God of Ecstasy by Lena loneson Read Free Book Online Page B

don’t mind, Jaime.”
His voice was quiet, but had barely suppressed excitement. “I invited a few of
your friends over using the electronic mail.” The girls let out giggles at
hearing the term. It seemed Dionysus’ powers worked on more than just Jaime.
    Or the girls were drunk. Or both.
    Liv spun her around again. “Okay, walk forward. Six steps
please.”
    Jaime kicked off her heels and did as her friend instructed.
The tile was cold against her toes. Liv’s hands smelled like paint. Jaime
called up a mental picture of what she’d first seen when she arrived at the
house and realized Missy’s golden hair had had red paint in it as well, and Liv
had some streaked on her freckled nose. Giselle was tidy, but then, Giselle was
always tidy.
    What had they been up to?
    Jaime’s feet hit carpet. She burrowed them into the lush
fabric.
    Liv removed her hand and Jaime gasped in surprise.
    The room had been transformed. It was still her living room
leading into the open-concept kitchen, but she barely recognized it—the plain
cream walls Keith had insisted on were gone.
    Jaime’s first impressions were of a miasma of color.
Purples, blues, reds, deep pinks, a splash of orange, all contrasted against
the stark white of painter’s cloths draped over the sofa and tables.
    “This is absolutely incredible.”
    Her three artist friends had transformed the room into a
sunset. It was absolutely stunning. Jaime spun around, craning her neck to
capture everything at once. She recognized Giselle’s brush strokes in the pink
clouds, the swirling texture reminiscent of Van Gogh’s Starry Night. The fading
gold of the sun in the horizon stretched out over the kitchen was definitely
Missy, and Liv’s touch was visible in three sailing birds sketched in black on
the kitchen cupboards.
    Jaime couldn’t stop smiling. She spun like a wild dervish,
taking everything in, wanting to see it all at once.
    Then she was hugging the girls again, planting sloppy kisses
on their cheeks, Giselle-style, laughing and thanking each of them in turn.
When she caught hold of herself again she saw Dionysus standing awkwardly to
the side, a streak of yellow paint in his own curls. He had on a pair of large
painter’s overalls streaked with every color of the rainbow. She smiled shyly
at him. “This was your idea?”
    “It was all Dee,” Liv confirmed. “He emailed us all this
morning, said it was an artistic emergency and you’d been with this boring
house for too long.”
    “Of course, ma cher , we’ve been saying that for
years,” Giselle gushed. “Who knew it would take a man to wake you up to it!”
    “Dee, huh?” Jaime arched an eyebrow at him.
    He shrugged. “It’s a nickname.”
    “I couldn’t remember the other name,” Liv explained. “Not
once we got through the first few bottles of wine anyway.”
    Jaime walked forward hesitantly. Seeing him amid her friends
like this was different than her comfort with him before. Previously, as much
as she’d liked him, he’d been The Magic Sex God from the Wine Bottle. Now, he
seemed almost a part of her life.
    You’ve known him for two days, Jaime.
    So? You knew Keith for seven years and he never managed
to get along with the girls.
    To see Giselle smiling rather than cursing out a man was
definitely a change.
    Jaime hugged him, whispering in his ear, “Thank you, Dee.
This was—incredible.” She placed a soft kiss on his mouth. “I have a surprise
of my own for you later.”
    At that, Missy, standing close, made an ooooh sound
and kissing noises. Jaime laughed. “Shut up!”
    “D’you think she wants us to leave?” Liv asked, winking
broadly at Dionysus. Her freckles made her look younger than the rest of the
women, though they were all in their early thirties. But she had always been
the one with the dirtiest mind. She’d been the one to teach Jaime how to give a
proper blowjob, practicing with a cucumber under the covers when they were
teenagers.
    “But we haven’t even