CH 22

I didn't bother to turn and see whom Florine referred to, assuming that if there was someone wishing to approach they would do it regardless if I acknowledged them.

As it was, Florine's vapid parting words had left me with the desire to sit in silence with a cup of coffee and the food I had ordered, which had gone cold and unnoticed during our exchange.

"Kimmer."

I didn't need to look up to know who stood on the other side of the table.

"Guin," I acknowledged without lifting my gaze.
"Am I interrupting?"

"Not at all." The sun was at her back, and when I finally looked up, I squinted at the halo of light around her. "Care for some caramelized onions?" I asked.

Given how my afternoon had started, I should not have been surprised that my meal was served with a side of onions. I wasn't certain if I had neglected to read the description in the menu or if the chef had made a mistake with his presentation of beef and toasted baguette. I recalled reading about roasted potatoes and cheese, but I felt confident the heaping pile of onions that dwarfed the rest of my meal had not been mentioned.

Guin crossed her arms. "Are you offering me people scraps?" she asked.

I grunted, surprised she had remembered my comment from weeks earlier. "My apologies, I suppose I am."

"May I accompany you?"

I started to stand, but she pulled out the chair and seated herself across from me.

"You don't like onions?" she asked.

"Not currently," I answered.

Guin gave me a curious look.

"There was a university supper before the start of the year and the meal was onion soup, salad with onions and vinaigrette dressing, and the main course of liver and onions."

"That is a lot of onions," she agreed.

"Since then I've…refrained from indulging."

She narrowed her eyes and smiled in impish fashion. "You're celibate then?"

I genuinely chuckled at her remark. "Yes, I suppose I am if I've abstained from consuming onions for eight months."

"Then why, may I ask, would you order a meal that came with a side of onions?"

"Clearly I enjoy making myself miserable," I muttered.

She offered a wicked smile, her foot touching my ankle beneath the table. "I suppose there are worse things to give up in life."

I picked off a piece of toasted bread, the underside of which was soaked in cold beef juice and the congealed grease from melted cheese. "Some things aren't worth giving up," I said under my breath.

"Why don't you take a bite of your bread?" she asked.

"I beg your pardon?"

She offered another devilish grin, displaying her perfectly straight teeth. "Why do you break off small pieces? It's like watching a pigeon eat in the park."

"It makes it last longer," I answered, feeling quite self-conscious of Guin's observation.

I had been eating in the same fashion for as long as I could recall. When the cupboards were bare aside from pickled or salted fish, and Alak had been absent for several days, I ate the last of the stale bread one tiny bit at a time, chewing until the hardened crumbs were little more than mush sloshing around my mouth.

It would take me half an hour to finish a piece of bread the size of my fist, my stomach growling and thoughts focused on chewing as if somehow I could ignore the pangs of hunger.

Despite the amount of bread I consumed as a child, it was the one food I never tired of eating, possibly because without it I was certain I would have starved to death.

As much as I wished to believe my habit made me feel fuller, I had not known what it felt like to be sated until an evening at the salon when Hugo purchased me two full meals and insisted I eat it all.

"You're strange," Guin said, her words spoken playfully.

"Are you normal?" I asked, raising a brow.

She shrugged. "Let's pretend we are both normal people seated together at a cafe." She glanced around as if the very thought intrigued her. "And that wasn't your wife who angrily stormed away a moment ago."

I lifted a brow. "That part is the truth. She isn't my wife."

I resisted the urge to say Florine was always angry these days, particularly at me, for which I couldn't blame her.

Guin offered a closed-lip smile dripping with seduction. "What about that beautiful woman in the red carriage from the other day?"

I looked across the table at her, finding it odd that Guin had looked directly at me on the street with no hint of acknowledgement in her gaze. It had been as if she had looked through me.

"A friend," I said, leaving it at that.

"Normal people," she mused. "What do average people do with their lives?"

I took a bite of cheese, which had melted to the plate while my food went from piping hot to cold. "They sit at cafes and watch the pigeons," I said, which was precisely what I was doing. Several beady eyes stared back at me from an empty table where they perched, waiting to see if they would be gifted with a morsel or two.

"And then they return to their apartment where they make passionate love for the rest of the afternoon," Guin said.

I lifted a brow. "I am positive that normal people return to their homes to fuss and fret over their financial state while deciding what to eat for supper. Normal, dull lives lived by normal, dull people until the day they finally die."

