First Quiver

by Beth C. Greenberg

And there it sat between them, the first either had spoken the awful truth out loud. This happy reunion wasn’t going to last forever.

  “Nothing is certain with the gods,” Pan offered, sounding lame even to his own ears.

  Cupid twirled the bottle between his palms, staring off into the distance. “Just in case, we should probably say our goodbyes before I head out tonight.” Craning his neck to study Pan, he added, “Don’t you agree?”

  33

  Ruby Lounge

  The failure of the fourth match should not have sparked even a glimmer of glee in Cupid’s heart, but it did, just the same. Four men, algorithmically culled by a website that dared to use Cupid’s name, and not a single vibration to be found. An ominous storm was gathering force. If the gods were to decide Cupid wasn’t giving his best effort, no telling how they’d twist the screws. Worse yet, Mia might lose faith.

  Still, without the finality of the echo beats, Cupid held onto his hope that the gods would realize their mistake and make Mia his for all eternity. As the night wore on, it sure seemed as if Mia was leaning the same way. She seemed increasingly welcoming of each of Cupid’s date-ending interventions, even rolling her eyes this last time and muttering, “What the hell took you so long?” before dropping her forehead onto the bar.

  Cupid lifted his hand to soothe her, braced to draw his fingers through her silky hair when he remembered their rule: no touching. He retracted his nearly guilty hand and shoved it into the front pocket of his jeans.

  “How are you holding up?” he asked the back of her head. “Can I get you another drink?”

  “Mmhmm,” she hummed, lifting her head, shoulders, and breasts off the bar. “I’m gonna need a stiff one.” He might have heard Mia’s remark as innocent if not for the teasing swipe of her tongue across her upper lip. Oh, great. We’re doing this again.

  Cupid had a stiff one for Mia, all right, ever since Jonah had opened their front door to reveal this evening’s dress of destruction. The upper half covered even less skin than her yoga tops, and all that unavailable flesh called to Cupid in ways he was thoroughly incapable of ignoring.

  Forcing his attention from her breasts, Cupid hailed the bartender, a nosy guy with beady eyes and a name tag that said Mo. Seconds later, a fresh gin and tonic arrived on a clean napkin, with a “What can I get you?” to Cupid.

  “Oh, I’m not—”

  “Come on, the least you can do is have one damn drink with me.” The bartender’s gaze followed Cupid’s pivot toward Mia, whose lips curled into a frisky grin. “What’s the matter? You’re not okay, Cupid?”

  A herd of buffalo charged through his chest before he realized Mia was only referencing the dating site. The stampede slowed to a trot, and Cupid drew a breath. “You know what, I will have a drink. Whatever she’s having is fine.” Now was not the time to get into a long consultation with the bartender.

  “Yes,” Mia snapped, “you should definitely have four guys in a row with another on the way.”

  Mo’s eyebrows jumped into his gooped-up hair, and his mouth settled into a this-oughtta-be-good smirk. Cupid gave Mo a withering glare and waved him away.

  “Are we having a problem, Mia?”

  “Problem? Now, why would you say that?” Mia’s head tipped to the side at an exaggerated angle. Shit. He’d been focused on heartbeats and eye contact and not on Mia’s alcohol intake. It struck Cupid for the first time that she had consumed a fair amount of liquor for someone her size—especially someone whose body was not accustomed to processing toxins.

  Could she have downed a whole drink with each of the prospects—four guys in forty minutes? Double shit. Not that liquor would interfere with the vibrations, but a girl passed out on the bar seemed unlikely to make a great first impression.

  Mo hustled back with Cupid’s drink, horning in on their conversation as if he would be held responsible later for recalling it word for word. “Thanks,” Cupid said, a scowl firmly in place as he tossed down a twenty and whirled around so his back faced the bar.

  “To Cupid’s last arrow,” Mia toasted. Cupid’s chest thudded once again, but he clinked glasses with her and downed a swig of gin and tonic. “And if this one misses, we send the chubby, flying crybaby home to Mama for a diaper change.”

  The alcohol had already reached Cupid’s throat when the visual assaulted him. A sputter grew into a choke, then a cough, and a hot sting blasted up his sinuses.

  “Oh shit, are you okay, Q?” Mia leapt off her stool and pressed her soggy cocktail napkin into his hand.

