So regular updates are pretty much nothing you should expect from me ever, especially now that I'm in a play that takes up 90% of my free time... Sorry about that, but there's not much I can do. The play and school take precedence over this website. Fortunately, though, (for me and for you guys) I've gotten to enjoy a few snow days this week, which means that I had time to work on this chapter.

Hopefully you'll enjoy it! Thanks for all the positive feedback on the last one! :)

Disclaimer: I don't own HoO.

(P.S. I don't know if you noticed, but I made cover art for this story! Yay! You can find a bigger version of it in my art tag on my tumblr... My url is sunshine-in-the-storm if you're interested. :))

Part Three

"You know, if I wanted to make this as cliché as possible, we would head to a county fair and I would win you a giant stuffed bear," Leo told her as they left the restaurant, the memory of spicy pepper still dancing along the edge of Reyna's tongue. She sipped on the second milkshake they'd taken to-go and tried not to think about the feeling of Leo's face so close to hers.

Instead, she rolled the cool beverage around her tongue and swallowed, considering Leo's statement. "A teddy bear?" she said finally. "Really?"

"Not just a teddy bear—a giant stuffed bear," Leo corrected her. "But seeing as Manhattan's a little short on county fairs . . ." Without warning, he grabbed her hand and dragged her through a quaint-looking door. "I decided to do the next best thing." He grinned at her. "Reyna, welcome to The Great American Toy Store."

"Valdez, I'm too old to keep a giant stuffed bear in my apartment—oh, my gods."

The store was gigantic. Shelves lined the walls from floor to ceiling, neatly displaying toys and games ranging from Operation to Littlest Pet Shop to remote control cars to something called Elefun. Lego displays crowded the floors, showcasing intricate details that Reyna was sure Leo appreciated, and an intense Hot Wheels racetrack dominated one corner. Even better, however (although she'd never admit that out loud), were the lower, chest-high containers scattered all over the shop—containers crammed full of every type of stuffed animal imaginable. And to top it all off, the store smelled inexplicably of vanilla. Gods, Reyna had always thought places like this were fantasies concocted in feel-good children's books. She had no idea they actually existed.

Leo watched her take in the store with a soft smile on his face. "Breaking through the famously-tough praetor's shell, am I?" he chuckled. "When was the last time you walked through an honest-to-gods toy store?"

Reyna figured her mouth was probably hanging open, but she couldn't help it. "I . . . never," she admitted.

"Never?" he gaped. "Mi reina, how did you spend your childhood?"

An image of her father glaring down at her, slowly deteriorating into a mania, flashed through Reyna's head, and she winced. "I'd, uh, rather not say."

A curse slipped through Leo's lips, and a nearby mother glared at them and steered her kids away. Leo didn't seem to notice. "Gods, I'm sorry, Reyna," he said, looking stricken. "I didn't mean—"

"Oh, don't worry about it," she hurried to reassure him. "It was a long time ago, and it's not your fault for bringing it back up. It's not like you know what happened, anyway."

The unspoken implication—and I'm not going to tell you what happened—stuck in the air between them, and Leo glared at the ground. "Still, I know about Styx-y childhoods," he mumbled. "That was dumb of me."

"Leo, it's okay," she repeated. "Really." When he didn't acknowledge her, Reyna took his hand without thinking, hoping to get his attention.

It worked. Leo jumped and looked at her with wide eyes, and Reyna quickly let go. "Sorry."

Slowly, a grin swept across Leo's face. "Oh, don't worry about it, mi reina," he told her, and Reyna could almost see him shaking off his guilt at bringing up her past.
"We're on a date, aren't we? And couples on a date hold hands. It's a normal couple-y thing to do." And with that, he grabbed her hand decisively. Reyna couldn't help lacing her fingers through his—it felt too natural, as unnatural as this whole fake-date was. "Now let's go get you a giant stuffed bear."

And with that, he started weaving his way to the back, taking advantage of their hand-holding to drag Reyna behind him. "Valdez, wait," Reyna protested. "I haven't even gotten a chance to look around yet—we're missing everything—Valdez look it's a unicorn-bear hybrid and you're missing it—Valdez—"

"Please, reina, we haven't even gotten to the good stuff yet," Leo said dismissively. "Anything worth our time is on the second floor."

Reyna stopped short, yanking Leo backwards until he stopped too. "There's a second floor?" she gasped.

