Page 68 of The Hard Way

“I won’t let you lose yourself.”

“I lost myself a long time ago, goddess. The idea that I’m like a regular person or like you or even like Thor and Zeus, that’s a fiction.”

“Stop it.”

He brushed my hair back. “It’s true. You didn’t know me before.”

“I know you now.”

“You don’t, baby, not really. I’ve done very dark things. Things that don’t get washed out with time.”

I ached with such grief for him. “You’re beautiful and good, Odin. You see yourself wrong. You’re not objective.”

“It means everything that you think that,” he said sadly. “It means everything.”

“Fuck that. Like I just think it. Like it’s this fiction.”

“If you knew the things I’ve done. If you knew what I did to get my men out of that prison in Algiers.”

“Whatever you did, you had to.”

He gazed out over the valley, arms tight around me. We just sat there, gazing out.

I laid my forehead on his shoulder. “Tell me, then. I want to know.”

“I’d rather not.”

“Tell me.” I met his gaze. “Make me understand. Here and now.”

He shook his head.No.

“Why?”

“It’ll change things.”

“Not for me.”

Again he shook his head.

I traced the shell of his ear. “Trust me with it. That’s what a marriage is for—right?” Silence. “Do you ever dream of being free of the darkness of it?”

“Does it matter?”

“It matters to me. Do you?”

“I suppose.”

I swiped my thumb across his beautiful cheekbone. “Remember our wedding vows?”

His gaze clouded. Oh, he knew where I was going with this.

“I promise to always love you. And to protect you. And to fight for your dreams.Do you remember? That’s why you’re going to tell me. Because we’re allies.”

“You won’t like it.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” I said.

He gave me his stormy look, like this wasn’t the time for levity, but actually it was. What better time?

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