When I gave her a little shove between her shoulder blades to get her moving, Dorn waited calmly, acting as if he would allow her to waltz right past him.
When she was just out of reach, he pulled an ion pistol from inside his coat and pointed it at me. “Sophia, is it?”
Sophia froze in place, her eyes wide with terror as she looked from the blaster to me and back again. “Yes.”
“Come here. Now. Or Gunnar is a dead man.”
I saw the battle take place behind her eyes. “No, Sophia. Just run. Go.”
She bit her lip, that nervous habit I found so endearing, and stepped to place her chest directly in front of the ion pistol. “Leave Gunnar out of this, Dorn. It’s between you and me.”
Dorn grabbed her by the arm, spun her around and pressed the blaster to the side of her head. “Women are always so stupid, Sophia. This was never about you. This is about saving Viken.”
As Dorn pressed the tip of the ion pistol to Sophia’s forehead, I saw her flinch in pain, but she made no sound. Her gaze caught mine and the resignation I saw there scared me more than the pistol. She was going to do something stupid to try to save me. I could see it in her eyes, in the stiff set of her shoulders and the stubborn line of her beautiful chin.
She’d been used by men just like Dorn on Earth, and I saw the resolve in her, the rage.
And it terrified me.
I held out my hands, more to plead with my mate than with the man holding her. “Don’t do anything stupid. We can talk about this.”
Dorn laughed, the sound hollow and without mirth. “Talk, Gunnar? The VSS is through talking. The Kings need to die. They’ve disrupted centuries of honor and tradition.”
“It’s not about honor for you, Dorn. It’s about power. I’ve known your family my entire life. The old line of kings.”
Dorn interrupted, “The rightful rulers of Viken. The child Queen has no right to usurp our claim. She’s an alien child born of an alien mother.” Leaning down, he buried his nose in Sophia’s hair, breathing in her sweet scent. “Like this alien bitch here.”
Dorn shook her and pulled on her hair until she winced, crying out in pain. Rage rose like a monster within me at the strain etched on her face, at the sick enjoyment I saw on his.
Sophia was the only thing that mattered to me. In that moment I realized just how completely she had won my heart.
Without her, life was meaningless.
Sophia must live. Dorn? He would die, right here, right now, even if he took me with him.
Chapter Ten
Sophia
I was a pawn. Dorn, the fucker, wanted me dead because I’d accidentally seen too much. I was the loose thread that was ruining his carefully hidden life as a member of the VSS. This entire fucked-up situation was just like what happened back home with the Corellis. They’d given me no choice but to smuggle for them. I knew their faces, knew their crimes—my crimes—and could put them all away.
To keep me from identifying them, I’d been the one turned in to the FBI, the one who’d been caught red-handed, found guilty and sentenced to prison. Not them. It didn’t matter that I’d been innocent of everything but wanting to save my mother’s life. Once I’d taken the money for my mother’s medical treatment, they’d owned me. Used me. And when my mother was gone, they’d held my own life, my freedom, the lives of my cousins over my head. I’d taken the money to save my mother, not realizing that I’d sold my soul in the process.
And so I had done whatever they wanted me to do. Smuggle. Lie. Again and again. Until I was caught. Then I was tossed away, convicted.
I realized, with Dorn’s space gun at my head, that if I’d stayed on Earth, I’d most likely be dead. Even in jail, my knowledge would have been a liability to the Corellis. Surely they had someone on the inside who would have been able to kill me. To eliminate the threat.
Just as Dorn was doing now. Once I was dead, and Gunnar with me, Dorn was a free man.
I could feel the tension vibrating from Dorn’s body. The energy coming from him made me think of a wild animal, hurt and cornered. Desperate. Willing to gnaw off its own foot to escape the trap.
“Say goodbye,” he hissed.
I took one last look at Gunnar, his face handsome, even etched with anger and fear. He was perfect, everything I wanted in a mate. In one of my mates. I held his gaze as I felt the pistol pressed into my forehead, resolved to what I must do. I had to save him at any cost. If I could buy Gunnar a few seconds, that would be all he needed to reach Dorn, to stop him.