"My God, you're the next Lord Byron. Such poetry without an ounce of cynicism."

I grunted. The scenario I described was hardly cynical. It was the type of existence Valgarde and Carmen suffered through on a daily basis, agonizing over their financial state as though at any moment the bank would seize their home and they'd be picking rags in alleys. Their muttered words gave me a headache during the brief time I spent in their home, and I couldn't imagine what it was like to live in their stressful, seemingly loveless lives. My own life was perhaps equally lacking in love, but at least I refrained from disappointing the same person day in and day out.

"Normal is rather dull, isn't it?" Guin said. "Perhaps we should be strange people then." She leaned forward and licked her lips, her eyes locked on mine. "The type of people who spend hours in bed on Fridays, blissfully tangled in each other's arms."

I mirrored her posture, body leaning forward, and eyes narrowed. "I guarantee you, I have every intention," I said, my voice dropping lower and gaze sweeping over her, "of licking and sucking every drop of juice and moist bread until I've finished my meal."

Guin pouted, lower lip jutting out. She sat back and rolled her eyes, which I found highly amusing.

"Honestly, do you care for an onion?" I asked. "Cheese, perhaps?"

She wrinkled her nose, clearly impatient. "I would not."

"The raclette is quite good," I commented. "I've ordered it in the past."

Guin crossed her arms, her lips pulled into a smile of amusement. "Why didn't you want to see me at Jean's home last week?" she asked.

I had completely forgotten that she had stopped by the gathering Jean had canceled because of me. The night I thought for certain was the last time I'd ever see Hugo felt like a lifetime ago when in reality only a week had passed.

"There was an emergency."

"One involving your–"

"No."

She eyed me. "How can you tell me 'no' when I didn't finish speaking?"

"Because."

"You think you know my thoughts?"

I inhaled. "I do, actually."

"Then go on, have at it. What was I about to say?"

I sat back and looked her over. She was dressed in a white and green frock, the jade a perfect compliment to her dark hair and eyes. Her brass jewelry was fashioned in the same pattern as a snake's skin with topaz earring that reminded me of a reptile's eye.

"You have consistently asked if I am married, thus I assume you intend to inquire if the emergency concerned my wife."

Guin appeared amused by my comment. "You are correct."

It both pleased and alarmed me that I knew her well enough to guess what she would say.

"But," she continued, "you should know I already asked Carmelina about your marital status, and she confirmed you are not married, amongst a few other details."

My jaw clenched. Given my most recent encounter with Val's wife, I doubted she had anything positive to say about me.

"I do hope she told you about my Asseryian harem."

Guin turned her head to the side. "But of course. I always suspected you had a secret society of women strewn across Paris, catering to your every carnal desire."

"Must not be a very well-kept secret then," I said more to myself than to Guin.

"It's well known you're a man who has a way with women."

I took another bite of bread soaked in juice, recalling the exact phrase that had led to whatever had happened between us over the last few weeks. It was hardly a relationship by any stretch of the imagination, but it also wasn't as meaningless as I would have preferred.

"So I've been told," I said.

"Why don't you finish your food so you can have your way with me?" she suggested.

"I believe regardless of the time it takes to consume every last bite that is not an onion, you'll still be sitting here, waiting for me."

She sat back, folded her hands, and sighed, proving me correct yet again.

"Do you have children?" she asked suddenly.

"Yes," I answered between bites.

She appeared annoyed by my answer. "How many?"

"Thirty-six of them."

Alarm flitted through her gaze briefly before she rolled her eyes. "You're speaking of your students."

It was a terrible jest, but one I used quite frequently for the sheer satisfaction of seeing someone gape at me before they understood my humor.

"My adoring children," I said.

"You aren't going to ask me the same question?"

I sighed, confident I already knew her reply. Her skin was flawless; not one mark indicating she had carried a child in her womb.

"Do you have children?"

"My God, never."

I finished the rest of my food, aside from a few smaller pieces of bread, and drank the last of the coffee, which had gone from scalding hot to ice cold and disgusting. The waiter returned, I paid for my meal, and stood, tossing the beef-soaked crumbs to the pigeons, who greedily descended upon my offering.

"Finally," Guin said as she took my arm. "Thank God I already know you're worth the wait."

I made no reply to her comment, waiting instead for her to pick between her apartment or mine. I had a feeling she would choose her own bed as she didn't find mine as comfortable.

