It will tell all future lovers that you were once in love with someone else, and may never get over him. And," The dress that I liked so much appeared, two pearls unraveled themselves off the dress and slipped onto the chain, one on each side of the ring. "These pearls will represent Seth, and Rex. So you will always remember the pain you are putting all three men though."

The necklace floated onto me, the pearls and diamond weighed down my neck, it seemed to weight a hundred pounds. My burden to carry forever.

"Now you can go, there's a car for you to drive out of here just outside of the shop. I'll keep Apollo distracted. I have a plan for the wedding, all you have to do is drive." She flashed a sinister smile.

"Thank you." I said, wanting to give her a hug, but I didn't have the guts, and I just wanted to get out of there.

I pushed through a plush door and into the main dress shop where mannequins wore $5,000 dresses, the woman sitting behind the front desk shot a botox filled grin at me. I exited the shop and was greeted by a heavy snow fall, taxi drivers drove slower than usual and huge snow plows raced up and down the crammed New York City streets. I spotted the car immediately, the license plate said 'LOVE' on it with the 'O' and a heart. It was a small Chevy car, but the keys were in the ignition, and I just wanted to get to the nearest train station. As I warmed up the car I wondered if anyone was looking for me, if anyone noticed I was gone. What time was it? 1 o'clock?

I pushed the thought aside and pulled out of my parking spot, launched into a maze of streets that were unfamiliar to me. Brooklyn was more of my territory, that's where I grew up until I was twelve, New York City was foreign to me, I never came here much because my mother was scared that I would run into my father there, or more afraid that she would see him and not be able to control herself.

Traffic wasn't horrendous, like I thought it was going to be, we might not have been on a crowded part of the city. As I was stuck at a red light played with the necklace between my fingers. My lucky day. Well, I guess I shouldn't be too sarcastic about that because Aphrodite was the one who set me "free". I felt bad for her, what she said was true, she was the popular girl that absolutely nobody liked, but they couldn't resist her either. The Regina George of the gods, minus the broken back. She was forced into marrying Hephaestus the same way Apollo was forcing me to marry him. Everyone hated her because she didn't love her husband, but she never chose him, people would probably look at me the same way when I finally cracked after how many centuries of immortality. She saved me.

The light turned green and I started forward. From the corner of my eye I could see the headlights of another truck through the snowy haze but I didn't think anything of it. My mistake. In seconds the car I was in was being tossed uncontrollably through the air. Time slowed, the necklace floated in front of my eyes as I screamed as if Seth, Apollo, and Rex were the last things I would ever see.

There was a sickening crunch-

Jacob's POV:

"You're saying that she left me for someone who will never treat her the way I can?" Seth said, seething.

He was furious, but I was too. I didn't think Layla would actually choose to marry Apollo. But now Seth had lost his reason for existing and I knew he wouldn't stop until he got her back. Which wouldn't be easy, there was no way for us to get to Olympus and stop the wedding. The farthest we could get was the Empire State Building, but not even close to Olympus.

"Seth," I started, he was about to change, but he couldn't do it in the camp. "I know it's a lot but you really need to camp down, at least until we get out of here."

If he phased in the camp, we would be in big trouble and there would be practically no way to get him out of here with out any of these kids getting to us first. For some reason I got the feeling that they had faced way worse than giant wolves, not that we couldn't take them, but their weapons make it hard for us heal quickly, we couldn't risk a major wound. That was why we were already half way up the humongous hill that we crashed through the day before. The guards at the top of the hill were already looking sternly at us.

When we reached the summit I reached into my pocket and pulled out two gold coins that Layla had given us to bribe any of the campers off. I flipped them to the two guards and they nodded to us and returned to searching the hills for any threats.

"Come on man." I said, pulling Seth across the boarder.

"Why her? Why did I have to imprint on someone like her? Someone that doesn't even have the decency to say good bye or even tell me that she's in love with a god for the love of all things holy." Seth ranted, starting to shake as we got farther down the hill. "And that... two thousand year old... pedophile just always knows exactly what to say to make her cozy up to him when ever he needed it. It was all a set up! And she still left me for him!"

He burst into the air and phased. I sighed and phased too, making sure I picked up my back pack that had all of our cash and clothes inside of it. I ran after him, but there was no stopping him.

Where are you going?

Home. Away from here. Seth thought.

No, we are not going home Seth, you're going to fight for her.

She made her decision that first night she cheated on me with him. I never had a chance, there's no reason to convince her to stay with me if she doesn't even love me! It was a waste of time to come here. It was a waste of time just knowing her.

I tackled him from behind and pinned him beneath my paws. He didn't know what he was saying, he knew he couldn't live without, he was practically throwing himself off of a bridge. Seth couldn't be Seth anymore without Layla, she was apart of him whether he liked it or not.

YOU ARE GOING TO FIGHT FOR HER DO YOU HEAR ME? We are going to New York City right NOW and we are going to get her back or else you will DESTROY yourself!

Don't tell me what to do Jake, I never said anything when you lost Bella to Edward, or when Nessa had to move to Alaska and you weren't invited. So you just leave me alone. I'm going home without her, just accept it.

You will NOT go home and drink yourself away the way you always do when things don't go your way. You leave and it's over forever, I'm not going to fight your battles for you Seth, not this time.

I don't care what you say Jake, I'm going home.

Then you don't love her.

That got his attention. He looked at me with hatred.

What did you say?

If you leave, then you don't love her, simple as that.

Seth shoved himself from out from under me and went for my neck, his teeth bit deeply through my fur and sliced through my skin. I didn't fight back, he needed to let it out, I had him right where I wanted him anyway. For the first time in the history of my existence, Seth had me pinned, something that I wouldn't have the heart to tell him that I let him do.

Don't ever say that I don't love her, if I didn't love her we would still be stuck on the rez listening to Nessa and Leah whine. I love her with everything I have and she doesn't. Do you know how that feels?

I glared at him, Yeah, actually, I do.

He shook his head and unpinned me, in the matter of seconds, he took off.

Where are you going now?

New York City, asshole.

I smiled in my mind, my plan came through. He's just so easy to manipulate.

About an hour later, we were in the middle of the city (in human form) lost with no knowledge of where we were or how to get to where we wanted. All I knew is that we were on 5th Avenue with a bunch of she-she stores that looked extremely over priced and it was snowing terribly. People bundled in their parkas, braving the winter wind and snow looked at Seth and I like we were crazy since we were just in sweatshirts and jeans.

Traffic was backed up, horns honked and people shouted at others through the window. There was a street light up ahead that seemed like the epicenter of all the traffic madness. Police were directing traffic and I as we got closer we understood why. An SUV's front end was bent into another car (that was a complete pancake) that had been rammed into one of those huge snow plows.

Seth stopped dead in his tracks. "Do you smell that?" He asked.

I sniffed the air, my nostrils erupted with a familiar scent that seemed too strong, "Layla."

Seth walked a little faster.

"She could just be in traffic." I said looking through the windows of random cars blocked in the mess.

"No, shes-" He stopped talking, I immediately saw why.

Rescue workers were pulling out the bloodied, broken body of Layla Brice.

I told you this one would be out realitively soon! Next chapter might take a little longer depending on how things go, hope you enjoyed it! -Aims