Love's Choice

by Renee Jordan

  “Meeting?” I frowned. “This sounds very...old fashioned.”

  Gerdie nodded her head. “So much has changed since our youth. Well, Freddy walked into the, um, date and, well, he claimed me.” Her smile broadened. “He took me and I couldn't resist him. So strong.”

  “And Owen was one of those that thought it was stupid to give up some prized heirloom just to meet a woman?” I asked.

  Gerdie glanced at Owen. “Yeah. But Owen believes in always holding on to valuables. He's greedy that way.”

  “Owen has valuables?” I glanced at the faded jacket Owen wore.

  “There are things more valuable than material wealth.”

  “Like?”

  “Love,” Gerdie smiled. “I think you're figuring that out with that sexy man of yours.”

  My cheeks reddened. “I am.”

  Gerdie's smile fell. “It'll be difficult for you and him, child. But hold onto that love and it'll see you through your trials.”

  Before I could ask what she was talking about, a customer walked in and Gerdie strolled off to join her husband. I put on my friendly barista smile and tried not to scream at the customer as she vacillated for an eternity, or possibly two minutes, on what kind of latte she wanted.

  “There are just so many choices,” she kept muttering, her gum smacking.

  Three o'clock couldn't come fast enough.

  Chapter Six

  Raven

  “Here's your last refill before I go, Owen,” I smiled as I walked up to the vet.

  Today was a whirlwind. Besides Magnus striding into my coffee shop, I had found a connection to my dead parents. Owen knew them. I was so young when they were killed by the bear, I barely remembered a thing about them.

  They did love each other. I remembered that. Father was strong and mother was beautiful.

  “Thanks,” he smiled as I poured the rich, black coffee into his cup.

  “And we need to get together and talk about my parents,” I told him. “I need to learn everything about them.”

  Owen nodded. His one good eye met mine. “We will. But not today. I think you have a hot date.” A smile crossed his grizzled lips. “Isn't that how they say it today?”

  My cheeks burned. “I guess. It's always changing.”

  Owen snorted. “That it is. You made a good choice, Raven.”

  “Hmm?”

  “The biker. He's strong, protective. He's exactly what you need. He reminds me of your father.”

  “I guess he does,” I said with a frown. I hadn't realized that. My father was strong and independent.

  “It'll be tough, but you'll get through it.”

  “My date?” My eyebrows furrowed. “Why would my date be tough?”

  “No, not your date.” He sipped his coffee and sighed. “Freddy always brews the best. The man has a magic touch.”

  “Okay, Owen,” I said. Then I leaned down and gave him a kiss on the cheek.

  Owen snorted. “Save that for your man. My wife can be a jealous harridan.”

  “You're married?” I blinked.

  He nodded his head. “To Freddy's sister. Now get out of here. You have more important things to do then listen to a tired, old soldier's ramblings.”

  My heart fluttered. Magnus would be here any minute. I rushed back to the counter and set the pot back beneath the coffee drip. I headed into the back room, took off my apron, tossed it into the hamper, and snagged my purse. I pulled out the body spray I had in there and gave myself a quick spritz so I smelled more like strawberry than coffee.

  A shudder spasmed through me. My stomach became lead. I was so nervous and so eager. How could I be both? I wanted to hide in the back room. What if this date was a complete disaster? What if Magnus lied in his note? What if he wasn't this amazing guy he presented himself to be?

  “Stop being scared,” I growled to myself. “Mother was never scared. Magnus won't hurt me. No man could lie like he did with that note. There was so much truth poured out into it. You need to unbunch your panties and march out there.”

  I felt better after berating myself. I slung my purse over my shoulder and marched out of the coffee shop. Gerdie had a big smile as she watched me over a customer's head. Freddy held the door open for me, nodding his head.

  “You'll do just fine. I have faith in you, Raven.”

  “Thanks, boss,” I said, giving him a strange look. Why were they all making such a big deal out of this?

  I mean, it was a big deal to me. But why was it so special for my bosses and Owen?

