by Anna Collins
“I usually take my breakfast outside,” Apollo said as we passed by. “I sit with my coffee and read the LA Times and try to guess the temperature.”
He led me through the patio door into the kitchen. “Why guess the temperature?” I asked, jotting down his comment.
The kitchen looked very much like the one at Saison. Open concept, long islands with shelving underneath, pots and pans hanging from racks, overhead lights, and a huge sink. It was a little bit smaller than the one at the restaurant, but not by much. You could easily fit a small chef team comfortably in the space.
“It’s just something I’ve always done,” he said. “My grandpa used to do it. He’d step outside first thing in the morning, naked to the waist, and stand there for a minute or two, just breathing. Then he’d come in, announce the temperature, and compare it to the thermometer. He was almost always exactly right. I’m not quite as accurate yet, but I’m improving—usually two or three degrees off. It’s a way of connecting with the world. Not many people bother using their built-in senses for these things anymore.”
I looked at my phone. “Okay, so what temperature is it now?”
He said, “Fifty degrees.”
My phone said forty-nine. “You’re way off.”
He crossed his arms, amused. “Am I?”
“By a whole degree. Tsk tsk. Technology wins again.”
“I suppose it’s finally time to bow to my machine overlords.”
“You can have my old iPhone.”
“How generous.”
Despite his dry humor, his eyes were smiling genuinely. Such a beautiful blue. I know it’s cliché to want to go swimming in someone’s blue eyes, but his had the distinct look of mountain lakes. The water would probably be cold, but looking at those eyes made me anything but.
He took me around the house, showing off the different rooms and explaining their purpose. He had a cozy living room—mainly, it seemed for guests—, an office—I was surprised to see a computer there, but then he had to handle work email somehow—, a couple more bathrooms, and of course, the master bedroom. I could hardly step into it without turning red. I took a few pictures along the way as a reference for how to describe things in the book, with his permission. Also, you know, for my own fantasies.
The bedroom was minimalist in design, like most of the rooms, and the bed was crisply made—almost as though he had never slept in it. When I asked about it, he said making the bed was part of his morning ritual. He was never a part of the military, but his grandpa fought in World War II, keeping a lot of the drilled-in habits, which Apollo picked up.
The wood-beamed roof of the bedroom was high and slanted since the house had a peaked roof, and behind the bed, there was a huge semicircle window looking out over the forested backyard. Lights hung down on strings from a branch-like beam above the bed. Beside the bed, there was a little wood-burning fireplace, with a small stack of logs piled next to it. And the bed…
I tried not to fixate on the bed. But it had gray-and-white pillows and sheets; big enough for a king, and a queen…, and was flanked by stools with books stacked on them. The light from the high window spilled beautifully over the bed, and I could just imagine the glow of Apollo’s skin when he rose in the morning. I wanted to be there to see it. To feel the sun’s warmth on his body.
“Something on your mind?” Apollo asked when it seemed I wasn’t following him out of the room. I was too busy dreaming about the bed.
“Oh!” I said, awkwardly lifting my iPad to take a photo of the bedroom. “It just looks so, uh. You know. Cozy?”
“Were you hoping for a nap?” Apollo chuckled.
“Not exactly…”
Apollo raised his eyebrows.
Stupid! That was a stupid thing to say. Yeah, great job, Callie, hit on your boss on the first day. Wreck his stuff, then hit on him like a dog in heat. Fantastic first impression, babe.
I was too embarrassed to look at him. I just kept snapping pictures, keeping my eyes on my iPad screen. That was when Apollo grabbed my wrist. Not roughly—just steadily enough to keep me from waving my iPad around. I looked up at him. He was smiling his usual confident smile. I had to lock my knees to keep them from wobbling.
“It is cozy,” he said. I was turning into goo. “I think you’ve got enough pictures, though.”
I laughed, more out of nervousness than humor. “I—you’re probably right. I just like to be… thorough.”
“So do I.”
His eyes burned blue flame. He had to be feeling this intensity. Right? He looked at me like he was confused why I wasn’t already in that bed. His chest expanded and constricted steadily, but I could hear his breath flowing out of his nose like he was trying not to pant. A hungry wolf—that was what he looked like.
“Probably the first time a girl like me has seen this room,” I joked, trying to lighten the intensity of the mood.
“What kind of girl are you?” He asked me, the corner of his lip hooking upward.
“You know,” I said.
“No.”
I waved my arms demonstratively around my body. He frowned, still not understanding. I made a round shape with my arms, blowing my cheeks out. A little hyperbolic, maybe, but I certainly wasn’t a twiggy Cassandra-type supermodel.
“A curvy girl,” I finally explained. “I’m not exactly the type someone like you has to settle for.”
Apollo’s expression changed—drastically. He looked angry. God damn, from wrecking his stuff to salivating all over him to calling him shallow—I was the employee of the year.
“I didn’t mean—” I started, but he interrupted me, stepping forward and closing the space between us almost faster than I could see.
“You are a work of art,” he growled, placing his hand on my shoulder. He didn’t squeeze or pull me but touched me with an intensity of purpose. “Do you hear me?”
