Pamela shifted her weight and curled her feet under her, completely engrossed in sketching the fountain. Well, her version of the fountain. She kept its cloverleaf shape, but she shrank it and ignored the hideous statues of Artemis, Apollo, and Caesar, replacing them with pretty swirls meant to look like waves from the middle of which fish spouted water. She glanced up at the bulbous center statue and sighed. No matter how she "fixed" the rest of the gihugic thing, there was no way she could make Bacchus acceptable - especially if Eddie kept insisting that the thing be animated. Her fingers, which had been flying over the page of her sketchbook, slowed. She drew in the center pedestal, but left blank the area on top of it where Bacchus sat. Surely she could talk Eddie into something less... she frowned at the statue... less fat and hideous.
She checked her watch - three-thirty. Four and a half more hours until her date. She should get her camera and take pictures of the columns, as well as make notes about colors and textures. All this preliminary work would be needed Monday when she finally met with Eddie at his home. But instead of thinking about work, her mind wandered to thoughts of pleasure. The gilding of the overly ornate columns reminded her of the brightness of Phoebus' hair. Now that her concentration was no longer required to sketch the fountain, Pamela's mind circled back to him. The pretend sky from which fluffy clouds billowed reminded her of his eyes. Hell, even the tacky statue of Apollo was somehow beginning to look like him.
It was like he was one of those glowing bug lights, and she was a love-struck mosquito. She was obsessed. Pamela knew it, and was more than a little chagrined to realize that she really didn't care. On the contrary, she felt like she did when she was reading an exceptionally good book - like she was walking around in someone else's world and enjoying every second of it.
Her smile was self-satisfied and very, very sensual. Maybe she should gamble; she sure felt lucky.
As if echoing her thoughts, a slender young woman breezed up to the fountain, talking in excited little snatches to her friend.
"Can you believe our amazing luck? Oh. My. God. Stumbling into the Chanel sale of the year!"
A sale at Chanel? Pamela's ears perked.
"I thought I was going to faint when I saw how far that dress had been marked down."
Giggling and hefting their full shopping bags, the two women breezed past Pamela's bench.
It must be fate. Pamela gave the ugly fountain another look and almost laughed out loud. Or maybe it was ordained by the gods. She was going to buy a fabulous new Chanel dress to wear tonight. She was going to go to an erotic show with a gorgeous hunk of a man. And she might even have sex with him afterwards. Her stomach butterflied.
Okay, scratch that. She was getting ahead of herself. Big, deep breath.
How about... She might even make out with him afterwards. And heavy petting wasn't out of the question, either. She closed her sketchbook and slid it into her leather briefcase.
Red. She'd buy a red dress that showed just a little too much leg. She might even get a pedicure. Yes, she would get a pedicure. Red toes were definitely a necessity tonight. Humming softly to herself, she headed happily towards couture heaven.
Bacchus drummed his fingers on the top of the restaurant table. Things weren't going as he'd planned.
"Bring me another tequila!" he snarled at a passing waitress and then was instantly sorry when she cringed at the heat of the god's wrath and almost knocked over several chairs in her haste to get to the bar to place his order. It was bad enough that the young Olympians were annoying him. It was totally unacceptable that they were causing him to take out his annoyance on the innocent people in his kingdom.
And it was still his kingdom.
The waitress rushed up to his table with his tequila.
"I'm so sorry, sir. I should have been paying better attention to you. I didn't mean for you to have to wait for your drink."
Bacchus smiled kindly at her and touched her arm, transmitting a dose of magic into her body. Instantly her terrified look vanished. Her young cheeks flushed, and her lips parted seductively.
She thought how wrong she had been to have ever considered him a terrifying, obese stranger. His anger wasn't palpable. And he wasn't fat. He was just a big man. She liked big men - really liked them. Heat coursed from his fingers into her arm and all through her body, tingling her nerve endings and causing her most private parts to become wet and ready. She stared into his dark eyes and leaned closer to him, wishing he would take his hand from her arm and slide it down between her legs and...
Bacchus chuckled and stroked the firm flesh of her young arm. "Later this night you will come to my suite. Just think of me, and your desire will lead you to the correct room." Only after he was certain that his command had been firmly planted into her subconscious, did he break contact with her skin.
The waitress shivered with intense pleasure. "Yes." She moaned the word.
"Now be off." He gestured slightly with his hand, and a veil lifted from her eyes.
She blinked and smiled hesitantly at him.
"Is there anything else I can get you, sir?"
"Later, perhaps," he said.
