Accidentally Aphrodite - Dakota Cassidy Page 0,21

and her clenched fists were any indication.

Setting Spike back on Nina’s lap with a scratch under his chin, Wanda smiled. “See? Nice vampire is nice. Now, onto what Khristos was saying about being Aphrodite. Please. Finish. I’ll keep Nina in line while you do.”

He sat on the edge of her coffee table and looked directly into her eyes, taking one of her hands in his. “As I said, I’ll move in here with you, and we’ll begin immediately.”

But she snatched her fingers from the warmth of his palm. How was she going to breathe with this man in her apartment? “Why does the way it works have to include you staying here? You can see how tiny my apartment is. I only have one bedroom the size of a broom closet. Where would you sleep? Can’t we do like a nine-to-five thing? You know, like school hours?”

“Oooo, I hope they cut your carrot sticks into shapes and make happy freakin’ faces out of your fruit for snack time at Goddess School, Lite-Brite,” Nina crowed sarcastically.

“Nina!” Marty hissed, coming around the corner of the kitchen and back into the living room. “Don’t make me snatch that tongue of yours from your head.”

“Fuuu…” Nina’s lips thinned in exasperation. “Fluff you, Blondie. Fluff you so hard.”

Marty winked and snickered. “Fluff this. Now be quiet and let Khristos explain.”

“I can’t leave you alone, Quinn. Especially not with the way you’re feeling about love and relationships at this point.”

“Ah. Does my utter disdain trouble you?” Because it should. Which just might be her permission slip out of this crazy gym class.

“In a startling way.”

All of this was becoming too much. Her senses were preparing for a crash—just like Nina predicted. “I don’t understand what being Aphrodite even means. Doesn’t she just make people fall in love with her beauty? What does it have to do with other relationships? She’s not a matchmaker. I thought Cupid handled that?”

Khristos grinned. “Here’s a little inside dirt on gods and goddesses—something you won’t find in your books. They have minions. Cupid might shoot the arrow, but Aphrodite’s the one who tells him when and where. She’s an expert matchmaker and when her true matches fall in love, it’s forever. It’s her contribution to procreation.”

Quinn took another long, deep breath. “So what you’re saying is, I decide who falls in love and who doesn’t? And what does her contribution to procreation mean? Am I responsible for matching people so they can have children and thus future generations will continue to repopulate the world?” That was crackers. Total crackers.

How could she be responsible for something so enormous? Her? A nobody ex-dreamer who worked at a bookstore? What if she did it wrong? What if she put two people together who ended up miserable?

“It’s like a dream job come true, huh, Boobs?” Nina snorted. “You with all your floaty dreams about love and the sky raining rose petals. You’re a shoo-in. See? No bad guys. No need for a good rumble where I gotta get in the mud with some freaky-deaky demon. Which means I can go.”

Demon?

But Quinn popped up from the couch without a second thought, her hand outstretched. “No!” she shouted, knocking over the cup of tea in the process. Nina leaving left her utterly panicked. “Please don’t go. I…I don’t know him. I mean, I know you know him, and I’m not saying that your friendship vouch isn’t solid. I’d never doubt your word because you leave me so terrified I want to hide under my covers, but I’m feeling very, very uncomfortable with a strange man in my apartment.”

Surely she’d pay for this moment of weakness in the way of endless snark and Nina’s cackles, but she didn’t care. If what Ingrid said was true, and Nina was the muscle of the group, then she wanted some muscle. It might sound silly to someone as confident as Nina, but she wasn’t going to stay with a man she didn’t know without a buffer of some kind.

And it had nothing to do with the fact that he was hotter than lava.

Nothing.

Especially a man who’d likely inherited his mother’s gift for making women hither and yon fall in love with him.

No, ma’am. Not on her new no-romance watch.

Not to mention, she couldn’t forget what Ingrid had said about there always being some kind of danger in these cases of accidental turnings. Did she really want to face some big angry god or goddess alone without some kind of plan B?

What