  “I’m fi-i-i—” Another coughing fit strangled his answer.

  “Hang on. Here, drink this . . . slowly.” The cool glass met his lips, and Cupid sipped at the ice water until the fire in his throat died down.

  Glancing sideways at Mia, he clasped his hand over hers and gently lowered the water. “I’m, uh-uhmm, fine, thanks.”

  “Are you?”

  Not even close, especially when she tipped her head like that and drilled deep inside his gaze. Lies were not a construct Cupid had mastered yet, but his deflection skills were improving. “Evan should be here any minute now,” he said.

  Mia grimaced. “You really want me to do this?”

  What he wanted to do was kiss her again like their first time in her kitchen, peel off her skintight top, and lick his way down to the miracle of her navel. “I’m sorry, Mia. There’s no other way.”

  She blew out a sigh of frustration and folded her arms under her bosom, which only made everything worse. “No? Hmm, maybe you just need my scent, like a bloodhound. Hey, why don’t I peel off my undies right here, right now,” she said, smirking when Cupid’s jaw hinged open, “and thennnn”—she poked Cupid in the chest with her finger—“you can tie them to your side-view mirror and drive all around Tarra, waving them around like a flag flapping in the breeze.” Her eyes were wide with mischief and liquor. “Then all you have to do is find” . . . poke . . . “my” . . . poke . . . “panty echo.”

  The two sat locked together for several seconds, neither moving a muscle. Mia’s little idea had every part of Cupid’s body at full salute, a result she’d surely intended.

  He gave his erection a discreet nudge and gently coaxed her fingertip off his chest. “Thanks for the creative input, but I don’t think that’s going to work.”

  “In that case,” she said, “you better scram because I think my date’s headed this way.”

  With an agonizing blend of anticipation and dread, Cupid located Evan. Tall, blond, and bright-eyed, Evan strode over toward Mia’s tipsy grin with exactly the eager spring to his step Cupid would have expected. Evan’s not-quite-perfect teeth somehow managed to form an endearing smile. The nauseating thought occurred to Cupid that these two would make great-looking babies.

  “Oh, he’s cute,” she said to Cupid. “He’s the football player, right?”

  “Right.” As he’d made more than obvious with that body-hugging shirt. “Don’t worry, Mia. Once he gets close enough, I’ll make this quick and get you out of here.”

  “What’s your rush?” she asked. Cupid turned away from the rapidly approaching Evan to find Mia applying a fresh coat of lipstick. “I think I might like this one.” Ignoring Cupid’s dismay, she added, “What? Isn’t that what you want?”

  “No. I mean yes, of course, if he’s the right—”

  “Mia?”

  Mia reached for the outstretched hand. “Evan.” The name rolled off her tongue as if she were greeting Zeus Himself. Their palms met, and Cupid forced himself to push through his own confusing, conflicting emotions and focus on the beats. There it was—he hadn’t imagined it—a resounding silence. He’d sort out his feelings later. Right now, he needed to get Mia away from this guy.

  Wrenching apart their clasped hands, Cupid grabbed Mia’s wrist, shook his head, and said, “Sorry, Mia.”

  “Sorry, my ass. I
am having this date right now, mister, and you need to leave.”

  Sensing the man closing in behind him, Cupid threw a shoulder block that would have made Hercules proud. “Your date is over, and I’m not leaving without you.” In the stare-down that followed, Cupid tightened his grip on Mia’s wrist.

  “Oh yeah?” Mia stepped into Cupid’s body, pressing her icy drink against his chest and wafting a gust of sour breath across his cheek. Her eyes were wild, but no less alluring for their lack of focus. “If you’re planning to dump me on my doorstep, thanks but no thanks. I am not in the mood to be alone tonight.”

  If Cupid didn’t keep her company, other arms would hold her tonight, arms Cupid himself had driven her into, arms that belonged to a man who did not have her best interests at heart. Behind the tough girl act were the saddest brown eyes Cupid had ever seen at close range. Only a man with a heart of stone could have possibly turned her down.

  “I won’t leave you alone tonight, Mia.” Cupid wasn’t sure what he’d just committed to, but he could not have been more earnest.

