Page 48 of Odin
My stomach flip flops, my breath catches, and parts of me start buzzing that I really wish would just behave. Along with being tired, I must have entered the stage of wild hormones doing all things hormonal. I’m not making excuses, but this week especially, it’s as though I’m paying the horny tax for all those years I didn’t think about sex in any shape or form.
I get up and walk down the first few stairs, but stop dead as soon as I see Odin.
He’s bent over the bike. It’s an older one, with a straight frame that he has to curl over. I don’t know anything about years or types of bikes, but this is nothing like his bike, gorgeous, all chrome and leather bike where the handlebars were at a comfortable angle and he could recline back on it. This one looks uncomfortable, but it’s as beautiful as the man riding it.
Okay, half as beautiful.
Odin rights himself as soon as his boots are planted on the asphalt alley. He stretches out to full height, his shoulders filling out his new leather jacket. It’s so fresh looking, without a single scrape or scuff. The black leather is still soft and supple looking, and stretches over his massive frame perfectly. He unzips it after he kicks the bike into standing, showing off thatbarrel chest in one of his old, worn in garage t-shirts. The cotton is also probably soft as butter, and warm from his body. His jeans are old, but that just means that they fit him like they were tailored to his body, especially in the back. They cup his hard ass effortlessly.
I can imagine getting on a bike behind him, having to hang on tight as he rides. I’d be pressed so tight to his stupidly muscled body that all his heat would soak into me. I know exactly how he’d smell, that perfect blend of herbs, spices, the open sky, and garage scents. I’d be able to lock my hands in front of his chiseled abs and let the rumble of that bike roll through me as I rushed through the world with him.
My heart arrests and a steady, undeniable pulsing starts up between my legs.
I stumble forward to the metal railing and clutch it tightly, even though I have to angle one shoulder down to get both hands on it.
I wish I could stop thinking about what Odin looked like out of clothes. I’ve tried desperately to remind myself that this is platonic only. When we get married, it will be a contract marriage. I might have said I needed more time, but that time will come to an end, and I’ll legally be this man’swife.
I should be more terrified at the prospect. There should be at least some small part of me that rebels at the idea. When people talk about baby brain, is this what they mean? Where they can’t process a normal line of rational and reasonable thoughts?
Odin undoes the black saddlebag and pulls out a plastic package. He waves it in the air, grinning widely. His eyescrease at the corners, his patch scrunching up on the one side with the sheer joy of bringing me… mousetraps.
Another thing that I didn’t want to bug Crow for.
It’s a great distraction from my whole body begging me to get in my car and follow Odin to some private place where he can do things to me on that bike that are perfectly safe physically, but not so much for my heart and brain.
Not that my body would like them to have a say. My nipples are so hard they practically pierce through the loose cream sweater I have on over a long black dress. It’s stretchy and form fitting, but the sweater hides pretty much all the curves it might show off.
I make my way down the stairs carefully, rushing over to Odin, but stopping just short of throwing my arms around him.
That’s too familiar.
He’s not mine to hug or to hold.
I wish the ache in my chest didn’t start up every single time I see him pull up in front of my house. It doesn’t matter if it’s in that old truck or on that bike. He could come riding a little kid’s pedal car and ask me to get on the back of it with him, and I’d somehow find a way. My heart would be galloping the entire time, no doubt.
“Hey.” I try for casual, but even I can tell how gravelly my voice is. My face gets hot, so I angle it to the side, staring up at the top of the building. “I know I asked for mousetraps, but doesn’t it seem a little bit harsh to have to do this to them?”
“That fucker terrified you last night. For hours.”
It sounds so silly now. I was sitting up in bed, reading a book on animal psychology. It was late and the apartment was quiet. Even when the tattoo studio is full below me, the building is well insulated and must have thick floors and walls. I hardly ever hear anything other than the faint thumping of the basslines from the music, and never late into the night. It was quiet and then suddenly, not so much. I heard a rustle like a paper bag scrunching. I froze and it came again, and then stopped for a minute. Out of nowhere, a massive brown mouse came careening right into the bedroom. It leapt, scrambled up the bedframe and got right into bed with me.
I love animals, but I prefer those kind of animals to stay outside. I screamed and grabbed the blankets, flinging it onto the floor. It took off out of the room, and I immediately texted Odin.
I peer into the bag and see he’s brought the catch and release type traps. If I wasn’t already falling for this big, kind man then a gesture like this would have turned me to mush.
Out of the other bag, he produces a rotisserie chicken and a head of lettuce. “Was it presumptuous of me to assume you could do something with this befitting a delicious dinner?”
The smell of those chickens is basically like catnip. I could be sick as hell and would still find my mouth watering. “I can think of a hundred different things to make. Come on up and we’ll figure it out.”
He follows me up the stairs, his heavy boots ringing on the metal steps.
He stands there, his grin stretching from ear to ear. I take the bag from him and say, “Thank you for coming. Thanks for taking the time to show me all these things that my dad never got to show me. I could have learned them online or asked someone else, but I didn’t even really know it was knowledge I was missing.”
He strokes his beard, a little bit awkward now, but he’s adorable when he’s shy. Compliment the man and he grows more and more flustered. “It’s an honor.”
“I think that- that it might not be the only thing I didn’t know was missing.” I should wait. Make dinner. Let the man come in, but here I go, still blabbing away, just because I’ve had too much time to think and it’s all coming out.
“What do you mean?”
