Chapter Eleven

Weeks go by of dates, flowers, chocolates, nights in, star gazing, and well... sex. Ares was not kidding when he said he fully intended to make me fall for him and, as much as I hate to admit, it's working. With each new fact about him, each date, each kiss, I fall and so far, I keep falling. I haven't told him, I tell myself it's because I won't give him the satisfaction of winning, but I know it's because I am scared he doesn't feel the same.

I practically live at his place. He picks me up and drops me off at work, each time returning to his apartment, I haven't been to my own apartment in weeks. Persephone texts me constantly apologizing for our last meeting and I assure her it was all on me and that we will get together soon. I do regret the way I treated her, but she seems to understand that Olympus puts me on edge.

Tonight is beautiful, the breeze cooler than it was a week ago. Fall is coming in smoothly and the cold penetrates my jeans and long sleeve shirt. When I shiver, Ares drapes his jacket over my shoulders. I give him a grateful smile and rest my head on his shoulder. We don't have any plans today, so we went to the roof of his building to enjoy the sunset.

Pent up emotions swirl within me and my stomach turns with each turn of emotion. Love, worry, anxiety. My head spins and I have to close my eyes, taking in many deep breaths to get any semblance of relaxation.

"Tell me something," he says. This is something we have found ourselves doing a lot lately, especially after sex. A way to get to know the little things about each other.

I smile, nestling into his jacket. "I hate bananas," I reply, giggling as his expression turns, highly, questioning.

"Do explain, pretty dove."

I wrinkle my nose, just thinking about them makes my skin crawl. "The smell is gods awful, the texture has to be brewed from soaked bread and they look ugly."

He laughs, a full, joyous sound that causes my own lips to tilt in a smile. I wish I could bottle up the sound and keep it close forever. "You seem to enjoy the taste and look of my banana just fine," he teases.

Gasping at the joke, I slap his chest and this causes him to laugh even louder. I roll my eyes and shake my head. "You're insufferable."

He shrugs as though to say it's all my fault and I shake my head again. Crazy, crazy man. Once it gets too dark to sit outside, Ares sweeps me into his arms and takes me down towards his apartment. "I don't like boots," he says in my ear.

Raising an eyebrow, I pull my head from the comfort of his shoulder and look at him. "I do believe it is your turn to explain."

He chuckles, using caution when walking down the stairs. "They're just not comfortable. I have big feet and they pinch my toes."

"You have big feet?" I tease, poking his cheek. "Mister Ares isn't perfect?"

He enters his apartment and sets me on my feet, swatting my ass, drawing a gasp from me. His hands rest on my hips and he presses against me, eliciting another sound from my throat. "You know what they say about big feet..."

I hush him by sliding a hand along the length of him. He hisses and grips my hips in his palms. With no hesitation he takes off my shirt, growling at the bra, covering me from him. With us having sex so often, I usually forego a bra, but today I had work so I put one on and forgot to take it off when I got back. Calluses scrape along my back as he inches towards the clasp. With the flick of his fingers the bra falls to the floor and I take his shirt off.

Slowly, he backs me towards the window and presses me against it. My heart races as he undoes the button of my pants and slowly, oh so slowly, pulls down the zipper. "People can see us," my voice comes out breathy, my chest heaving and brushing against his.

A smirk slides along his lips as he hooks his fingers into my pants and panties, sliding them off, leaving me completely bare. "Only if they have binoculars." He isn't wrong. His apartment is so high, no one on the ground can see us and the nearest building is too far to see anything specific.

Fuck it.

I set about taking off the remainder of his clothes with suddenly a big, callused hand slips between my thighs. My head falls back against the glass at the warmth of his hand and my hips move of their own accord, rocking into his palm.

"Quite eager are we?" His voice is low and deep, my skin stretching across my bones and my breasts ache with the sound.

"Shut up and touch me," I growl, hooking a hand around the back of his neck.

He tsks and starts to move his hand away.

Desperately I clap my free hand over his, keeping him against him. "I am sorry," I breathe reluctantly.

"Ah, there you go." His fingers slide and my back arches. Cocky bastard.

With little warning his fingers slip in and my nails dig into his arms as he works me again and again and again. Just when I think I can take no more he stops. I am about to protest when he lifts me up, pulling my legs around his waist and drives into me. My mouth drops into and O and I tremble around him with the force of his hips.

“I dare you.” He gets in my face, panting with want and need. “I dare you to feel something for me. Get involved. Let yourself feel something for me. Stop being scared. You’re not some submissive puny goddess.” One hand drags along my center, eliciting a whimper from my throat, his other hand coming up to cup my face, his hands shaking slightly against my cheeks, making me look up into those amber brown eyes. “You’re free, little dove. Don’t let fear rule you.” Ares voice wavers with some emotion and my heart squeezes in my chest and I can barely stand to look at him.

Week after week he has made love to me. He hasn’t once detached himself from any emotion. He lets himself feel love while we share our bodies. I have felt it each and every time he has brought me back to his house, laid me in my bed with care. I have seen it even outside the bedroom. The way he looks at me, his gentle hands as he brushed tears from my cheeks after a nightmare, his care with my dog… all of it, the emotion I have ignored so long but my powers drank in so greedily.

