The Unleashing

by Shelly Laurenston

  She was one of those power brokers in the industry that most of Hollywood knew nothing about. Of course, she was currently on the phone with her long-distance boyfriend, who lived in Germany. They were in one of their arguing moments, which meant that Alessandra yelled at him in Spanish and he yelled back at her in German.

  But . . . again . . . Alessandra seemed happy, so who was Erin to question?

  Besides, Erin had bigger issues to deal with right now. Like the new girl. Ex-military types could be such a pain in the ass. They were used to everything being spelled out for them in detail. Usually in writing. They were told how to do everything, including folding their clothes, cleaning their living quarters, even how to wear their hair.

  Crows didn’t do any of that. They had kind of a uniform when they went out hunting, but even that was open to personal style. One Crow painted the Hello Kitty logo on her jeans. Another, instead of wearing a racer-back tank so her wings were unhindered, wore full T-shirts with slits cut into the back of the cotton so that her wings could come out. And at least three Crows wore designer boots on their hunts with six-inch heels. It was all about what a Crow was comfortable in. There was only one hard and fast rule among the Crows: Never betray a sister-Crow. Ever.

  And Erin didn’t doubt the new girl’s loyalty, but she did doubt that she was a girl’s girl. She seemed like one of those chicks who was just more comfortable around men. That would be a problem for her in the long run. Maybe Erin needed to find her a loyal friend. Maybe Jacinda. They called her Jace for short and she was . . . uh . . . shy. Yeah. You could call her shy. Great in battle, but said little otherwise. Even now, she could be lounging by the pool with the rest of her team, but instead she was behind the toolshed on the other side of the yard. It used to bother the other Crows when she first got here, but after realizing what a benefit she was in battle, they let Jace’s terrified reaction to basic conversation go.

  Honestly, as long as the new girl came through during battle, she should be okay. Even if she mostly hung out with the Ravens.

  Erin stretched her neck and went back to sketching a future tattoo for one of her best clients. She was just finishing when she saw Kera walk out the sliding back doors into the yard. Something that normally wouldn’t concern Erin in the least . . . except for the clipboard she was holding. Why was the new girl holding a clipboard?

  Good God, why did she have a clipboard?

  Leigh suddenly clamored over the several other deck chairs between them until she reached Erin’s.

  “Why does that woman have a clipboard?” Leigh demanded.

  “I’m afraid to ask.”

  “Is she . . . is she organizing?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t want to know.”

  Kera spotted Erin and Leigh, and immediately made her way over to them.

  “There you are,” Kera said.

  “Yes. Here I am. Relaxing,” Erin told her, hoping she’d understand.

  “Uh-huh. I have a few questions for you.”

  “Okay.”

  “What kind of training program do you guys have in place?”

  “Training program?”

  “Yeah. Early morning? Or later in the afternoon? Or do you have several over the course of the day?”

  “We really don’t have a training schedule.”

  “But you guys go out at night, right? That’s when you do your gods-sanctioned killing?”

  Leigh’s hands clenched into fists and she closed her eyes, while Erin tried to figure out the best way to handle this situation.

  “We all have such varied schedules that we just train on our own.”

  “Really?” Kera briefly stopped to note that on the notepad attached to her clipboard. Her horrifying clipboard. “That doesn’t seem the most effective way to make this work.”

  “Except it’s been working for more than thirteen hundred years.”

  “But it can be better, right?” But before Erin could answer that stupid question, Kera replied, “Exactly! And I think I have some good ideas for that.”

  Leigh, unable to contain her panic a moment longer, jumped up, yanked the clipboard away from Kera, pulled back her arm, and then pitched the whole fucking thing right into the pool.

  “There!” she nearly screamed. “We’re done!”

  “I’m not sure why you did that,” Kera replied calmly. “But I can successfully keep most information in my head, so I don’t really need it. I just like having things written out so when I type it into a very helpful handbook, I have less work to do.”

