Authors: Sandra Hill
Viking Heat (36 page)
“Fornicated with any goats lately, Torkel?” Dagny asked sweetly.
“None since you, dearling,” he replied with equal sweetness.
“Why have you not come home in all these years?”
“I was waiting for you to leave.”
“It is my home, too.”
“Not after you divorced me.”
“I had good reason.”
“One mistake! Just one, and I was condemned for life.”
“What if it had been me?”
“I would have killed the man. But I see you have found a new man. Do you not think he is a mite young for you?”
“I am only twenty-two to his twenty-four.”
“Hah! You are twenty-six, almost twenty-seven.”
“If you must know, Einar is not really my betrothed, not that it is any of your concern. We just made up that story to keep some of the shiphirds away from me. Some men still find me attractive. But mark me well, I could have Einar if I wanted.”
“By the by, when did you plan on telling me that I have a son?” Tork stared bleakly at the other end of the hall where the boyling, Sidroc, sat beneath the Christmas tree, fascinated by the bright ribbons and crystal beads. The twins Brokk and Gandolf were with him, chattering away, no doubt relating all of Joy’s Santa stories.
“If you had ever come home, you would have known.”
“What kind of female illogic is that?”
If things weren’t bad enough, Joy walked up and sat down beside him. He put his face in his hands, just knowing what would come next.
“Hi, Dagny. I’m Joy Nelson, a psychologist. I could help you two with marriage counseling.”
“She comes from the year two thousand and nine,” Tork informed Dagny snidely.
“Shut up!” Joy said.
Dagny’s startled expression soon turned to one of admiration. She said to Tork, “I agree. Shut up!”
“One of the main reasons that marriages break up is a failure to communicate. Couples just don’t listen to each other.”
“See, dunderhead,” Dagny told Tork. “That is the very thing I said to you on numerous occasions. You just do not listen to me.”
Tork rolled his eyes.
“There is this one tried and true method that many psychologists use. It’s called mirroring.” Joy stood and made Tork and Dagny sit facing each other, almost knee to knee. “Now, let’s start with you, Dagny. You tell Tork something that is really bothering you.”
“You made love with another woman. That really hurt me.” Tears welled in her eyes.
“Now, Tork, what you have to do is repeat Dagny’s remark back to her as if you understand.”
Brandr and Tork looked at each as if to say, “How can we escape?”
But Tork heaved a whooshy exhale, then said, “I believe what you are saying, Dagny, is that I hurt you by fucking the dairymaid.”
“Exactly,” Dagny said.
“Notice that I said fuck, not make love.”
“Okay, okay, we are making progress. Now you repeat back what Tork just said, as if you understand.”
“Tork, you are an idiot if you think that adultery is all well and good if you used your cock and not your tongue.”
At the blush on Tork’s face, she added with consternation, “Oh, good gods! You used your tongue, too.”
“Not in the way you think.”
“Go swive a goat, you big oaf!” With those words, Dagny stood and stormed off toward the kitchen.
Tork appeared confused. Then he stood, too, but not before slicing Joy with an icy glance. “Methinks it is time I introduced myself to my son.”
“Well, that went well, don’t you think?” Joy said to Brandr. “You can see how much they still love each other.”
I can?
“Maybe we’ll have a Christmas wedding here at Bear’s Lair. Or a re-wedding, if you will. Ha, ha, ha!”
That is not funny. Not at all.
“Besides that, have you seen the way Einar keeps mooning over Liv?”
What? I will kill him if he dares hurt Liv again.
“Maybe we’ll have a double wedding.”
What world is her brain residing in?
“Whate’er you say, sweetling.”
I need a beer.
He popped the question, but it was the wrong question . . .“Whate’er you say, sweetling.”
I need a beer.
Joy looked right and left to make sure no one was watching, then slipped down the corridor and into the second storage room, the one Arnora had shown her weeks ago.
Waiting there for her, behind some tall shelves, was JAM, a longtime SEAL, a member of her team. She had been shocked, absolutely shocked, when she had recognized him yesterday coming in with the shipwreck survivors. He’d been wearing a priest’s disguise, which wasn’t surprising. JAM had at one time studied for the priesthood, or so the rumors went. Quickly, he came forward toward her, giving her a quick hug. “Are you okay?”
“Fine. How did you get here?”
“It was weird. You just disappeared after that explosion in Germany, but there were no body parts found in the residue. Sorry to be so graphic. Then a couple weeks ago we got a signal from your GPS locator. Just a few blips and it was gone.”
Joy knew just when that had happened. It had been when Brandr had discovered and removed the device behind her ear.
“That still doesn’t explain how you got here.”
“It’s a long story, but a few years back, some of us SEALs had what I can only call an out-of-body weird experience. Torolf, Geek, Pretty Boy, Cage, and myself were on this reproduction longship in Norway, and suddenly, after a wreck, we found ourselves back in the tenth century, where we ended up fighting and killing this evil villain Steinolf. Then later we somehow managed to return to the future, bringing Britta with us. You know Britta . . . Torolf’s wife? She was in one of the first WEALS classes.”
Her mouth was gaping open. “How come I never heard about that?”
“Believe me, it’s not something we ever talk about. If anyone found out, they would, first, not believe us, then, second, decide to put us in some isolation lab to dissect our parts.”
“I guess so,” she said hesitantly. “That still doesn’t explain how you got here.”
“Geek is the one who came up with all the clues.” Merrill “Geek” Good was a genius. Why he was a SEAL and not a rocket scientist was a puzzle to everyone. “He took your GPS location, a current and past map of Germany, our knowledge about what had happened with us in time travel, and somehow with all the overlays, he came up with the theory that you had time traveled during the explosion.”
“And you went to the authorities with that intel?”
