Apollo's 11

by Anna Collins

  Jesus Christ, now I was having doubts whether I was still in love with the man I willingly moved in with.

  I was messed up, a messed up woman indeed.

  I ran out of Portola Valley and drove like a maniac all the way home. I needed to see Nick. I was dreading to see the look on his face once I told him what happened, but I couldn’t hide this from him anymore. Flirting with Apollo Irons was one thing, and yeah, that was something I could’ve gone without telling him at all because nothing else happened.

  Well, something happened earlier, alright. My boss kissed me. Twice.

  And I kissed him back. Twice.

  Oh boy, I think I’m screwed.

  I remembered all those movies and series I watched on TV about cheating men and women and how I absolutely hated them, scorning them with every fiber of my being for their lack of fidelity to their significant others. I remembered how I used to insult them all the time, cursing them for lying and their partner for being stupid whenever they took that lying creep back.

  Look how the tables have turned, Callie. You are now just like them. You’ve become a lying creep yourself, hoping that once you’ve confessed your heinous crime, Nick will be just like those blubbering idiots who take lying creeps like you back.

  Oh, my God, I’m such a horrible human being…and it was all Apollo Irons’ fault!

  If he hadn’t kissed me, this wouldn’t have happened. I would still be stuck in that flirting game we had going on, and I would still dream about what it would feel like to kiss him and feel his arms around me while my boyfriend and I had sex…

  That actually sounded way worse, now that I thought about it.

  I shook my head and breathed a sigh of relief once I finally got home, and I climbed the stairs and unlocked my door. My face split into a wide smile as I expected my boyfriend to be right in the living room, playing his Xbox or Play Station or whatever it was called—

  Except he was not there, which was weird because he had to be here. Nick was a creature of habit, and since he hardly ever needed to make an appearance at work, he was almost perpetually perched on the couch, playing whatever game he was playing on his console, talking to the other person he was playing with on the headphones he was wearing. That was his routine, that’s what he did every morning.

  Except not this morning, apparently. I looked around the room, and although I still felt guilty about what I had done, I couldn’t help but feel a little resentment for Nick start to brim inside me. There on the dining table still sat the Chinese takeout boxes we had a couple of days ago, with the addition of a couple of cans of beer for company. Then on the kitchen sink, loads of unwashed plates were still piled up and probably growing a new kind of life form from all of the leftovers and half-eaten food.

  I mean, yes, he did earn more than I do, but since he was home almost all the time, would it kill him to at least wash the plates? Or throw out the trash even?

  And sure, I was at home most of the time too, but I did my fair share of cleaning around here. For starters, if I didn’t load the washer every week, would we have anything left to wear? And I cleaned up a little from time to time, whereas Nick hardly ever did. The only exercise his hand got was when he was thumbing down those buttons on his controller or when he was jacking off.

  I knew I was probably just thinking this because I was diverting my frustration over myself to him. However, a part of me couldn’t help but think that I probably had all of this bottled up inside of me for a while, and I was just starting to think about it because, well, I needed to feel good about myself.

  I heard a faint laughter from our room, and I tiptoed quietly, wanting to see what was so funny. My heart started to beat faster as I neared the door, but I didn’t know what I was doing. Instinct led me to sneak in quietly and see what my boyfriend was laughing at, while a part of me was convinced I was just paranoid, which was also making me feel a bit ashamed of myself. I had no right to be paranoid when I was the guilty one between the two of us, but at the same time, I had a bad feeling for this.

  I spied through the crack in the door and saw him grinning at his laptop, and I closed my eyes as I sighed in relief. He was watching a funny movie! That’s what this was about. Oh, Callie, you paranoid little—

  “Oh, Nick, you are soo bad,” a woman’s voice said before erupting into giggles, the sound of it coming from the laptop and my eyes snapped open.

  That was not a movie.

  I stood up straight and opened the door wide, Nick’s head snapping up and his hands shooting towards the lid of his laptop, putting it down with a click. His eyes were wide as he looked at me.

  “Callie! What are you doing here?” he asked.

  “What do you mean, ‘What am I doing here?’ I live here,” I told him, and he rolled his eyes.

  “No, I meant what are you doing here so early? I thought you had work today,” he explained, and I shrugged, feigning nonchalance.

  “He let me off early. We just needed to discuss a few things,” I lied, and the corners of his mouth twitched as he gave me a nervous smile. I made a show of turning my head towards him, to his laptop, and to the hand resting on top of the lid a couple of times before he laughed, catching my drift.

  “I was just surfing some stuff up. You know, for work,” he said, pulling at the collar of his shirt and I raised my eyebrows.

  “Oh,” I said. He pushed the laptop away and stood up from the bed, giving me a swift kiss on the cheek.

  “Come on, let’s eat lunch. I know you’re starving,” he said, before patting my butt and walking past me towards the kitchen.

  I took a look at his laptop again, the heavy feeling from my insides still not going away. On the contrary, it felt worse, like I had almost stumbled upon a secret and was just short of an ear. Why did I still feel like I was missing something important here?

  I wasn’t in the mood to cook anything except for instant Cup Noodles, and we spent lunch eating in silence. I was about to take another bite of my crab sticks when he gulped down his noodles and looked up.

