If Brenna was a Valkyrie—
He scrubbed his head with both hands, washing out the shampoo. That opened up a whole new level of thought, something he couldn’t wrap his head around right now. Better he work through his original idea.
One fact rang true. His fantasy woman was real, in the here and now and only a closed door away.
Only a touch away.
He flashed back to grappling with Brenna, her body tight against him. The soft gasp, her hips thrusting back as she writhed. In another time and place…
Desire burned fast and furiously down his spine, centering in his groin. His right hand slipped down to caress his balls, a natural prelude to his usual solitary interludes.
She’s real and alive and in the next room.
Erik gritted his teeth and gave himself one, two hard strokes before slapping his palms on the wall in frustration.
He hadn’t sworn off women on his travels. Since leaving the hospital and going on the fight circuit, there’d been a handful of one-night stands, ending with a discreet departure from someone’s apartment early in the morning. It was considered one of the perks of the job, the women waiting outside the dressing rooms or in the parking lot to offer themselves, eyes filled with desire and unbridled lust. A throwback to the past when gladiators fought in the arena and had their choice of partners. No expectations, no illusions of it being anything more than a physical rush, the emotional part of him shut off in a blind dash to completion.
But Erik always had his mystery woman, the blond with the blue eyes dominating his thoughts.
It’d taken a force of will to not invite Brenna in when he caught her peeping at him in the bathroom mirror. Pull her in and strip her down, devour her whole like he had in a hundred dreams.
He groaned and grabbed himself again, cursing. He needed a clear mind to deal with the trouble smashing into his life, and if this was what it took…
Short, sweet, and fast.
The opposite of what he wanted with Brenna.
Chapter Eight
She walked around the hotel room to calm her mind, taking inventory of the furnishings. One chair, one table, one television set that she doubted pulled in much more than static and the local stations.
One bed.
Brenna forced her attention to the duffel bag lying on the dark brown bedspread. She didn’t have anything with her, having disposed of any belongings earlier that day in anticipation of being back in the barracks before sunrise.
That’d been a bad decision.
She shucked off her leather jacket and checked her right forearm, wincing as the narrow cut opened again. Nothing more than a deep scratch.
Its presence created a whole new set of issues, adding to her initial mistake.
Her fingers trembled as she dug out her wallet from a back pocket. It had never been empty—Freyja had seen fit to at least provide her with the money to pursue her prey, enough to keep her going but not enough to encourage her to splurge on indulgences…
Empty.
The leather billfold held nothing more than her identification—she breathed a sigh of relief, glad it was still there. But the lack of cash would make evading Kara even more difficult.
The bathroom door clicked, and Erik stepped out, his lower half wrapped in a black towel.
Her eyes traveled down the light body hair to the loose knot.
A big mistake.
“Right.” He picked up the chair and positioned it to face the bed. He sat on the edge of the mattress. “I’m glad you’re still here. Not quite up to chasing you.”
Brenna couldn’t help smiling at that one, imagining the dash across the parking lot. She took her seat, forcing herself to keep her eyes above his waist.
He held up the first-aid kit. “Took something for my headache, a bit of antiseptic cream on a few spots.” He motioned at her arm. “Want me to take a look?”
“No, I’m fine. Just a scratch.”
“There’s plenty of bandages here if you change your mind.” He sighed. “Where do I start?” He ran a hand through his short brown hair as he leaned in, resting his elbows on his knees. “Listen. I’ve been in battle. You see a lot of strange shit when the bullets fly. You lose track of what’s real and what’s fake, fighting to find sanity in the middle of the crazy swirling around you.”
His voice was soft and low, peeling the armor off her heart.
“You and I, we understand what it’s like to see death up close and personal.” He glanced at the door. “People out there, they don’t. Thank God, they don’t have to because we step in front and take it on ourselves. We keep them safe but at a price. It affects us, no matter how we try to steel our minds, build invisible walls.” He looked at her, capturing her gaze with his own. “Do you trust me?”
She nodded, caught up in the emotional speech.
“Please tell me who you really are. Where you and your friend came from. Give me something so I can help you and help her before someone gets hurt.”
“It’s more complicated than that.” She bit the inside of her cheek, grateful for the pain. It helped to focus on the topic at hand and not the dip in the towel between his knees.
“No rush.” He smiled as he propped his chin up on a curled fist, cocking his head to the side. “We paid for the entire night.”
Brenna’s body ached from head to toe, the last hour’s efforts coming home. She scrubbed her eyes, searching for the right words.
“I…” She shook her head. “I don’t know where to start.”
“Take a deep breath.” He held up his hands. “Tell you what. I’ll get dressed. You think over what you’re going to say, and when I come back out, we’re going to talk.”
He rose and tugged at the towel.
For one second, Brenna thought he was about to pull it off in front of her. She swallowed hard, her heart racing.
He hooked his thumb in the thin fabric as he brushed by her and picked up his duffel bag, going into the bathroom.
The door shut behind him, cutting her off.
She drew a ragged breath, grateful for the reprieve.
Her gaze went to the front door as she ran through her options.