  Owen watched me through the coffee shop, his arms folded. I shifted my shoulders and turned away. I could still feel their eyes on me. I tried to ignore them. They were making me more nervous. What if Magnus didn't show up, and my bosses and Owen all witnessed my humiliation?

  “No, he will show up. And everyone inside the cafe cares about me. Even if they're being so creepy about it.”

  I fished out my phone from my purse, checking the time. 3:01. He was late. I peered up the street. Traffic moved at a crawl. I doubt Magnus was at all familiar with how terrible traffic was in Seattle. I wouldn't hold it against him for being a few minutes late.

  My ears prickled for the distinctive roar of his Harley over the cars streaming by me. The road was one-way, and traffic only came from my left, so I craned my head in that direction, trying to spot Magnus approaching. I rose on my tiptoes, peering over cars.

  Movement caught my attention. I looked up at the building across the street. It was the Marriott Hotel, its tinted windows gleaming in the sun. A window washer worked halfway down the skyscraper. I stared at him for a moment. Was that the movement I saw?

  Something wavered on the side of the building to the window washer's left. A mirage moved across the building, climbing down the side from up high. I blinked. Was I seeing things?

  No. It was still moving down the side.

  What was it?

  The mirage reached the fourth or fifth floor of the hotel and stopped. A shudder washed through me. Eyes were on me. The mirage was somehow staring at me. I took a step back. I wanted to rush back into the coffee shop. I could wait for Magnus in there.

  A motorcycle engine's roar grew louder, echoing down the street. I wrenched my eyes away from the mirage. Over a block away, Magnus worked his way to me. He was powerful and handsome on his bike. I bit my lip and glanced back at the mirage.

  A snarl growled louder than traffic. The mirage leaped.

  My breath caught as the mirage rippled. White and frost-blue swirled about it. Snow drifted in the mirage's wake as it soared across the street towards me. A shape formed, hardening out of frost. Dingy-white fur covered a vaguely apish body. It snarled from a fang-filled muzzle as it landed on a taxi right in front of me.

  Metal groaned and twisted as the hulking monster crushed the cab's roof. A car horn blared. People screamed. The monster stepped off the car, walking on short, rear legs and powerful knuckles like a gorilla. The thing stood fifteen feet tall. It snarled at me, red eyes glaring above a wolf-like muzzle.

  “What is going on?” I gasped in shock.

  “Valkyrie,” the thing snarled.

  Fetid breath washed over me in a warm caress. Rotten meat clung to sharp, blackened teeth. A pink tongue lolled as it stalked forward, crushing a parking meter. Coins spilled out across the street as the ape-wolf stopped before me.

  The thing licked its chops. “You smell delicious.”

  ~ ~ ~

  Magnus

  Metal crunched ahead. People screamed.

  I craned my neck to peer past the cars before me. Something white and hulking stepped off the ruins of a yellow cab. I blinked in shock, my jaw dropping. It was something out of some dumb movie, only lacking that cartoonish fakery that all CGI seemed to possess.

  This was real. This monster had stepped into reality and was stalking towards a black-haired woman in a green shirt.

  Raven.

  I didn't think. I revved my Harley's engine and shifted gears
. I barely felt the bounce as I drove onto the sidewalk. Pedestrians screamed, diving out of the way as I roared down the sidewalk towards the coffee house.

  The monster swung a knuckled fist at Raven. She dodged to the right, rolling across the sidewalk and coming up in a run, racing towards me. The monster snarled like a mad dog. Its arm swung, crashing into the side of a passing sedan. The car flipped over and landed against an SUV.

  I twisted the accelerator. My Harley roared. I flew down the sidewalk. I didn't even look for cross traffic as I raced through the intersection. I didn't know what was going on. I didn't care. Raven was in trouble. Cars honked. Tires squealed. I zoomed through the intersection and bounced onto the sidewalk, the rear end of my Harley fishtailing as I fought to control my bike.

  Raven raced towards me, her purse half-hanging on her arm. The monster battered down a tree as it chased her. Wood cracked. The tree toppled into the street. The monster crashed through a red-and-white striped awning, momentarily tripped up by the cloth.