  “So, how was your first day as Mr. Irons’ assistant?” he asked.

  Wonderful. I spent most of my time there imagining what it would feel like to sleep with him on his wide, king-sized bed and the rest playing tonsil hockey with him as he tried to coerce me into cheating on you.

  Yeah. NO.

  “It was fine,” I said instead, and he shrugged, not bothering to ask for more details, another trait I hated about him. He didn’t really bother asking me about my day, and he didn’t really like sharing about his, either. It was as if he merely asked out of courtesy, and he preferred that I answered him as short as possible.

  As we continued to eat, I couldn’t help but wonder why I didn’t tell him about the kiss when I was adamant to do so earlier. It must have been because that woman’s voice earlier was making me paranoid. I was afraid that Nick was keeping something from me too, judging from the way he had hastily closed his laptop at the sight of me, and I didn’t feel like fessing up to my mistake yet until I found out what he was hiding.

  It was funny how in a span of a few hours, our relaxed and easygoing relationship had turned into one where both of us were keeping secrets from each other.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Apollo

  I groaned as I watched Callie’s head go up and down slowly, her lips wrapping around my cock like a vice grip, making me delirious with need. God damn, her mouth was amazing. I was torn between blowing my load inside of her hot mouth or if I wanted to push her off so I could bury myself inside her to the hilt.

  She released my cock with a pop and grinned salaciously at me, kissing the tip of my cock with a brush of her lips before licking it with her tongue like a lollipop. All this foreplay was driving me crazy. This woman was driving me crazy, and I didn’t know if I could hold on any longer.

  “Callie, stop,” I groaned, and she laughed sexily.

  “But, Mr. Irons, you taste so good,” she whined, taking hold of my coc
k and pumping it up and down very, very slowly.

  “Come here,” I growled, and she pouted before releasing my cock and crawling her way over me, her perfect breasts swinging and begging me to suck them.

  She swung her head to the side, making most of her hair fall over one shoulder before lowering her head towards me, her lips just a hairsbreadth away from mine.

  She opened her mouth to speak.

  “Apollo!” a voice that sounded nothing like her and eerily similar to my brother came out, and I frowned.

  “Apollo, wake the fuck up, man!”

  My eyes snapped open, and I felt something smack my face. I pulled it away and glared at the pillow before throwing it to the side.

  Perseus was clutching at his stomach like he was in pain, but his face was filled with joy as he laughed loudly.

  “You were having a fucking sex dream!” Perseus exclaimed, wiping a stray tear from the corner of his eye with his finger, his mouth spread into a wide grin. I could do nothing but glare at him as I waited for my heart to slow down. I couldn’t let him see how much that dream affected me. He’d never let me off the hook for it.

  I let him laugh for a few more minutes. It was a rare moment for him to find a reason to laugh at my expense, so I could afford to let him have it just this once. When he finally straightened up and calmed down, he walked over to my bed and planted his ass down to the mattress, his eyebrows raised. I raised one of mine in return.

  “So?” he asked.

  “What?” I asked back.

  “Who were you dreaming about?” he asked.

  “Who said it was anyone specific?” I pointed out.

  “You wouldn’t dream of having sex with anyone random,” Perseus replied. “And I highly doubt you dream about every single woman you’ve had sex with if that’s the case.”

  Leave it to Perseus to leave no stone unturned. I was considered the brilliant one among us Irons siblings, but Perseus wasn’t that far off. He was probably the only one I knew who could see through my words and fill up any loopholes. He was an analyst by nature, and I counted on him to look into things for me from time to time. It was a trait I was grateful for.

  But that didn’t mean I liked it whenever he used it on me.

  “What are you doing here, Perseus?” I asked him, purposely changing the subject. The corner of his mouth lifted up to form a smirk, seeing through my action.

  “You know what I’m here for. We need to handle the situation about Helen. She’s spending way too much time with those Ridley twins,” Perseus answered.

  “Then maybe you should tell her to stop hanging out with them. You care about her more, anyway.”

  “Get your head out of your ass, Apollo. She would never listen to me. She’d listen to you, though. Which is why you have to speak to her,” he insisted.

  “I’m busy right now. I don’t have time to deal with her mundane problems,” I said, throwing my sheets off and got out of bed. I tilted my head from side to side and stretched my muscles before walking over to the salamander bars. Perseus sighed and walked over to me.

  “Her ‘mundane problems’ could affect your work sooner or later. You know how reckless Helen could be. She might fuck things up, and that could be damaging.” Perseus said.

  I placed the bar on the second level and heaved it over to the third, my arms flexing as I pulled my weight in and raised myself to the fourth level, my feet swinging three feet above the ground.

  I considered Perseus’ words, and how our little sister might become a deterrent to my plans. I was working on a lot of things besides my autobiography, and her association with the Ridley twins was worrisome. Their reputation for ruining companies to buy them out and sell them to the highest bidder was notorious in the business world, and their sudden interest in Helen meant they were targeting me or Perseus next.

