by Dena Christy
Bitterness dripped from the laugh her husband forced out, and she reached for his hand. He moved it away and folded it in his lap.
“Someone is trying very hard to make it look like I’ve gone off the rails, and they may very well succeed,” he said.
“Won’t they give you more time,” she said.
Surely he would be granted that. All he needed was a little push in the right direction to realize that he needed to look far into his past to find the enemy that was out to destroy him. It would be so easy to tell him who it was, but how could she do that without also telling how she knew it was Loki and how he’d escaped Asgard. She hated seeing him like this, but fear of what would happen if he found out what she’d done kept her mouth firmly shut.
“I’ve asked for that, and I’m out of time,” he said as he sighed and reached up to pinch the bridge of his nose.
“Maybe they will find in your favor.”
“If it was me, I wouldn’t,” he said as he shook his head again.
“What will happen,” she asked.
If he told her that he was going to be killed, she would have to tell him that Loki was behind everything and that she was responsible for his being here. All she had wanted was her husband to come home, and if she was honest with herself she still did. She didn’t see his leaving the Order in the same light that he did. She knew it was important to him, but she’d been important to him once too, and he’d left her easily enough.
“Right now this is a preliminary investigation. If they feel there is sufficient evidence against me then I will be suspended and there will be a tribunal. The tribunal will be made of up four heads of the Order, will decide if I’m to be removed permanently.”
“You won’t be killed?” she asked. She didn’t think that was what he had meant, but wanted to be sure. “You’ll just be removed?”
“Just be removed,” he shouted, and she jumped in her chair. “I built this organization from the ground up. It’s not a matter of just being removed. They will rip away from me the most important thing in my life.”
His words slammed into her like a fist in the gut. She stared at him, unable to comprehend for a moment that the words had come out of his mouth.
The Order is the most important thing in his life? There was a time when she was the centre of his world, and the illusion that that was still true was being torn away from her. She’d risked eternal punishment to get him back in her life, and she didn’t even rate the number one spot in his. How many times did she need to hear it before she got the message?
She pushed back in the chair and stood. She needed to get out and get air. He seemed to shake himself out of his thoughts, and his face paled a little.
“I didn’t mean it that way,” he said.
She held up her hand to stop him from talking any more. Anything he said now would only make it worse.
“You don’t need to explain. I know how much the Order means to you, and I know exactly what my place in your life is.” Now it was her turn to let the bitterness creep into her voice.
“Nan,” he said as he ran his hand through his hair. “Don't be like that. I didn’t mean it that way. Don’t twist my words to mean something they don’t.”
She bit her tongue, holding in the need to tell him that there was no need to twist his words, because he’d said exactly what he meant.
The phone on the corner of his desk jangled, and she turned away to face the door.
“You better answer that,” she said.
She heard him pick up the phone and speak into the other end. She had no desire to listen. It was too painful to hear how quickly she was disregarded when there was something happening with the Order. Today was supposed to have been their time to rebuild their marriage, and not only were they here, he’d let her know in the most painful way how her efforts for him were wasted.
“That was John,” he said as he hung up the phone. “He’s given me some information on Eduard’s body.”
She’d forgotten about their reason for being here, and her shoulders sagged as she turned back to him.
“What is it?” she asked, not because she had any burning desire to know, but because if she didn’t keep talking she would soon cry, and she didn’t want to do that in front of him.
“His body has been frozen. There is no way to know for sure how long he’s been dead. This has got to mean something,” he said, more to himself than to her. Already she could see his focus had shifted, and she was no longer under his scrutiny. “What am I not seeing?”
Me, Nan thought as she sat back down in the chair and folded her hands in her lap. You’re not seeing me.
* * *
Cadric looked up when Hadria knocked on the doorframe of his office. She held a file folder and wore a concerned look on her face. He ignored the look and motioned for her to come in. He’d been getting funny looks all day and had hidden out in his office when it had gotten to be too much. This was the second day of the investigation, and he was sure his staff was dying to know what was going on, and truth be told so was he.
Hadria came as sat in the chair in front of him and set the file down on his desk.
“You look terrible,” she said as she sat back in the chair and folded her hands in her lap.
“Thanks Hadria, but I didn’t call you in here to critique my appearance,” he said, his voice edged with sarcasm. He didn’t need her to tell him how bad he looked. He was aware of it. He’d had been little sleep, and he’d spent a lot of his time pacing. At first Nan had tried to get him to come to bed, but after it became evident that he wouldn’t she’d given up. There had been a hurt inside her since the day they’d found Eduard’s body, but he didn’t know how to reach out to her without using her to bury his other problems. So he paced and hardly slept. He was certain his hair was sticking up all over the place since he’d spent a lot of his time dragging his hands through it in his frustration over what was happening.
“Does how you look have anything to do with the three gods who are here asking questions?”
“They are here to see if I’m fit to continue with the Order, and that’s all I’m going to say about it,” Cadric said as he reached for the file sitting in front of her. She moved it out of his way, and he scowled over at her. “Hadria what do you think you’re doing?”