  I squeezed the brakes and swung around my Harley's rear end. Acrid rubber smoked and burned as my rear tire drew a half-circle on the sidewalk. I did a 180, facing away from the monster. “Hop on!”

  Raven threw herself on the back of my bike, her arms slipping around my waist. She held me tight, her face buried in my neck. I revved the Harley. The rear tire smoked and squealed as it spun. The traction bit. We raced down the sidewalk.

  “Valkyrie!” howled the monster.

  “What the fuck is that thing?” I demanded.

  “I don't know,” she screamed, her words almost ripped away. “I don't know what's going on. It just...appeared out of a mirage.”

  Metal crashed behind us. The ground shook. I risked a glance. Beyond Raven's streaming hair, the ape-wolf followed. It moved with the lumbering gait of a gorilla far faster than I thought possible. Red eyes fixed on us.

  Hunter's eyes.

  “Fuck,” I roared.

  Raven's arms tightened around me. “What are we going to do?”

  “Out run the fucker!” I snarled back. “Hold on.”

  I took a turn hard. Tires squealed. I leaned the bike over. Raven yelled in my ear. She smelled like strawberries. No. I couldn't concentrate on that. Screams followed us. The monster lumbered. I twisted the accelerator and my Harley's twin cam engine roared.

  The bike raced down the new street. The pedestrians fled out of our way, terror on their faces. The monster howled behind us. Cars crashed as their drivers panicked. Chaos echoed down the streets of Seattle as we barreled through another intersection.

  “Where do we go?” Raven asked.

  “I don't know. I don't live in this damned city.”

  Ahead, a street drummer sat in our path, banging on his improvised instruments, his greasy dreadlocks swinging about his pale face. I cursed, cutting my motorcycle over into a bike lane. Metal scraped and my tail pipe rattled.

  I could fix it later.

  The drummer screamed, scrambling to his feet. Metal crunched. A half-crushed steel can flew past us, crashing through the window of a Starbucks. I risked another glance.

  Another piece of twisted metal hurtled at us.

  I cut the bike hard to the right, my foot coming down to keep the bike from tipping over as we turned. The bike straightened, and I drove us between a pair of stopped trucks, barely clearing their large, side view mirrors. I couldn't stay in traffic. The monster howled behind us. Car horns honked. I winced as metal crunched.

  “What is going on?” Raven cried. “Is this a dream?”

  “It's not a dream,” I growled. “Just hold tight. I'll get us away.”

  “Stop running, pretty Valkyrie!” howled the demon. “I just want to taste how delicious you are.”

  Anger burned inside me. There was no way this fucker was touching my Raven.

  “Go left!” she shouted. “The alley. It's narrow.”

  I saw it and took a hard turn. She gasped as the bike slid. I fought to keep us from spilling and crashing. A parking meter whizzed past us, crashing against the brick wall at the alley's corner. Coins glinted as they spun through the air. We roared through them. I grit my teeth as they bounced off my chest and arms, leaving behind stinging pain.

  My bike's engine echoed as I raced through the narrow alleyway. Garbage and strewn newspapers fluttered in my wake. I dodged around a metal, emergency stairwell and then burst out into daylight. A woman screamed in fright, jumping back as I took the turn hard into a quieter street. It was narrow, lined with cars. More residential than the busy streets we left behind.

  “Did it follow?” I demanded, taking a hard left at the first intersection.

  “No,” Raven sighed.

  Her body shook. It took me a moment to realize she was laughing.

  “What?” I asked, my body shaking as the adrenaline bled out of me.

  “This is not what I thought our first date would be like,” she said, her arms tightening about me.

  My laugh bubbled out of my chest. I threw back my head and joined her. All the fear and confusion poured out in that roaring laugh. My blood howled. Never had I felt so alive. Not even the night I rescued Raven had been this exciting. I had no idea what sort of nightmare that monster wandered out of, but we escaped.

  We had survived.

  What better reason to laugh?

  “Magnus!” Raven suddenly shouted.