He laughed, his eyes sweeping over her face with untamed glee. "He—heck yeah there's a second floor," he amended, darting a glance at a nearby toddler. "They store all the best toys there, where only the worthy customers will find them."

Reyna snorted. "Valdez—"

"The customers willing to scour the bottom of every container to find perfection in toy form."

"Valdez—"

"The customers who are so dedicated to the art of toy-finding that they will continue their journey up an entire flight of stairs!"

"VALDEZ."

He finally stopped blathering on and looked at her. "Yeah?"

"Is the second floor as big as this one?"

He shrugged. "Not quite—but what it lacks in quantity, it makes up for by raining quality in hurricane proportions."

Reyna grinned. "Excellent. This part was a little overwhelming anyway." And before Leo could start pulling her toward the second floor again, Reyna bounded up the stairs two at a time and dragged him along instead.

Reyna wasn't sure how long they spent on the second floor, sorting through the store's vast collection of teddy bears, before Leo laughed and called her over. "Okay, no. Forget the bear. Reyna, look at this." She turned and saw him holding an adorable plush wolf. "Brings you straight back to your days at Camp Jupiter, am I right?"

"It would," she said, "if all the wolves at camp weren't a thousand times more deadly than that one."

Leo stuck his tongue out at her. "Well, The Great American Toy Store doesn't really sell ravenous, bloodthirsty wolves, Praetor. You're going to have to make do with this one. Or . . ." He paused as something caught his eyes. "Hey, maybe you'd prefer this instead." Before Reyna could blink, Leo had shoved a life-sized stuffed greyhound into her arms.

Her mouth dropped open. "Leo, I . . ."

"You said you missed Aurum and Argentum like crazy, right?" Leo reminded her. "That it killed you to have to leave them with Frank and Hazel because your landlord can't stand pets, even if they're the world's most hypoallergenic dogs?" Reyna couldn't help but smile at that. "Yeah, you know I'm right. Anyway, I figured that while you couldn't keep Aurum and Argentum in your apartment, you can at least stick it to your landlord with the best possible substitute."

Reyna stared at him. "Wow," she said slowly. "That's . . . that's actually really sweet."

To her surprise, Leo's face reddened. "Well, good," he said. "Sweet is what I'm going for, right? Sweet is what will raise my rating of potential?"

It was like Leo had thrown her straight back into reality. "Oh . . . right," she said. "Of course. Consider your rating raised. But since this isn't a real date or anything, you don't have to actually get this greyhound for me. I'm sure it's super expensive—these toy stores are always ridiculously overpriced." She deposited it reluctantly into Leo's arms. "Annabeth would probably freak out if she came home and saw it anyway."

Leo froze, looking from her, to the greyhound, and back to her. Then he grinned carefully and said, "Oh, come on. That's even more reason to get it. It's always fun to see the hardened, unshakable daughter of Athena lose her cool for once."

"Leo, I—"

"Consider it an apology for bursting in on you earlier," he interrupted. "Don't worry about it, Reyna."

Then he checked the price tag. "On second thought," he muttered, "do you mind if I get you the wolf after all?"

"What?" she frowned, snatching the greyhound back. "How much does it cost . . . ?" Her voice trailed off as she found the price tag. It took her ten seconds to process the amount, and then she whistled under her breath. "Holy Styx. I told you these toy stores are always ridiculously overpriced."

"No kidding," Leo said, laughing when she carefully returned the costly dog to its spot in the collection. Then he dangled the wolf under her nose. "So what do you say? Will you allow me to buy you something even better than a giant stuffed bear?"

Reyna hesitated. "This is ridiculous. You already bought me dinner—"

"Of course I bought you dinner," Leo said dismissively. "That was the only reason you agreed to go on this fake date with me in the first place. And now I'm going to buy you this stuffed wolf as a thank-you for going along with . . . with whatever this is." He dropped the toy into her arms before Reyna could protest. "And . . . and since this isn't a real date and you don't really want me to give you a stuffed wolf, you can donate this to a children's hospital tomorrow, and I won't be offended. Okay?"

Reyna looked down at the wolf's glass eyes. "Okay."

It wasn't until they were back on the sidewalk with the wolf safely packaged away that Reyna thought to ask Leo, "So how did you find out about this place anyway?"

To her surprise, Leo froze. "I . . . uh . . ." His eyes darted from the store sign to the wolf in her hands, and he didn't finish.