  “Fine. Tell her to meet me next week. I’ll have Daphne call her about the details,” I said, giving in to my brother’s request. I did a couple more sets at the salamander bars before dropping down next to Perseus. He smiled and clapped his hand on my back.

  “Thanks, A. I appreciate it. I’ll send a snap to Helen later to tell her,” he said, and I furrowed my eyebrows.

  “’Snap’?” I asked, not understanding. He rolled his eyes and looked at me with pity.

  “I will never understand why you insist on staying behind the times, man. It’s 2017! Get out from under that rock already,” he said, and I shook my head as I chuckled.

  “Seems to me that the advancements in technology these days are more trouble than they’re worth. Don’t mind me, Perseus. I’m quite content living under a rock,” I replied.

  “Uh huh. Sure, whatever makes you happy,” he said, rolling his eyes once more. “Oh, but if you think you could distract me from asking you about who you were having that sex dream about, then you’re dead wrong. So who was it?” he asked, and I cursed softly.

  “You’re really not going to leave it alone, are you?” I asked, and he shook his head.

  “Not in this lifetime,” he retorted, and I sighed.

  “She’s no one you know. So can you please just drop it?” I asked, lying through my teeth. He narrowed his eyes at me for a while before sighing.

  “Alright. I guess I can’t grill you about it today. But mark my words, bro. I will find out who that girl is,” he warned before walking out of my bedroom.

  I had no doubt he would figure it out. Not with him having met Callie already back at the restaurant, but I didn’t need him snooping around my business over a dream that felt so vivid I almost came in my pants.

  I hoped that by the time he did find out, I’d have experienced the real thing.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Callie

  I couldn’t get that flirty giggle out of my head.

  It repeated over and over in my brain and crawled its way to my subconscious even as I slept. It ruined every single dream my mind conjured up to the point that I kept waking up at odd hours all throughout the night. It was terrible.

  Which is why I was really grumpy when I finally decided to get out of bed at six in the morning. I was sluggish and tired, and my eye bags were probably as big as Wisconsin. I didn’t even make an effort to brush my hair as soon as I got up, so my bed head probably looked absolutely ridiculous.

  I dragged my feet towards the kitchen and glared at the empty coffee pot. Unbelievable. I always filled this up after I made a cup so that all I had to do was flip a button every morning and I could have my coffee immediately. I remembered filling this up yesterday, and now it was empty. Nick had drained the damn thing to the last drop again and didn’t replace it.

  Goddammit, did I have to do everything around here? Was this really how it was supposed to go? He couldn’t be bothered to clean, so he left me to clean up after him. He ordered takeout but didn’t throw them out once he had finished eating. And he definitely didn’t wash pots or plates, which was probably also why he preferred takeout. It was so damn infuriating!

  I bet Apollo didn’t leave dirty dishes in the sink, I thought, sulking.

  I caught myself. That was a bad thing to do, Calista Cohen. Why would you even compare them with each other? That was sick, even for you.

  I shook my head, trying to dismiss the thought. I couldn’t think about Apollo Irons like that, not when I was already committed to somebody else. Those kisses we shared were a mistake, and entertaining such thoughts about him, like I was actually considering the thought of exploring something more, would only get me into trouble.

  I had never realized I had a big grudge over how Nick was at home until what happened between me and Apollo yesterday. It brought everything to the surface. But if I were being honest, it probably started before then, when I caught a whiff of his spicy cologne, seeing him standing on the other side of my door. The first time we met.

  I had started to fantasize about him since then, and when I finally got a taste of him, a taste of what a man like him could do with his wicked mou
th and tongue, my reality just couldn’t compare.

  Nick had become inadequate, and it was no one’s fault but mine for giving into Apollo.

  I sighed as I waited for my coffee to brew, the sound of Nick loudly snoring from our room made my musings ten times worse. I still hadn’t told him about yesterday, and even though I was scared shitless over what could happen between us, I knew I had to tell him soon. It would hurt him, and he’d probably ask me to break up with him, too. I wouldn’t blame him if he did, though. I knew I deserved it.

  But there was one thing still nagging at me about last night. Why didn’t he fess up and tell me who he was talking to instead? Why did he have to hide it? Why did he have to lie to me?

  If he was talking to his co-worker or his boss, he wouldn’t feel the need to keep it from me. He wouldn’t pretend he was surfing the net when he obviously wasn’t. And as far as I knew, all his workmates were male, and the voice I heard clearly didn’t sound masculine.

  Suddenly the thought that my boyfriend may have been cheating on me popped into my head and made me feel sick to my stomach. I quickly pushed the thought out of my mind. Nick would never do that to me. He loved me. He would never go behind my back and be with another woman.

  He wouldn’t do the same thing I did.

  I closed my eyes and groaned. I didn’t technically cheat on Nick because it was just a kiss. I shouldn’t make myself feel better by thinking that Nick was probably doing something else too. But I really should just come out and tell him. Maybe all of these horrible thoughts would go away once I said it.

  I poured myself a cup of coffee and turned around to see Nick open his mouth wide to yawn, stretching his skinny arms over his head as he did so. My eyes went down to his flat and pale chest, and I sighed in disappointment. Maybe I could convince Nick to start working out?