Page 6 of Savage King

Annika had moved behind her again, her smaller body pressed against Skathi’s back. She was trembling hard enough for Skathi to feel it in her extended hands.

Again, Slick ran at her, his fists raised, swinging at her. She dodged his blows, allowing him to wind himself, before she finally struck out, using her fingers to throat punch him. His head flew back as he grasped wildly at his throat. Falling to his knees, his chest heaving as he fought to take in unobstructed breaths. No doubt, the blood from his broken nose wasn’t making breathing any easier.

Finally, the man collapsed face first into the sticky, beer coated floor.

“Skittles!” Annika cried, wrapping her arms around Skathi’s waist.

Her gaze pinned to the man on the floor, Skathi pulled from Annika’s vice-like grip and knelt down beside him, checking for a pulse.

Alive.

Good. That last thing she needed was another kill on her conscience.

“What the fuck is going on here!” a voice like thunder roared over the blood thirsty crowd. The music died, the crowd moved, and finally a god stood before her.

“Why are there more pictures of you and your gang in the newspaper?” sneered a disapproving voice he heard nearly every fucking night in his thoughts. No matter what he did—drink himself into oblivion or fuck a bitch into Valhalla, he could still hear his father’s voice telling him what a disappointment he was.

Ten years as an Army Ranger. Ten years as a multi-million-dollar business mogul. Thirty-eight years as his only goddamn son. But the man was never satisfied. Not with his son’s service in the military, nor his commendations, nor his business success, nor his loyalty and respect to a father who didn’t give a shit about any of it.

And he was so fucking tired of trying.

There was a club party banging downstairs and he was stuck in his office on the phone…with his father.

“We didn’t take the pictures, and we cannot control what the newspaper prints. We were out on a ride—which isn’t illegal,” he answered, his voice taut as a bowstring.

“We’re you riding drunk?” the man on the other end of the line asked, a pitch in his tone that Odin knew too well. His father was on the razor’s edge of control, which meant he was gearing up for another tirade about his son’s lack of real accomplishments. To his father, that meant marrying a Norwegian woman, siring a basket of sons, and taking over his father’s shipbuilding business,Vikander Fleets.

“Nej, Far,”no, father, he growled in Norwegian, frustrated. The man hadn’t reached out in more than a month andtonightwas the night he decided to call. Just fucking great.

All day Odin had been antsy, his skin too tight, his body feeling too big even to him, and he knew that if he could just drink until blacked out and fuck until his dick fell off, he’d feel better.

But his dad had other plans.

Odin, a first generation Norwegian-American, was born Stellan Vikander in a household where old world tradition was expected, required, and adhered to like a religion. Matter of fact, the only good thing that had come from being the son of a staunch, old school Norwegian was the ancient stories of the gods.

He’d fashioned his MC to reflect the old tales and the old ways, even taking his road name from the All Father of Norse legend. That, at least, was something his father could respect.

The fact that Odin dared to go into the military service for a country not his father’s was a black mark against him. Even worse, now that he lived and breathed the Savage Raiders, his father spared not a second after Odin said “Hallo” to rip into him about his “criminal ways” and how he was “shaming the family and killing his mother.” Fuck, he was thirty-eight years old, had served ten years as an Army Ranger, had built a multi-million-dollar business from the ground up—he deserved a fucking hello from his own father.

“You never listen to me, Stellan. When are you going to stop this craziness and find a real, honest job? A good, honest woman? Your mother and I aren’t getting younger, and we’d like to have some grandchildren to spoil.”

And there it fucking was, the demand for him to give up the life he built, a life he fucking loved, to become a domestic casualty.

Fuck that.

“You know the answer to that,Far,” he answered, knowing full well his tone would spark another tirade.

A knock on his office door made him grit his teeth. Now was not the time.

Without waiting for his response, the door opened and Bonnie slipped through, closing the door behind her. Ignoring his glare, she sauntered over to where he was standing behind his desk and leaned her ass right against it, as if she owned the place.

Bonnie, his late brother, Tosser’s old lady, was the only old lady in the club and had rights and privileges none of the other club bitches had. Still, her audacity in that moment only made Odin’s temper spike.

“The fuck you want, Bonnie?” he snapped, momentarily forgetting his father was on the other line.

Her brown hair cut into a bob that framed her face, her makeup caked on with a practiced hand, and her long, lean body wrapped in a short black leather skirt and a top so small and tight it barely covered her nipples. She had spiked black heels on her feet that didn’t impede her stride in the least.

Yeah, she was a fucking knockout, and she knew it. But Odin had been there, done her, and had kept his distance from her out of respect for Tosser. Not that he’d touch her now, even with Tosser gone. Bonnie was still angling for a position ashisold lady—he knew it, and he regularly turned down her advances.

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