"What did Carmelina tell you about me?" she asked once we started walking toward her apartment.

"Nothing," I answered.

Guin looked at me sharply. "Not a word?"

"I haven't spoken to Carmen in a few weeks," I said.

It was the truth; I hadn't spoken to Carmen since the last dinner party I'd attended, and the words exchanged between us lasted mere seconds. I couldn't remember the last time we'd held a conversation with more than a bland, 'You look well, what a pleasure to see you.'

When Valgarde and Carmen first started their courtship, I'd still been living with him and did my best to remain cordial and mostly unseen when it came to the woman he fancied.

She had been warmer toward me then, beautiful in physical appearance and with a genuinely welcoming personality. She was enamored with Val, as if he hung the moon and stars for her, and in turn, she expressed how much she looked forward to having me as a brother, given that she had only sisters.

As a child I'd thought of having a sister as simply dreadful, but Carmen was witty and loved to entertain, and she told riveting stories to guests at her parties. I could see why Val was in love with her, although I questioned what she saw in my cousin as he was much more reserved.

And then one day, when Elizabeth was quite young and toddling about the dining room, I stopped by for supper on a Sunday night, went to kiss Carmen on the cheek as I'd done every time since she'd married my cousin, and she turned away. I started to address her, but she walked out of the room and avoided me for the rest of the evening.

From that moment on, the friendly young woman who had handed me her newborn daughter before her husband arrived, the sister who had fondly called me her favorite brother, became a stranger for reasons that remained unexplained.

"She's a lovely woman," Guin said.

I bobbed my head in acknowledgment of her statement. Carmen had been joyful, years earlier, but I no longer had any idea what she was like.

"You don't think so?"

"I have no opinion either way," I answered.

"But she's married to your brother. How can you have no opinion?"

"Val–Joshua–is not my brother," I firmly said. "He's my cousin, as I have previously told you."

"Yes, I know, but Carmelina said you were raised as brothers. Doesn't that count for something?"

My jaw clenched. Carmen, who for years had barely said a word to me in person for almost a decade, had certainly been quite forthcoming about the details of my life. "Carmen didn't live with us."

"Where did you grow up?"

"In a rotting tree stump in the woods," I dryly said, my irritation bleeding into our conversation.

Guin issued quite the pointed look, one that indicated she may have regretted waiting for me to finish my meal.

"In a German castle," I answered lightly, despite still growing tired of her questions regarding subjects I had no desire to discuss. "I am the son of a Duke."

Guin gave me a sideways look as if she wasn't sure she wished to play along. "With a harem?"

"That was merely a rumor started by uncouth, jealous peasants."

At last she smiled. "Then I am on the arm of royalty?"

I straightened my back. "Most certainly."

Guin unexpectedly leaned into me and I found I did the same, pressing my arm to hers. It was a completely different feeling of intimacy than what I was accustomed to experiencing behind closed doors, where urgent breaths and whispered pleas of desire replaced mundane conversation.

The way her arm brushed against mine with each step felt like something normal people experienced, as though we were two ordinary people involved in a courtship out for a stroll together on a cloudless Friday afternoon.

How simple yet strange it seemed to walk beside her. The back of her hand bumped against mine and suddenly our fingers were entwined as if a magnet pulled us together. Immediately my stomach felt as if a loose knot was suddenly pulled tight, a sensation that was distantly familiar.

My breath hitched and I waited for the feeling to pass, but it remained, and I could think of nothing else save what a gentle pleasure it provided.

We walked for a while in comfortable silence, mutually joined by our entwined hands. I wondered if Guin noticed the couples we passed, women gazing into the eyes of their male companions, who smiled warmly back at them in return. Some strolled together, arm in arm, dutifully looking ahead as they engaged in conversation, while others simply strolled beside each other, stealing glances as they proceeded down the boulevard.

I thought of the afternoons where I purposely waited in the park for hours, hoping Florine would stroll by, yellow parasol over her shoulder. Three hours of sketching the same dull bench and tree seemed worth it when she appeared along the curve in the path.

At first she took no notice of me, but once she came to realize I was sitting there nearly every day, she would shake her head, then smile at me in a way that made my stomach flutter like nothing I'd ever experienced.

Are you out here being a nuisance again, she would ask. Back then her sternness was not necessarily meant to be taken as unfriendly, it was simply the manner in which she spoke to every man who had the audacity to approach her.

Quite the contrary. I am far less of a nuisance while waiting for you.