  “Promise?” she asked, allowing the edges of her frown to ease upward into the beginnings of a smile.

  “Uh, mind if I ask what’s going on here?”

  Mia’s gaze shifted to the agitated man nudging his way around Cupid. “I’m so sorry, Evan,” she said. “There’s been a terrible mistake. My friend was about to take me home . . . and not leave me.”

  Before Evan could protest, Mia pushed past him, towing Cupid behind. The cool night air provided a welcome reprieve from the stale haze of failure, but the heat between them had only intensified. Cupid’s no-touch rule had imploded at the worst possible time. Mia was shooting off pheromones as if she’d bathed in them, and all the logical arguments for not touching her made less and less sense.

  Ignoring the cosmic consequences weighing on his heart even as Mia trapped him against the car door with that body, his personal agony and singular relief, Cupid succumbed with a deep groan, opened his lips, and drew her tongue inside. So wrong.

  She flattened Cupid against the Prius, cancelling out his few working brain cells with a harsh grind of body parts that wouldn’t take no for an answer, not that he offered it. Her fingers found his zipper; his breath hitched with each metal tooth unclenched. Must stop her.

  “Oh god, oh god,” she mumbled between deep kisses and gasps for air. She pressed her breasts to his chest. “Touch me. Please, Q, if you care about me at all, touch me.”

  Mia’s need struck a chord deep inside him, surpassing any desire of his own or concern for divine retaliation. What kind of monster would refuse? His hand slipped between her soft thighs, found the warm valley. He rubbed the heel of his hand against the thin fabric. She bit down on his tongue and breached the opening in his boxers—reckless fingers meeting swollen flesh. What could it hurt?

  Cupid moaned and burrowed beneath the silk, crazed with her desire on his fingers and her needy whimpers against his mouth. Mia rocked her hips, grinding against his hand while she pumped him furiously in return. Hades, here I come.

  God and mortal yielded, but the Prius held its ground; tires straining to hold the vehicle in place, cold metal squealing with the pounding and rocking. Mia quivered and spasmed into his palm, tightening her fist and losing her rhythm. Maddened by her erratic strokes, Cupid pistoned wildly until three days’ pressure uncorked in a spectacular release.

  An insistent rumble against his ass cut through Cupid’s bliss. His phone. He didn’t need to see the picture of the buck on his screen; who else would call at the exact moment of Cupid’s colossal orgasm? Delaying the reckoning would only make matters worse, and Cupid was fresh out of wiggle room.

  “Sorry, Mia, I can’t ignore this,” he apologized as he answered Pan’s call.

  “What the FUCK have you just done?”

  34

  Lump

  Twin streaks of bright light arced across the truck’s rearview mirror. Inside the parked Titan, Pan clenched and unclenched his fists once, twice, three times, as if rehearsing for Cupid’s arrival. Despite the short ride to the diner, Pan’s revenge fantasies had fully taken root—a punch to Cupid’s stomach, perhaps; a knee to the nuts, definitely.

  The Prius rolled to a quiet stop in the space to Pan’s left. Glowing in the reflection off the dashboard, Cupid took his sweet time powering down the hybrid. The stalling spoke louder than had all of Cupid’s objections during their brief phone call. Oh, he’s guilty all right. Rage coursed through Pan’s system like hemlock, paralyzing his heart and freezing out his affection for his oldest friend. Pan drew in one more set of choppy breaths, but the action did little more than remind him exactly how out of control he felt.

  Cupid’s anxiety filled Pan’s nostrils even before Cupid stepped out of his car onto the makeshift altar for the slaughter. The irony nearly brought a smile to Pan’s face: the lamb offering himself to the goat. Very funny, you immortal fuckers. Cupid’s gaze dropped to the pavement, his hands retreated into his pockets, and he inched toward Pan’s truck.

  Pan threw open his door. His boots hit the asphalt with a purposeful thunk, and he opened his mouth to rip Cupid a new one. Before he could get a single word out, Cupid started spewing like a helium balloon stabbed with a pitchfork.

  “I’m sorry, Pan. I swear, I didn’t think it would hurt anything. We only used our hands. She was drunk, and I—”

  “Stop it.”

  “But you know I wouldn’t—”

  “Goddammit, Q! I said shut up.”

