The bird brushed its head against Tessa’s, then took to the trees. Once settled on a high branch, it sent out a call and Tessa knew that its sisters and brothers would be coming to help.

“But be careful,” Tessa warned. “I wouldn’t put it past the bitch to shoot at you. She seems like she’d be one of those crazy rich women with a lot of guns.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

Vig picked up the coffees and Kera grabbed the sandwiches.

This was Vig’s favorite coffee shop. Owned by a tough ex-Israeli soldier who didn’t know anything about Nordic gods and wasn’t put off by Vig’s battle stare.

Vig had accidentally stumbled upon Kera’s coffee shop when he was waiting for a Raven brother to get his car out of a tow lot. Vig knew the process would take a while because his brother felt his six-figure Mercedes had been illegally towed and he wasn’t about to pay a cent to get it back. That meant arguing. Vig hadn’t been in the mood to watch arguing, so he’d gone to the coffee shop he’d passed earlier and walked up to the counter. The pretty blonde behind the counter had looked up at him and blanched, her eyes widening at the sight of him. He’d been truly afraid she was about to piss her extremely tight jeans when her manager came over and told her to clean the tables and that she’d help this customer.

That manager had been Kera. She’d been pretty and kind and sexy as hell. Even better, smart and confident. Vig loved smart and confident.

“I’m sorry about that,” Kera said just before biting into her sandwich.

Kera had picked a table on the deck, overlooking the Pacific Ocean, right by the protective glass. Vig moved over a large umbrella to keep the sun off them and settled in to eat.

“It’s not your fault,” he replied to her. “I really don’t know what was wrong with her. Amsel doesn’t usually care about anyone. Especially me.”

“I think she was just using you to get rid of me. And I fell for it. But she irritates me.”

“Why did she want to get rid of you?”

Kera swallowed her food. “Because I have ideas to get some organization into their lives. You’d think I was trying to poison them with mustard gas the way they were acting.”

“Crows and Ravens . . . we don’t do organization. I mean . . . there’s organization but very loose. Very . . . nonthreatening to our personal style.”

Kera laughed. “I never saw organization as threatening, but okay.” She opened a bag of chips, poured them onto her plate, and offered some to Vig with a wave of her hand.

“So,” she asked, “how does this work?”

“Nothing too hard. I was thinking we go out for dinner and if that works, we take it from there.”

Kera gazed at him over her sandwich, her eyes wide. “I meant,” she said after she swallowed, “how does the Crows, Ravens,Clans thing work.”

“Oh. That. Um . . . well, each Clan is different. Different gods, different rules. Different demands.”

“Like what?”

“Well, my sister is one of the Valkyries. They’re the Choosers of the Slain. They pick the warriors who die in battle and will go to either Odin or Freyja for the final battle of Ragnarok. They’re also brutal warriors in their own right, but they rarely fight on this plane of existence. Then there are the Isa. Skadi’s their ruling goddess and they live their lives in the mountains, among nature and animals you and I can never get close to. You’ll find a lot of Isa in the state and national parks . . . and in the winter Olympics. Good skiers . . . like Skadi. And, of course, you’ve met the Giant Killers.”

“They’re lovely.”

Vig chuckled. “Yes. That’s exactly how I’d describe them. They basically do whatever Thor wants them to, and we try not to ask what that is.”

“Be honest with me, Vig . . . are we just hitmen for these gods?”

“No. That’s archangels. Try not to get into any disputes with them. Those never go well, and they can be really nasty.”

Kera put down her sandwich. “Archangels?”

“And the followers of the Greek gods are no better. Especially Ares’s people.”

Kera put her elbows on the table, her hands covering her mouth, her gaze focused at the view of the ocean.

“You all right?” Vig asked.

“Just realizing my mother may have been right,” she said around her fingers.

“Right about what?”

“I am going to hell.”

“No. You’re going to Valhalla.”

Her eyes flicked back to focus on his face. “Valhalla?”

“We all go to Valhalla when we die as long as you don’t betray your Clan.”

“Even the Crows?”

“Even the Crows. Odin can’t be that picky when it comes to Ragnarok. He needs all the warriors he can get. And good warriors like Crows . . . he can’t ignore them, no matter how much he may want to.”

Kera dropped her hands back to the table. “I guess that’s something.” She took another bite out of her sandwich. “I’m guessing the Ravens were around long before the Crows, huh?”

“No. We came after the Crows.”

“Really?”

He nodded. “A small Clan of Crows began an assault on a village in Norway. My ancestor was one of those warriors who called on Odin for help. Odin, already pissed at Skuld for giving slaves such an elevated status, gave the warriors wings so they could fight the Crows and defend the village. After it was over, the warriors kept their wings and they continued to fight for Odin. That’s how the Ravens began.”