My Date From Hell (The Blooming Goddess Trilogy, #2)

The Understatement of the Century (Part 6)

"Sophie," he purred, "this little baby isn't just a pretty trinket. You can transport via trees. If you'd touched one of the laurel trees there and thought of Hope Park, it would have brought you through to a tree on your school's property. I figured that's why you lifted it." He released the pendant and the sapphire thunked against my chest.

"It was a gift from my mom," I mumbled.

I bowed my head and traced the cool edges of the table with my fingertip, following the path until I'd walked around to the other side. I gripped the lip of the table, needing something solid between the two of us, something to ground me since having my understanding of reality thrown for a loop had severely disoriented me.

My righteous indignation had been knocked out of me in one fell swoop. I didn't like the feeling. This whole time I'd thought he'd betrayed me and left me for dead. When all he'd really been guilty of was taking Theo's chain.

My mind reeled. If only he'd just trusted me with all of this in the first place. But no. He wouldn't have. Even my limited exposure to gods clued me in to that. Backstabbing, manipulation, and destruction, bring it. Trust, friendship, and communication, not familiar with those concepts.

A little late, but he was trusting me now.

That was something. A pretty big something.

Unless he was just playing me. Argh!

I was so busy avoiding Kai's gaze that he managed to get the drop on me. He brushed his lips against my ears. I swear he made my cartilage flutter.

"Stop over thinking me, Goddess. You're gonna make your head explode."

"Don't flatter yourself." My voice sounded impressively cool given the millions of champagne bubble sensations tingling through my body.

Amazing.

From annoyed to aroused and back to deeply annoyed again in minutes. Kai was an emotional roller coaster and I was the idiot on the all-day pass.

Kai arched his neck and shoulders as if easing the stiffness in them. He really had nice shoulders. "So whatcha in for?" he asked in a 1930's gangster voice.

"Zeus wanted the location of the ritual you were planning. Do you know it?""

Kai swore. "No. But that's top of the list after getting out of here."

"Preaching to the choir, buddy. When is it supposed to go down?"

"Spring equinox." At my look of total incomprehension, he explained. "It's the balance of light, above, and shadow, below. So for you and me? Olympus and Underworld? Off the charts power surge. We'll be able to seize control of the minions."

His right shoulder cracked as he stretched it back. "See, a few other gods openly sided with Hades or Zeus, but most couldn't bother to get involved. Nothing in it for them. So really, the only soldiers fighting on Earth, fighting this war at all, are the Photokia and Pyrosim. When we combine our power through this ritual and make the minions ours, Zeus and Hades no longer have armies. Earth is safe." His eyes glittered. "And if we turn that unending supply of fighters on our fathers? Even those gods can't battle them forever. Eventually Zeus and Hades will weaken, and Olympus and the Underworld will be ours."

I didn't want Olympus. I just wanted Earth to be left alone. That was a discussion for another time, though.

"Our 'have sex, save the world' plan is gonna require some pretty amazing foreplay to overcome the stress of facing them." I was only partly joking.

Kai rolled onto the outsides of his feet, shoving his hands into his pockets. "About that."

I eyed him, highly suspicious.

His lips twisted wryly. "The ritual is us declaring our love. Not having sex."

My reaction was a bit tri-polar.

Relief that we didn't have to have sex to save the world.

Disappointment that we didn't have to have sex to save the world.

And a massive WTF! that we had to fall in love to save the world.

My mouth actually fell open in stunned shock."You lied to me?"

"Hey, sex was your assumption," he said. "My words were 'two become one.'"

He had the audacity to look superior.

I shoved him, making him stumble sideways. "That's me pushing you off your moral high ground, asshat."

The enormity of this hit me like a sledgehammer to the head. I paced, my temples pounding. "No, no, no. It's one thing to have sex. Fleas have sex." I gestured madly. "Love is supposed to involve choice. You can't force people to fall in love and then hinge saving the world on it. Who does that?"

Kai eased himself up onto the table, his legs dangling. "So choose to do it." He sounded frustrated.

What part of this didn't he understand? "It's not that simple. There's no blueprint for falling in love. Sex, well, it's a physical process." I bounced on my toes, distraught. "Love is an emotional one. You can't force emotions."

Kai gave me a half-grin. "You get mad at me all the time."

"Well, yes. But love? That's ... everything. I was willing to lose my virginity for this. Take one for the team."

"Gee, thanks." Kai leaned back onto his elbows.

"But love? It's impossible." I could deal with sex. That just involved performance anxiety, not the potential having my heart broken into a million sharp shards.

I wrapped my arms around myself because I had suddenly gotten very cold. With my accelerated healing skills, my body was actually feeling a bit better, but my emotional well-being was going through the wringer big time.

"How are you and I ever going to fall in love, Kai? And why would you even want to? You don't even like me."

His eyes flicked to the torture machine. Went soft and sad. His voice was quiet as he said, "Sometimes you gotta go into the dark to find the light."