Page 4 of Odin

Freyja shook her head. Kendall was right, though. She didn't have anything to do this weekend, while the body defrosted. And when it did, she'd be flat out, running every test she could to work out as much as she could about the person.

Maybe she should go to the pub, just for a little while. And if she met a man she liked, who she'd like even more naked, then maybe...

Maybe.

That was all.

She pulled her coat on, locked up, and headed outside to the garage where she'd parked her car. Of course, the helicopter had blown all the snow up against the roller door, so she'd have to spend an hour or two shovelling to get it out. But there were the two sleek new electric scooters the university had bought...she could squeeze one of them out the snow-free side door, no worries. Plus, instead of leaving her car in the pub car park, she could put the scooter in the boot of the guy's car, if she did find someone worth getting naked with.

Not that she'd be getting naked tonight.

But it might be nice...

Freyja buckled on her helmet, and walked the scooter out into the courtyard before she could second guess herself.

She'd promised Kendall. She'd go to the pub, order a drink and a sausage, take pictures, and then go home. Mission accomplished.

She was a little unsteady at first, almost losing her balance once or twice on the drive to the main road, but as she turned onto the road, she felt confident enough to open up the throttle, to get a little speed. Just as she hit an ice patch. The scooter went flying and so did she, tumbling through the air headed downhill way too fast...until the whole world went white.

THREE

Odin had never been so cold in his life, and he'd fallen into a fjord once when he was ice fishing. This felt like his blood had turned to sleet, but he couldn't even shout for help because he was surrounded by ice. Yet he could move...

He fell a short distance to a floor that was warmer than ice, but not by much. Like he'd fallen out of bed onto flagstones, after waking from a bad nightmare. Only...he'd never had a nightmare quite like this.

He blinked his eyes open, then could not help but stare around the small, square room. All the walls were made of shiny metal, and the ceiling, too. Everything but the floor, which consisted of square flagstones in shiny ice white.

Fuck. Ice. HELP.

Down through the not-ice floor and the earth below, then through snow and actual ice to where the call was coming from.

A woman wearing the most peculiar helmet, buried in a snowdrift.

Odin reached for her, lifting her up.

Her eyes blinked open, blue as a the ice on the fjords in winter...

...and Odin fell in love.

FOUR

Freyja was cold and wet and bumping up and down like she was on a small boat at sea. Which made no sense, because she could have sworn she'd been on a scooter, nowhere near the water...

She forced her eyes open. Yes, she recognised the snow piled up on either side of the road to the lab – she'd driven down here in her car only this morning.

But the bumping?

She squirmed so she could see.

A hard chest that she was pressed against. Bulging arm muscles as the chest's owner carried her.

What kind of man walked around shirtless in the snow?

A man whose grip tightened around her so she didn't fall.

"Must get you inside, somewhere safe and warm, so we can see if you are injured from your fall," he rumbled.

Yes, her fuzzy head agreed. She'd been thrown from her scooter. Might have broken bones or internal injuries. At least she was wearing a helmet...

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