Ah, then you are waiting for me, Monsieur?

Until there is nothing but moonlight overhead, if that is what it would take to see you again.

Her smile was radiant and filled me with warmth that would rival the sun. I would grin back at her, hoping she would spend a moment to grace me with a few more words from her lovely mouth.

Sooner or later you will grow roots from sitting in the grass, she would say, tapping me on the shoulder with her umbrella as if she wished to reprimand me.

And I would rip them out simply to see you.

She would roll her eyes and then I would climb to my feet, greet her warmly with another smile, and ask if I could walk her home. On the days she agreed, the whole world seemed more magnificent and alive. I felt certain that this was how dogs felt when their masters returned; a great sense of both joy and relief that they were no longer alone.

And somehow, walk after walk, smile after smile, hands held and lips touching, an offer to see her safely home became a secret courtship, one that I thought would sustain me until my dying breath.

How swiftly I had learned that my romantic notions were little more than the workings of a fairytale and that the courtship I thought would lead to a lifetime of affection lasted a brief nine months. The butterflies no longer fluttered, the knot pulled tight in my belly unraveling.

Seventeen years later, the affection had turned to indifference with moments of disdain when we were in each other's company.

I glanced at Guin from the corner of my eye. Courtship no longer interested me as it had in my youth. It couldn't interest me as I had no desire to experience such erratic emotions again, falling victim to hope

I attempted to look straight ahead, but Guin's expression was difficult to avoid. She looked content despite the false narrative, as though she enjoyed the charades of our time together.

"What is it like walking amongst these peasants?" she playfully questioned.

I found myself glad for the distraction of a false life, one quite far removed from my reality. "Like every book you've ever read with a nobleman who longs to live a life as an equal to commoners."

"Romantic?" she guessed.

Absently I had stroked her thumb, but stopped. "Romantic? Absolutely not. It's filthy and far more miserable than one could imagine. I have no one to fluff my pillows at night or dress me in the morning."

She turned her face toward mine, dark eyes dazzling. "What about undressing?" she whispered.

I smiled to myself. "Are you volunteering your services?"

"Someone has to do it, I suppose."

"I assure you, my lady, I shall reciprocate."

Guin chuckled. She looked up and grinned at me. The sunlight sparkled against her straight black hair, like the glint off the feathers of a raven's wing. "And if I may be so bold to inquire with a nobleman's offspring, were you the Duke's only son?" she asked.

My gaze immediately dropped, and I debated the appropriate answer to a fantasy that was built on falsehoods. I had lived from the age of seven on as an only child, as an exceptionally lonely and uncertain child who spent hours equally longing for someone to take care of and someone to take care of me.

I had neither. I'd lost the only person I'd had to protect and there had been no one permanent in my life who had treated me like someone worthy of their time or affection.

The thought sent a wave of gooseflesh down my arms. When Erik went missing, that was when the first hole had found its way into my heart, like a bullet wound ripping through flesh. For years I had been riddled with more and more shots, one overlapping another until it was more emptiness than intact insides.

"Would the Duke need another child once I was born?" I questioned, attempting to snuff out reality.

Guin searched my face in a way that made me stare straight ahead, cautious of what I could allow her to see.

"A child so perfect none could compare or a child so insolent and feral that the Duke and Duchess couldn't survive raising another little beast?" She elbowed me, forcing me to meet her eye again. The moment I looked at her, she smiled to herself and looked me up and down. "Definitely the latter."

I often wondered how Alak would have described me to Erik when they traveled together from Conforeit to Paris. I imagined that they had plenty to discuss and hoped that our uncle had told my brother how much I had loved him.

In the letters Alak sent to Valgarde, however, he never acknowledged me, at least not that I had ever seen in the handful that arrived by post.

The first few letters he sent to Val, I asked to read, mostly because I was beyond thrilled that Alak had not simply found Erik, but he had every intention of taking him from Bjorn. The two of them would then travel to Paris and Erik would be reunited with us at last. Alak estimated it would take about six months for them to arrive as he still needed to acquire the appropriate funds, but I was beside myself with anticipation.

And then in the very next letter, I read that Alak was struggling to gain Erik's trust. Feral, Alak called him, like some creature who has never seen another person.

My brother was also injured; he limped along, arm cradled to his chest to protect his swollen hand, appearing only at night like a ghost haunting the village. He had scratches down his arms and neck and welts on his bare legs. He was bruised–bruised everywhere on his body from his eyes to his shins–and he spoke in whispers, often stuttering and stammering.