Reyna started to get a bad feeling in her stomach that had nothing to do with their spicy dinner. "This is one of those topics you don't bring up on a first date, isn't it?" she guessed. "Especially not on a fake first date."

He bit his lip. "I guess . . . I guess childhood is a touchy subject for both of us."

Reyna winced. "Just another side effect of being a demigod," she said, not even bothering to hide the bitterness in her voice. "We didn't get the luxury of normal childhoods."

Leo fiddled with something in his tool belt, not answering, not even meeting her eyes. They walked on in silence, the toy store bag hanging limply on Reyna's arm while she tried to decide what to say. After all the fun they'd had tonight, she refused to let them end this date with pent-up memories and half-glances. Still, she wasn't ready to air out her entire life story tonight. It was like she'd said. That kind of conversation wasn't meant for a fake first date.

Finally, she figured out what to say and whirled toward Leo, her braid and bag whipping around at the same time. "I—"

"My—"

They looked at each other, and a shaky laugh broke the silence they'd built up. "Not this again," Reyna sighed. She pressed her lips together and decided it was her job to make the peace-offering, since she was the one who had broached the subject of childhoods. "I'll go first."

To her surprise, Leo objected. "You went first last time. I'll go."

"Leo—"

"I'll go." He sighed. "It's not even a bad memory. Not really. My mom caught a break one time, way back when I was five. She got a chance to attend some sort of mechanical conference here in New York—I was way too young to remember any details—and she took it right away. I got to ride a plane—a plane, you have no idea how excited I was about that—and when she wasn't working, we saw everything, playing the part of money-laden tourists even though we didn't have any money."

Reyna was starting to see how the toy store fit in. "And one of those things you saw . . . ?"

"The Great American Toy Store," Leo confirmed, a tragic smile flitting across his face. "It's a stupid name, but that didn't stop me from seeing a K'Nex display in the window and dragging my mom inside. She couldn't get me out of there for hours." He laughed wryly. "Not that she tried very hard. She got permission from the manager to let us mess around with the displays, as long as we left them in better configurations that we found them in. I think I built a dinosaur family out of Legos? Or something. Point is, it was cool."

Reyna glanced behind her, even though the toy store was out of sight by now. "I guess it left quite an impression if you remembered where it was after all these years."

His smile vanished, and he shoved his hands deeper into his tool belt. "Yeah, well, that wasn't the only time I went to that store. A couple years after my mom . . . after she died, I wound up in a group home in the Bronx. It wasn't, um, a great place to be, so I took the subway and wandered around a lot. Probably shouldn't have, but I did. Wound up at that dumb store more times than I'd like to admit, wasting away as many hours as I could before I had to go back to the Bronx. And then one night . . ." He shrugged. "I just decided not to go back. It took five days for social services to find me."

Reyna stared at Leo. She was having trouble letting his story sink in. "You were alone and homeless in the shadiest part of the state? On purpose? Do you know what the crime rate is like around here?"

Leo kicked at the curb, inspecting cracks in the sidewalk like they were maps that led to buried treasure. "I knew. And it was probably stupid as Styx for me to do that. But at the time it seemed preferable to going back to a house where I heard gunshots in the neighborhood every night and some of the neighbors got a little too attached to their bottles of whiskey."

Reyna twisted the handle of the plastic bag around her wrist, wondering if there were any words strong enough to acknowledge what he'd just told her. In the end, she just offered up a secret of her own and hoped that it was enough. "I killed my father back in Puerto Rico."

That was enough to jerk Leo's hands out of his tool belt. "What—?"

"He'd deteriorated into something that was basically a deranged ghost, and I was sure he'd just killed my sister . . . but yeah. I killed what was left of my father. Stabbed him with an Imperial gold cutlass and did my best to never look back." She rubbed her forearm, where the burned record of her legion service reminded her of the secret she almost never shared. "I can't always manage that, but I try."

Reyna kept her eyes on her arm and waited for Leo to say something. When he stayed silent, she swallowed hard and said, "Well, now you know. I guess it kind of puts a damper on this fake date, but I just—"

"Hey! Hey, Reyna, it's fine." Leo tugged on Reyna's arm until she looked at him. His eyes were large and dark and serious, but he wasn't backing away. "I know what it's like to think you killed your parent, you know," he said quietly. "I'm sure someone's told you my whole workshop-fire sob story by now."