“Gunnar,” I said, my voice shaky. “I…I love you.”
Dorn laughed. “So perfect.”
I held my breath as I knew the shot would come at any moment. I was out of time.
Gunnar jumped toward us as I rammed my elbow into Dorn’s gut and slammed my heel down on his instep.
“Cunt!” Dorn yelled at me as I slammed my head back into his chin as hard as I could and fought his hold on the pistol. I wrapped my hands around his large wrist and put every ounce of strength I had into shoving the gun away from my head.
The weapon fired. The strange light blasted right past my face and hit the wall of the building closest to us. Across the street, people screamed and scrambled to get away.
I wrenched free of Dorn’s hold just as Gunnar reached me, throwing me to the ground under his massive frame. He covered me as I heard another shot fire, hitting the ground inches from Gunnar’s head.
“Gunnar!” I screamed his name and tried to get him off me as I heard another strange buzzing sound.
Gunnar tensed at the sound. “Fuck, stay down!”
More afraid of the urgency in Gunnar’s command, I huddled as he rose to charge Dorn.
I rolled onto my side as Gunnar charged our enemy. He was within a few steps. Dorn lifted the gun he had and aimed at my mate with a look of pure malice twisting his features into a cruel mask of hatred.
An odd blasting sound, then a weird sizzle shocked me motionless. I flinched after seeing Gunnar’s eyes widen, afraid he’d been shot. I tightened every muscle in my body, assessing the situation as I rolled onto my hands and knees to rush Dorn. I would not let my mate die at the hands of someone so vile, so corrupt. Gunnar deserved so much better than that.
Dorn’s hold on his gun slackened, then fell away, the gun clattering on the hard ground at his feet. I blinked in confusion as I watched him slump to the ground. Confused, I looked up and discovered half of his face gone, a gruesome and charred mess of bone and flesh and exposed brain made me moan. I rolled onto my side, gagging, the contents of my stomach churned and spewed as I closed my eyes, the image of his death burned onto my retinas until I could not escape the sight.
Gunnar launched himself at me. Faster than I could process, Gunnar lifted me and sprinted around the corner, away from Dorn. Gunnar pressed me against the wall of the nearest building, blocking my body with his own.
“What…happened?” I asked, my brain confused, my heart pumping.
“Sniper,” Gunnar bit out.
He looked over his shoulder, pressed his communication device. “Get down here. Now. We’ve got a sniper shooting at Sophia.”
“On our way.” Erik’s voice came through the speaker on Gunnar’s wrist, his calm assurance helped me breathe. Erik must have ended the call because Gunnar didn’t speak further.
“Don’t move,” he said when I tried to wiggle away. The wall was unforgiving against my back, Gunnar’s hard body unyielding at my front. “Someone’s fucking shooting!”
Anyone left on the street had fled before, but the single shot and the dead body ensured everyone stayed away.
I shook my head. “No. You’re wrong, Gunnar. We’re safe now. I’m safe.”
“What the fuck are you talking about? See Dorn? He’s missing half his head. We’re not going out there.”
“It was the VSS,” I said.
“Dorn worked for the VSS.”
I shook my head. It all made complete sense, at least to me. “
Not anymore. His cover was blown. They killed him. He was a liability.”
Gunnar was in warrior mode. His senses heightened, his body ready to fight. He’d been helpless standing there with Dorn holding me hostage. He’d had no weapon, no way to save me. That helplessness was gone now.
“Sophia, what the fuck are you talking about?”
I knew his tone wasn’t truly focused on me. He had to see past the dead body and think, but he was too riled. And I had no doubt it was because of me. I was his weakness here, his Achilles’ heel.
Taking hold of his chin, I forced him to look at me. Only when his dark eyes held mine did I speak. “As soon as we identified him, as soon as they knew I was alive, Dorn became a liability for the VSS.”
Gunnar looked down at me, but some of the stiffness left him. “Now that he’s dead, you can’t hurt the VSS.”