“I. Dare. You.” his words brush my lips and I suck in a breath.

A challenge. He’s been challenging me for weeks. I haven’t turned down one since I saw him in that bar, and I know I’m not going to start now.

I lean up to press my lips against his, but he pulls away, shaking his head. “Feel it, Aphrodite. Say it.”

Balling his hair my my fist, I push myself against him, brushing my lips against his. “I love you,” I breathe, the words barely audible.

All has been blown to smithereens.

He smirks, drawing it out slowly, stopping whenever I get close only to pick up a more harsher speed, then stopping to favor a more languid speed. My body aches and perspiration slicks my skin and I whimper with the desire, the need, to let go.

Finally as he drives in one last time, my world fractures around me and my head falls to his shoulder. He walks us to the couch and sits down with me in his lap. His hands smooth over my back and hair.

"I love you," I say it again, needing to say it again. For weeks I have fought and kicked and screamed, avoiding this, avoiding this feeling. Love leads to nowhere good and I can't decide if I am ready for it, yet, here I am.

My heart palpitates and my palms sweat. I should take it back, say it was a lie, he did dare me to say it, but I can't bring myself to diminish the growing feelings I have been having since that cursed night at the bar. His lips press against mine, quieting all thoughts that riot inside my head.

His thumb glides along my cheek. "I love you, Aphrodite."

The words cause tears to well in my eyes and I bury my face in his neck, content to let our feelings wrap us into a warm bubble, pushing around us like humid air.

Yet, unlike humid air, I don't mind it.

-~-

The morning sun filters through the blinds in his bedroom, casting his large naked form in a golden light. A smile slides onto my lips as I stretch alongside him, aching from sleep and other activities. His hair is mussed and his lips are slightly parted as he sleeps. It's hard to believe this is the man the Romans believed were responsible for their wars and chaos. It hurts to know Zeus keeps him only to prolong war and chaos and not aid in it.

His kind heart wasn't made for this. Beneath the hard exterior is a man who wants to be known for his good deeds, the things he actually does in wars. If I have learned anything in these past few months it's that he isn't what the myths make him out to be, but then again are any of us true to our myths?

Demeter tried to sell Persephone to the highest bidder before relenting and letting her live out her days with Hades,  Poseidon is said to be as pale as a statue with golden wheat hair but in reality he is dark of color with stark white hair, similar to his brother's. We are all unlike what the myths portray.

I run my fingers softly over his face, tracing the strong line of his jaw, up to his cheekbone, his brow and down his nose, sliding a finger over his soft lips. He is so beautiful, my heart hurts. My body feels light and airy. Everything feels so right for the first time in a long time.

He is everything I didn't know I needed.

Ares stirs and when his eyes flutter open the sun seems to highlight the red hues in his brown eyes. His arm wraps around my waist and he pulls me against him. "Good morning, love," he murmurs.

With a smile, I nestle into him, smoothing my hands over the expanse of his chest. "Good morning."

For an hour we lay in bed, saying nothing, just looking and touching. We are interrupted by my alarm clock and his phone ringing. He groans, pushing his face into my neck as he answers the phone and I shut off my alarm.

"Hello," he growls into the phone, drawing lazy circles on my ass. He is silent for a long time, then heaves a sigh. "I'll be there in fifteen."

I pull away to look at him, raising a questioning brow.

"It's Hawk, a deal went wrong and they want me there to scare some new start up." He rolls his eyes and I can't help my giggle. He swats my behind and I fall into a fit of giggles as he groans into my neck. "Don't laugh at me, you cruel creature."

He rolls out of bed, with me doing the same and we go about getting ready. Me for work and him for... ass kicking?

As we leave the building he pulls me in for one last kiss. "I can't walk with you to work today, but I'll see you at home?"

He called it home, as though it were mine too and... I do feel like it's my home. "Of course. I'll see you then and maybe with whip cream on your..." I trail off, wiggling my brows.

Ares chuckles, kissing me again. "You do realize women usually wear the whip cream?"

"Well, a girl can dream can't she?"

He shakes his head as he laughs, pressing the for real last kiss on my lips and slips onto his bike. "I love you," he says.

My heart skips a beat. "I love you too."

Then we both set about going our separate ways.  I practically float down the sidewalk, feeling lighter than I have since my unwanted marriage. It feels good and I owe it all to Ares. That stubborn man. Smiling, I shake my head and smother a giggle.

A block from the library, an arm snakes around my waist and just as I am about to chastise Ares for following me, a hand with a rag claps over my mouth and with only a few moments of struggling my body goes limp and vision bleeds into unconsciousness.

Hi guys:) I know in this chapter I spoke of the "myths" and the way they were "portrayed", I am aware this is incorrect, the bit about Persephone is from a story I have yet to finish about Hades and Persephone. I actually started it a long time ago and I hate how it was set up, so I will be editing and rewriting it. So when it comes out it will be before the events of this story so it will act as somewhat of a prequel. This is all fake and all I did was take Ares and Aphrodite and threw them into the modern world. Sorry if this makes anyone mad. Enjoy reading:)