  Cupid shrank back, catching his upper lip between his teeth.

  Pan spread his hand across the expanse of his forehead, rolling the pressure points at his temples with the pads of his fingers. “I can’t think when you talk.”

  “Sorry,” Cupid mumbled, looking away when Pan scowled at him again.

  “We should go inside,” Pan commanded, leaving the rest to play silently in his head, so I don’t beat you to a pulp.

  Cupid nodded, still working the puppy dog eyes but keeping quiet for once. This situation was dire, goddammit, and maybe it was about time Pan stopped shielding Mr. Innocent from the truth. It hadn’t worked too well for either of them thus far.

  “Y’know what? No. Gimme your fucking hand.”

  “Huh?” Cupid’s forehead creased from confusion or fear; either worked for Pan.

  He poked a finger at Cupid’s wrist. “You really want me to reach into your pocket and get it myself?”

  The hand was produced. Cupid flinched as Pan grasped him by the wrist and yanked him forward. “Ow.”

  Their hips slammed together, but Pan was in no condition to enjoy the contact. “Quiet.”

  Vibrating with rage, Pan tugged Cupid’s arm around his back and locked their joined hands against Pan’s spine. Cupid’s shallow, labored breaths sprayed Pan’s taste buds like droplets of dark ale: rich, bitter, intoxicating. Pan dragged Cupid’s fingers down his back, drove them lower, under his belt, and—fuck it, why not?—inside the waistband of his boxers. Cupid tensed and fought the downward motion, but Pan outmuscled him, forcing Cupid’s fingers to the growth on Pan’s tailbone.

  Cupid gasped. “What is that?”

  Perhaps it was cruel to ignore the question, but Pan had a fucking right to be cruel. Flattening Cupid’s hand against his skin, Pan traced the slope and fall of the stump, pressing firmly when Cupid tried to pull away. Beads of sweat gathered above Cupid’s dark eyebrows; a vein throbbed at his temple. An onlooker might have mistaken their embrace as the prelude to sex. Someone standing close enough might have misinterpreted Cupid’s erection as desire for Pan or construed Pan’s lack of erection as disinterest. They all would have been wrong.

  Cupid didn’t move, barely breathed while the pieces clicked into place. “Your tail is growing back?”

  “So it would appear.”

  Cupid’s fingertips glided a
cross the lump on their own, either unaware Pan had loosened his grip or perhaps serving his penance. “How long before it’s . . .?” The question died with a piteous shake of Cupid’s head.

  Flaccid cock and tail bud be damned, Pan’s resolve to hurt Cupid faded, which only made him more furious. “We need to focus on what you did, Q.”

  Pan glared at him until Cupid finally gave up and looked away, stroking the bump one last time on his way out of Pan’s jeans, a tender sweep that weakened Pan’s knees.

  “I promise you, I did not sleep with her.”

  “I don’t really think sleeping is the issue here,” Pan pointed out.

  “But my genitals were nowhere near her—”

  “For the love of Zeus, would you please just stop? I have heard more about your dick in the week you’ve been here than all the other deities I’ve serviced put together.”

  Mentioning the beast made it impossible for Pan not to steal a glance, and he immediately regretted his wandering eyes. How unfair could things be? Yeah, he so didn’t ask that question in his line of work.

  “I’m sorry, okay? But I still don’t see what my, um, has to do with . . .”

  “My ass?”

  “Yes.”

  Not nearly enough, Pan acknowledged with a rueful smirk. “Apparently, the Divine Council believes you might be moved to control yourself if they threaten to turn your old chum back into a goat.”

  “By the gods, Pan, I am sorry. I had no idea they would mess with you on my account.” Right, because Pan had neglected to mention the minor detail of his impotence.

  “Well, now you do. So keep it in your damn pants,” said Pan, adding, “and don’t invite company in there with it.”

  “Didn’t mean to,” he grumbled. “I just meant to pleasure Mia.”

  “In case you aren’t aware, lover boy, Mia doesn’t need you for that.”

  Cupid seemed to shrink an inch or two. Message received; remorse achieved. Nothing could be gained by further browbeating, and, frankly, the smell of warm apples and cinnamon wafting from the diner replaced Pan’s hunger for revenge with a far more urgent need: pie.