She walked away slowly, still looking dazed. Bacchus studied her well-rounded buttocks and let himself imagine how she was going to feel beneath him later that night. She would be delightful and young and fresh and completely enamored with him. He was a god; he could easily be certain of her adoration. Modern mortals needed to worship him. He was actually doing the young woman a favor by adding the intoxicating magic of wine and fertility to her otherwise mundane life.
But he was the only god who had a right to use his power amidst them. Las Vegas had been his discovery. HE WOULD NOT SHARE HIS REALM! He especially would not share it with the golden twins. He had always loathed both of them with their perfection and their nonchalant arrogance about everything. They hadn't been content to remain within Caesars Palace and gamble alongside the mortals. They had actually found their way to his special place - the fountain in The Forum.
Yes, he had loosed his immortal power through the nymphs. He had meant to shock the twins. He had purposefully targeted that repressed little mortal and caused her to drink just enough of his wine to set into motion the sequence of events that would allow the invocation to be completed. He knew Artemis' temper - all of Olympus knew it. He had been certain that the goddess would act to prevent the invocation, especially when he used the caricature of the vain Huntress in such a blatantly disrespectful manner. And in acting against him, the godlings would have betrayed themselves as immortals to the modern world. What an intoxicating spectacle that would have been! Of course Zeus' anger would also have been great, but after the thunderclouds had cleared from Olympus, Bacchus could have slid through the discarded portal, alone once again in his magnificent Las Vegas to reign with no restrictions to bind his desires and no rules to follow.
But neither of the twins had interrupted the invocation, and the mortal had actually bound Artemis to fulfill her heart's desire. Apollo had begun wooing her! Bacchus had watched the two of them fawn over one another the rest of the evening. He was even fairly sure that the God of Light hadn't been using any of his immortal powers to seduce the woman.
Anger mushroomed within Bacchus. Apollo didn't need to use his immortal powers to seduce with magic. He had a muscular, golden body that held a masculine beauty far beyond mortal standards. What the God of Light had been gifted with wasn't fair; it had never been fair.
He'd coaxed the desert sky into sending a rainstorm to ruin the god's little tryst, but that hadn't worked. Then he'd nudged the unsuspecting mortal, causing her to catch her heel. The mortal should have fallen into traffic, and the golden god should have betrayed his presence to save her, but Apollo had managed to foil the accident Bacchus had orchestrated without the mortals of Las Vegas realizing there was a powerful immortal in their midst. It was insufferable.
He would not tolerate another god usurping his place.
Then Bacchus remembered the passionate kiss Apollo and the mortal had shared, and the way the God of Light had carried her through the rain as if he were her savior. She was what was keeping the god's interest focused on Las Vegas. Who could guess how long Apollo would enjoy toying with her? And what if, after Apollo tired of this particular mortal, he found he had developed a taste for modern women? Bacchus certainly had. He threw back the shot of potent liquor. No. That would never do. He would not tolerate Apollo's seduction of his mortals.
But how to rid himself of the God of Light? It would be difficult. He obviously wasn't going to betray himself as a god and bring down Zeus' wrath, and neither he nor his twin sister seemed to be in any rush to tell Zeus about the invocation rite he'd worked. Unfortunately, it was apparent that, after Apollo had begun the seduction of the mortal woman, he was, indeed, thoroughly enjoying himself. Bacchus ground his teeth together. Well, he had himself to blame for that, so it was up to him to discover a way to dampen Apollo's enjoyment of Las Vegas.
Bacchus wanted to shriek in rage. How could Apollo not enjoy Las Vegas? It was a playground fit for the gods, and Apollo had the power to command its dormant magic alive, as did Bacchus. Ha! Scorn twisted the god's face into a sneer. He would like to see Apollo survive in Vegas without his supernatural powers. He would be a child lost in a dark forest. Apollo thought himself so superior to Bacchus, but he didn't know the modern mortal world - he didn't have his reserves of money or his luxurious suite of rooms and vast knowledge of how to manipulate mortals to his will.
Suddenly, Bacchus sat up straighter in the seat that was far too narrow for his bulk. That was it! If he could contrive a way for Apollo to miss the closing of the portal tomorrow evening, the great God of Light would be trapped in the mortal world for the span of five days, without his formidable powers. He would be weak... helpless... miserable. And when the portal reopened, he would be only too happy to depart and never return. Then it was only a matter of time before the God of Light's dislike for Las Vegas would be mirrored in the rest of the snobbish Olympians.
He would do it. Apollo would be trapped in Las Vegas without his powers. Bacchus' smile was filled with awful glee.