Page 28 of Trolling For Love

“I knew you wouldn’t be injured, and I knew it would eventually make it to town that someone had pushed a bunch of logs on top of a troll.”

“If you had injured my mate I would have torn you apart right there. It wouldn’t have mattered to me who saw or what they did to me,” I said and looked down at him in time to see him swallow hard.

“I know. And I really didn’t mean for you or anyone else to get hurt. It was all to convince Drummond he could trust me. The things he’s done to monsters are far worse than what the actual monsters do. He needs to pay for what he’s done.”

“He’ll pay, but it may not be human laws that do it,” I said and waited for him to disagree with me.

“What happens here is different than the human world, but I know you are not a troll who enjoys killing. Let the humans take care of him,” Gene said.

“I will decide when we catch up to him.”

Chapter 24

FLYNN

Time passed so slowly as I waited for Gunnar to return, and as night began to fall, I set up the tent and kept the fire going. The pain in my chest had dulled, and there had been no movement near the portal. The guard who was supposed to be watching it hadn’t come back this way.Please let Gunnar be okay.

The silence was deafening, and I tried to eat one of the sandwiches I’d packed, more out of boredom than hunger, but still the time dragged on. Night fell and once again I slept. The pain in my head had calmed down to a slow throb, but I wasn’t going to leave here without Gunnar. I had considered walking through the portal myself, but I didn’t want him to end up having to save me too. From everything I’d heard about the monster realm, shit was crazy there.

Warm hands brushed back my hair from my face and I knew he was nearby—I felt whole again. The hole that had been ripped in my chest was healed. “Am I dreaming?” I whispered, too out of it to open my eyes.

“No, my love, I’m here.”

“Gunnar!” I yelled and jumped into his arms. “I was so worried about you. Are you okay? Did you get hurt?”

He laughed and rubbed his forehead against my chest. “No, I was not hurt. We will never have to worry about Vince Drummond ever again.”

“Gunnar, I’ll meet with you at camp tomorrow to get all the information for the official report,” Gene said from behind Gunnar.

“Thank you, Gene. I will try not to hate you quite so much,” Gunnar said, and to my surprise Gene laughed.

“I appreciate that. Thanks again,” he said and walked off into the woods in the direction he’d probably come from hours ago.

“Tell me everything,” I said and climbed into Gunnar’s lap. He reached across and picked up the sandwich I hadn’t finished and shoved it all in his mouth.

“Sorry,” he said.

“It’s okay, come on, tell me what happened.”

“This portal is different to the other one. I walked out near a leshy village. One of them knew about Drummond and what he was doing. He’d also bragged about killing a troll, so I knew he had to be going to my homelands.”

“Oh no,” I said, and he wrapped his strong arms around me.

“The knife he had could easily kill a troll, but a troll can kill a human in more ways than one, and none of them require a weapon. He chose the wrong troll to fuck with,” Gunnar said with a chuckle.

“Was it someone you know?”

“It was Einar. He’s the troll that led me to the portal when I told him I wanted to find a mate. He’s far older than me, far stronger and has no fear of any human no matter what weapon they may yield.”

“Is he okay?”

“Einar? Oh yes, he was not injured at all. It seems Drummond had gotten quite sloppy. He had too much faith in a weapon that could kill if given the chance, but he still had to get within an arm’s length to use. Gene and I arrived just as he lunged for Einar and Einar ripped his arm off. Once his knife was lying to the side with his unattached arm, he had no defense. It makes me wonder why I was even worried about him at all,” Gunnar said and looked off into the distance as though seriously considering why he would have thought that.

“What happened to Vince?”

Gunnar looked at me then and his eyes were filled with regret and possibly a little guilt. “I know he was your uncle and I’m sorry his life ended the way it did, but if it wasn’t Einar, it would have been another monster eventually. He did not have any special power or skill beyond having a knife that would kill. Einar left with him, if I had to guess—well you know what trolls do with humans.”

“I just want to know he’ll never bother us or any other monster again. Gene told me what he was doing, and he deserved to pay for that. He was profiting off the suffering of monsters who did nothing wrong to him.”

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