Lottie's eyes narrowed and her head began to shake, bewildered and hurt by the things Eros was saying. How could he say they were friends and in the same breath casually say of course he'd shot her? The erote's own confusion didn't even register because she was so confounded by how he could think those two things could possibly go together. Yes, Eros was confident to the point of arrogance, but she hadn't thought his cockiness would lead him to do something this... this... hurtful!
Her fist was moving before she told it to, and it connected solidly with Eros' shoulder. Even in her anger, she couldn't imagine striking him in the face, or actually causing him any real damage. The loudest voice in the front of her mind said she should hit him again, harder. But the little voice in the back of her mind, the one that had prevented her from hitting him harder, kept her from doing it again. Instead, the betrayal she felt came pouring out of her voice.
“How could you? How could you meddle with my feelings that way? Yes, I liked him. Liked him. But you... you made it into something that it could never be! It's not like the old days, it's not like it was, you can't just... you can't just fall in love with a mortal. There is no happily ever after there! They die! Half the time the children died! How could you wish that on me? After you saw what it did to Harm--”
Lottie's voice cracked, and the lump in her throat grew too large to speak around. It had been a harsh lesson for Philotes, but one she learned too well to ever forget. She'd watched her best friend in the world lose her children, and her grandchildren, and then she'd lost Harmonia. Oh, she still visited, but it wasn't the same as having her there whenever she wanted to see her. It wasn't like it should be. Because losing her babies and her husband had broken Harm's spirit, and Lottie was never going to let that happen to her. That was why she enjoyed her time with mortal lovers, but she never thought it would be more than it really was: a passing fancy.
Until this time. Until Nicolas. Until Eros interfered.
She couldn't even stand looking at him any longer. Even if he was blurry because of all the tears pushing their way out. It just hurt too much that he'd want her to suffer this way, that he'd cause it to happen to her. Lottie turned, hiding her face against Anteros' shoulder again, wrapping her arms around him to ask him to hug her in return. She barely even realized that he'd said anything, but on some level it sank in that he was offering to cause harm on her behalf. Lottie wasn't ready to handle that just yet, so she just pressed closer to Ter.