Chapter Three
Summer opened her eyes then blinked as she tried not to panic when she looked up at a ceiling that did not have water stains on it. Turning her head slowly, she looked around but did not recognize where she was. Probing her brain, she also could not remember how she’d gotten here.
Moving her head left to right, she discovered she was lying on a couch in a large, but simply decorated, living room. She had no idea what time it was because heavy blood red curtains across the room were pulled, blocking out whatever view was available outside the windows.
Shoving off the blanket, she sat up, immediately wishing she hadn’t when the room began to spin around her. In the next instant, a pain started at her temples, throbbing at the same tempo as the increased beat of her heart. Should she lie back down until she felt better? Or get up and run?
The only problem was she didn’t know where she could run to.
“Easy, sweets,” a deep voice said from behind the couch.
She squeaked in surprise then spun on the couch to plant her feet on the floor and push up so she was standing.
The quick movement sent the room spinning around her while the pain in her head increased exponentially.
Two racing heartbeats later the headache was joined by a queasy feeling in her stomach.
Her body forced her to collapse back down onto the couch to allow everything to even out and settle a bit.
“Where am I?” she asked, closing her eyes as she lifted both hands to her head. Pressing at her temples and then rubbing in circles eased the thumping minimally, but it did stop it from popping off and rolling across the floor.
“You’re in my home.” The man moved around the couch and sat down on the large, solid wood coffee table just across from her. “You fainted in the street in front of my home, so I brought you upstairs to rest and recuperate.”
Summer studied the man sitting in front of her and a vague memory of him visiting the bar and then stopping three wolves from running her down in a lobby surfaced. She sucked in a breath when it felt like her heart tore itself from her body and flew across the small space between them.
For some reason, he looked even bigger now that he was no longer wearing the black suit he’d worn each night at The Gin Room. Instead, he wore blue jeans and a skintight t-shirt that outlined the ridges and valleys of his well-honed body.
“How long have I been here?” she whispered, before swallowing hard to keep her stomach from turning over.
She wasn’t sure why she felt like she needed to throw up.
She had not eaten since waking up just after noon.
The bar had been so busy she’d worked through dinner and the sandwich she’d brought to eat was probably smooshed in her backpack.
After work, she usually went home and ate leftovers she could scrounge in the refrigerator.
Vincent loved to cook a casserole once or twice a week that they would eat on for days.
But instead of going home to her questionably safe apartment, she’d been chased through the city by large dogs or wolves or something.
Then after finding safe shelter in a strange building in a neighborhood she’d never been in, she’d almost been attacked by another trio of wolves.
When had wild animals overrun New York City?
She must have missed that article in the newspaper.
She didn’t think there would be wolves within a hundred miles.
“Your name is Fenrir North,” she said once everything seemed to settle inside her. She remembered it from the credit card he’d used on his first visit to The Gin Room.
“Yes, it is,” he answered as he stared into her eyes.
Summer found she could not look away. Instead, she felt drawn into his deep, dark chocolate brown eyes.
They seemed to be calling to her, though she could not understand what he was saying.
Taking a slow, deep breath, Summer forced her eyes away, looking over his shoulder at the wall of heavy, velvet curtains.
“Fenrir is a unique name. An old Norse name, isn’t it?”
Fenrir shrugged. “It is from old Norse mythology, yes. It was common for Vikings to name their children after the old gods, hoping that by using those names, the child would be empowered with that god’s gifts.”
“And do you have special gifts like Fenrir the wolf?”
Summer was surprised she was relaxing as he talked in his deep, slightly accented voice.
Something in his tone pulled her further under his spell.
What was it about this man that made her want to curl up in his lap and purr like a cat?
She’d learned in high school that men did not like needy women.
After graduation, she’d learned not to expect anything from the men she dated, not even cuddles when she felt lost and confused or emotionally battered.
A squeak escaped when Fenrir suddenly stood up before lifting her into his arms again. He took her place on the couch then settled her so she sat across his lap and leaned against his body.
“What are you doing?”
“You looked like you need a cuddle,” he said. He wrapped one large hand around the back of her head and pressed her cheek into his shoulder. “It will be my honor from now on to give you everything you need, want, and desire. Now just relax while we discuss our future.”