Over and over I read the same paragraph, attempting to imagine my brother no longer three, but at the age of twelve. Nine years of hoping Erik had been somehow kept safe, lying to myself that he was content and the truth was before my eyes. Every word made it sound like he had been through hell–and I was ultimately responsible for his suffering.

Rage consumed me as I received the details of my younger brother's existence; the fear in his eyes, the wariness, the reserve…that was not how I had ever known him. He had been lively and affectionate, fearless in his tumbles down ravines and leaps across fallen trees across the streams. He was always smiling and laughing, so inquisitive and lively and his voice always rang out, scaring away every beast and bird when we roamed the woods together.

Once Erik was able to walk and speak, I had learned to be a child and not simply his caretaker. I had someone who would play games and build structures for fairy folk and imps out of mud, sticks and rocks. For a summer, I had everything, and we had each other. We were loud and wild, jumping from trees to tackle one another, playing games in which I chased him about and he ran screaming and laughing until neither of us could breathe. We bathed our sweat-covered selves in the stream, naked and cold in the water as we spit water at one another and pulled leaches from each other's bare flesh, then attempted to make the other one eat the slithering creature.

The thought of what Erik had endured sickened me. My brother, who hated the dark, kept in a cellar. My brother, who asked a hundred questions, silenced. My brother, so affectionate and kind, left injured and afraid.

He had never been afraid. I had made certain that if it thundered, I held onto him. If the rain pelted the windows at night or the wind howled and he thought it was an animal ready to eat us alive, I sheltered him with my body until he relaxed and slept. I stroked his cheeks, both the side that others would find ghastly and the one that looked like mine, and he would look at me and smile, content with the attention he received.

After the first few letters, when it was obvious that Alak would not write to me or send his regards, I stopped asking to read the letters. I couldn't bear the contents, the thought of my brother enduring so much in my absence from his life.

At night, long after Val was asleep and I was curled up on the rug in the storage room like a dog, the anger turned to a rush of overwhelming sadness that my uncle had excluded me in every way imaginable. I wondered if he would ever forgive me for losing Erik, if he would pull me aside and apologize for the years that he had made me feel insignificant in many ways and like a burden in others.

One hot summer night, around the anniversary of when Erik had gone missing, I lay grief-stricken and sobbing, face buried in my hands, eyes squeezed shut as I imagined what it would be like when Erik and I saw each other again after so many years apart.

I imagined him staring at me in disbelief, then running toward me and me toward him, the two of us wrapped in a long overdue embrace.

Then I imagined a different scenario where he would stare at me with contempt, his green eyes filled with malice as he stalked toward me, shoved me in the chest, and asked why the hell I hadn't looked for him, why I had been so cruel to abandon him.

And lastly I imagined Erik looking past me, no recollection of his older brother as he had been so young when he disappeared and our uncle had not mentioned me to him.

I imagined him taking a step back when I approached, hand on his trouser pocket as though I were a thief ready to accost him, followed by the recognition of seeing a face he did recognize, a visage that I shared with the man who left my brother a limping, bruised, and a shriveled remnant of who he had been when we had last been together.

The last one stung far worse than simple rejection. I had loved my brother fiercely, and I was certain I had cared for him more than I had or ever would love anyone else. I couldn't bear the thought of Erik not remembering how much of myself I had poured into him, how night and day I had catered to his every need. It all blended together, all of our laughter and daydreams, aside from the night he went missing and everything was ripped away.

"What is it?" Guin asked.

I blinked, realizing I'd been lost in my thoughts. We approached her apartment building and I released her hand in favor of pressing my palm to her back.

"Nothing."

"I don't believe you."

"Merely thinking about my former life," I answered.

oOo

"It's almost five," Guin commented.

"Shall I leave?" I asked.

She smiled at me, heavy lidded eyes and lips still swollen from what felt like an eternity of kissing and touching her.

We were still in her bed, still very much undressed, lying side by side, facing one another.

From the moment we walked into her building, she knew what she wanted: to be taken from behind until she could barely breathe. Once I raised a brow and smiled, she asked what I desired in return.

Against the wall, I suggested, her legs wrapped around me. She had looked me up and down before nodding, adding that will be interesting.

