by Lauren Dawes
Bryn laughed then coughed violently, spraying droplets of blood over her chin. ‘You can’t kill me,’ she spat the words at Loki.
In less than a second, Loki had pulled a Glock from somewhere Korvain hadn’t seen and had it pointed at Eir’s head. ‘Eir will die in ten seconds if you don’t tell me where your cloak is.’
The laughter died in Bryn’s throat, her eyes going wide, as he flipped the safety off. ‘No!’ Bryn screamed, bucking against the chains, pulling and twisting her body around.
‘Ten.’
‘Fuck you!’
He smiled. ‘Nine.’
She actually spat in his face this time.
Wiping it away, he said, ‘Eight.’
‘You bastard! You fucking bastard!’
‘Seven...’
Korvain moved silently, pulling his garrotte wire out and wrapping it around Loki’s neck from behind. Loki’s fingers scrambled to relieve the pressure, but Korvain pulled back further, dropping to his knees and taking Loki with him. Korvain knew this wouldn’t kill Loki. He was too powerful to simply be killed by strangulation. But if Korvain could subdue him for a moment then he could get Bryn and Eir away from this place.
The god’s legs scrambled on the concrete floor, kicking up some bloody feathers and flailing while choking sounds tore free from his throat. Korvain held on as his body bucked. He was breathing heavily through his nose, his eyes bulging from their sockets. Bryn watched on with her one functioning eye, confused. To her, it would have simply looked like Loki struggling with nothing on the floor. He shook the shadows from his body and watched her eyes widen from over the god’s shoulder.
‘Korvain?’ she asked.
‘Hi Cupcake,’ he drawled back with a lazy smile he hoped hid his relief. Loki had just gone limp in his arms and he released his hold. He was waiting for Bryn to verbally kick his ass again, but when he approached the slab, he saw tears dribbling down her blood-encrusted face.
He should have said something like ‘Don’t cry’ or ‘It’s okay’ but he knew they were lies. They weren’t out of the woods yet—not by a long shot. Even though it killed him, he ignored her until he got her hands free of the bonds.
She sat up—wincing as she did—and tried to work one ankle while he did the other. She turned to look at him for a moment when he felt the air move behind him. Loki was up and moving again.
He whirled around to face him, an ugly snarl on his almost angelic face. Loki roared and charged toward Korvain. He readied himself, pulling his karambit free from the holster and holding it in a downward position.
‘Duck,’ Bryn breathed in his ear. He didn’t think. He just reacted. Korvain hit the floor. An arc of gold flashed. The air seemed to tingle with magic and Loki dropped to the ground in front of him.
Korvain stood up to continue the fight when he felt Bryn’s hand on his shoulder. ‘He’s dead,’ she breathed, blinking rapidly as if she were about to...
Pass out.
Bryn slumped back onto the table, her head hitting the metal slab with a loud crack before he could stop it. In her hand, Bryn held her golden sword, Loki’s blood glistening on it. Korvain looked down at the god. Cautiously, he rolled him over to find the smallest hole in his jacket, a bare puncture in his skin. It shouldn’t have been a kill. Korvain glanced back at the sword in Bryn’s hand.
What the fuck had just happened?
Chapter Thirty-five
I’ve done it, and I don’t regret a thing.
*
Bryn woke up feeling like her head was stuffed with wet newspaper. Everything hurt, even blinking. Through barely cracked eyelids, she looked around the room, terror filling her for a moment before she realized she wasn’t in that tunnel anymore. Loki wasn’t there to torture her. She was home.
Her whole body relaxed into the familiarity of it all.
She was home.
There was a gentle knocking on the door. Rolling her head toward the sound, she rasped, ‘Come in.’ Bryn cleared her throat and tried again.
The door opened and Korvain slid inside. His broad shoulders held her attention first, as they always did. She looked away, sinking her teeth into her bottom lip. She still felt this burning attraction to him even when she’d been angry with him.
