Valentine's Day : CUPID'S MATCH BOOK 2

Chapter 55

The room is dark, and I lie awake in Cupid's bed staring at the ceiling. I'm alone.

Cupid decided to head back to the Matchmaking Service – to go back into the Sim himself and try and push Valentine for more information. I think we both know that he won't be successful. But after our conversation he seemed agitated – just like Cal who I can still hear pottering around downstairs. I think he just needed to feel like he was doing something.

But realistically, that pressure rests on me only.

Where are the hearts?

I already told you. Valentine's voice comes back to me in the darkness.

My mind churns over my time in the Sim. The answer is in there, in my mind - it has to be. But it seems that all we talked about was Psyche.

I think about everything Cupid said about her, as well. And for a moment I allow a pang of pity to grow inside me for Valentine.

But then I remember him saying he needed my heart, and the heart of my match, to bring Venus back. I remember that he has Cal's life thread, and Morta's sheers. I remember he's killed countless cupids to build up his zombie army.

No – his story may be sad, but it doesn't excuse everything he has done.

I lay awake for what feels like hours.

Every time I try to sleep I see his eyes, shocking blue, burning into me. I see his taunting smile and the small dimples in his cheeks imprinted on the back of my eyelids. Every time I've met him I've had this feeling that he knows something about me that I don't. After our visit to the Fates I'd thought it was just that he'd put Cupid into the Matchmaking Service system.

But then I remember what he said before – back in the sim.

Do you know how powerful you are, Lila?

What did he mean by that?

My mind churns over Psyche as well; the fact that his and Cupid's stories don't quite add up. Did Cupid know about Valentine's feelings for her before they got together? And Cupid told me that they weren't in love, but is that true? Valentine said that they stayed together after the effects of the Ardor wore off – and when Cupid told me she had died, I saw the pain in his eyes.

Finally, I sit back up in the silky sheets, pull my hair into a knot on top of my head. I can't sleep – there's no point trying. I grab my phone, thinking I'll do some Googling about Psyche and Cupid. The battery is dead.

But I still have the book of mythology from school in my satchel downstairs. I wonder if there's anything in there.

I slip my cell into the pocket of Cupid's sweatpants that he let me borrow for bed. Then I pad barefoot across the carpet, the moonlight from the un-curtained window casting a ghostly glow across the room, and head out through the corridor and down the twisty staircase. The house is quiet now and I find myself tip-toeing, creeping toward the kitchen almost as though I'm doing something wrong.