Dark Deceit (23 page)

‘Sweet dreams, Brynhildr.’

A
drian had been
cooped up far too long with nothing to do but fight the urges to kill his best
friend. They were getting worse—bad enough he had to physically remove himself
from the house just so he could get some peace.

In the middle of a practice session with Taer, his phone had started
ringing. Motioning for Tay to stop, he dropped his training mitts and scooped
his phone up from the edge of the weapons rack.

‘Adrian? Mason,’ the gravel voice on the other end said.

‘Mason, what’s up?’

‘Club’s opening tonight. I need you in for your usual shift.’

He scrubbed a hand down his face. Thank fuck for that.

‘Tell me about it,’ Mason replied. Adrian frowned. He must have said
that last part out loud.

‘Why was it closed?’

‘I couldn’t tell you. Bryn’s not even going to be in tonight. Mist
just told me to open it up and get everyone in. That includes your buddy. We
could use him up on
Level Three
again.’

‘You got it.’

He ended the call after the requisite goodbyes and ended the
training session. Taer looked exhausted anyway. He had been pushing her to the
point of breaking nearly every day since Darrion had forced the contract on
him.

‘Get some sleep. I have to work tonight,’ he told her, bumping her
shoulder playfully as he walked through the kitchen, heading for the stairs. At
the door at the end of the hall, he knocked.

‘Yeah?’ Korvain’s voice rumbled through the wood.

Adrian stuck his head in the room, his brain already sparking out
from being this close to him without a weapon in his hand. He squeezed his eyes
shut and waited for the feeling to pass.

‘You good, my brother?’ Korvain asked, his dark eyes seeming to suck
in the shadows in his dimly lit room. Adrian noticed he had palmed his karambit
already. Gods, he was like a goddamn time bomb ticking away.

‘Yeah, I’m good. Fighting the good fight.’ He shrugged and Korvain
released his hold.

‘What can I do for you then?’

He held up his phone and waved it back and forth. ‘Just got a call
to go to work.
The Eye
has reopened and Mason wants you there.’ He
managed a grin. He liked that Korvain had gotten work at the club, too.

But when he looked over at the other Mare, he didn’t look pumped at
all.

‘Got something more pressing to attend to?’ Ad asked.

‘Think that’s a good idea?’ Korvain asked with a raised brow. ‘You
have orders to kill her, and me.’

He grinned. ‘That’s not going to be an issue. Bryn’s not going to be
there tonight, and I’ll ask to swap with someone else so we won’t be on the
same floor.’

Korvain sat forward on the bed, his eyes looking slightly wild. ‘Bryn’s
not there? Well, where is she?’

Ad shrugged casually. ‘I don’t know. Mason said she just isn’t
there. So are you coming or what?’

Korvain stared at the sheets for a moment before nodding. ‘Yeah, I’m
coming.’

* * *

K
orvain had tried
to keep the fear from his eyes, but the news that Bryn was gone felt like a
noose around his neck. If she was gone, it meant the phone call had come and
she was now Loki’s captive.

Adrian still stood in the doorway to his room, the look of pain as
he fought the compulsion plain to see. By threatening Adrian into taking the
hit on him, Darrion was getting exactly what he wanted. He wanted them both to
suffer, and they both were.

Korvain fixed his dark eyes on his friend. He knew they would have
been swimming in shadows, his hand on his weapon in case Adrian’s control
snapped and he had to kill him there and then.

‘Get out of here, my brother. There’s no need to torture yourself.
I’ll meet you there.’

Adrian nodded woodenly and disappeared from the doorway. When the
door snicked closed behind his best friend, Korvain let the all-out panic surface.
Leaping from his bed, he dressed in black slacks and a black tee. Shrugging
into the black leather holster that sat over his shoulders, he armed up—his karambit
sitting over his heart. He pulled the shadows to it, covering it, making it
blend into all the black he wore. Lastly he pulled on his steel-toed boots,
lacing them up tight.

He would go to the club and see what he could find out, but he
wanted to see if he could get into her dreams first. Stretching himself out on
his bed, he let his mind relax as he probed for Bryn.