‘How are you feeling?’ he asked, his voice all gravel and doing something to the lower half of her body.
‘Sore.’ Her voice didn’t sound much better. She felt him sit on the side of her bed, not touching her even though her body cried out for it. She rolled her head to look at him.
‘Would you mind telling me what happened?’
His dark eyebrows rose over his black as pitch eyes. ‘You don’t remember?’
Bryn tried to wiggle into a sitting position.
‘Let me help you,’ Korvain murmured, his strong arm sliding behind her back and helping her become vertical. Her nose ended up in the space between his neck and shoulders. Bryn inhaled deeply, committing his scent to memory. He had saved her. He was going to bail on her as soon as he’d seen she was okay. She knew this because she had told him to get out of her life. What reason did he have to hang around now?
He chuckled. ‘Did you just sniff me?’ he asked playfully. How gently he treated her was at odds with his nature. His true nature. She could laugh. He was one of the most feared beings in her whole world. Yet when he was with her, she didn’t feel threatened. She felt...safe. Protected. Even loved.
Bryn pulled away from him, shaking her head, looking into his eyes so suddenly filled with joy. ‘No...maybe...’ she threw her hands into the air stiffly. ‘Okay. Yeah, I did.’ She looked at him from the corner of her eye only to see him smiling at her, a smile that revealed all his teeth, including his incredibly sharp fangs.
That sobered her. ‘I’m still pissed off with you,’ she muttered. More like she was pissed off with herself.
‘For what?’
‘For lying to me about who and what you really are.’
She expected him to blow her off, but he held her eyes, studying her face. ‘I’m sorry about that. Truly.’
Her eyes narrowed on his handsomely arrogant face. She knew she couldn’t stay angry at him. He had rescued her and Eir when she wasn’t able. ‘I guess you’re forgiven then.’
‘I am?’ he asked.
‘You don’t have to be so damn smug about it,’ she retorted sharply.
He chuckled softly, his low, rough voice making her watch his mouth with a longing she had felt ever since she’d dreamed of him coming to her. Korvain saw she was staring. ‘I’m going to kiss you now.’ It was an announcement, not requesting permission. And even then, that didn’t bother her because that was what she wanted, too. Korvain leaned into her, his lips less than an inch from her mouth when she laid a hand on his chest. She practically melted at the touch.
‘Wait. You said before that you can enter people’s dreams. Is that how you found me in the tunnels?’
‘Yes.’
She licked her lips and looked at her hand planted firmly on his chest. He felt so real. She dug her nails into his skin, drawing a hiss from his throat. She looked into his hooded eyes, the question she needed answering sitting on the tip of her tongue.
‘In my other dreams, you came to me. Was what I felt then real, or did you make me think I wanted you?’
He pulled back from her, frowning. His eyes had dropped to somewhere in the region of her shoulder.
‘Korvain?’
He blinked at her. ‘Would you like to find out if the feelings were real?’
She nodded.
‘Close your eyes then.’
Bryn did as she was told. A minute passed then maybe two. She kept her eyes shut, wondering what Korvain was doing. She couldn’t smell his familiar spices anymore, but she hadn’t felt him move, or heard him leave either.
Her door opened again, and she opened her eyes. Gods, everything still hurt. She moaned as her palm hit her bruised cheekbone. That’s right. One had been shattered. Hadn’t sh
e already gone through all of this?
‘Bryn,’ Korvain said, stepping into the room and closing the door behind him. ‘Bryn, don’t touch it. Eir healed you the best she could, but there was still some swelling left behind.’
Korvain stilled her arm, sending a jolt of electricity down into the rest of her body. She hadn’t felt that before. She blinked at him, silently asking him what was going on. Releasing her arm, he eased down onto the bed beside her.
He gave her a crooked smile. ‘You wanted to see if the feelings were real.’
‘That was a dream before? When you came into my room?’
He nodded, his eyes sliding down her chest. She jerked the sheet back into position, feeling the heat of her blush on her cheeks. ‘Every time I’ve come to you has been in your dreams.’
