Читать книгу Immortal, Insatiable, Indomitable - Olivia Gates - Страница 6

Vidar walked out into the bitter cold of Chicago’s winter a few steps ahead of his would-be executioners.

That label wasn’t much of a stretch. With the collective Odinforce imbuing them, if he let them, they could kill him.

That was, if Loki saw fit to let the injuries they’d cause overcome his regenerative powers.

While he didn’t particularly relish the idea of having these bozos be the ones to end his life, death was death. No such thing as a worthy one. They were as good a way to go as any.

The question now was whether Loki would consider this qualified as his “heart’s desire.”

Knowing the slippery son of a bitch, no. He’d spent millennia in the god’s service, but not out of some idealized belief that his lord could do no wrong. Loki did plenty of wrong. So did he, for that matter. But all in all, from the proof of eons, Loki stood for better things, did more good, than any of the other gods. It was why Vidar mostly admired him. But he sure resented the hell out of him at times. Loki always pointed out that his exasperation stemmed from the same reason he’d been chosen among the first Originals. He’d been Loki’s mortal reflection. Different, nonconforming and rubbing it in the noses of those who disapproved. And reviled and demonized as Loki had always been for it, too, of course.

But he could try. He’d never accumulated injuries that were beyond his regenerative abilities. Maybe if he did this time, Loki would finally let him go.

Time to find out.

He let the first blow land square on his left cheekbone. He heard the crunch of bones, his and his attacker’s, as pain exploded behind his eye sockets.

That was a good punch. Odinforce-boosted strength was something. His bone, harder than steel, had cracked.

He felt another blow coming a full two seconds before his next attacker connected. He had enough time to rip the man’s heart out and cram it down his throat. But he didn’t even try to block it. Something metal and unyielding crashed against his side. He felt ribs shatter and tear through his muscles and skin. He gritted his teeth on the shredding pain.

“Ooh, he’s glaring at us. We supposed to get scared?”

“Is that all you got, you fuck?”

“And we thought a Lokian deserved ten of us, thought shifting was a big deal. All he did was expand. Like a hot-air balloon.”

“Is that how your dick expands, too?”

“Seems Lokian is code for Pussy.”

At his silence, they attacked again. After more direct hits, the thugs got confident, swarmed around him. He had dozens of openings to rip throats and sever limbs and heads. He took none.

He had to give it to them. They were quick and creative. They pulverized body parts overlooked by most. His feet and hands were favorite targets. They wanted to cripple him before they killed him. He let them do whatever their twisted appetites for inflicting damage could belch up.

In seconds he was bathed in blood, his left arm all but hacked off, his chest and abdomen punctured in vital areas, his skull fractured. His consciousness was wavering from the pain. He didn’t feel the healing kicking in.

Had Loki heeded his request? Would he finally die?

He fell to his knees. He didn’t want to get up.

He was ready.

A booted foot kicked his head with enough force to almost take it off his shoulders. Snickers phased in and out of his awareness.

“Is it me or is he enjoying this? You one of those wimps that get off on being abused?”

“But we ain’t gonna abuse you, pussyboy. We gonna kill ya, and drink your Endowment.”

“What Endowment?”

Rowdy laughter burst out.

They weren’t just vicious, they were assholes. One thing an Asgard-Endowed didn’t do, mortal or immortal, was humiliate a fallen enemy. Odin should be ashamed of granting such scumbags even the power he wiped off his ass.

He could smell what they’d paid for the Odinforce. Their very lives. They were rotting. Not in flesh yet, but their souls had long putrefied. To them, his Endowment must have smelled like raw meat to a pack of starving hyenas. They thought they could gorge on it and revive themselves. A misconception that held no matter how many millennia passed without one successful incident of anyone absorbing a Lokian’s, let alone an Original’s, Endowment. Yet power-addicts kept telling themselves they’d succeed where others had failed.

“Hey, hey…look what the cat dragged out.”

“Say, isn’t that piece of ass from back in the club?”

What were the bastards talking about?

He raised his head, could see nothing. One eye was soaked in blood, the other swollen shut.

But he could smell. Her.

The mortal woman. She was here.

His heart, which that had slowed down to almost a standstill for the duration of the attack, detonated. What was she doing here?

He snapped a crushed hand to his eye, wiped away blood.

She stood two dozen feet away, as tall as most of his attackers, her hair a rioting flame around her shoulders in the eddying wind, her outfit flapping around her lush frame. And she hadn’t simply stumbled out at the wrong time. Not judging by her confrontational pose and the pipe in her hand.

Another boot whacked his head. “Yo, pussyboy, she one of your Lokian sluts? You sure pick ’em stupid. She came after you like a bitch after her master.”

“Can’t be for his hot-air dick. He must have her hooked on some Asgardian dope.”

“Too bad for her. She got a good look at all of us.”

And he roared. “Leave.”

Another kick to his head. “She ain’t going anywhere, wuss.”

Another voice chuckled. “Get her, Jack. We’ll finish him off.”

The thug named Jack charged at her. The moment he was in range, she swung. He heard the crack of metal against bone, saw blood arc in the indirect lights. If the thug weren’t jacked up on Odinforce, he would have gone down. She’d hit sure and hard, to cripple, even kill. She understood the danger well.

But if she did, why was she here? For all she knew this was a ten-to-one fight, one he was losing big-time. She was one woman with a pipe. What did she hope to achieve with those odds?

He had no explanation. But he knew one fact.

She was defending him.

Only his fellow Lokians had ever fought beside him, risked injury and pain for him. But that didn’t compare.

No one had ever put their life on the line for him.