“Our future?” she asked as she thought she felt him brush a kiss on the top of her head.
“Yes, our future. But I suppose we should start the conversation with a story.”
“I love stories. That’s why I like being a bartender. So many stories.” Summer relaxed as the hand around the back of her head began to gently massage her skull.
Fenrir reached out with one hand and pulled the soft blanket she’d been covered with up over her again before he said, “Over a thousand years ago, a boychild was born to a pair of Viking warriors.
Back then, women were as likely to be of the warrior class as the men.
In this case, the two were not only Vikings, but also some of the last known wolf shapeshifters.
Their son was also a shifter, but did not prove himself as one until he was ten years old.
By that time, both his parents had been killed on the battlefield, and he was being raised by his grandmother.
“A few years later, when he’d grown big enough and strong enough, the jarl, or leader, of their village took the boy away from his grandmother for training to become a warrior just like his parents. Full-blooded wolf shifters were growing rarer with each generation.
“Near the end of the Viking era, the boy, who had grown into a powerfully strong man and had taken over as the jarl of his village, went on a raid with his men. Only this time, the village they attacked had become the home of a coven of vampires.
“The battle was a fierce one and went on for three days. In the end, there were only a handful of survivors on the Viking side. As the jarl lay dying, two female vampires came upon him. They liked his look and decided to turn him so they wouldn’t be alone since both of their mates had been killed.
Though he was a wolf shifter, the man was so weak, he could not shift nor could he fight them off.
They turned him, not realizing that as a full-blooded wolf shifter, he would not become a vampire, but a shifter-vampire hybrid, which proved to be stronger than either single entity.
“Once healed, the man went on a rampage, killing the rest of the vampire coven, and returning to his village.
“The man outlived the people of his village several generations over before he decided to see what lay beyond the mountains that protected the village. Over the next eight hundred years, he traveled the world, seeing the great historic sights, often as they were built. He befriended kings and slaves and every class of humankind between. As he traveled, he met other vampires who became his most trusted advisors. More than two centuries ago, he negotiated peace between the wolf shifters and vampires of this city, bringing them together as a pack, a tribe, a family. He provides both safety and security for them with the understanding that neither species is better than the other, and the understanding that they will not interbreed and create more hybrids.”
Summer relaxed against him. “You’re that boy, aren’t you? The Viking wolf shifter warrior that the vampires turned into a wolf-vampire hybrid.”
Fenrir slid his arms around her, holding her securely in a hug. She wasn’t sure if he meant to comfort her or was keeping her from trying to run away.
Finally he said, “Yes. I am the boy who grew to take over as jarl of his village and then became a vam-wolf and went on to see the world. My knowledge, and superior strength and gifts earned me the title Konungr.”
“And what does that word mean?”
“It means king. As the oldest of both species, they call me King of the vampires as well as Alpha of the wolf shifters. I brought them out of the dark ages, led them into the future. I’ve housed them, fed them, kept them safe, and made sure our businesses make more than enough money for all of us to live well now and for as far into the future as we might want to look. ”
Summer stared to the side of the room at a beautiful tapestry that appeared to be handwoven and several hundred years old. It probably was, given the story he’d just shared with her.
Though fantastic, the story also rang true.
Finally, she asked, “So, if you are a king and a vamwolf or wolfpire or whatever you are, and over eight hundred years old, why have you been coming into The Gin Room every night for the past week? What does your past have to do with my future? Our future as you said?”
“I am one-thousand-forty-four years old and in all that time I have never met the woman who would bring meaning to my existence. Then, last week, I walked into The Gin Room and found her. Found my mate, the woman sent by the gods to be my mate. I found you.”
“Me? I’m your mate? Are you sure? I mean, I’m not anyone special, just a twenty-five-year-old bartender who is still trying to figure out what I want to be when I grow up.”
She took a moment to think over the past week, and then asked, “If you are my mate, and you knew it last week, why didn’t you talk to me about it then? Why did you and your friends have to scare me to death by chasing me through the city as wolves tonight?”