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“He tried, but—” The door to the room slid open then, cutting off anything Wren was about to say. He grinned when he saw who was entering and stepped away from the couch. “Great timing.”
Odin didn’t reply, his gaze already on Hunter. He stopped a few feet away, staring as if seeing him for the first time.
Hunter drank him in as well, noting the slight differences that hadn’t been there the last time he’d seen him, just before he’d left for the meeting with the Emperor. There was dark scruff on Odin’s chin and his blue hair had about half an inch's worth of brown root showing. There were blood stains on the knees and lower legs of his gray jeans, but his hands and arms were clean.
He looked tired. Like he hadn’t slept in days, and he probably hadn’t if what Wren had said was any indicator.
“I’ll be off now,” Wren said between them, though neither gave him any sort of acknowledgment. “I’ve got a ball of sunshine to check in with and then it’s back to that disgusting excuse for an emperor. Clingy motherfucker has been blowing up my multi-slate since I got here.” He gave a mock shiver and then he was gone, the door shutting behind him with a whoosh.
Hunter broke the staring contest first, mostly because it was starting to make him uneasy, his earlier doubts still heavy on his mind. “Where have you been?”
“How are you feeling, Huntsman?” Odin asked instead of answering, he kept his tone even and steady, despite the wild look in his eye giving him away. He was every bit as emotional right now as Hunter was.
The question was, why?
“I have to say this,” Hunter decided, “no matter how pathetic it sounds, and I swear I’ll only ask it once, and then I’ll never bring it up again, but I’ve got to know. Do you…not want me anymore?”
Odin’s brow furrowed, almost as though the question had been asked in a foreign language and he was struggling to puzzle out what the words meant translated. It must have hit him eventually, however, because in the next instant, he was rushing forward, dropping down to Hunter’s side and taking his hands in his lap.
“Don’t,” he said, a bit frantically now, almost as if he was the one here who was afraid. “Don’t let him get in your head. Whatever he said to you, forget it.”
“What about what he did to me?”
“I’ll make him pay.”
“He touched me, Odin.”
“I’ll cut off his hands.”
Hunter glanced down to where Snow was holding onto him tightly, and when he tried to pull away, that grip only strengthened, keeping him there. “What if you hadn’t made it in time?”
“But I did make it.”
“What if you hadn’t?” he insisted stubbornly. He needed to know. “What we’ve got right now, it’s fragile. Enough so that any little thing can come along and topple it over. This, Isa Frost having his hands on my body, that isn’t little. It’s a big deal. And he said you wouldn’t want—”
“Since when did you listen to a damn thing Isa says?” Odin’s voice dropped low, almost in warning, and in return, Hunter’s spine straightened.
Not in the same way it’d done with Wren, though. There was no fear. It was as if Odin was calling to something deep within him and that something was responding in turn. The possessiveness in his voice was soothing to Hunter, coaxing him into a sense of security.
“You’re mine, Huntsman. No one can change that, certainly not someone as obsolete as Isa Frost. You’re my Whisper, and now that you’re awake, you’ll soon be my husband too.”
Hunter frowned. “What?”
Odin reached for him, cupping the side of his face in one palm and easing him closer so they were leaning toward one another. “I’ve already trapped you with the mating bond,” he said, “but it’s not enough. I want more. I want everything. I’ll trap you legally as well, make it impossible for you to ever walk away from me. Catch you, well and truly, mate. So, whatever happened to you? Forget it. I’ll help you any way I can, just know it’s not something you have to carry. We’ll make Frost pay for what he’s done. Frost. No one else. It was no one else’s fault but his.”
Hunter searched his expression for any signs this was a trick or that he was merely trying to placate him, but there weren’t any. “You mean that?”
“You once mentioned us needing to be on the same page for this to work,” Odin reminded. “Let’s do that now, get on the same page. Who do you belong to, Hunter Thorn?”
He licked his lips, only hesitating briefly. But they were alone and there was no reason for him to be embarrassed. “You.”
“Who do you want to touch you?” Odin leaned in even closer, bringing his mouth dangerously close to brushing against Hunter’s, though at the last second, he held himself back.
“You.” Hunter had been unconscious for weeks and had been half dead before that, and yet his body responded to the other man’s nearness like a moth to a flame, coming alive instantly.
“And who are you going to marry?”
“You—” He stopped himself. “Hey.”