  “Oh my God!” Leigh barked at Erin. “Do something! She’s your problem, Amsel, do something!”

  They watched Leigh stomp off to the fully stocked bar on the other side of the pool.

  “Wow, she’s kind of moody.”

  “Because you’re becoming a problem,” Erin told Watson.

  “A problem today, a solution tomorrow.”

  “A solution to what? We don’t need a solution.”

  “You don’t think you need a solution, but based on what I’ve seen today, this place desperately needs a solution. And don’t worry, by the time I’m done, everything will hum like a well-oiled machine.”

  “Don’t you have a dog to take care of or something?”

  “She’s off jogging or something with a couple of other Crows. Oh, that reminds me.” She pulled out a smaller notepad from the back pocket of her cut-off shorts and began writing something down. “I need to get her food and put a schedule in the kitchen so the other girls don’t overfeed her while we’re here.”

  Erin sat up and placed her hand against Kera’s hip. “Look, I know you need to feel like you’re in control of something, but this isn’t it. You can’t control the Crows. That’s kind of the whole point of us. We refuse to be controlled by anyone.”

  “Sure. I get that,” Kera replied, glancing off. “So,” she suddenly asked, “have you guys tried meditating? It’s a really good way to center yourself. I learned about it in the Marines, believe it or not, and I do it every day. It’s good for you.” She nodded, wrote something down in her little notepad. “Yeah. I’ll get a schedule together for meditation sessions, as well as training sessions. I think that’ll help. A lot. Don’t you?”

  “ No. ”

  “Yeah. It’ll help.”

  “You’re not even trying to listen to me.”

  “When you make sense, I’ll listen. But to keep doing things the wrong way just because you’ve always done it that way doesn’t make sense to me. Not when there’s a better way to do things.”

  “But you know nothing about us. You know nothing about the Clans. About what we do. How we function.”

  “Are you planning to teach me all that?” When Erin didn’t answer immediately, Watson nodded. “That’s what I thought. I’m on my own here, which is fine, but then I’ll do things my way. And if there is one thing the United States Marines has taught me . . . organization is key.”

  “We’re not the Marines.”

  “No. But you’re a fighting force and the Marines are one of the best fighting forces in the entire world. What can’t you learn from us?”

  “Them.”

  “What?”

  Erin took a deep breath, trying to control her growing annoyance. “You and the Marines are no longer an ‘us.’ You and the Crows are an ‘us.’ The Marines are a ‘them.’ And the sooner you learn that, the happier you’ll be.”

  “I’m happy when things are organized.”

  Erin threw up her hands. “Oh my God! I can’t reason with you.”

  “Hey, hey,” a low voice said and Erin let out a sad, strangled cry that had nearby Crows appearing from everywhere to make sure everything was all right.

  Watson stared at Erin. “What is wrong with you?”

  “He creeped up on us.”

  “Crept. He crept up on us.” Kera smiled up at Vig Rundstöm’s hulking figure standing behind her. “Where did you come from?”

  “Depends who you ask, but for
your purposes . . . I walked here.”

  And when Kera chuckled at that ridiculous reply, Erin realized she might have an answer to her current problems. On many levels. But first . . . her immediate issue.

  “What are you doing here, Raven?” Erin snarled.

  “Be nice,” Kera ordered. Considering she hadn’t even been here forty-eight hours yet, she sure was confident about ordering people around.

  “You want the Crows to be nice? Then get him off our territory.”

  “He hasn’t done anything.”

  Erin slowly stood and she leaned into Kera. “I said get him off our territory.”

  Kera shoved her notepad back into her pocket and stepped into Erin. “Make me.”

  “I can just go,” Rundstöm said quickly. “Yeah. I’ll just go.”

  “Hold up, Vig,” Kera told him while her gaze still bored into Erin’s. “I’ll come with you.”

  Kera took his arm and led him away, Vig glancing back at Erin, a deep frown on his face as his slow Viking mind turned, trying to figure out what the hell she was doing.