“Hell, no! Only Geek and I know. We decided to go over to that reproduction Viking market town.”
“Hedeby,” she prompted.
“Right. Once there, we both got all kinds of—not sure how to describe it—vibes. Geek left, and I hung around for days in a monk disguise.” He patted his brown cassock with the hooded cowl and rope belt. “One day some idiot tried to rob me—a priest, ferchrissake!—by coldcocking me with the butt end of a pistol. When I woke up, I was on a longship leaving the Hedeby harbor.”
“So, do you think people can just travel back and forth in time?”
“No. Not at all. I think God is involved and miracles and that there’s a specific reason why these things happen. Does that make sense?”
She nodded.
“You figured out why you were sent back?”
She nodded again.
“Damned if I know why I was sent, unless it’s to bring you home.”
A moan of distress escaped her lips before she had a chance to catch herself.
JAM studied her closely. “Is it the brooding Attila the Viking Hun?”
She smiled weakly at his apt description. “Yes.”
“He’s suspicious of me, you know.”
“What do you mean?”
“When I was in the bathing house last night, he came in. After staring me down for a minute or so—and, believe me, a naked guy staring at me in a bathhouse is not my idea of fun—he said something about my being the most muscular monk he’d ever seen. More like a warrior.”
“Uh-oh! If he finds out who you are, he’s going to consider you an enemy, no matter what I say. He might lop off your head.”
“Not if I lop his off first.”
“Don’t you dare.”
“Huh? Did you get motion sickness on your time travel trip and lose a few screws?”
“Probably.”
“All we have to do is tell him that I’m a friendly, that I’m only here to take you back.”
“You can’t tell him that.”
“Well, well, well, what have we here?”
Brandr was standing in the open doorway, taking in what he must consider a cozy scene.
“Benedicat vos omnipotens Deus, Pater, et Filius, et Spiritus Sanctus.”
JAM was making the sign of the cross in front of her face, as if he had been giving her a blessing.
JAM was making the sign of the cross in front of her face, as if he had been giving her a blessing.
But at the same time, although she was momentarily surprised by JAM’s Latin, Joy burst out with, “I’m glad you came, Brandr. I can’t find the candles that Father Mendozo needs for his church service tomorrow,” she lied.
“They are right behind you.”
She turned and laughed, or tried to. “Hiding in plain sight.”
“Tell me true, what is going on?” Brandr stepped farther into the room. “And no lies.”
Joy looked at JAM, and when he nodded his approval, she said, “JAM is one of the SEALs . . . a soldier from the future.”
Brandr’s hand went immediately to the sword in his belt sheath. “Are you carrying a weapon?”
JAM put both hands up. “No. I’m not armed. You can frisk me.”
“Where are the others in your troop?”
“Back in the future.”
Brandr made a scoffing sound.
“Hey, I think it’s as unbelievable as you do, but it is what it is.”
“Why are you here?”
“To bring Joy home.”
“Over my dead body,” Brandr said. “This is her home now.”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa! We’ve had this discussion before, Brandr,” she inserted.
He ignored her and asked JAM, “Are you a real priest, or just a soldier pretending to be a priest?”
“Uh, well, I studied to be a Jesuit priest before I entered SEALs, but I never took my final vows. I did qualify along the way to be a lay minister and deacon, that kind of thing. So, yes, I can do some religious services for you.”
Brandr nodded. “Then you can perform marriages?”
“I suppose.”
Joy figured Brandr was taking her advice about Tork and Dagny and Einar and Liv.
What a guy!
What a guy!
“Then you will marry me and Joy on Christmas Eve.”
“Whaaat?” she squealed.
The guy is a flaming idiot.
The guy is a flaming idiot.
Finally, Brandr gave her his attention. “What now? You were unhappy as a thrall. Now you will be a wife.”
“You told me that a thrall couldn’t be a wife.”
“I found some loopholes . . . is that not the modern word you taught me?”
“You lied!”
“Nay. I just forgot some things.”
“Like?”
“Son of a sword! Like I am the bloody jarl here, and I can bloody hell do whatever I want. And I want to marry you.”
“Aaarrgh!”
“What is your problem?”
“Because you didn’t ask me, you big lug. You told me.”
“Oh. Well, then, will you be my wife?”
“No!”
He threw his arms up in the air in a “So there!” fashion. And JAM just continued to grin at the whole discussion.
“Why?” she asked.
“Why what?”
“Why do you want to marry me?”
Please, God, don’t let him say it’s because he likes to swive me.
Please, God, don’t let him say it’s because he likes to swive me.
“To keep you here.”
That’s just as bad.
“And that is the only reason?”
“And that is the only reason?”
“What other reason is there?”
Clueless! Men everywhere are clueless morons with the sensitivity of a rock.
With a grunt of disgust, she shoved past him and JAM, who was now outright laughing.
Mayhap cluelessness is contagious . . .With a grunt of disgust, she shoved past him and JAM, who was now outright laughing.
“I could give you advice,” Tork told him that evening during dinner. “I have talents.”
Somehow the seating arrangement left the men at one end of the high table and the women at the other end, both casting killing glances at each other.
“Those talents are gaining you great headway with your wife,” he scoffed.
“She is
not
my wife anymore.”
not
my wife anymore.”
Other books
Who Murdered Garson Talmadge by Bishop, David
Undeniable (Undeniable series) by Claire, Kimberly
Bangkok (That Wedding Girl Book 3) by Way, Maggie
Dead Gorgeous (A Mystery for D.I. Costello) by Elizabeth Flynn
The Mogul's Maybe Marriage by Mindy Klasky
Off the Grid by Cassandra Carr
Blood River by Tim Butcher
Einstein's Dreams by Alan Lightman
More Bang for His Buck by Madelene Martin
Waiting for Us by Stanton, Dawn