He was handsome, and strong, and he’d been brutally honest with me. Honesty was something I valued as much as anything else. Something that I wasn’t sure now that Remo had given me. Even when he’d walked away, he’d held back from being honest. So what was I doing? Wishing Remo were still with me, while considering the kiss I’d shared with Smithy? My mother would be horrified. And she would be right.

I was soooo going to H-E-double-hockey-sticks in a handbasket.

CHAPTER 4

“What the hell just happened there?” Tad looked at me, the closed door, and then back at me again.

“Long story.” I ran a hand over my head, smoothing my hair back.

He laughed. “And? You can’t say ‘long story’ and then not even give me a little bit of it, sis.”

I rolled my eyes. “It has nothing to do with you, so I’m not telling you anything.”

Still laughing, he helped me get going on the recipe. I could never be really all that mad with my younger brother. I’d lost him once when I’d thought the Aegrus virus had taken him. And then I’d almost lost him again when Achilles had used him as bait for me to walk into a trap. No matter how Tad might poke at me, no matter how we might fight from time to time, I wouldn’t change it for anything. Our parents might have disowned us, but we had each other.

That was worth all the teasing in the world.

I smiled to myself, thinking about how far we’d come from the sheltered Firstamentalist lives we’d started with. I dumped the batter I’d begun and started the sponge cake over again, focusing on the ingredients instead of what had just happened. I wanted to put a buttercream frosting between the two-layer. Not the kind of frosting I’d laced my vomit-inducing cupcakes with. There would be no venom in this cake.

A thought hit me like a frying pan to the side of my head. The whole point of Smithy coming to see me was to warn me and tell me which hero Hera had raised to kill me this time. “Wait here, Tad!”

“I’m not going anywhere, but where are you going?” he called after me.

I ran out the door and into the parking lot without answering him, knowing I was probably too late. It had been a good ten minutes since Smithy had left.

But there he was on the far side of the road, across from the mob. He sat on a motorbike, gripping the handlebars, his head hanging. The low rumble of the Firstamentalists was the only sound in the night air.

I licked my lips, then sprinted across the road.

“Smithy, wait, please.”

His head jerked up and turned to me, a look in his eyes I didn’t want to dwell on. A look that said he’d been thinking about me and hoping I’d come after him.

The problem was, I hadn’t been lying when I’d said I loved Remo.

But it was also true that Smithy’s kiss had lit me up in a most unexpected way. I was in trouble no matter how I looked at things.

“Is something wrong?” He kicked the stand on his bike and stepped off. I stopped a few feet away, keeping distance between us. The closer I was, the more my libido woke up, and that was something I just didn’t want to deal with at the moment.

“You said you knew who the hero was . . . or was that just a reason to see me?” I didn’t really want to accuse him of lying. I didn’t think he would have done that.

He grunted and looked away. “Yeah, I know who it is.”

“Can you tell me? Please?”

His one hand clenched into a fist, and he was silent long enough that I wondered if he hadn’t heard me. “Let me take you on a date, and I’ll tell you.”

“That’s blackmail,” I said, while a small part of me squealed eagerly.

“No, that’s a trade.” He smiled. “I wouldn’t blackmail you.”

A date. With anyone else, I’d think it was harmless. But with him, I wasn’t so sure. He had some qualities that echoed what I loved about Remo, and some qualities that outshone the vampire at the moment. I shook my head, thinking fast, trying to come up with an alternative. “How about his name for a kiss?”

He arched an eyebrow and didn’t even hesitate. “Hercules.”

Well, that about settled that. I stepped back, feeling a bit like a jerk, knowing that he was going to be pissed when he understood what I’d done. “Thank you.”

Smithy took a step toward me. “The kiss—?”

“Has already been given. A kiss you took without permission, if I may remind you.” I smiled at him, incredibly pleased with myself. His jaw dropped.

“That’s cheating.” His eyes sparkled, though, as if he wasn’t too upset.

“No, that’s using what I’ve got to win.” I threw the words over my shoulder as I walked away back across the road to the bakery. I was going to use everything I had at my disposal to win against Hera. To survive when everything was stacked against me. Smithy’s laughter floated on the air.

“We aren’t done yet, Alena. Not by a long shot.”

I waved a hand back at him, as if to shoo him away. The sound of the bike starting up and then roaring away brought me around. He was gone, his back to me as he raced down the street.

I hurried back to the bakery. The mob booed me, of course, and I took a half step in a mock threat toward them. They all fell back, except for one bold member.

A young woman not wearing a mask stepped forward. She was about my age, maybe a little younger. She wore the typical drab colors, and her hair was pulled back in a severe braid that made her look older than she really was. But unlike the others in the crowd, she didn’t hide her face.