Mated To The Vikens (Interstellar Brides Book 8)(43)

He was mine, and I was never going to let him go.

Gunnar took my hand and led me to the entrance. I ignored everyone around me, focused on the feel of his strong hand around mine as he escorted me to the door. My body was lax and sated, the seed power now floating in my bloodstream made me feel languid and content. Happy.

That was what this was. Happiness. Contentment. Two things I hadn’t felt in months.

No, years. Since my mother’s cancer first appeared and I’d made a deal with the devil in the form of Anthony Corelli.

Even through my pleasure-induced haze, duty forced me to listen to the voices around us, and so I did, relieved when the man I’d been looking for did not make an appearance as we reached the entrance. Our visit had been a waste. Well, perhaps not, for Gunnar and I had connected in a way we might not have if we were anywhere else.

Gunnar paused before the door, the question in his eyes, and I shook my head. No. I had not heard the voice we sought.

We were steps away from the door when it opened and a Viken man and his female friend walked inside. They talked and joked, and I shook my head once more. No. Not him.

The door did not close and I peeked around Gunnar’s shoulder to see another man and woman outside, courteously holding the door for us.

Gunnar stepped through and I followed a step behind him, as was expected from a submissive at the club. As I passed the open door, I thanked the Viken male automatically.

“My pleasure.”

I stiffened instantly, a chill racing the length of my spine as I remembered that deep timbre saying something else entirely.

If she’s not royalty, or worth a ransom, kill her.

It was him. Oh, God. Fear and panic rushed to the front of my mind and I grabbed the side of Gunnar’s uniform with rigid fingers. That voice.

I glanced over at the man’s wrist where he held the door open.

Yes. There it was. The tattoo.

This was the man we’d been hunting, the man who’d tried to kill the Queen, the man who’d nearly cost me my life.



* * *



Gunnar



I sensed Sophia as she lagged behind, stumbling into my side. Her hand grasped at my shirt with urgency, all softness gone from her. We stood just outside the entry, the cool air refreshing after the cloying scents of fucking from the club. I should have been relaxed, pleased with my mate, but my contentment washed away the second I understood her actions.

My prey stood before me, a man I knew all too well. The Viken who held the door for us.

The couple had yet to go inside as they were staring at us in return where we’d frozen in place. The female wore a cloak identical to Sophia’s, the hood pulled up to hide her features. I could only see the lower half of her face beneath the hood. I assessed her bowed head, the hands folded before her as her companion led her into the club by a long silver chain affixed to a collar around her neck.

No, she was not the threat. The slave female was not who concerned me. It was him.

Dorn.

“Gunnar, it has been a long time. I am surprised to see you here.”

Sophia’s hand moved to the back of my shirt, her fingers curling and digging into my skin.

The man who had wanted my mate dead stood before me, and I couldn’t do a damn thing about it. Not here. Not now.

“Dorn.” I said his name in a flat tone, the best I could manage when the urge to wrap my hands around his neck and strangle the life from his worthless body flooded me.

The man was my height, yet his body was not honed from fighting, from battle. He was thin and lithe, and unchanged in the long years since last I’d seen him. I easily outweighed him by fifty pounds, but I did not doubt his speed, agility or ruthlessness. His black hair and eyes matched his soul, his sneer, his cruel nature. I’d seen him with females inside the club many, many times. Based on the slave collar around his lover’s neck, I guessed not much had changed.

I’d watched him break many, men and women both, watched them writhe and scream, cry and beg him to stop.

He never did, not until he was ready. Not until he’d broken them wide open, pushed them past the point they’d wished to go.

I’d cringed the first few times I’d witnessed his calculated and expert cruelty. But my mentor had instructed me to watch and learn, and so I had. And been shocked to see the people he hurt come back time and again, begging him for more. Begging him to break them.

Pain was never my thing, but I understood it. He excelled at dealing out pain, and many at the club fought to serve him, to experience a taste of his lash or cane. There was no personal connection between Dorn and the women who served him, only pain meted out for his pleasure. He was a Sadist in the truest form. I should have been surprised that I’d spent so much time in years past with the man who would betray the three Kings, the man who would stoop so low as to murder a beautiful woman and an innocent child.