He found the door into her mind, but no matter how hard he pushed,
that door just did not open. It seemed to be stuck. With one last great shove,
it inched open. He took a quick glance before the door slammed shut. Everything
in her mind looked foggy, disoriented.

He tried to push in again, but it wouldn’t budge. With a growl, he
pulled out of her head and returned to his bedroom. That little episode had
done absolutely nothing for his already jacked-up nerves. If she was
unresponsive, she could be drugged.

Sliding off his bed, he beat feet downstairs and slid out the back
door to fade to the club’s back entrance. He wondered who was manning the
office as he pushed the buzzer and looked up into the camera above the door.

To his surprise, it was Kara.

She looked at him like he was a lollipop she wanted to suck on long
and hard. She leaned onto one leg, shifting her hips in an almost unnatural
way. She was wearing a red bustier and micro mini that barely covered her
southern assets. The heels she was sporting pushed her closer to six foot six
rather than her usual six-two.

‘Hi,’ she purred, her eyes looking him over from top to toe. Korvain
didn’t appreciate the eye-fuck from her, but kept the warning growl to himself.
Hadn’t she taken the fucking hint? He started to push past her, but she maneuvered that killer body of hers directly into his path again so that as he
passed, he had no choice but to brush past her.

She moaned at the connection, reaching out to touch his face. He
grabbed her wrist and squeezed.

‘Didn’t learn your lesson last time?’ he asked.

‘Oh, yeah. Of course I did. I think I need to be punished for breaking
your rules though.’

He cursed under his breath and moved away.

‘I don’t know why you’re still bothering with her,’ Kara called out
angrily.

Korvain was raging so badly on the inside that when he turned around
to face the Valkyrie, he almost reached for his weapon. Instead, he flexed his
hands into fists at his side.

‘Who?’

Kara rolled her eyes—the perfect imitation of a teenage girl, and
the perfect example of Kara’s mental capacity. ‘Bryn. Who else?’

‘I don’t know what you mean.’

She made a strange noise at the back of her throat that, at a guess,
meant something to the effect of
bullshit
. ‘I’ve seen the way you fawn
all over her.’ She walked up the hallway, her long legs eating up the distance.
She was near his eye level with the four-inch heels on, so when she came to
stand in front of him, he could see how drug-fucked she really was.

He growled when her hand cupped what was oh so soft in the front of
his pants. It remained that way, too, much to her displeasure. She looked up
into his dark eyes no doubt seeing how pissed off he was.

‘You mind removing your hand?’ he asked coolly.

‘Don’t like what you see?’ she asked with a practiced pout.

His top lip peeled off his sharpened incisors. ‘No.’

Kara released her prize, tossing her hair over one shoulder like it
was no big deal. The truth was she was going to fall onto the next dick that
came along to stroke her ego, to tell herself she was desirable.

Low self-esteem could be a bitch.

‘She’ll never give it up for you,’ she snapped, hostility cooling Kara’s
voice to within a tenth of what his voice had sounded like.

He arched a brow at her, crossing his still fisted hands across his
chest.

‘Bryn. She’ll never give it up. If you’re after a Valkyrie, I’m the
girl for you. I like it rough and bloody.’ Her blue eyes fixed on his mouth
before she shook herself like a bird settling its feathers.

‘Sorry. Not interested.’

There was that pout again. Placing her hand on his forearm, she
gasped and touched him some more. His eyes dropped to the offending hand then
back to her face. She removed her hand and sniffed.

‘Whatever. I have money to make.’

She turned on her large heels and sashayed down the rest of the
hallway and out into the main body of the bar.

Korvain let out a breath and rubbed his head a couple of times. When
he was sure the coast was clear, he followed Kara’s path and pushed into
The
Eye
. The music assaulted his eardrums as if it was a physical force working
against his body. The place was packed, heaving with people chatting, drinking
and grinding against one another.

Korvain’s eyes scanned the bar, finding Mason’s hazels staring back
at him. He approached the other male, offering him his palm.

Mason took it before resuming his position; hands clasped in front
of his hips, a stern look on his face. ‘It’s good to see you again, Korvain.’

‘You, too.’

‘I need you up on
Level Three
tonight. You good with that?’

He nodded. ‘Wherever you need me.’ Mason looked at his face like he
was trying to see something that wasn’t really there. ‘You’re staring,’ Korvain
added.

