Oh fuck, I really am going to come.
The door closes slowly. The click of it shutting might as well be a gun going off. I reach down and cover Apollo’s hand with mine, urging him to keep going, to finish this. I can’t stop shaking, can’t stop the little whimpers that his palm barely muffles.
He kisses my neck and nibbles on my ear. “Come for me, Cassandra. I want to feel it.”
My body responds to his command, clenching around his fingers as my orgasm crests hard enough to make my head spin. He eases me down slowly. “That’s my girl.”
I’m not his girl. Not in any permanent way. I just can’t quite make my mouth work to tell him so.
“That was a good start, but I’m nowhere near done with you yet.” He presses one last kiss to the spot behind my ear. “Do you want to walk or shall I carry you?”
Habit has me saying, “I can walk.”
He doesn’t immediately move back. “Cassandra.” There’s quiet censor in his voice. “Do you want me to carry you?”
Very much, but my heart is already doing something funny and I need to wrestle it back under control and quickly. Allowing Apollo to carry me—tocare forme—is a terrible idea. No matter how much I crave it. “I want to walk.” I attempt to say it firmly, but the words emerge as a question.
Apollo finally nods. “Very well.” He stands, easily pulling me to my feet with him, though he keeps his hands cupped under my elbows as if he knows exactly how shaky my balance is right now.
“Thanks.”
It should feel silly to lace my fingers with his and allow him to lead me out of the room. Who walks around holding hands when they don’t need to? Even with Hermes, this wasn’t how I operated. She was into casual intimacy, but she wasn’tsweet. And this is sweet enough to make my teeth ache.
The feeling lasts until we turn the corner and come face-to-face with the Minotaur.
Apollo moves before I fully register the man’s presence. He uses his hold on my hand to tuck me neatly behind him and angles his body to stay between me and the larger man. Where before his body language was loose and easy, he’s now so rigid, I press my hand to the middle of his back in support.
“Minotaur.”
The Minotaur looks down at him with no expression at all. Apollo is tall, but the other man towers over him. His scarred face looks even scarier in the low lighting of the hallway. “You shouldn’t wander.”
That surprises me enough that I burst out laughing. “I’m sorry, but why not? Surely you aren’t going to try and convince us that there are ghosts haunting these halls.”
He shifts that eerie attention to me. “Your safety isn’t guaranteed, Cassandra.”
I blink. “What do you mean it’s not guaranteed?” Is he talking generally? Or about me specifically?
“Your safety isn’t guaranteed,” he repeats. “No cameras now. Who knows what could happen to you in the dark?” Without another word, he turns and stalks down the hall in the opposite direction.
Apollo doesn’t move until the other man is out of sight. Only then does he reclaim my hand and lead me back to the bedroom. He closes the door behind us and checks the lock. “Well, we have no cameras to worry about, but apparently they’re going to use that as an excuse to wash their hands of anything that happens here.”
A frisson of fear dampens my lust. “They really are planning something for this party, aren’t they?”
“I don’t know.” His jaw goes tight. “And that worries me.”
My body is still flush with two orgasms. It makes thinking hard, but I try anyway. “Do we ignore the warning and keep looking tonight?”
“I don’t think there’s anything to find on the second floor. The sitting rooms are all exactly what was promised, and the rest of the rooms have occupants. We’ll have a better chance with the third floor and finishing out the main one. We also can’t exclude the possibility that he’s using the garage or some building on the grounds for storage.” He drags his hand through his hair, making it stand on end. “We’ve done enough for tonight. Might as well call it and get some sleep.”
“Or we could do exactly as promised earlier and finish what we started in the sitting room.”
“Cassandra.”
I ignore the warning in his tone. In fact, it sends a delicious little shiver down my spine. We can’t take back what we did in that sitting room, but I wouldn’t even if I could. He wants me. I can barely believe it after so long of desiring him.
I’m leaving in a week. I’ll be damned if I miss a single opportunity to fulfill the promise held in the heated way he looked at me, touched me. If we’re not continuing the search tonight, then there’s no reason not to give in to the inferno of lust that makes it hard to breathe when I look at him.
Even so, it takes more courage than I want to admit to hold his gaze and pull my top over my head. I barely register his sharp inhale as I shimmy out of my shorts. The way this man looks at me should be illegal. His gaze sweeps over me as if he can’t take in my features fast enough, as if this is a gift I’ll snatch back at the last moment and he wants to imprint the image of me in his brain. It washes away the last of my hesitance. This is happening. We both want this to happen.