The thug she’d nailed lunged at her. She evaded him with the grace of a seasoned boxer, hit him square in the throat.

“You’re paying for that, bitch,” the thug named Jack gurgled. “I was just gonna snap your neck but now I’m gonna rip you some new holes and fuck you in each for days.”

The other thugs seemed to consider this a done deal, turned to Vidar, calling to their accomplice over their shoulders.

“Leave us some. I bet a Lokian bitch would love the ten of us taking turns on her.”

“Why take turns? Bet she’s used to ten at once.”

Their intentions jolted him like lightning bolts.

He wouldn’t have let them endanger any mortal. But her?

Time for heads to roll.

He willed himself back to his feet, forced the words through blood-filled lungs and torn lips. “Here’s the thing, you ass-gardian pieces of shit. Torturing and killing me, I would have let you get away with without a scratch. But insulting the lady? Threatening her with that vileness? By Loki’s Locket, even thinking it? For that, you die.”

“Sure, pussyboy, when you’re two seconds from dead.”

“You couldn’t raise a hand to do shit when you were in one piece. Now we crushed you like a nut, what you gonna do? Glare us to death? Oh, wait, you can’t even do that anymore.”

“Here, let us put you out of your misery.”

Vidar caught one fist on its way to his gut and another targeting his windpipe. He tore the first clear off, ripped off the entire arm attached to the second.

The disbelief in his attackers’ eyes spattered him along with the geyser of blood. Then realization, terror and agony exploded on butchered howls.

“Since I can’t raise my hands, how about I make do with your buddies’?” He threw the appendage and limb at their colleagues.

They all jumped back in horror. The ones he’d torn apart crumpled to the ground. Two down. Eight more to go.

But first, Jack.

He charged through the now-paralyzed thugs, agony skewering through him with every step. The woman had been holding her own until Jack saw what Vidar had done to his pals. He stopped trying to evade her strikes, took two crushing hits so he could get to her.

Then he had her in a chokehold, screamed, “One more step, you son of a bitch, and I gouge her neck out.”

“I wanted to make your death the most protracted and agonizing.” Vidar’s torn lips pulled back in vicious humor. “Oh, well. Long ago, my mother told me I can’t have everything I want.” He met the woman’s eyes. They were huge, gleaming emeralds in the dimness. Somehow they contained no terror. They transmitted mostly fury. Good girl. He gave her a conspiratorial smile. “Duck.”

She didn’t hesitate. She exploded in her captor’s hold, plowing her elbow into his gut with all she had. He gasped, loosened his arm. She dropped down, giving Vidar a clear shot.

He shifted his working arm into a blade as wide as a broadsword and, in one sweep, lopped off Jack’s head.

Without a sound, the woman bolted sideways, escaping the path of spraying blood as the head fell at Vidar’s feet with the inimitable sound only heads made on impacting asphalt.

Keeping her behind him, he faced the remaining seven. The horror in their eyes was turning to desperation.

Sustaining another injury was a luxury he couldn’t afford. He couldn’t go down and leave even one standing to hunt her down. He had to finish them all off, quickly.

He waited until they charged, rage and dread and momentum throwing them off-balance, before shifting his arm into a tentacle as thick as an Asgardian serpent. He lashed it out, reaping them all and lassoing them up in the air. Then he catapulted them to crash down at his feet.

Before any of them could regain his feet, he shifted his arm back to sword-mode. Beheading was one sure way to kill a mortal Endowed. Ripping out hearts and spilling brains worked, too. But those methods were messier and not time-effective. Any other injury could leave the injured able to regroup, reattack.

He finished off the seven, turned to the ones he’d injured first. They’d gotten over their shock and were trying to slink away.

But even armless and handless, they posed as great a danger to her as their now-headless friends had. She could implicate them to the human authorities. They wouldn’t let her be. They had to join their gang in death. In moments, they did.

Standing over the scattered body parts, he forced himself to straighten, looked over to her. She was still there.

Her eyes were stricken.

She hadn’t looked alarmed when she’d seen him rip off limbs with his bare hands. But seeing parts of him shift into weapons and creatures that existed only in mortal nightmares had probably been too much. Not to mention watching him behead ten men, even if they’d been about to rape her to death.

It was a miracle she hadn’t run away screaming long ago.

“God, you’re…” She encompassed him with a frantic gesture.

He looked down. His right arm, still shifting back to its natural shape, looked even more grotesque in midform.

Guess that meant ravishing her was out of the question now.

“I-I’m so sorry.” She was? For what? No longer being interested in jumping his bones? “I should have followed you sooner.” He stared at her. That was what she was sorry about? Being slow to attend this massacre? “They…they tore you apart….”

She stopped again, swallowed, a shudder racking her.

His erection, unheeding of any other part of him that was torn or crushed, made its approval of everything about her rock solid. The siren song that flowed from her lips, the beauty that was now a canvas for such vivid emotions, the generosity of the body that trembled with the effect of each.

Her voice caught, cracked. “It’s just…I hesitated to call the police. I wasn’t sure you’d appreciate their presence.”

He sure wouldn’t. Mortal scum he could dispatch. Mortal law enforcement he avoided at all costs.

But did she mean that… “You called them?”

She nodded.

Shit.

His hand, which was back to its natural form but felt more shattered than before he’d shifted it, hurt like Odin’s sorry ass as he fumbled for his cell phone. He speed dialed Daven.

On the second ring, the line opened. Daven’s mocking voice poured into his ear.

“Legion of Loki Lodge. How can I help you, darlin’?”

“You can grab Alvar and get your smart asses down here, stat.” He grunted the address, specified the alley. “Get the big truck.”