  A shadow flashed over us. The ape-wolf crashed to the ground before us. The asphalt cracked. Chunks of tar-black debris flew into the air about its knuckled fists. It howled. I had to stop us. There was no room to get around the beast. I hit the brakes and turned the bike, planting my foot on the ground as we slid towards the beast.

  Raven screamed in my ear. We were going too fast for me to control.

  Sparks flew as the bike slammed on its side. The world tumbled about me. Metal crashed. The monster howled. My arm and side burned as I skidded to a stop. Raven whimpered beside me. She tried to stand, a swath of her jeans frayed through showing red skin.

  “Magnus!”

  I coughed. I had to get up. The monster lumbered towards us, red eyes hungry. I drew my Beretta 92FS handgun as I stood and faced the creature.

  Chapter Seven

  Raven

  “Run, Raven!”

  Magnus's voice echoed down the street as he rose, a silver handgun pointed at the monster. His right arm was rubbed raw by our tumble. My side and back burned from the slide. Magnus's blond hair whipped around his shoulders as the monster howled and charged forward.

  “Get out of here,” he shouted as he fired.

  The handgun barked. Golden shells tumbled through the air. White-blue smoke erupted from the barrel. Small dots of red burst across the monster's broad chest. But it was huge, and Magnus's gun was so tiny. The wounds didn't seem to affect the thing any more than a mosquito bite would slow me down.

  I scrambled to my feet. Ice beat through my veins. Magnus's bike was a tangled heap, crushed by the monster's knuckles as it barreled towards us. I ran. The gun kept barking behind me. The monster howled. This couldn't be happening. Monsters weren't real.

  What was going on?

  Did this have to do with that glowing man I saw? Was that why it was after me?

  “Your guardian is pathetic, Valkyrie!” the monster howled.

  Why did he keep calling me Valkyrie? I wasn't that. Valkyrie had something to do with Norse mythology. They were warrior women. I wasn't a warrior. My mother was. She wouldn't have run away from this monster.

  She would have fought it like she had the wolf.

  I froze.

  The wolf howled in my mind. Half-remembered images of my parents fighting a hulking, gray wolf rose from the depths of my subconscious. I stumbled and turned around. Magnus backed away from the beast, his gun barking. He fought without fear like my father had.

  My mother didn't run away. She had fought with my father and died with him. I had forgotten. My childish mind had suppressed the terrible memori
es. My parents shouts and cries of pain screamed through my mind. The wolf had savaged them.

  My parents were killed by a monster, and now they were back for me.

  I couldn't run. I had to help Magnus somehow. I looked around for something to use as a weapon. Something as simple as a hunk of of wood or piece of metal. Even a stone I could throw at the beast. Anything to help Magnus out. A tree grew nearby, planted only a few years ago with thin branches.

  Magnus's gun fell silent.

  I rushed over and grasped the lowest limb, pulling on it. In the background, sirens blared. Help was coming. We only had to hold off the monster for a minute. The branch bent and twisted in my hand, but it didn't snap. The tree trunk swayed. The wood was too limber, the entire trunk bending. I couldn't break it. The dry scent of bark filled my nose as the branch twisted in my hands.

  “Raven! Run!” Magnus yelled. “Don't—”

  His words cut off with a sickening crunch.

  All the sounds died. Magnus flew through the air, thrown by a hard swipe from the monster. The handgun spun beside him, flashing silver every revolution. The pistol hit the asphalt first, bouncing soundlessly down the street. My eyes were fixed on Magnus's as he tumbled. His limbs looked limp.

  He crashed on the sidewalk and rolled to a stop. His side was crushed. Blood covered his lips. His right arm was twisted and bent. He didn't move.

  “No!”

  I didn't even remember racing to his side. I fell to my knees beside him. The ground shook as the monster approached. Tears fell from my eyes onto Magnus's still face. His blue eyes were wide, sightless. His chest didn't move.

  “No, no, no,” I sobbed, hugging Magnus and pressing my face to his chest. “No. You can't be dead.”

  “Did I break your little protector, Valkyrie,” laughed the fiend as he strolled forward. A car crunched as he batted it out of the way. “You should have chosen someone stronger.”