Mason guiltily dropped his eyes, rubbing the back of his head like
he was trying to explain why he was caught jerking off in his bedroom. ‘Yeah,
sorry my man. It’s just,’ he paused, looked around. When he looked back at
Korvain, he said in a lowered voice, ‘Can we talk in the office?’

Korvain nodded, his interest piqued. Mason led the way, Korvain
following at his back. When the office door was shut, Mason turned around and
looked like he wanted to be sick.

‘You feeling alright?’ Korvain asked.

Mason’s hand went through his hair again. ‘Yeah, it’s just...’ He
looked Korvain square in the eyes. ‘Look, I know about Bryn and the other
girls. I know what they are.’

‘And what are they?’ Korvain just kept his words neutral even though
a snarl was vibrating in his throat.

The human male pinned Korvain with a hard don’t-fuck-around-with-me
look. ‘Valkyries. They’re Valkyries from like the Viking times.’

Korvain kept his expression disinterested. If he shifted the mask
into anything else, he would confirm the human’s suspicions.

‘They’re not suspicions,’ Mason snapped.

Korvain’s eyes narrowed.
Did he just read my thoughts?
Tightening
his mental shields, he didn’t hold back on the snarl this time.

Mason blanched; the color draining from his face too quickly. ‘And...and
I know what you are, and what Adrian is.’

‘And what’s that?’ Korvain could feel the temperature drop in the
room. Mason shivered.

‘You’re both Walkers,’ he said.

Korvain made a sound at the back of his throat. ‘There’s no such
thing as Walkers anymore. Whoever told you they exist was yanking your fucking
chain.’

‘The only one yanking my chain is you,’ Mason looked him square in
the eye as the last word slipped off his tongue. ‘
Morier.
’

Mason only had time to blink before Korvain had him pinned to the
back of the door, the toes of his steel-capped boots scraping the floor.
Korvain slipped his civilized face away, baring his teeth, letting the human
see his incisors and letting him know he knew what to do with them. He
recognized he was letting his baser instinct have free reign. He recognized he
was letting his beast out, but his woman was being held captive and there was
not a damn thing he could do about it.

‘How do you know about us?’ Fuck. His emotions were all over the
place. Mason was gasping for air, gulping it down from around Korvain’s slowly
closing fingers. The human raised his hand slowly and tapped his temple three
times.

Korvain spat a nasty curse and let the male go. Mason slumped to the
ground, folding in on himself, sucking in the O
²
.

‘I don’t know how to explain it. I can’t do it with everyone—only
certain people. I can read their thoughts. I only realized after listening in
for a while that the people I could hear were gods—like the gods from our
mythology. Bryn and the rest of the girls, I can hear their thoughts. I have to
block them out most of the time.’

‘Can you hear mine?’ he growled.

He shook his head. ‘No. Your shields are too strong, but Adrian’s
are weaker. Sometimes his thoughts slip through.’

All those hours of practice had paid off then. Darrion had made him
strengthen and restrengthen his mental shields for hours on end—until sweat had
soaked his shirt and he’d been dehydrated. He’d designed it so his shields looked
like an endless ocean at night—black and still.

‘You and Adrian have the same...I don’t know how to explain it...the
same
feel
, I guess,’ Mason explained.

Korvain had backed up a few steps to listen to the human’s words and
now that he had stopped, he turned back to Mason. ‘Why did you tell me this?’

‘Because I’m worried about Bryn. She never misses a shift. If she’s
not in her office, she’s somewhere in the club, or upstairs. But I haven’t seen
her, and the other Valkyries don’t know where she is either. They figured she
was out talking to a supplier or something. I’m worried something has happened
to her. I kept getting snippets of thoughts from the other gods about someone
killing
Valkyries. I need to know whether this is true or not.’

Korvain had to put him down. He knew too fucking much.

‘If you’re thinking of killing me, please don’t. I won’t say
anything to anyone.’

Korvain growled. ‘How can I know for sure?’

And then Mason laughed. ‘Do you really think I can tell people I
hear the thoughts of gods and people will
not
think I’m crazy?’ He shook
his head. ‘I learned from an early age to keep my trap shut about this shit.’