34. Loki
Thirty-Four
Loki
I wanted to believe that Lugh was getting predictable. However, assuming anything where he was concerned, letting my guard down, was more dangerous than taking on the entire TOM Board in to-the-death combat.
Finn, on the other hand…
He was playing double—triple—agent, and it was obvious. Knowing that he only had one goal made it easy to find my way into Lugh’s game, which was how I found myself in an apartment that looked oddly familiar.
The walls were a textured eggshell color, and the furniture was mismatched. The chair near the far wall had a stain on it, and the coffee table had a magazine under one leg, making it level.
The one spot of color, the literal bright spot in the room, was the woman lying on the couch. That was why this place looked familiar—I’d seen surveillance photos among those of a recent TOM target. The woman we sent Nobles after seven months ago. Our best team.
Until one of them went AWOL and the other turned up in a morgue in Salt Lake City.
Not that I blamed the sniper for leaving, and her partner had been an ass, even by my low bar.
They didn’t matter. The woman who lived in this apartment did, and she was sleeping on the couch in front of me. Given everything I’d seen, everything I knew about Azzie, she’d never in her life owned a sundress like the pale yellow one she wore now.
Her red hair draped around her face, and her chest rose and fell with each soft, sleeping breath.
Like this she looked sweet. Vulnerable. Helpless.
When I was done with her, she’d also be broken. That wasn’t happening today, though. Shattering her would take time. A long time. Long enough it would piss off Lugh again and again.
“It’s not personal, Ava.” I brushed a strand of hair from her forehead, and her eyelids fluttered—dark lashes on pale skin—but she didn’t otherwise stir. “If you lived long enough you’d discover the prophecies never are.” It wasn’t easy being a vessel for expectation and fate, but she wouldn’t have to put up with it much longer.
In a blink, she was sitting, and the tip of a sword was pressed to my throat. “Who are you?”
She’d moved so quickly that if I hadn’t been paying attention, I would’ve thought she teleported. Where did she get the blade?
“You don’t recognize me? I’m hurt.” Sarcasm dripped from my retort. Even if we had been introduced before, I was wearing a face I only wore in private these days—my own.
She raised her brows and used a combination of nods and her blade to indicate I should take a step back. As I obliged, she stood and paced in a quarter circle, always watching me.
No trust at all, this one. I hoped Davyn was learning something from her. The big bear had always given his loyalty too easily.
“Answer my question.” Her voice was hard.
“Loki.” I extended my hand.
She nicked the skin on my neck with the flick of a wrist. I felt the sharp sting of the cut, so quick and precise it was almost surgical. I also felt the wound heal almost as fast as she moved.
I dropped my arm and kept the distance between us. Did she know I could teleport? Did she know how to fight someone like that? Finn said he’d refused any requests she made to train with him, but like all of us, Finn was in this for himself. Who the fuck knew if he was telling the truth?
Regardless, “I simply wanted to meet you. See what all the hype was about.”
“Uh-huh.” She planted her feet shoulder width apart, and the tension in her muscles slid toward something more aggressive.
Davyn’s influence was in her fighting stance, but so were others.
“Don’t do that.” I kept my tone kind as I made the request.
“Do what?”
“I’m not a fighter unless I have to be, and I guarantee neither of us wants me to be that today.”
Her chuckle was strained. “Why would I fight you?”
She was feisty, she was sexy, and she was sarcastic. I tilted my head lower, drinking in her form in the flimsy dress, as the lamp behind her hinted at the silhouette underneath. Fascinating.
Azzie snapped her fingers near her face. “Up here, asshole. I’m kind of surprised you left my panties on when you changed my clothes.”
And she was talking instead of fighting. Using the back and forth to assess the situation. She’d rather not fight either.
“I didn’t change your clothes.” Though I was thinking now about how she’d look if I stripped that dress off. How she’d sound, begging me to do so. “This is the siren’s trial.”
“And the best she could give me to confront my fears was you? Are you a manifestation of my subconscious?”
“I’m very real. This isn’t your mind, it’s her cave .” Not a physical cave—not like they used to use. This was a villa a few blocks from Tania’s bakery. “Did you learn the rude behavior from Davyn, or were you like this before?”
Her surprise looked exaggerated. “Who?”
