Accidentally Aphrodite - Dakota Cassidy Page 0,76

a grating sigh. Okay, disembodied voices were on her checklist of things she’d like to take a pass on, going forward. They were unnerving and just a little unfair on the playing field of who had bigger powers.

“Who are you?”

“Who I am matters little. Who I’ll be when you’re dead is what matters.”

Did the voice belong to Aphrodite? That moment when she’d shown up was still a little hazy. So she couldn’t be sure. But it was worth a shot to ask. “Aphrodite?”

Laughter filled her small apartment. Maniacal and so earsplitting, her eardrums shook. “Uh, no. I would have been Aphrodite if you would’ve just died like you were supposed to. Alas, you’re tougher than you first appeared.”

Okay, not Aphrodite. Shit just got real. Bad guys were real, and in all her new realist state of mind, she was in trouble—for real.

“So it was you who knocked me down that night?” she asked into the room, hoping whomever the voice belonged to couldn’t see her knees quaking.

A wistful sigh whistled in her ear. “Honestly, I’m better than that shot I took at you. I can’t believe my aim was so off. But you really gave it a good effort when you hit the ground. Your tuck and roll was impressive.”

Quinn nodded, looking around the room to find something to defend herself with. “Yeah. I took a gymnastics class for like a hot second when my mom thought I didn’t get out enough. Funny what you retain, isn’t it?”

“Oh, a laugh riot.”

“And that match I made—afterward, when it felt like someone was sticking a hot poker in my colon?”

Another long, drawn-out sigh whizzed around the room, leaving an echo of disappointment. “I poisoned the apple just before you sunk your pretty white teeth into it. But it was the wrong poison. I forgot you’re human. No residual effects. Just gas to show for my efforts. Bummer, right?”

Stall, Quinn. Stall. “You think my teeth are pretty?”

And then she remembered Nina was right outside.

Just as Quinn thought to call out to Nina was the moment an invisible hand grabbed her and threw her up against the far wall, pinning her there.

A woman, surreal, beautiful, perfect in almost every way, appeared in front of her, her wrist attached to the hand wrapped around Quinn’s throat. “Shut—up!” the woman hissed in her face.

She was so caught off-guard, she somehow managed to marvel at this woman’s beauty. From her long, graceful neck, to her almond-shaped sapphire eyes, to hair flowing to her waist in soft, full curls, she was amazing. It almost hurt to look at her.

And okay, it was scary to look at her in all this fury Quinn didn’t understand the reasons behind.

But damn, she had some firm grip.

Quinn grabbed at the woman’s hand, tearing at it, unable to breathe. Now probably wouldn’t be the time to bemoan the fact that she hadn’t been turned into a vampire or a werewolf with super-strength. But it had to be more useful than making matches.

As her feet lifted farther off the ground and her legs dangled, she tried to remember the fights she’d witnessed on the playground as a kid in school from a corner where she always hid from the chaos.

What did the person who lost always accuse the person who beat them of doing?

Fighting like a girl.

Why?

Because the winner had pulled her opponents hair.

As her eyes began to roll back in her head, Quinn forced herself to focus on one thing—yanking the shit out of this woman’s amazing hair.

She couldn’t even grunt her monumental effort when she reached upward with both hands and grabbed two lengths of this madwoman’s hair as close to her scalp as possible and pulled for all she was worth.

The woman’s mouth opened wide in a scream so chilling, Quinn was sure she’d shatter all the china Arch had brought in from Nina’s mansion.

So she yanked harder. So hard, her fingers burned with the effort.

The woman dropped her, letting Quinn slam to the floor. She crashed into her end table, taking out the lamp, struggling for breath.

As she reflected on her small victory, she also noted the spinning wheel of fire, coming at her like one of those Chinese stars in an action movie. Coming at her and aimed right at her head.

So, yeah. Bad guys really did exist.

* * * *

“What the hell’s going on?” Khristos yelled over the wind whipping against Nina and Carl.

Nina had sent him a text that Quinn needed him, and even though it only