Between passionate kisses and undressing one another, we had succeeded in thoroughly pleasing each other in multiple positions, insatiable urges turning into blissful satisfaction.

"No, I don't want you to leave just yet," she said. "I was merely thinking it's almost your bedtime."

I grunted and raked her hair back from her flushed face. "Three more hours and I'll be nodding off in my chair."

"You could stay the night," she offered, taking my hand.

"I can't," I answered.

"Because of your–"

"Macaw," I answered.

She frowned at me. "Ah, yes, that's right. You own that screaming chicken."

"Rude, but not entirely incorrect."

Guin turned onto her back, firm breasts exposed and tempting me to caress her all over again. "I suppose it's for the best. My husband wouldn't like you staying the night."

I stared at her for a long moment, silently evaluating her words. The apartment was too sparsely furnished to indicate whether or not another person–particularly a man–lived there.

"What is it, Kimmer?" she asked.

"Are you married?" I asked flatly.

I'd been with all types of women, some older than me, some younger, some better looking than others, but never a woman who was married or betrothed. It simply didn't interest me to sleep with a woman who had a husband or fiance.

Guin offered a sly smile. "Fortunately he did me a favor and died two years ago."

I turned onto my back and stared at the ceiling, unsure of what to make of her words, much less how to reply. Questions lead to complications and I disliked the burden of complications.

"You," Guin said as she rolled onto her side, "fascinate me."

"Do I?"

She raked her fingertips through the hair on my chest and down to my stomach where she paused just below my navel and traced her finger back up again.

"You are blessed with a body from Greek mythology, you definitely know how to use every part of it to please your partner to climax while remaining enigmatic." She continued trailing her fingers back down, this time lower. "I'm not certain you're real."

I inhaled and turned my head. "Keep doing precisely what you're doing and I assure you, I will prove to you that I am most definitely real."

Guin returned a closed-lipped smile and scooted closer, the hardened tips of her breasts against my arm. "I know that is real," she said. Her gaze slid down my body, her hand pausing at my rib cage where she drew her finger from one side of my torso to the other. "This is where the enigma starts."

I followed the tracing of her finger, then met her eye. "Do you intend to cut me in half?"

"If I did, what would I find inside?" she wondered aloud.

"Hopefully properly functioning organs."

She inhaled. "Why ruin such a perfect torso?" she questioned, moving her finger along the definition of my abdomen. "You're like marble come to life in order to please women. Or perhaps more like Galatea carved from ivory."

I was certain Guin's words were meant as a generous compliment, but her words made me acutely aware of how I didn't fit the myth. Not even Aphrodite could make me feel the spark of love between Pygmalion and his sculpted beauty.

"You are a mystery, Kimmer, a beautiful, fit mystery," she murmured, fingers weaving back and forth over my chest until she flattened her hand over the left side. "I feel your heart beating beneath my palm and wonder if anyone else has truly felt it."

"Perhaps my heart was simply created to move blood through my veins and nothing more."

"It seems a waste," she said. "So near perfection and yet entirely imperfect."

Her hand reached lower, smiling lips brushing against mine. I pulled her closer, our bodies crushed together in a way that I hoped would make her forget my imperfections.

"But this? How many women are familiar with this part of your anatomy?" she murmured against my lips, her touch intimate and voice seductive.

I ignored her words in favor of caressing her in a similar manner until we were both breathing harder, bodies writhing with primal anticipation of becoming one.

"I want you to make me forget how to breathe," Guin murmured.

"I'll make you forget your name," I promised.

She smiled and I felt her legs begin to tremble far quicker than I desired. I pulled away just as the first ripples of pleasure started and she gasped. "Don't stop," she pleaded, grabbing the back of my hand to return it to the apex of her thighs.

"You're still breathing," I said. "I want you breathless."

"You are wicked," she said under her breath.

I smiled to myself and rolled toward the side of the bed where I stood, grabbed her by the legs, and pulled her toward the edge. She inhaled in anticipation, teeth sinking into her bottom lip. I ran my thumb along the arch of her foot and her toes curled.

Of course I was wicked, I wanted to tell her. I could give her all the pleasure in the world as long as she didn't ask to cross that invisible line she'd drawn from one side of my torso to the other. I would make her forget everything, including all that I lacked.

And as she rested her Achilles tendon on my shoulder while her other foot hooked to the small of my back, I couldn't help but think Aphrodite would have been ashamed if she had brought me to life like Galatea for Pygmalion's pleasure.