  Once they were gone, Erin let out a sigh.

  “What the hell was that about?” Alessandra asked.

  “She had to go.”

  “Aren’t you her mentor? Aren’t you supposed to be helping her?”

  “She had a clipboard! There is no help for people who walk around with clipboards for absolutely no apparent reason!”

  Alessandra went back to the tablet she was working on as Leigh stormed over, a beer now in her hand.

  “You have to do something.”

  “I know. I know.” Erin returned to her deck chair. “Trust me. I know.”

  “Not only is she a menace,” Leigh went on, now good and panicked, “but she’s all eager and hopeful, ready to change everything with her focused energy and positive work ethic. We can’t have that, Amsel.”

  “Are you done?”

  “Except for the panic . . . yes.”

  “Don’t panic. She just needs a job. And to get into battle.”

  “We can’t bring her into battle without her wings. Even if she doesn’t know how to use them, the rule is she must have her wings.”

  Erin shrugged and stretched out on her chair again. “Trust me. I’ll get her wings out.”

  Her name was Simone Andrews and she was a douche.

  Tessa had no idea what they’d done to that woman, but she’d had a hard-on for the Crows ever since she’d moved to her nearby Malibu home. She must be spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on lawyers sending repeated, pain-in-the-ass legal documents just to fuck with them. And that’s all it was, because legally there was nothing the woman could do to get them out. They weren’t doing anything wrong. The legal sister-Crows made sure every t was crossed and every goddamn i dotted when it came to keeping their company running and their home base safe from the government. Especially the IRS, which scared them more than the rest of the federal government could even dream of. Because the IRS could fuck up their world.

  Unlike the other Clans, the Crows didn’t have their people spread out through the upper echelons of the ruling parties of whatever country they lived in. Because of the kind of women who were chosen for the Crows by Skuld, the Crows were on their own. Like always.

  But Tessa would have to be careful. Chloe’s temper was shorter than usual these days. She wasn’t getting enough rest. Or maybe that ex of hers was just making her life more miserable than usual. Whatever it was, Tessa couldn’t risk letting Chloe turn Simone Andrews into something she had to “deal with directly.” Because anytime Chloe dealt with something directly, someone usually ended up dead.

  When it was a demon from hell using one of Skuld’s hair clips to drain the souls of the innocent—that was fine. When it was a crappy neighbor being a bitch—that was not fine.

  So Tessa would manage the situation. Just like she was born to do. Manage. That’s why she was a nurse. That’s probably why Skuld had chosen her to be a Crow. That was probably why her strike team was made of the most difficult sister-Crows in California. Because Tessa managed shit.

  It was her gift. It was her curse.

  Thankfully, Tessa didn’t have to do this sort of thing alone. She had friends. Very good friends.

  “I need you to keep an eye on this woman. Watch her. Closely.” She glanced at the crow sitting on her shoulder, the bird’s head twisting as it looked for danger in the area. “I need to know if she’s just a petty bitch who likes to fuck with people . . . or if it’s something more. Okay?”

  The bird brushed its head against Tessa’s, then took to the trees. Once settled on a high branch, it sent out a call and Tessa knew that its sisters and brothers would be coming to help.

  “But be careful,” Tessa warned. “I wouldn’t put it past the bitch to shoot at you. She seems like she’d be one of those crazy rich women with a lot of guns.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Vig picked up the coffees and Kera grabbed the sandwiches.

  This was Vig’s favorite coffee shop. Owned by a tough ex-Israeli soldier who didn’t know anything about Nordic gods and wasn’t put off by Vig’s battle stare.

  Vig had accidentally stumbled upon Kera’s coffee shop when he was waiting for a Raven brother to get his car out of a tow lot. Vig knew the process would take a while because his brother felt his six-figure Mercedes had been illegally towed and he wasn’t about to pay a cent to get it back. That meant arguing. Vig hadn’t been in the mood to watch arguing, so he’d gone to the coffee shop he’d passed earlier and walked up to the counter. The pretty blonde behind the counter had looked up at him and blanched, her eyes widening at the sight of him. He’d been truly afraid she was about to piss her extremely tight jeans when her manager came over and told her to clean the tables and that she’d help this customer.