“I wasn’t criticizing you,” I stammered, “I was joking about myself.”
He shook his head, lips pressed tight. “You don’t understand. There’s more to you.”
“A whole lot more,” I laughed, once again desperately trying to take the edge off. “Come on, Apollo, I didn’t mean to—”
“Follow me,” he commanded, releasing his hand from my shoulder, fingers dragging away and sending electric thrills along my skin.
It was like I was hypnotized. He had the commanding confidence of a general, and I was unconsciously compelled to follow his lead. Given his anger, he could have been leading me to some torture dungeon or another scary place—there were no witnesses here, after all—but I followed anyway. Even when he walked down the spiral staircase, past the main level, down into the basement, I followed him without question, wanting only to do as he commanded.
A distant part of me wanted to stop, ask questions, text Nick and tell him where I was. Tweet the images of Apollo’s house to the world so they’d know where to find my body—but I kept following, down into the darkness of the basement.
Apollo flicked a light switch, and immediately the whole room lit up—a massive space of white walls and overhanging lights pointing to works of art all over the place. Paintings, photography prints, sculptures, statues—like in the foyer but multiplied times ten. I’d been to actual art galleries which had smaller selections than this.
I wanted to tell him how amazing it was, how breathtaking, but all I could do was keep following him as he weaved through L-shaped freestanding walls on wheels, all the way to the very back of the gallery.
He stopped beneath a familiar painting. I mean, the painting itself wasn’t familiar. The subject was.
The woman in the painting looked like me.
It was a portrait of a woman with rosy lips, big doe eyes and long, semi-curly brown hair pulled back into braids. She was leaning on a stone pedestal, which must have been acting as a writing desk because she had a half-rolled-up stack of papers spread onto the surface of the pedestal. She was exactly my level of plump—not a balloon, but not a stick. S
he looked the way classic paintings of women always looked—a healthy weight. She wore a white dress with a gold cloak—or maybe a toga—clasped over one shoulder, as well as a gold crown on her head like a hairband. She held some kind of instrument in her left hand, like a horn or trumpet.
But who was she?
“This is Calliope,” Apollo said. “The Muse of Epic Poetry. Painted by Joseph Fagnani in 1869. It’s one of my most prized pieces.”
“She’s beautiful,” I said.
Apollo looked down from the painting, straight into my eyes.
“Exactly,” he said.
I was petrified by his eyes yet again. I was a deer in headlights, facing the eyes of a hungry beast. The alpha wolf. I felt warm—hot—like I was on the beach on a summer day. I could feel my face flush, sweat building, and myself beginning to melt beneath my abdomen. I basked in the blue flames of his eyes, seared by his gaze.
“The sun,” I whispered incoherently. My bottom lip trembled.
He lifted his hands and brushed my hair back like he did the first time he met me.
And then he pulled me into the deepest kiss of my life.
Chapter Fifteen
Callie
He was kissing me. Kissing me.
Both his hands were cradling the back of my head, fingers threading through my hair as he covered my mouth with his, gliding his smooth lips over mine, separating them, capturing my top lip, and then my bottom one. And oh God, I kissed him back, pushing myself onto my toes and tugging desperately on his shirt, completely oblivious to the fact I dropped my tablet to the ground.
Deep, our mouths just fit together, and we pulled each other in close and tight. Lips dancing, heads turning to one side, then the next, our noses softly crossing every time. Soon his tongue slipped through, and I welcomed it warmly with my own.
God, was this really happening?
His fingers pressed into the back of my head and neck, my hands climbed along his broad chest, and mmm, our tongues massaged together in a heated tango. I could have collapsed into his arms, but our mouths were magnetic, keeping us connected, sending electric pleasure all through my body. I could hear him rumble, this needy moan almost without a voice, more feeling than sound—and when I moaned back, I heard it loud and clear.
And somehow, it brought me to my senses.
Hands still fisting his shirt, I pushed him away. The sound of our kiss breaking seemed to echo through the gallery. He didn’t step back or get knocked off balance—it was almost as if my push had no effect at all—but it did make him stop.
“This is wrong,” I panted, my lips still burning from the kiss. “This is completely wrong.”
Apollo didn’t respond, but he let me go. I picked up my iPad and Apple Pencil off the floor, brushing off the screen of my tablet. No damage, thankfully.
“I have a boyfriend,” I breathed. “And I work for you. And—and maybe I shouldn’t… Work for you, I mean, not that I shouldn’t have a boyfriend… And, God, the only reason you hired me was because I looked like this fucking… muse? Because my name sounds like Calliope?”
“That’s not why ” Apollo said.
“Bullshit. The first thing you did when you met me was to pull my hair back the way the girl in the picture has hers. This is so fucked up, I don’t even know where to—”
“Callie,” Apollo said, gripping my shoulders so tight I stopped trembling. “The reason I hired you was because you are the only person for the job. You say what needs to be said. Your resemblance to this painting is a coincidence. I brought you here not to compare you to a mythical figure, but to show you that you are perfect—as perfect as a work of art. As perfect as a divine creature.”
“You kissed me,” I breathed. My lips were tingling.