“Right. I’m nobody, Gunnar. Trust me. I know how these people operate. I’m worthless to them. And now that Dorn is dead, I’m not even worth the effort or energy to kill.” I sighed, closing my eyes and imagined a black ops sniper in the movies back home. “Whoever took the shot is long gone. As soon as he killed Dorn, he would vanish like a ghost.”
Gunnar shifted and I opened my eyes to see him inspecting the sidewalk behind us, leaning out to look up at the windows on the buildings, the rooflines.
“See anything?” I asked.
“No. Your logic is sound, Sophia.” He turned back to me and lifted his arms to the wall on either side of my head, caging me. “But I’m not letting you go until Erik and Rolf arrive. I can’t take the chance.”
I didn’t argue or struggle, simply leaned forward and plastered my body to my mate’s much larger, stronger frame, eager for the comfort he offered. Even if the sniper was gone, the adrenaline pumping through my body made me shake. I knew it would take a long time for me to process this, to get the image of Dorn’s death out of my mind. But relief rushed through me, making my knees weak. I was safe now. No one out there trying to kill me.
I could just be a mate, a normal citizen. A big, fat nobody.
I lifted my hand so I could rasp my thumb over his whiskers.
“I guess I’ll have to thank the Corellis.” I gave a small smile, knowing how lucky I’d been to leave Earth. “I’m sure they don’t even think about me anymore. But thanks to them, I was mated to some crazy space alien I adore.”
That got Gunnar’s attention and he pulled far enough away to press his forehead to mine. “You said you loved me, mate.”
Lifting both hands to his face, I held him to make sure he felt my touch. I wanted him to feel my words, too, all the way down to his soul. “I love you, Gunnar. I know it’s crazy, and too fast, and totally illogical, but…”
Gunnar shut me up with a kiss that curled my toes. I wrapped my arms around his head and held on tight as he pulled me close and made me forget all about the last few minutes of hell.
“Gunnar!” Erik shouted.
Gunnar stepped away then, and I took a deep breath. Before me was Erik, Rolf standing over Dorn’s dead body with a host of guards. Royal guards swarmed both sides of the street, running into buildings and shining searchlights down alleyways and into dark corners. Both Erik and Rolf wore their Viken United guard uniforms, complete with weapons and the light body armor I’d come to recognize.
After a minute, Rolf came to stand beside us, the entire time his pistol was up, his gaze searching the buildings around us.
“Sophia is safe now,” Gunnar said. “And the sniper is long gone.”
Both men frowned and didn’t stand down.
“Explain it to them, Sophia,” Gunnar ordered.
All three men glanced at me, but once I started speaking, telling Erik and Rolf what I’d said to Gunnar, they remained vigilant.
“The VSS only cared about eliminating Dorn. Not me. He’d been identified. He was the liability. I was just a stupid mistake,” I insisted.
“But you can implicate them,” Erik said, lowering his weapon.
“No. I could only implicate Dorn. The VSS has no reason to kill me now. Unless they kill for sport, I’m safe. They won’t want anything to do with me.”
“It makes sense,” Rolf said, pulling me in for a hug. I felt the frantic beat of his heart as he held me. He was warm and I reveled in his familiar scent.
“So the VSS continues. We’ve done nothing to bring them down,” Erik said, disappointed.
“No, they lost a high-ranking council member from Sector Two. And we’re free,” Gunnar said. “Sophia is safe.”
Rolf passed me to Erik, who also held me close. “That scared ten years off my life.”
Gunnar grunted his agreement.
The men stood around me in a protective circle. People started to come out from hiding, voices speaking, someone loomed over the body until a member of the Royal Guard chased him off and set up a perimeter. I ignored them all. I didn’t care what they did. I had my men. We were safe once and for all. The VSS might continue to be a scourge on Viken, but it was not my fight, at least not right now. I didn’t have a target on my back any longer.
“Can we go home now?” I asked.
“Yes,” Gunnar answered. “We’ll have you home as soon as possible.”
“Didn’t you have me just a little while ago?” I asked, teasing.
“You didn’t have me,” Rolf replied.
“Or me,” Erik added, raising his brows. “What did Gunnar do to you in there? I want a detailed account, mate, and I want you to tell me every naughty detail.”