‘But they weren’t real, were they?’
He touched the side of her face gently, stroking the skin along her undamaged cheek bone. ‘Everything you felt in them was real. It’s true I can manipulate the dream, but everything you felt was real.’
So he had actually rejected her before, after he’d made her come so spectacularly? She turned away from his feather caresses, ashamed with herself.
‘Bryn? What is it?’
She threw out the one word men hated to hear from a woman’s mouth in response to that question. ‘Nothing.’
A low growl trickled from his throat. ‘Tell me. You were thinking about something just then. I saw the look on your face. What was it?’
She turned back toward him. ‘So the rejection was real. That I felt.’ She wanted her words to wound him like a dagger through the heart.
‘What are you talking about?’
‘The last time you came to me, after Eir had been brought here unconscious, you...’ she flushed even thinking about it. ‘You stopped before you...’ Gods, why was it so hard to talk about this?
‘I brought you and then did not take you?’ he asked gently, once more stroking her skin. He had moved onto her neck.
She nodded.
‘You told me you were a virgin. I didn’t want to have your first time like that. I wanted you to know that everything that happened between us was real.’
He had taken to tucking strands of hair behind her ear now. The soft repetitive movements made her eyes droop.
‘I’ll let you sleep,’ Korvain announced. He was just getting off the bed when Bryn gripped his wrist. He looked down at her, a question in his dark eyes.
‘Please don’t go yet. Stay with me a while?’
She didn’t understand why she needed him close. Maybe it was because he was the one who had rescued her. Maybe it was because he was going to disappear from her life after this. She didn’t want him to go. She realized just how precious life was, how much she had wasted worrying about what Odin thought of her.
In the corner of her room was one of the dining room chairs that must have been brought in by whoever had kept vigil. Korvain reached for it.
‘No.’ She moved over to one side with a wince. ‘Lie with me?’
He hesitated.
‘Please?’
He nodded and began lowering his body down onto the bed. His muscle-heavy weight dipped the mattress, forcing her to either hike up the other side, or simply roll into his warmth. She chose to let herself just be next to him.
His body was hard. He was all muscle, not an inch of fat on his frame. His familiar spicy, masculine scent saturated her, drawing her in. She was on her side, him on his back. She felt the long hot line of him against her, but craved more.
She wouldn’t ask for it though. He seemed almost afraid to touch her any more than a feather’s caress. Putting the thought out of her head, she closed her eyes and began drifting off. Korvain woke her when he grunted, shifting his weight on the mattress.
‘What are you doing?’ she mumbled; her voice already sleep affected.
‘Trying to get comfortable.’
He had slipped out of bed, and when she peered around, she saw him stripping off a weapons harness she hadn’t noticed. He pulled his snug tee up over his head too, and Bryn’s eyes sank to drink him all in. Embarrassed she was just ogling him, she looked away to give him some privacy.
There were some more sounds: shoes coming off, and clothes being pulled away from his warm body. When he slid back into the bed, his heat was instant. She could feel his pecs and abdominal muscles molding against her spine.
He threw an arm over her waist and dragged her back into his chest, holding her there with his muscular arm. She was blanketed by him now, caged in by his warmth. With him there, she felt as if she could finally sleep safely.
* * *
Korvain finally had his woman where he wanted her; pressed against his chest, her hair in his face, her gardenia scent entangling in his nostrils and imprinting on his brain. When he’d first come into the room after stepping out of her dream, she’d looked so fragile.
Eir had done her best to heal the damage from the beatings she’d endured under Loki’s hand, and she was healing. Just thinking about that bastard made his hands curl into fists. But half of that anger was with himself. He had taken her cloak to protect her. He may have protected her, but he had made her suffer for it first.
His arm tightened around her waist, dragging her even closer into the line of his body. There wasn’t a place on their bodies they weren’t touching.