She could walk out and abandon him to Kara. Technically her promise only extended until he came out of the shower. It was now null and void.
She was in better shape than he was; it’d be easy to outrun him and seek shelter on her own, leave Erik open and vulnerable. Her sister would find him eventually, as Brenna had done, and dispatch him. He’d ascend to his rightful place in Valhalla, join his friends.
Then the hunter would become the hunted as Kara turned on her.
Walking away wouldn’t give her the answers she wanted and needed. What had held her back from reaping him at their first meeting. Tonight, her inability to kill him. Until he explained what hold he had over her, it would be a mystery gnawing at her insides. Once Kara took Erik to Valhalla, he would be out of reach, forever.
So, she was trapped with him. That only left…
Erik came out, wearing only his jeans. His chest gleamed with water droplets, tempting her to brush away the last remnants of the shower.
He tossed the remains of his shredded shirt in the wastebasket. “Not worth saving.”
She nodded, straightening her back in preparation for the upcoming discussion.
He smiled and came back to sit on the edge of the bed, facing her again. “So, let’s talk.”
…
Erik scratched his chin, unsure what he wanted to hear from her. Here he was, face-to-face with his fantasy woman, and there weren’t too many options that didn’t mean trouble.
But he had to give her the chance.
“I told you,” she said softly. “I am a Valkyrie. As is Kara. My job is to…”
“To collect souls for Valhalla. I understand. Let’s go back a bit. What unit were you with? What base did you deploy from before you took this assignment? What town did you grow up in? Where did you go to school?” He lowere
d his voice. “Tell me the truth, Brenna. I can’t help you if you’re not honest with me.”
Her right eyebrow rose. “I am telling you the truth.”
Erik pulled back a sigh. “Look…”
“Listen.” She leaned forward and put her hand on his right knee, the firm grip freezing him in place. “The radio call came in, medical convoy under fire. Your squad was prepped for another mission, but you didn’t care—you went because you had to. They followed you without question because they trusted you and they knew their duty. They’d gone with you into the jaws of hell before and did so again.”
Her voice was hypnotic, keeping him still as she described the worst day of his life. “The plan was to take the pressure off the convoy, draw the insurgents away and give the medical personnel a chance to get to safety. No one knew it was a trap until the bombs started going off.”
His chest tightened, letting him only draw short, brief breaths. He couldn’t move even though every muscle, every nerve screamed at him to run, run far away from this hotel room so he wouldn’t have to listen to her anymore.
“Right after you entered the marketplace, an IED went off, deafening everyone, scattering them around the clearing. Scotty took a piece of metal to his leg, cut wide open. He was fumbling to put a tourniquet on. Wouldn’t have made a difference anyway—he was bleeding out, dying right in front of you.”
Her touch burned through to his skin as she continued. “April had a shrapnel wound to her head, a fatal injury. Tore right through her helmet, exposed her brain to the sun. She managed to get the picture of her family out and was looking at it before I arrived. She had a little boy.”
He recognized the emotions in her voice as she described the battlefield, bloody inch by bloody inch.
Pride. Honor. Respect.
The reality sunk in as she recounted reaping souls and moving toward him, taking his squad mates one by one to their eternal reward. There was no other option, no other way she could have known and seen so many personal details about Scotty and the others. Even if she’d read the battle reports, the debriefing—it wouldn’t be so complete.
His skin itched as if he were about to go into a firefight, the hairs on the back of his neck standing straight up as the truth sank in.
She was real.
The childhood stories, heard from his grandfather when growing up were true. All of it.
Erik forced himself to keep listening as she finished her recitation. He swallowed hard, choking back the burning twisting his gut into knots.
She squeezed his knee and sighed. “I’m sorry for bringing up these memories, but I don’t know what else to do to prove to you who I am. I appreciate your sympathy and your desire to help me out, but this is the truth: I’m a Valkyrie. I came to the battlefield as I was assigned, sent to collect the bravest and the strongest.” A light blush colored her cheeks. “I was supposed to take you. All I had to do was touch you with the end of my lance and you would join your friends, rise to a glorious afterlife in the Great Halls.”
“Except you didn’t,” he whispered. “I challenged you. You took off your helmet and kissed me.”
“Yes.” She exhaled the single word like a prayer.
He put his hands atop hers and leaned in, close enough to feel her breathing, the short, soft puffs caressing his skin. “Why?”
“I don’t know.” She looked at him, her blue eyes locking with his. “I honestly don’t. That’s when it went all wrong.”
“Wrong?” Erik pulled back, frowning.
“I should have done my job. If I had taken you, we wouldn’t be here, with Kara hunting both of us. It was a mistake.” She closed her eyes and sighed. “At the start, I wondered if Loki was behind this, toying with us. Then I realized Mother Freyja and the Allfather would never let this go on for so long.”
Erik sat up straight, his head spinning. A ball of nausea rolled around his belly, sticking behind his throbbing rib cage.
Valkyries. Odin. Norse gods.
Valhalla.
Suddenly, his world was a whole lot bigger.
There was one small consolation he could take from this.