That was Erik, talking dirty. My pussy and bottom clenched, remembering. “He…he prepared me for all three of you.”
Erik growled. “For us to claim you together?”
I nodded.
“Then you accept us as your mates? No second doubts? No denial?”
Rolf stroked a finger down my cheek. Erik’s hands were on my shoulders. Gunnar didn’t touch me, but his eyes were filled with lust.
But he would touch me, fill me, fuck me. I wanted all of them.
“Yes, I accept all three of you as my mates. I want you to take me home and make me forget everything but you.”
***
Eric
Rolf and I had been pacing, waiting. We’d tried to relax, but it had been impossible. Sure, Gunnar would keep her safe, would definitely fuck her while they were in the club, but time seemed to have moved at a glacial pace. When he’d reached us through the InterCom, we’d sighed in relief. But that had been short lived.
Holy fuck.
We’ve got a sniper shooting at Sophia.
Those were not words we expected to hear, nor in Gunnar’s slightly frantic tone. We’d never heard him frantic before. It wasn’t a word I’d ever use to describe him. Ever.
But now, with Sophia in danger, it was bad. We’d only just found her, our mate, from all the planets in the universe. She’d been miraculously matched to the three of us and now her life was threatened. Again.
We’d leapt over furniture, knocked down people who were in our way to get to them. It took ten interminable minutes to cross Central City and find them. We couldn’t miss the flurry of Vikens leaving the area. People talking about someone being shot, a dead body, had us running even faster. Then we saw the body sprawled on the ground, blood pooling thick and dark on the street. It wasn’t Sophia. Nor Gunnar.
Relief pumped through my veins. It wasn’t our mate. It wasn’t Gunnar. That didn’t mean they were safe. Fuck, we didn’t even know if the dead Viken was Sophia’s mystery man.
We had no idea who he was, but half of his face was gone. Had Gunnar shot him up close?
We didn’t linger since there was no question he was not a danger any longer, only raised our own ion pistols and searched for any others.
And when we found Gunnar and Sophia, my heart finally settled. Shit, I’d never been so scared in my life, and I’d spent years fighting the Hive. Just imagining what had happened to Sophia was enough to put me off a warrior’s life
permanently. I was getting too old for this shit. It was time to settle down to a sedate life as a royal guard and come home to fuck our mate for the rest of our lives. Perhaps fill her with a baby or two. A little girl who looked just like Sophia, but first a boy to protect her. As if three Viken warrior fathers weren’t enough.
I glanced at Rolf, saw the relief in every line of his body, too.
Gunnar had quickly confirmed the dead body was the “voice”, but learning it had been Dorn made me furious. I knew who he was, had met him a time or two, but hadn’t had the connection of the club with him like Gunnar.
And after hearing what had happened, I knew the VSS was more insidious than we ever imagined. We couldn’t bring it down in one day. It was a network of evil, creating an ever-growing web that spread through the government, the communities and even the Sectors. We could slow it, and perhaps with Dorn’s death, we had, but it wasn’t over. Like the Hive, the battle would go on.
As for Sophia, her words rung true. She was safe, at least from the VSS. They wouldn’t draw any further attention to themselves for her. She wasn’t worth it. Not with three royal guards as mates. Not with Dorn dead. While she wasn’t any safer than anyone else on Viken from the VSS’s threats, she wasn’t a target any longer.
It was time to make her ours. She wanted it. I needed it. I hadn’t thought much about her thirty-day decision period. I just assumed if she had been matched to three Vikens, surely there were no more good matches. We were it for her. I knew it and now she did as well. It was time to make her ours.
I’d never imagined I’d have a second family. No, Gunnar and Rolf weren’t brothers by birth, but we were ones nonetheless, bound together by battle, by honor, by Sophia.
Sophia.
She was the one who made our family. Without her, we were three warriors. Yes, brothers. But now we were mates, lovers, protectors. She belonged to us, just as we belonged to her. There would be no separating us now. And as soon as we had her alone, we’d claim her completely. The bond would be permanent.
Mated To The Vikens (Interstellar Brides Book 8) Page 13