  That manager had been Kera. She’d been pretty and kind and sexy as hell. Even better, smart and confident. Vig loved smart and confident.

  “I’m sorry about that,” Kera said just before biting into her sandwich.

  Kera had picked a table on the deck, overlooking the Pacific Ocean, right by the protective glass. Vig moved over a large umbrella to keep the sun off them and settled in to eat.

  “It’s not your fault,” he replied to her. “I really don’t know what was wrong with her. Amsel doesn’t usually care about anyone. Especially me.”

  “I think she was just using you to get rid of me. And I fell for it. But she irritates me.”

  “Why did she want to get rid of you?”

  Kera swallowed her food. “Because I have ideas to get some organization into their lives. You’d think I was trying to poison them with mustard gas the way they were acting.”

  “Crows and Ravens . . . we don’t do organization. I mean . . . there’s organization but very loose. Very . . . nonthreatening to our personal style.”

  Kera laughed. “I never saw organization as threatening, but okay.” She opened a bag of chips, poured them onto her plate, and offered some to Vig with a wave of her hand.

  “So,” she asked, “how does this work?”

  “Nothing too hard. I was thinking we go out for dinner and if that works, we take it from there.”

  Kera gazed at him over her sandwich, her eyes wide. “I meant,” she said after she swallowed, “how does the Crows, Ravens, Clans thing work.”

  “Oh. That. Um . . . well, each Clan is different. Different gods, different rules. Different demands.”

  “Like what?”

  “Well, my sister is one of the Valkyries. They’re the Choosers of the Slain. They pick the warriors who die in battle and will go to either Odin or Freyja for the final battle of Ragnarok. They’re also brutal warriors in their own right, but they rarely fight on this plane of existence. Then there are the Isa. Skadi’s their ruling goddess and they live their lives in the mountains, among nature and animals you and I can never get close to. You’ll find a lot of Isa in the state and national parks . . . and in the winter Olym
pics. Good skiers . . . like Skadi. And, of course, you’ve met the Giant Killers.”

  “They’re lovely.”

  Vig chuckled. “Yes. That’s exactly how I’d describe them. They basically do whatever Thor wants them to, and we try not to ask what that is.”

  “Be honest with me, Vig . . . are we just hitmen for these gods?”

  “No. That’s archangels. Try not to get into any disputes with them. Those never go well, and they can be really nasty.”

  Kera put down her sandwich. “Archangels?”

  “And the followers of the Greek gods are no better. Especially Ares’s people.”

  Kera put her elbows on the table, her hands covering her mouth, her gaze focused at the view of the ocean.

  “You all right?” Vig asked.

  “Just realizing my mother may have been right,” she said around her fingers.

  “Right about what?”

  “I am going to hell.”

  “No. You’re going to Valhalla.”

  Her eyes flicked back to focus on his face. “Valhalla?”

  “We all go to Valhalla when we die as long as you don’t betray your Clan.”

  “Even the Crows?”

  “Even the Crows. Odin can’t be that picky when it comes to Ragnarok. He needs all the warriors he can get. And good warriors like Crows . . . he can’t ignore them, no matter how much he may want to.”

  Kera dropped her hands back to the table. “I guess that’s something.” She took another bite out of her sandwich. “I’m guessing the Ravens were around long before the Crows, huh?”

  “No. We came after the Crows.”

  “Really?”

  He nodded. “A small Clan of Crows began an assault on a village in Norway. My ancestor was one of those warriors who called on Odin for help. Odin, already pissed at Skuld for giving slaves such an elevated status, gave the warriors wings so they could fight the Crows and defend the village. After it was over, the warriors kept their wings and they continued to fight for Odin. That’s how the Ravens began.”