“Thanks, Av. Go ahead and tell Maddi to take the day off since you’re doing her job,” I teased.
She paused at the door and batted her lashes sarcastically at me. “Just taking care of my favorite dickhead,” she said sweetly.
I adjusted in my seat. “Jeez. I thought your husband’s dickhead would be your favorite,” I grinned.
Avril threw a pillow from the couch at my head, and I dodged it easily. She was still shaking her head when she closed my glass door.
My phone vibrated. I turned it over, finding a message from my mother on the screen, prompting me to press my elbows into the desk and rub my eyes. She’d been on me about going home for a few years now, and I wasn’t sure how long I could keep putting it off. Between that and the very little sleep I’d been getting lately, I was exhausted.
I’d started having dreams again—dreams of a feeling and a touch I thought lost forever. In every dream, complete darkness surrounded me and the woman I laid in bed with. I could taste her, smell her, feel her. And every time I had the dream, I only thought of one person: the woman I’d searched for for five years and found nothing on.
Chloe.
The only regret I had in my life was leaving her.
I still think about that night almost every day. It drove me crazy that I’d not changed my flight and taken at least the next day with her. I had no way of knowing where she was any longer. She’d deleted the Cupid’s Arrow app almost immediately after that Valentine’s night, and I hadn’t even been smart enough to remember her last name.
She was a ghost. An apparition that tortured me almost daily. That night had ignited my world again and sent me searching for something that I hadn’t felt in centuries—something that was so familiar and yet new.
I’d nearly gone home just to seek the Oracle about finding her, but I knew better than to think Apollo would ever give me an answer after the way we’d ended things.
I smiled at that memory.Idiot. A few friends had told me to apologize for humiliating him so long ago, but the rage on his face when we randomly saw each other over the years was much more fun. I’d even played a few more tricks on him with mortals I knew he was lusting after, sending the same blunted arrows after them so they might despise him as Daphne had.
I chuckled and opened the Cupid’s Arrow app on my phone. It was really ignorant of him to use my app in the first place, so why not have a little fun?
Maybe I could even dig up a little dirt on anyone from Designare Fusion while I was on it.
CHAPTER THREE - CHLOE
LANA’S ARRIVAL THE next Wednesday was a whirlwind of screams and hugs. I hadn’t seen her in person in over a year. We’d both been so busy with work that our vacations hadn’t lined up. She had already planned our evening—a whiskey distillery, a nice Thai restaurant, and a late-night pajama party that Tyler wasn’t invited to. He’d chosen to stay at his parents another day to avoid having to hang around the opposite side of the apartment all night.
“Fuck all, I can’t wait for tomorrow,” Lana said as she lounged back in the booth we had picked out at the restaurant. “It’s going to be epic.”
“I think I’ll remain wasted the rest of the week,” I muttered against my wine glass. “Champagne tomorrow morning at the fitting. Vodka tomorrow night to get through possibly seeing Gavin in the same room as my fiancé—“
“Bloody Mary’s Saturday morning for the hangover,” Lana interjected.
“—Wine that afternoon for dinner with the in-laws,” I added.
“Ugh,” Lana grunted, rolling her eyes. “I can’t believe you’re subjecting me to that torture.”
“You can rag on me and complain all you want on Sunday with mimosas at brunch with the girls,” I said.
“Fucking, yes,” Lana said. “Can’t wait to see Ezzie and Raegan so we can all dish about your little conundrum.”
“There is no conundrum,” I argued. “One look at Gavin will not make me leave Tyler and jump into bed with him,” I said.
“Not unless he brings one of his little love arrows,” she replied. “Still, filling them in on the details will be fun.”
I could only imagine the absolute chaos that would ensue when they found out.
Lana and I laughed and chatted all through our dinner, and by the time we headed home, both of us were on the verge of a drunken stupor, and full of Thai food. We stopped by a late night bakery to fuel our slumber party with cheesecake and chocolate before surrendering back to my apartment.
“—until you see the onesie I found,” Lana said as we exited the elevator to my floor. “It’s my favorite animal.”
“Unicorn or narwhal?” I asked. I fumbled for my keys, almost tripping on the rug down the hallway.
“Aren’t they—oh shit!” Lana grabbed me to keep from falling—unsuccessfully, and both of us burst into laughter, cursing and sinking to the floor in our dresses.