“Tell me what’s going on,” she said. “Three gods show up, you send out a memo telling all of us to answer questions they put to us, and then you either pace the halls like a caged animal, or hide out in your office. Now you tell me that they are here to see if you’re fit to continue?”
“Why do think is going on? It’s because of what happened to Dany Cavanaugh and the incident at the warehouse. I really don’t want to get into it. Let’s talk about Eduard Rouben.”
She looked at him with concern, and didn’t appear to be in a hurry to open the file or at least let him have it. He knew her well enough to know that she’d want to talk this thing to death. What she wouldn’t understand was that he didn’t want to talk about it. Talking about what he feared would happen made him itchy. Like if he said it out loud it would make it come true.
“Cadric…” she said as she reached out to put her hand on his arm. He withdrew from her touch.
“Hadria, come on. I want to work. I need to work, so let’s talk about Eduard Rouben. What do we know?” he said. He had to have a focus on something he could do, and they could put their heads together and try to figure out the puzzle of Eduard Rouben. “Let’s go through his file and what he know about him and see if there were any signs that could have predicted him going off the rails.”
Her mouth compressed into a thin line, and he looked at her. She would not get her way, not in this. She must have seen his determination to focus on work because she sighed and opened the file she had in front of her.
“Eduard Rouben was a thirty-five-year old coy-wolf, he’d been with the Order for ten years. Before he joined us, he was rather lost,” she said as her eyes skimmed over the
paperwork in front of her.
“What do you mean by lost?” Cadric said, hoping that there was something they’d missed, that would give them an idea of how Eduard had hooked up with the people who appeared to be out to destroy him.
“He was born to an ancient pack, a very isolated and close-knit one,” Hadria said and she gave him a pointed looked. What she meant by close knit was that Eduard’s pack didn’t breed outside the pack. There were a few of those types of wolf packs left, and they usually lived in the north and kept to themselves. Most wolf packs now were more progressive, and were also healthier, since their genetic material would be more diverse.
“So if he was from an isolated pack, how is it he was a hybrid?”
“His mother went outside the pack, and from what it says here, was rebellious. She fell in with a group of werecoyotes and got into some trouble with the law. to avoid jail, she ran back up north and hid with her pack. She also came back pregnant with Eduard.”
“I’m sure that went over real well,” Cadric said.
“Yeah, not so much. His mother was banished from the pack, and she was forced to raise Eduard alone. She died when he was in his teens, and he tried to go back to her pack, but they wouldn’t accept him. He also tried to find his father, but the coys wouldn’t accept him either.”
“So he was a loner and an outsider. How did he fit in here?” Cadric asked. He tried to remember what Eduard had been like when he’d been selected to serve with the Order. He’d struck Cadric at the time as a very intense and disciplined individual.
“He took to the Order as naturally as breathing. His record is impeccable, and until this latest incident I would say his loyalty was unquestioned.”
“So the Order was the first place he found acceptance, and he betrayed it. What would have compelled him to do something like that?”
Hadria bit her bottom lip and closed the file in front of her.
“I wonder if he betrayed us,” she said. “The Order was the first place he’d ever found a sense of belonging. Why would he throw that away?”
“I don’t know. Maybe something or someone came along who over rode his loyalty to us. Surely you can’t be questioning that he was guilty of anything.”
“I know that facts say he killed Dany, but it makes little sense.”
“The facts are indisputable. He was the only one seen getting in the van with Dany. We know he got in at the cabin, and everyone there attested to that. The van drove straight to headquarters and didn’t make any stops. There was a short delay in getting the van open to escort Dany to his cell, and it would have given Eduard time to escape.”
“Ok, so say Eduard had switched loyalties and was working with whoever is behind this. Why did he turn up dead at your property?”
Cadric had given that some thought since discovering his missing agent's body near his home, and he thought he had the answer.
“He outlived his usefulness. He was being hunted by us, and we would have found him sooner or later. I think he was killed and frozen because whoever he betrayed us for wanted to plant him on my property when it would do the most damage.”
A frown knotted Hadria’s forehead, and she shook her head. Before she could say any more, a shadow crossed the open door way and Cadric looked up to see Nemesis standing there.
His heart picked up speed in his chest, and coldness invaded his gut.
“I’d like to speak to your privately,” Nemesis said, her voice quiet as she looked at him with sadness in her eyes. He already knew what she would say, and he didn’t care if Hadria heard it.
Hadria stood to go.
“Sit down,” Cadric said with a thread of steel in his voice. Hadria had been with him through most of his career and it fit that she should be the one to witness its end. He looked at Nemesis once Hadria had resumed her seat. “Anything you need to say to me can be said in front of her.”
Nemesis nodded and walked into his office. She straightened her shoulders, and manifested a small scroll and unfurled it.