I bet she thought she was a good liar.
“Big bear of a grumpy guy. Probably has so much honor and baggage that he hasn’t touched you yet.” I made a show of studying her again. “He’s missing out.”
“You can’t kill me before I bring you to your knees.” Her voice was hard again, but was that a flicker of doubt in her eyes?
I blinked out of sight and appeared behind her, close enough my chest rested against her sword arm, and the scent of talcum powder teased me. Her entire body went rigid as I dipped my head closer, and ran my nose up her neck, breathing her in but never making contact.
“Go on, then,” I said in a low, even voice. “Bring me to my knees.”
I didn’t need enhanced senses to know her pulse was racing, or empathy to feel her ambivalence.
I tried to be subtle about inhaling another breath. Dragging in more of her scent. “Do you know what the difference is between the hero and the villain?” I asked.
“I’m right and you’re wrong?” Her voice was steady and cool, despite her ramrod straight spine.
That was cute. She thought she was the hero. “The hero will sacrifice everything they have, including the ones they love, to save the world. The villain gets called that because he’ll burn down the world to save the ones he loves.”
I wasn’t either one of those. The world could go fuck itself and I only loved me.
“There’s a chasm of other options between those.” Did Azzie’s voice waver?
I smirked at the back of her head. “For most people. Not for the King of Snakes and the Shield of Flame.”
Azzie dropped without warning, already bending her arm as she flung it toward me.
I blinked out of sight before she could elbow me in the balls, and appeared immediately in front of her. It seemed referencing the two of us in the prophecy was her breaking point. Noted .
She was already on her feet again, bringing up her empty arm to block an attack that wasn’t coming.
Instead, I grabbed her sword arm, and dug my fingers into the tendon at her wrist.
She didn’t loosen her grip, but she did grimace.
I grabbed her other arm as well, and held tight. This was getting tedious. “I told you I’m not here to fight, I’m here to talk.”
“Bullshit.” She scoffed, and tried to twist free of my grip.
She may have years of training, but she was still mortal. Her pulse pounded against my fingertips, and her defiance drilled into me, drawing desire to the surface.
I couldn’t wait to taste more of what she was offering. “You’re going to be so much fun.”
The front door slammed against the far wall, and the sounds of cracking wood and plaster filled the air. “Let go of her.”
That was Davyn.
No. It was Davyn’s voice. A heavy footfall like his, running toward us.
I vanished and reappeared near the door he’d left behind, to see Davyn join Azzie. “Are you all right?” He paused in his pursuit to check on her.
That wasn’t Davyn. He would never take his eyes off a fight. Fascinating that whatever Azzie had to confront here involved a softer version of him.
“I’m fine.” She was already facing me again. “Look who I found.”
Davyn charged me again without warning.
Seemed the conversation was over. I vanished before test-Davyn reached me, and blinked into sight next to Azzie again. “Make it to the front door and the siren’s magic vanishes.”
She whirled with her sword at the ready this time.
I did one more teleport to behind her. “Next time, we’ll talk.” I vanished before test-Davyn could land a punch.
Even as I reappeared in my office on the TOM campus, I was wearing my current skin again, rather than my original. Being him for too long was dangerous. It let thoughts in that only belonged to a me who I kept in a box. A young man who felt sorry for the woman I’d just met. A young god who would make it personal, because he understood what it was like to be an avatar for everyone else’s expectations.
Fortunately, that version of me was gone. Destroyed by broken trust.
Prophecy. Lugh. Finn and Davyn… Baldur… they all held bigger pieces of the man Azzie saw in their memories than I did.
I shook all the thoughts aside at the sound of a knock on my door. “Come,” I called.
One of the privates opened the door and stepped in enough to salute. TOM—The Order of Mistletoe. Supposedly a banner to how I killed Baldur. A name I suggested as a joke, but the other gods on the board, those who I worked with to stop the prophecies, thought it was clever.
I worked with idiots.
“At ease.” I hated the protocol in this fucking place.
“Sir, Sergeant Brit has returned.”
Really? She’d been missing for seven months. Since she went after Kirby—not that she knew that at the time. I’d assumed Brit dead after the incident with Hel. This ought to be interesting. Not as much fun as getting to know Azzie, but still intriguing.