I need it now.
I couldn’t have anticipated that I’d be failing Apollo by not having this skill set. I’m pretty sure he doesn’t consider me failing, but it stings nonetheless. “I’m sorry.”
“You have nothing to be sorry for.” He turns slowly, dark eyes narrowed. “This entire situation is less than ideal, and we’re doing the best we can with the information we have.” Apollo glances at me, expression going soft. “You’re doing wonderfully, Cassandra.”
His tone rings with sincerity and the praise warms me right down to my cold, shriveled heart. I drop my gaze, unable to look him directly in the face when I know I’m blushing furiously. “I haven’t helped at all.”
“On the contrary, you’ve done quite a bit. You just being here has shone the light on certain things, and I doubt Minos would have bothered to pull me aside without your presence pushing him to action.” He huffs out a breath. “I can be rather dense about those sorts of things.”
I snort. I can’t help it. “Yeah, well, you didn’t notice me making eyes at you for five years so I guess that statement checks out.”
A choked sound has me glancing at him. His eyes have gone wide and his mouth is moving but no sound comes out. I jolt. “Apollo, are you okay?”
“What did you say?”
There’s absolutely no reason to blush. I’ve had sex with this man. He’s seen every bit of me. There is no reason that admitting I’ve had a thing for him should make me feel more vulnerable than that. Even if he’s looking at me like I just hit him in the head with my purse.
I lick my lips. “Apollo, you have access to a mirror. You know that you’re one of the most painfully attractive people in this damned city.”
He surprises me—he always surprises me—with his response. “Don’t do that.” He shakes his head slowly. “Don’t act like you would let something as simple as lust turn your head.”
“There is nothing simple about lust.” When he just waits, I relent. “Okay, fine. I like you. I’ve thought you were attractive since I took the job, but working with you so closely only added to that. You’re a legitimately good guy. I…like you.”
He drags his hand over his face. “Why didn’t you say something?”
“I thought you didn’t want me.” I don’t mean for the words to come out almost small. “I don’t know if it would have mattered, but…I honestly thought you weren’t attracted to me.”
Heat and frustration flare in his dark eyes. “Cassandra, after five years of working with me, I would hope that you’d understand that I would never put you in a position where you felt uncomfortable. The more I got to know you, the more I was attracted to you, which just made me more determined to ensure you didn’t feel obligated to…” He motions between us almost helplessly. “Anything.”
“If you know me as well as you say, then you’d know I wouldn’t feel obligated to do shit.”
He shrugs. “I wasn’t going to make your life harder just because I wanted you.”
Last night, we definitely crossed a whole bunch of lines, and I won’t pretend it’s because we’re fake dating. We were both pretty damn clear that we were on the same page about wanting each other. Still, it can’t hurt to make things even more explicitly clear. “Apollo.”
“Yes?”
I can’t tell if he looks hopeful or if I’m just imagining things. It doesn’t matter; I’ve come too far to back out now. I swallow hard. “I would like to have my filthy way with you again the first opportunity that presents itself, and also as often as can be managed before this thing between us ends.”
The tips of his ears go a bit pink, but he sharpens in the same way he did last night. “Consider it a promise.”
“Great. Good. Perfect.” I’m stammering, but I kind of like that he flusters me because I know he won’t use that flustered feeling against me. He seems to enjoy it, too, his attention snagging on my cheeks and lips before coasting down my body in a slow drag I can almost feel.
I start to turn toward the door but stop short. “Apollo,look.” I point to the bed with its absurd number of pillows. Pillows that, until I stood at exactly this angle, hid what appears to be a laptop.
We exchange a glance and move quickly to the bed. He grabs the laptop and opens it. “Surely we’re not about to get lucky now.”
It boots up quickly, showing a desktop with a handful of icons on it. “Not password protected,” I say softly.
He angles it toward himself and starts typing, agile fingers moving so fast through a series of commands that it makes my head spin. I’m decent when it comes to computers, but Apollo is on another level. Within seconds, he has Ariadne’s search history, her password storage, and a whole lot of files of what appears to be fan fiction. “This is worthless.”
“Give me a second.” He narrows his eyes and leans forward. “There.” A new browser window pops up for a different email account. “Minos logged into his email on this computer.”
I lean back. “That seems very foolish of him.” He’s gone through all this trouble to keep things secure, and he logged into his email on a computer that isn’t even password protected? It defies belief.
“Not looking the gift horse in the mouth.” With a few keystrokes, he selects hundreds of emails and begins to forward them to Hector’s email. “This will take a second, and Hector is going to have a lot to wade through, but this is the best lead we have right now.”
All sorts of stuff is stored in email accounts. Log-in info. Bank notices. It will give a skilled hacker like Hector more than enough to work with. “This is big,” I say. “But we also can’t discard the fact that it might be a red herring. Doesn’t it seem a little too convenient?”