“Which is the only damn reason I’m going to ask for her help. She irritates the crap out of me.”

“And yet you are wise enough not to let that irritation keep you from calling on her gifts.” His smile was full of warmth and pride. “You see, my beauty, why I trust you so?”

“I see that you and I haven’t had enough quality alone time.”

“We are alone now.” His smile turned sexy.

“And my headache is definitely gone.” She drained the rest of the iced coffee and put the glass on her marble-topped nightstand. Aphrodite draped her arms around his broad shoulders and pulled him down to her. Darius came to her eagerly. His kiss was deep and as she opened her mouth he moaned, and rolled, taking her with him so that she was on top, pressed against him while his hand found the edge of her T-shirt and began moving in hot, insistent strokes against her naked skin.

When the knocking started on the door, Aphrodite whispered against Darius’s lips, “Ignore it and it will go away.”

The knocking became louder, more insistent.

Aphrodite nibbled on the side of Darius’s neck. “Pretend it’s reality TV. Ignore it.”

“Aphrodite! Hellllo!” Zoey’s voice carried through the door. “Stark told me Darius was bringing you iced coffee, which means you’re in there and awake.”

Darius reluctantly pulled down her T-shirt. “You do need to talk with her.”

Aphrodite kissed him one more time before she stomped to the door, not bothering to fix her hair, her T-shirt, or her annoyed look, and opened it, saying, “Oh, for shit’s sake, come in, birth control.”

“Huh? Birth control?” Z walked in.

“Never mind. Too late.”

“Hi,” Zoey said. “You don’t look bad.”

“I never look bad,” Aphrodite told her.

Z rolled her eyes and waved at Darius. “Hey there, Darius. Stark said to tell you he needs help with the boxes, like, right now. Kalona’s plan worked and he’s got Dallas and his group piling up logs for the pyre.”

“I am on my way.” He paused to kiss Aphrodite quickly before leaving. “You, I will meet back here at sunrise.”

“Alone.” Aphrodite enunciated the word carefully, sending Zoey a Look.

After Darius closed the door, Z perched on one of Aphrodite’s velvet chairs. “So, if you’re feeling frisky, you must not be too hung over.”

“Frisky is not a verb people under the age of eighty use to describe anything except the behavior of horses, and I’m not hung over at all,” Aphrodite began as she fixed her T-shirt, went to her vanity mirror, and started combing her hair. Then, watching Zoey in the reflection, she added, “Well, okay, maybe I got a little messed up last night, but sleep, caffeine, and sugar fixed that.”

“Brown pop always does it for me,” Z said.

“You know that’s not good for your skin,” Aphrodite told her.

“Like your mimosas are?”

“Orange juice is totally healthy. I just like mine diluted.”

“With alcohol,” Z said, shaking her head and trying, unsuccessfully, not to smile.

“With good alcohol. Like Marilyn Monroe. And you see that her skin didn’t wrinkle.”

“Aphrodite, Marilyn Monroe died before she could get wrinkled.”

“My point exactly. Mimosas are healthy. The end.”

“You’re making my head hurt,” Z said.

Aphrodite smiled. “You are welcome. Oh, and before Darius and I started our super hot makeout session, which was going to lead to super hot sex, which you totally interrupted, he told me about Chera and the jewels.”

“First, eew, frisky sounded so much better than your description. Second, Chera seemed cool, but basically her being here means the House of Night is in deep poo. Third, you do understand they’re not jewels—they’re ancient weapons that happen to have diamonds and rubies and stuff like that set into them.”

“Proving how moronic males can be. Precious gems belong draped around a beautiful woman’s—meaning mine—body. Not wasted in pointy and shieldy things.”

“Except for the part about them belonging just on your body, I’m in total agreement with you.”

“And I agree with you that we need to keep our mouths shut about them.”

“Yeah, that’s what my gut told me to do, but it felt awkward keeping it from Thanatos.”

“If Thanatos didn’t mention the weapons to you, that means Dragon was the one keeping them from her, not you—not us. I say box them up and hide them in one of Lenobia’s tack rooms. I’m pretty sure if I tried to use my mom’s gold card today, it would tell me I’m shit out of luck, so I say yes to having a financial backup plan.”

Zoey’s gaze met hers in the mirror. “Last night was bad. I’m really sorry about your dad, and I’m sorry about the stuff your mom said to you, too.”

Aphrodite bit back the sarcastic reply that came so easily to her, drew a deep breath, and was honest with her friend. “I knew my mom never really cared about me, but knowing it and having her put it out there for everyone else to know are two different things—two different feelings. It hurts. A lot.”

“Yeah,” Z said softly, her eyes getting watery. “I know what you mean.”

Aphrodite turned the little stool around so she could face Zoey. “You know what one of the first things I was happy about when I got Marked?”

“Having awesome hair?” Z smiled through her tears.

“No, stupid, I already had awesome hair,” she quipped, and then her voice changed and she stared down at her lap. “One of the first things that made me happy was that I learned vampyres can’t have babies, so I knew there was no way I’d slip up and accidentally get pregnant and then be a shitty mom and make some poor kid as fucking miserable as my mom made me.”

“Hey, that’s not going to happen.”

Aphrodite wiped her eyes and looked up at Z. “Yeah, not as long as I keep having super hot sex with a vampyre it won’t.”

“Well, that’s as true as it is gross, but it’s not what I was talking about. That’s not going to happen to you because you aren’t like your mom,” Zoey said carefully. “You’re good and loyal, and you wouldn’t hurt someone you love.”

“Thanks,” Aphrodite managed to say, wiping her eyes again.

“And don’t call me stupid,” Z said.

“I didn’t call you a retard. I was being nice and politically correct.” Aphrodite turned back around and started fixing her smeared mascara.

“And yet you still found a reason to say the r word.” Zoey sighed. “So, you really are okay after losing your dad?”

“Are you really okay after losing your mom?”

Z looked surprised at the question. “I guess I will be. I mean, like you, my mom hadn’t done much mothering in a long time. I was used to her not being around already.”

“Then I guess I will be okay, too.”

“If you need someone to talk to, you know you can talk to me, right?”

“Right. Same for you with me. I know you and the bumpkin are close, but she has the perfect mamma and daddy,” Aphrodite put on Stevie Rae’s accent.

“There’s nothing wrong with having good parents. It’s actually normal.”

Aphrodite snorted. “We’ll have to agree to disagree about that, but that’s not my point. I’m just saying if you need someone else to talk to who has at least one dead parent, I’m here for you.”

“Thanks, I think.” Z grabbed a Kleenex and blew her nose loudly. “Why don’t you get all snotty and ugly when you cry?”

“Because I am not as disgusting as you are,” she said.

“Can I take back that nice stuff I said about you?”

“You can try. You’ll be unsuccessful, but you can still try.” Aphrodite pulled a pair of skinny jeans from a hanger and flipped the switch that started her electronic shoe cabinet to begin turning so that a neat row of boots appeared. She grabbed the red-soled Louboutins. Looking over her shoulder at Z’s gawk she said, “What? You can’t tell me these boots aren’t perfection.”

“I can’t even look at your boots because your closet is freaking me the heck out.”