Hired a Gigolo Got a Billionaire (Zoey and Christian) novel Chapter 368

Chapter 368

Madeline’s POV

The days that followed turned into a string of moments that felt lifted straight out of a Hollywood romance. Obscenely expensive wines I hadn’t even known existed. Sex that left me breathless. Landscapes so unreal that sometimes I had to pinch myself just to be sure I wasn’t dreaming.

It my original plan had been to forget Dominic curled up on my couch with a bucket of ice cream and a marathon of dramatic movies, Apollo had been doing a far better job. My private gigolo, as he liked to joke, had proven devastatingly effective at his role.

We spent entire mornings tangled together in bed, wrapped in Egyptian cotton sheets, exploring every inch of each other as if time didn’t exist. Apollo touched me in a way that woke my entire body, as if every nerve ending had been designed solely to respond to his fingers, his mouth, the delicious weight of his body over mine.

Our afternoons were filled with things I’d never imagined myself doing: diving along coral reefs while tropical fish swirled around us like colorful confetti, side-by-side massages at a floating spa over the lagoon, dinners on deserted beaches lit only by candles and stars.

And the nights… the nights were pure magic. Apollo had a gift for making me laugh until I couldn’t breathe, for provoking me until I wanted to punch him and kiss him at the same time, for looking at me in a way that made my heart race like I was a teenager falling in love for the first time.

We drank Kensington wine as if it were water, ate caviar like it was a casual snack, and I let myself live in a way I never had before. No worries. No responsibilities. No constant weight of being a Sullivan and everything that came with it.

But time was passing.

There was no completely ignoring that reality, no matter how hard I tried. Every morning I woke up in Apollo’s

arms,

another day was crossed off the mental calendar I kept in my head. Our week was coming to an end, and I had no idea what I was supposed to do when it did.

Going back home meant facing my parents. Dealing with the fallout of the canceled wedding. Deciding what to do about Dominic and the mess I’d left behind. And most of all, it meant saying goodbye to Apollo.

The question that haunted me in the quiet moments was this: when it came time to forget Apollo, who would help me do it? What private gigolo would I hire to help me forget the man who had made me forget everyone else?

I tried not to think about it. But sometimes, when I lay beside him watching him sleep, or when he smiled in that way that made my stomach flip, reality hit me like icy water: this had an expiration date.

On the afternoon of our sixth day, after a snorkeling session that ended with both of us laughing hysterically because I’d tried to hug a stingray and nearly caused a marine diplomatic incident, we returned to the bungalow exhausted but happy.

“I’m going to take a shower,” Apollo announced, kissing my neck before heading toward the bathroom. “You coming with me?”

“In five minutes,” I promised, dropping onto the bed in my still-wet bikini. “I need to catch my breath first.”

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I heard the water start to run and gave myself a few quiet minutes, staring out the bedroom window at the view that had already become so familiar. In just a few days, I would be back in Verdania, and all of this would be nothing more than a memory.

That was when my phone started vibrating insistently on the nightstand.

I ignored it the first time, assuming it was just another attempt by Dominic to get in touch. But the phone kept

zzing relentlessly, like someone sending a rapid string of messages.

Curious and already irritated, I got up to check.

The screen showed an unknown number, but there was a stack of image notifications. I opened the first one, my heart already beginning to race from an instinct I couldn’t quite name.

It was a photo.

A photo of Apollo and me at the airport on the day we arrived. I was pulling my suitcase, he was walking beside me, and we both looked completely unaware that we were being photographed.

I opened the second image, my hands starting to shake.

Us at the resort restaurant, laughing, wineglasses raised in a toast. The angle suggested it had been taken from far away, maybe from another table, but the zoom was good enough to capture our faces perfectly.

The third photo showed our boat trip. I was in a bikini, Apollo was shirtless, and we were clearly sharing an intimate moment, him spreading sunscreen across my back.

My stomach twisted as I kept opening the messages. There were photos from every day. Every activity. Every moment I had thought was private. Someone had been watching us. Following us. Documenting every second of our week together.

Who? Why?

I opened the second-to-last photo with fingers shaking so badly I almost dropped the phone. It was the two of us on the bungalow’s deck the night before with me sitting in his lap, kissing him deeply as the sun set behind

But it was the last image that made a sharp scream rip out of my throat as the phone slipped from my hand and crashed onto the marble floor.

“Aphrodite?” Apollo’s worried voice came from the bathroom doorway. He stepped into the room with a towel wrapped low around his waist, hair wet, droplets of water still sliding down his chest. “What happened?”

D

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