‘Fuck,’ he muttered under his breath quietly. Bryn was trying to recuperate and he was as fucking hard as a rock. Korvain angled his hips away from her ass and thought about mundane things like the weather and football. Fuck.
Bryn’s breathing had finally eased off a few minutes ago which was just where he wanted her to be. She needed her rest. He didn’t know the reason she had asked him to stay with her, but he didn’t care.
His cock throbbed between his legs, so he let his thoughts wander to distract himself. He couldn’t sleep. He wouldn’t sleep while Bryn was relying on him to keep her safe. It was very caveman of him, but the instinct was there, screaming at him.
Taer was in the other room—the room where Eir was also set up. The Valkyries had healed Tay’s injuries, but she would forever have a scar across the front of her throat. Korvain heard a rumbling through the room and realized it was him. Darrion was going to pay for killing his best friend and maiming his little sister.
Adrian had asked him once, that if for whatever reason he wasn’t there, Korvain would look out for Taer, to keep up with her training and protect her from Darrion. He’d sworn he would until he drew his last breath, and goddammit he was going to keep his promise. Adrian deserved that at least.
After bringing Bryn and Eir back to the other remaining Valkyries, Korvain had told them all he could about what had happened, and also about the bodies of the other Valkyries. They’d wanted to return straight away, but Korvain had his own body to collect.
He returned to the house he had shared with his best friend only to find it going up in flames. The human authorities were crawling all over the place; police, ambulance and fire fighters. Korvain had remained hidden, but managed to hear snippets of information coming out. There had been a body found in the house, but there was a helluva large pool of blood in the garage. They assumed it had been the kill site and the body had been moved inside. The house had then been set alight by the perp to cover their tracks.
Darrion, that motherfucking bastard had done it as one final fuck-you to Korvain. He didn’t even get to bury his brother after everything they’d been through together.
Korvain waited until all the flames were extinguished before moving in for a closer look. There was nothing but charred wood and a few barely recognizable pieces of furniture left behind. He picked through it all until he found what he believed was his room.
Everything was gone, but as he shifted the rubble around, he discovered what he’d been hoping was still there. His gun safe was charred, but he got it open and took out the small arsenal, strapping it to his body. He’d returned to the
club to check on Taer, and had fallen asleep in the chair beside her bed.
Bryn wiggled closer to his body drawing him out of his dark thoughts. He pulled her even closer, despite the heat radiating from her body, despite how uncomfortable he was getting.
His body still raged for her. Goddammit, he was a perverted bastard for wanting her like this, but the message between the logical part of his brain and the primitive part had shorted out and he could only see her, smell her. Fuck, he wanted to taste her again. When he’d taken her into his mouth, he’d drunk her down, savoring her gardenia flavor. Being here now, he wanted her again.
Leaning forward just a little, he placed his lips onto the skin at the back of her neck. She sighed gently, but did not wake. Now that he had her taste on his lips, he needed more. He needed all of her.
Chapter Thirty-six
Bryn woke up to the feel of Korvain’s velvet lips on the nape of her neck. His warm breath brought a rush of goose bumps to her arms; peaking her nipples at the same time. She only had a thin cotton shirt on that wouldn’t hide her reaction to him at all.
But, gods, did she care? She’d denied herself for too long. Now that she knew Odin had no real interest in her, or the other Valkyries other than for his own selfish survival, she didn’t feel as if she had to remain pure. Playing by Odin’s rules for a minute longer was not an option. She wanted to play by her own, and she was going to start by losing herself completely to Korvain and his satin touch.
The intoxicating scent that belonged to him and him alone rolled over her. The tip of his tongue skimmed the shell of her ear, drawing a soft shiver from her throat, her skin tingling in his wake.
She lay there for a few minutes, letting him kiss her softly, letting his fingers skim down her arms, to trace over the goose bumps. He must have thought she was cold because he was suddenly pulling her closer into his hips, forcing her to mold into the line of his hard body. She gasped when she felt the long, hot length of his erection pressed into the top of her ass.