“Scotty, April. The others…”
She smiled and took his hands in hers, squeezing lightly. “They’re in the Great Halls, feasting and enjoying themselves. They play all night, and they fight all day, and every sunset they rise anew to do the same again and again, preparing for Ragnarok.”
His heart ached, and for a second, he was back at the military graveyard, standing over the headstones.
If they were truly in Valhalla…
Erik closed his eyes, sorting through his feelings. A flash of anger came up, mixing with a horrible sadness and the guilt. There was something more this time—a hope of an afterlife where they received the rewards they deserved, earned even though he’d let them down, let them die. He sighed, pulling up the memories he’d kept close at hand ever since that sad day.
“I’m sorry. You should be with them,” Brenna said. “I failed in my calling.”
“No.” He remembered Everett telling the worst jokes to try and cheer them up during the long nights on patrol. Samantha sharing her care boxes from home so no one felt lonely. “They were good people.”
“Yes. As are you. Worthy to sit beside them.”
He opened his eyes to see her staring at him.
“I’m sorry,” she repeated.
“Tell me about Kara.” He needed something to think about, anything but this. “Tell me why she’s out to kill both of us.”
“I didn’t complete my assignment.” Brenna released his hands and sat back. “Simple as that.”
“She’s got a lance. You have a knife. Why?”
“You mean I had a knife.” She balled her hands into tight fists. “My punishment included restrictions.”
“You lost your wings as well.” He resisted the urge to reach out and stroke her back. “I’m assuming she can’t fly, at least; she didn’t when attacking us. And no armor, at least, nothing like you wore when we first met.”
Brenna nodded her agreement, one edge of her mouth turning upward. “The wings would be a bit hard to hide.” She rolled her shoulders back. “Mine have been gone ever since I came down here. As for the breastplate, it’s more for show than practicality when we visit a battlefield to claim souls. We’re invulnerable when among mortals.”
“Invulnerable?” He stared at her. “So, if you’re shot or stabbed, it doesn’t do any damage?”
She nodded. “Some fool in Houston tried to mug me. Knife shattered on my skin.” Her lips curled upward. “Probably thought he was having a bad drug reaction.”
His stare fell on the narrow cut on her arm. “That would seem to counter your statement.”
“Yes. My status has been revoked, it seems.” Her voice cracked. “I’m as mortal as you are now.”
“Tell me about the lance.” He forced himself into professional mode, trying hard not to dwell too much on how his world had changed. “You touched their foreheads with the tips and sent them to Heaven.”
She tilted her head, frowning in disapproval.
“Valhalla,” he corrected himself.
“Our primary weapon. We train with it, fight with it, and take souls to Valhalla with it.”
“You had…” He paused, unsure how to phrase it. “You had blood on yours when you came to me. Did you…”
“No,” she quickly replied. “That was from the injured soldiers. We never kill anyone outright with the lance, just use it as a vehicle to collect your spirits.”
“But Kara…”
“That’s different. As is our situation.” She dropped her gaze. “Because you didn’t die on the battlefield, I needed to recreate the scenario to set your soul free—take you to the edge of death. The same holds true for Kara.” Her cheeks turned a light shade of pink. “I’m sorry about that. Trying to kill you, I mean.”
“You saved me from being impaled. Cancels each other out.” His head was spinning, the
headache hovering behind his eyes. “Right. Here’s the plan for now. We’re going to rest until morning and then figure out our next move.” He pressed his fingers to his temples in a futile effort to stem the pain. “How serious is Kara going to be about hunting us down?”
Brenna frowned. “She’s a Valkyrie. She won’t stop.”
“Wonderful.” He grunted. “How fast can she find us?”
She looked at the ceiling, pressing her lips into a tight line before speaking. “Took me six months to track you from when you left the hospital until now. She’s not starting from there; she’s starting from the warehouse.” The strain in her voice reminded Erik of fingernails on a chalkboard. “I don’t know how long she’s been following me. That’s why she was at the event, ready to step in if…”
“When you didn’t kill me,” he corrected her.
She nodded. “Once she recovers, she’ll begin searching for us.” Brenna shrugged. “That’s all I can tell you.”
“She’s invulnerable but she can still be knocked out?” He shook his head, trying to balance the facts.
“If she’s following the same restrictions placed on me, she’ll need to eat, to sleep—just like in Valhalla. The major difference is she’s got the lance.”
“She got a pretty bad bounce off the ground back at the fight, possible concussion. Might have gotten to her feet but I’ll bet she’ll be woozy for a few hours, maybe until morning until she fully recovers. Does she have a car?”
Brenna shrugged. “I have no idea.”
“Even if she does, she’ll be slow to get going. We’ve got a bit of a start on her.” Erik stood. “That’s all the reality I can take for now.” He gestured at the bed. “Here. I’ll sleep in the chair.”
She eyed him as if he’d cursed her in three different languages. “Spare me the chivalry. You need the bed more than I do. You’re wounded and weary. I’ll take the chair and stand watch while you rest.”
He hesitated, just long enough to earn a tired smile.
“I promise I won’t kill you in your sleep.”
“Good enough.” He laid on his back, wincing as his ribs ached. “Good enough.”
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