Reyna wasn't sure what he wanted her to say to that, so she just bit her lip and nodded. "So you know I spent years thinking my mom's death was my fault—but it wasn't. And your dad's death isn't your fault either. You said he was . . . a deranged ghost? From what I can tell, it kinda sounds like he was already dead before you did anything. I hope you haven't been beating yourself up over this since you left Puerto Rico." He tilted his head and narrowed his eyes. "You haven't, have you?"

Reyna managed a smile. "No, Valdez, you're not the first person to tell me that what I did in Puerto Rico doesn't make me a terrible person. It's been . . . thirteen years, at least? I've gotten past all that. I just figured—one sob story deserves another, right?"

Leo laughed out loud, and his eyes lightened up a little. "Yeah, something like that."

Reyna stuck out her tongue. It was a childish gesture she hadn't used since Circe's spa, but around this stupid mechanic, it felt natural. "Something like that. Now would you like to let go of my arm, por favor?"

"Oh! Sorry." He yanked his hand back and curled it into a fist inside his tool belt. "So, um, how about we do something lighthearted for the next part of this fake date?"

Reyna hugged herself, hating that she could still feel the touch of his fingers on her arm. "I think that sounds like a good change of pace. I've had enough seriousness to last the rest of the night."

So for the rest of the night, Leo carefully circumvented anything serious. They wandered around Manhattan having all sorts of ridiculous fun, but they never brought up the subject of childhoods again. By the time the cab Leo had hailed stopped in front of her apartment complex, Reyna had almost forgotten the secrets they'd shared. Almost.

Leo paid the cab driver and waved him off jauntily before turning to Reyna. "So . . ."

"So," Reyna said, her heart sinking. "It looks like this fake date is over."

"Yeah," he said, scuffing his shoe on the concrete sidewalk. "In that case, I guess it's time to end this date cliché with the most cliché ending of all. But I . . ." He hesitated, then peered across at Reyna with dark eyes that matched her own. "Actually, I don't think this date is quite over yet. First, I must gallantly walk you to your apartment door."

That shocked a laugh out of her. "Oh yeah?"

"Who knows what dangers could be lurking in your building?" he answered, brandishing a hammer with mock paranoia. "It would be irresponsible to let you traverse the halls on your own!" He shoved the hammer back inside his tool belt and grinned sideways. "Not that anyone could survive a fight with you, Praetor."

"Glad to see we understand each other, Valdez."

His grin widened, and he chattered excitedly about everything and nothing as they walked inside. "At least I'll be able to take off my shoes when I get in my apartment," Reyna sighed, wiggling her toes inside her boots. "These barely have any heel, and they're already killing me. I don't know how people survive in those six-inch disasters—are you kidding me?"

"What?"

Reyna gestured at the white sign on the elevator door. "Out of order? I can't believe this. We've already walked halfway around Manhattan tonight, and now we have to deal with stairs?"

Leo laughed. "I thought Rome's illustrious former praetor worked hard to stay in peak physical condition."

"Peak physical condition doesn't account for Styx-y shoes, Valdez," Reyna growled. "Don't make me take out my daggers."

He threw up his hands, and Reyna swore she saw fear cross his face for an instant. But his expression quickly settled into amusement. "But if you killed me with your pointy Imperial gold weapons, who would fix the elevator for you?"

Her eyebrows shot up before she could stop them. "You could do that?"

"Well, sure. I'm not a mechanic for nothing," Leo bragged. "I'd have to do some Hephaestus-style inspecting to be sure, but I'd bet they're using a mechanical relay system that should have been updated to one with a microprocessor ages ago. Or maybe the door operators have worn down and need to be replaced." He patted the elevator doors gently. "Has the building owner been neglecting your maintenance, buddy? I bet you haven't been serviced in months. Don't worry. I'll get you up to date until you're functioning better than the freaky mythological elevator in the Empire State Building—"

"Um, Valdez?"

He whipped around, leaving his palm pressed against the elevator. "Yeah?"

"How long do you think this elevator repair will take?"

He shrugged. "Depends on a lot of things, I guess. How long it takes us to find the building owner and convince him to let me take a lot at the elevator control system, the severity of the problem, whether I have the right components to make the repair . . ."

"Leo! Ballpark!"

"Oh. Right. Couple hours, maybe?"

Reyna gaped at him. "This is ridiculous. We should just take the stairs."

He frowned. "But I thought your feet hurt."