“I’d do it again.” His voice rumbled with need.
“I wanted you to kiss me.”
“You still do.”
I did. I ached for him.
“But I can’t…”
God, I was weak. I couldn’t control myself around him. If he wanted me, he had me. How could I resist him? He was everything I wanted in my life. He was perfect. He was a piece of Heaven.
“There is nothing you can’t do,” Apollo said. He reached for my face again, and I flinched. He stopped briefly, silently assuring me he wasn’t trying to hurt me, and then he pressed his palm to my cheek. It was so warm. My face felt so tiny in his hand.
“You’re in control of what happens here,” he continued.
He was wrong. He was in control. He must have known that.
Yet I felt stronger, just hearing him say it.
“I won’t tell you we can continue as if this never happened. Because it did happen.” He inclined his head just a little bit closer to me. “And I loved every second of it.”
Oh, God. So did I…
“But we can continue,” Apollo said. “And I will await your actual response with all the patience and respect you deserve.”
And then he walked away.
And I followed.
Maybe I was still in a daze, but I couldn’t give this up now. I had to know where we’d go. I had some decisions to make, but they could wait.
At least until my work day was over…
Chapter Sixteen
Apollo
I walked past her, giving her the space she needed to figure out what she was going to do next. If I was right, if everything were to go as I expected, she’d follow me right to my bedroom, and she’d finally get to know just how cozy my bedspread was. I’d probably make a night of giving her a full experience.
I wasn’t lying when I told her she was in control here because she was. I wouldn’t force her to be with me, no matter how hard I was aching with need for her, but I also left the part where I’d use every means I could to influence her to join me.
I walked over to my bed and lied down, waiting for her to come up. I smiled a little as I saw the after effects of my kiss still evident on her face and mouth, and my cock went half-hard as I looked at her. Her face was still flushed, and she looked out of breath, her mouth a little red and swollen, like it was the first time she’d ever been kissed that deeply. Her hair was a little mussed up, too, and I hummed in satisfaction at how thoroughly ravaged she looked, and how much I wanted to do it again on every part of her body.
She put a hand on her chest and took a deep breath before looking straight into my eyes. Hers were swirling with so many different emotions that I couldn’t tell what it was she felt.
“I think I need to leave now,” she said, her voice quivering a little and I frowned.
“Are you afraid of me?” I asked, and she shook her head adamantly.
“No, I just…I just need to clear my head,” she said, and I tilted my head at her.
Alright. I was expecting her to be reluctant to the idea, so I stood up and placed my hand on her arm, making her jump a little.
“You don’t have to go,” I whispered in her ear, my lips brushing against the shell of it and a part of me wanted to nip the top just to see how she’d react. I restrained myself, knowing that if I did, she’d push me away and bolt, and that wasn’t what I wanted at all.
She took a step back, letting my hand drop from her arm before shaking her head again.
“Clearly, I won’t be able to do my work today, not with this--,” she waved her hand in the air in front of us, her face twisting into a grimace as she failed to find the words to describe what she meant. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” she said, barely giving me a glance before she turned around and walked away.
I closed the distance between us and grabbed her wrist, pulling her back towards me. She spun around, and I caught her, wrapping an arm around her waist as she placed both of hers in my chest, clutching at my shirt tightly for balance. I raised her head, placing my thumb and forefingers under her chin to tilt it up, her eyes wide as she looked at me.
“Before you go, this might help you decide,” I said. Before she could ask me what I meant, I lowered my
face and gave her another deep kiss, taking advantage of her gasp by sweeping my tongue inside of the caverns of her mouth and caressing her tongue, coaxing it to dance. I felt her arms shifting around in front of me like she couldn’t decide whether to push me away or pull me closer, but I pulled her closer to me, pinning her arms between our bodies so she couldn’t get away.
I kissed her with open eyes, watching as her eyes closed as she reciprocated the kiss, our mouth and tongues moving in sync like a beautifully choreographed dance. She tasted so sweet, and I couldn’t get enough of her. I could kiss her for hours, and it still wouldn’t be enough.
I pulled away this time, licking her lips a little naughtily as I did, making her cheeks blush red some more. I removed my hands from her waist, and she stumbled back, almost as if she was dizzy all of a sudden.
“Until tomorrow then, Calista,” I murmured, calling her by her full name instead. She nodded and slowly made her way out, and I heaved a heavy sigh as the door shut behind her.
I should probably go and check what the horses are up to and then see what else I could do to distract myself. It was going to be a long night, and I hoped by tomorrow, Callie would see it my way.
Chapter Seventeen
Callie
I had no idea what I was doing back there. I had let Apollo Irons kiss me goodbye, and I kissed him back again, even after I pushed him away earlier and proclaimed I had a boyfriend.
What the hell was wrong with me? I had a very faithful boyfriend waiting for me back home, and there I was, kissing another man. No, not just any other man, but my boss! Hell, my boyfriend’s boss, even.
I couldn’t help but think that if he hadn’t stopped the kiss, I would probably still be in there right now, wearing a hell of a lot less. I’d probably be fornicating with him at this moment, and I’d have cheated on Nick, on the man I….loved.