“Cadric Odinson,” she read. “Previously known as Baldr, Norse god from Asgard, I hereby suspend you from the Order of Odin. You are to vacate the premises immediately and are to be escorted from the building. You will not be permitted to return to your place at the Order of Odin until a full tribunal has been conducted. Do you have questions?”
Nemesis rolled up the scroll and placed it in front of him on his desk. He didn’t have any questions since he’d written the charter that was now being used against him. There was a roaring in his ears as his blood pounded through his veins. He longed to tear up the paper she’d just read allowed from, but held himself back. It was going to be humiliating enough to escorted from here like some criminal, he would not compound the problem by losing control of himself.
“No,” he said as he stood up tall. He stared straight ahead, blocking out everything except putting one foot in front of the other. Hadria murmured his name, and he tuned it out. The only way he could do this, to walk away from everything he’d built was to push everything away, and shove his feelings deep down inside where they wouldn’t spill over. His entire body felt cold as he walked out of his office for what he hoped wasn’t the last time.
Chapter 15
Nan looked toward the door when she heard a car coming to a sudden stop on the gravel driveway. She knew without looking that it was Baldr. She’d hardly seen him since the gods had come to investigate him, and when he was here he spent most of his time pacing the floors. He was home a lot earlier than she’d expected.
He came slamming into the house, his face twisted with pain and anger. She stood and looked at him.
“Baldr,” she said quietly. “What happened?”
“Only what I knew would,” he said as he threw himself down on the sofa and speared his fingers through his hair. “I’ve been suspended and there will be a tribunal.”
“Oh Baldr,” she said as she walked over to him. Guilt speared through her. “Is there anything I can do?”
He remained silent, and she reached out to caress the back of his head, he grasped her hand in an iron grip and tugged her down onto his lap. He buried his face against the side of her neck. She shivered when he ran his lips against her skin.
“Do you want to talk about it?” she asked as she eased away from him. She wanted him to share more with her than just his body, and what had happened to him today was huge.
He pulled back and looked into her eyes and shook his head.
“I don’t want to talk about it, I don’t want to think about it. You asked what you could do,” he said as he stood, holding her in his arms as he strode toward his bedroom. “This is what you can do. I need you Nan. My life is falling apart and I need you.”
A lump formed in Nan’s throat. Finally he was turning to her for comfort, and she could not deny him. A small voice nagged in the back of her skull that he only wanted to assuage his physical needs with her, but she pushed it away. He was her husband, and he was hurting. How could she hold back from him when he needed the comfort that she could offer?
He reached his bedroom and let go of her legs, and she kept her arms wrapped around his neck as her feet hit the floor. She drew his head down, and his kiss, when it came, held a note of desperation that she hadn’t felt from him before. Her hands moved in soothing circles on his back as his mouth devoured hers.
Her touch seemed to calm him, and his lips softened as he eased his tongue into her mouth. Her hand moved from his back up to his hair. She’d always loved the feel of his hair, the soft strands were like silk under her fingertips. His body was flush against her, and she could feel how much he wanted her. She pulled back from him.
“What are you doing?” he growled as she stepped away.
She reached up and put a finger up to his lips to silence him. Her touch stopped him from reaching for her, and he looked at her in confusion.
She looked deeply into his eyes as she removed her clothes, baring her body to his fevered gaze. He reached
up to rip his tie from around his neck, and she grasped his hands to stop him. She knew that this was going to be about him drawing comfort from her, but it didn’t need to be a quick mindless coupling so he could drive his troubles from his mind. She needed it to be about more than just him burying his problems inside her. In order for it to be that way, she needed to slow things down and dictate the pace. She needed to wrestle his iron control from him so she would be the only thing he could focus on.
“Let me take care of you, Baldr,” she said quietly as she undid the buttons on his shirt until it hung open. She parted the cotton fabric to reveal the iron hard muscles of her husband’s chest. Her hands slid across his skin, pushing his shirt from his shoulders and down onto the floor. She leaned forward and pressed her lips against the smooth warm skin of his pectoral muscles as her hands skimmed down his abdomen. The muscles of his stomach tightened under her touch as she grasped the waistband of his trousers and undid the button.
His hands grasped her shoulders, his grip tightening for a second when she eased the zipper down. His erection sprang free when she pushed his trouser and boxers down his legs. He stepped out of the fabric pooled at his feet and kicked his clothes aside. She looked up at him as she grasped his cock in her hands, encircling him. His eyes were so dark they looked like a midnight sky and she knew what he wanted and what she needed to do for him. She sank to her knees in front of him and took his smooth shaft inside her mouth.
He growled, and she glanced up to see him tilt his head back. He caressed the sides of her face with a gentle touch as she loved him with her mouth. She’d always loved doing this for him, it gave her a feeling of power to make him tremble with desire as he was doing now. She slid his shaft out of her mouth and looked up at him as she stroked him with her hand. He looked down at her, and she could see she had his complete focus, which was exactly what she wanted. Nothing, not his problems, not the Order or her guilt could intrude on this moment between them.