"They'd hurt more if we had to search the whole building for the owner and then travel to a hardware store to get equipment to fix this dumb elevator!" Reyna sputtered. "It'll take us like five minutes to walk up to the third floor. At most."

Leo pouted. "I know. That's why I wanted to fix the elevator instead."

"What?"

"Oh come on, mi reina, isn't it obvious? I wanted to spend a little more time in the sunshine of your company."

Reyna's mouth opened and closed, trying to find a good way to answer. But in the end, all she managed was, "Sunshine? Me? I thought you called Calypso that."

Leo's cheeky smile slid off his face. "I haven't called her that in over a year, Reyna, and with good reason. Trust me, your company is much sunnier than hers." Before Reyna could puzzle out a response to that, Leo was slipping past her and opening the door to the stairwell. "So anyway, are we taking these stairs or what? I thought your feet hurt. Why are you still standing around?"

At that, Reyna rolled her shoulders, physically shaking off her surprise. "Coming, idiota. Although I must say it's not very gallant of you to walk ahead of the girl you're escorting. Who knows what dangers may be lurking in my building?"

Leo was already halfway up the first flight, but he turned around and bounded back down towards her, his laughter rocketing around the tight stairwell. "Lo siento, mi reina. But I thought we'd already established that you could dismember anything that tried to attack you. Even in those horrendously uncomfortable shoes."

Reyna stalked past him, flipping her braid over her shoulder. "Still, it's very rude of you to leave me behind. What if I twisted my ankle in these horrendously uncomfortable shoes and required an ambulance?"

Leo followed her, still laughing. "Don't be silly, Reyna. You probably have some ambrosia stuffed down those boots." He wiggled his eyebrows at her. "Still, I must once again offer my sincerest apologies for deserting you, fair queen. I ought not to shirk in my knightly duties again."

"No, you ought not," Reyna said, tilting her chin up. "Or the fair queen will have to pull out her fair daggers."

"Oh, come on, not this again!"

Reyna's lips twitched, but she managed to hide her smile. "Yes, this again," she said. "Anyway, we're here."

"What, we reached the third floor already?"

"Yup."

"Gods. Well, in that case . . ." Leo leaped ahead of her and pushed the door to her floor open, holding it aside for her. "It appears that the gallant knight has safely delivered the fair lady to her grand castle!"

"Yes, he has," she replied, stepping past him. "And since her apartment is right"—she took a few steps forward—"here, I guess his great journey has officially come to an end."

Leo let the stairway door swing shut with a thunk. "You're right," he said. "And that means it's time to fulfill the final date cliché." He squeezed both eyes shut, took a deep breath, and then opened one to peek at her. "That's, um, the goodnight kiss. So, um, I . . ." He hooked both thumbs into the straps of his suspenders and rocked back on his heels. "Can I maybe kiss you now? You know, for dating-potential-rating purposes?"

Reyna's lips parted. "Oh," she said softly. "Um, sure."

He gulped. "Okay, then." And with that, he leaned forward and nudged Reyna's lips with his, wrapping one hand around the small of her back to bring her closer.

It wasn't much of a kiss, really. Reyna had already locked lips with Leo on the couch that afternoon, and that moment had lasted much longer and felt much steamier. And yet somehow, this kiss felt more like . . . like it meant something?

Before Reyna could really process what was going on, though, it was over. Leo took a quick step back and fiddled with a flap on his tool belt. "Well, that was the goodnight kiss, Reyna," he said, talking too fast and loud for eleven o'clock on a Wednesday night. "Date's officially finished. Wanna rate my boyfriend potential now?"

She was silent.

"Remember?" he said, looking at her anxiously. "Scale of one to ten? Tell me how bad my chances are?"

Reyna swallowed. "Sure, I'll rate your boyfriend potential, Valdez," she said. "You're right. It's one ten."

Leo frowned. "That's not a rating. You just repeated what the scale was."

"No, I didn't. One. Ten. A hundred and ten. That's your rating." And then she turned around, fumbled her key into the lock, and stepped inside before she could see the look on Leo's face.

By the time she mustered up the courage to look through the peephole, he was gone.

Will there be another chapter? Is this the end of this story? The world may never know.

(That's a lie. There's totally going to be another chapter. I'm not that cruel. Once again, I have inaccurately guesstimated the length of my stories. I promise this is it, though. Four parts are all you're getting.)