Dana Bell: Very Much Alive

“sweetheart".

Oh, yeah. So doomed. He looked down into her sweetly stubborn face and sighed. But what a way to go.

Jordan sat in the passenger seat of Kir's cherry red Mustang and tried to process everything the two men had told her, and shown her, in her office. They'd insisted she wasn't capable of driving, and, from how lightheaded she still felt, she had to agree with them.

Okay. So, Dad is Frey. Mom is mortal. Grey, Frey ... nobody said Dad was the brightest bulb in the chandelier.

If Dad is Frey, and mom is human, what the hell does that make me? And does Mom know?

What about Jamie and Jeff? Or Magnus and Morgan? Are they full gods? Two sets of twins, one half mortal, the other ... what?

God, my head hurts. She almost chuckled out loud at the irony of that phrase.

She rubbed her aching head and saw Kir glance at her. She ignored it, still trying to puzzle out who knew what, or, hell, who was what.

Logan, on the other hand, was more difficult to ignore. He reached forward and rubbed the back of her neck, the touch warm and surprisingly soothing. “Ease up, Jordan. I know it's a lot to take in, but we're willing to answer any questions you have."

"And we're ordering in pizza.” Kir's cheerful announcement fell flat as Logan and Jordan stared at him.

“What? I'm just saying."

Jordan stared at Logan's reflection in the rearview mirror and quirked her eyebrows. Kir had been determinedly cheerful the entire twenty minute drive from her office to their condo. “He has a great future at Hallmark, doesn't he?"

Logan choked, hiding his laugh behind the back of his hand. Kir, on the other hand, reached out and gently bopped her on the back of the head. “Very funny. Ha ha.” He pointed towards the backseat.

“And you, stop encouraging her."

"Yes, Your Highness.” Logan did another one of his bows. His laughing gaze tangled with Kir's in the mirror before they both looked away with identical grins.

Jordan watched the exchange with a puzzled frown. She could have sworn both men had been looking at her in her office with something other than professional interest. However, having a brother who was gay, she'd learned to recognize the signs of two men who were a couple. And from the looks of things, Kir and Logan were definitely a couple.

She saw Logan staring at her again in the rearview mirror, confusing her even further. He was looking at her like she was a Godiva chocolate and he was starving for a taste. What the hell?

Then she thought about all of the myths about Loki, and Loki's sexuality. If the myths were true, Loki was firmly bisexual. Trisexual? Omnisexual? The man is a mom , for God's sake! Do they even have a word for Loki's sexuality? From the quirky grin that briefly passed over his face he knew exactly what she was thinking about, too. She faced forward again, her cheeks heating in embarrassment. Pictures of the two men wrapped in each other's arms danced through her head. She firmly squashed them, not wanting to deal with the consequences of her fantasies. She didn't exactly carry around spare panties, for God's sake.

Jordan didn't do “casual sex". As far as she was concerned, there was nothing casual about it. Unless her emotions were engaged, her body wasn't. Although, from the feel of Logan's fingers still stroking her neck, her body was more than willing to drag her emotions along for the ride. Oh, and what a ride it would be , her traitorous body whispered.

Kir pulled into their condo's parking garage and pulled into the space assigned to them. He started to get out of the car and was stopped by Logan's grip on his shoulder.

"No, Kir.” Logan got out of the car with a grunt and took a look around the garage.

Kir rolled his eyes. “Sit, Kir. Stay, Kir. Good dog. Woof."

"What's he doing?” Jordan watched as Logan scoped out the place, his movements sleek and sure. She bet he didn't make a single sound as he moved. He looked right and left, leaning behind a pillar to check out the lower level. His jeans tightened across his damn fine ass. Her body knelt and pled at the feet of her emotions, Please? Pretty please? With a cherry on top?

"Making sure there are no assassins waiting for us."

Jordan blinked and focused back on Kir. My God, that much gorgeous should come with a warning label. “Assassins?"

Kir nodded as he watched Logan move around the parking lot. “Grimm wants me dead in the worst way. He has an assassin named Val—"

"Oh no. Uncle Val?” Talk about a libido killer. Uncle Val looked scary as hell, but he'd always been affectionate towards her and the twins.

Kir glanced at her but quickly turned his attention back to a rapidly approaching Logan. “ Uncle Val?"

"Brown hair, blue eyes, mean-looking son of a bitch?"

"That would be Val."

"Yup. Uncle Val."

"Uncle Val is Vali, the man who murdered my brother."

Jordan stared out the front windshield and searched her memory of Norse mythology, trying to match up the man who'd tossed her in the air as a child with the man Kir was describing. “Um. Vali?"

Kir sighed as Logan motioned for them to leave the car. “Wait until we get upstairs, okay?"

"Okay, what?” Logan asked as he held open Jordan's door.

"Okay, you guys are going to explain to me who Vali is once we get upstairs."

"Oh.” Logan shook his head as he led them to the elevator. “Listen closely, because I hate talking like this and I'm not repeating it.” He took a deep breath as they entered the elevator, and Jordan paused to admire how wide his chest was. And then, as the elevator began its rise to the twenty-second floor, he crossed his arms over that chest and began to chant.

"I saw for Baldur—for the bloodstained sacrifice,

Odin's child—the fates set hidden.

There stood full-grown, higher than the plains, slender and most fair, the mistletoe.

"There formed from that stem which was slender-seeming, a shaft of anguish, perilous:

Hodr started shooting.

A brother of Baldur was born quickly:

he started—Odin's son—slaying, at one night old.

"He never washed hands, never combed head, till he bore to the pyre Baldur's adversary—while Frigg wept in Fen Halls for Valhall's woe.

Do you still seek to know? And what?"

Kir leaned back as Logan's deep voice washed over him. There were times he missed the cadence of the poetry of his homeland, but this particular piece was one of his least favorites. It described how, at one day old, Vali slew Hodr in retaliation for the death of Baldur. That Hodr was both blind and was meant to help Baldur rule Valhalla had factored in greatly when Grimm was making his plans to murder them both.

Jordan leaned back against the wall. “What was that?"

"It's a portion of the Poetic Edda, translated by Ursula Dronke.” Logan was staring at her, his expression carefully nonchalant.

"Oh. Well. That clears that up.” From the confused frown on her face, it had raised more questions than it answered.

The doors opened onto a hallway. Kir stepped out, pulling out his key card. Jordan stepped out next.

Logan pushed passed her and Kir, taking Kir's key card to open the door to their condo. Since they'd come to Philadelphia Logan had been a nervous wreck, worried sick that Val and Grimm would find them before they would have a chance to set their plans in motion.

He entered the posh condo, his sneakers making no sound on the shiny maple flooring. Kir sighed as Logan nodded, letting him know no one had disrupted the wards Logan had set before heading out that morning.