Odin (Billionaire Titans Book 2)

C
opyright
© 2016 by Alison Ryan

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

Cover Design by
Mayhem Cover Creations

T
o the Perry
Boys’ Club

B
efore reading
ODIN it’s very important you’ve read
ATLAS
, which is book one in this series. It will be hard to understand the events of ODIN without reading the story of Atlas and Piper.

Reading
THE MENTOR
and
THE MOGUL
will also help you to understand certain connections to characters, but it’s not necessary.

I hope you enjoy! Buckle up for quite the ride!

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or news
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D
oes anybody read books anymore
? I mean actual, physical books, ones with paper pages.

My personal library is, all humility aside, one that would make the Library of Congress green with envy. Collecting rare first editions (only in the best possible condition, of course) and autographed copies of classics has become a hobby fueled by my lifelong love of reading and funded by the family fortune.

When your last name is Titan, you don’t check price tags.

Of course, it’s not all about auctions at Christie’s and consulting a global network of bibliophiles; I still enjoy picking up a good hardcover, any vintage, and losing myself in a story.

The best part of reading a book is reaching that middle section where you’re deep enough into it that the front cover lays down just so, baring itself completely to you. It’s like when a beautiful woman bares herself for the first time to me, nothing between our bodies other than desire. And sweat.

Or maybe that spot where a book requires no assistance from the reader, save turning the pages, is a bit like a life.

In infancy, and childhood, we all need help. With everything. And we readers likewise must hold that front cover open in order to continue reading. Hit the middle, however, and it’s smooth sailing. Set it down on the kitchen counter while scrambling the morning eggs and read away. Place the novel you’re reading on that little shelf, the one that reminds me of a music stand, at the front of a rowing machine or treadmill and it sits there, open and proud, ready to be enjoyed once you reach the meaty middle chapters. Toward the end, the back cover tries to shut itself; again, just like the end of a life. Without help, life, like a book, ends without the reader’s consent.

I was smack dab into those middle pages of my own life story when the Book of Odin Titan slammed shut.

Thankfully, somebody remembered to slip a bookmark inside. I just wish they’d left the lights on.

My last recollection is having picked up my brother, Atlas, and his fiancée, Piper Kipton, at the executive terminal of McCarran Airport in Las Vegas. My midnight blue Maybach might not have been the most inconspicuous way to travel, but on the Las Vegas Strip, even the most expensive vehicles tend to blend right in.

Being a Wednesday morning, traffic was relatively light, so I took Las Vegas Boulevard to give Atlas and Piper the lay of the land and let them see the recent developments to the area.

They needed some place to regroup and plan their next move after they were nearly killed at their island compound in Alaska, but after a pow wow between my father and brothers, we rerouted their Charleston flight to Las Vegas. We wanted to keep whomever was after them on their toes.

A private jet would land in Charleston with “Paul Porter” and “Vicki Porter,” on board, aliases adopted by Atlas and Piper, along with three wolf hybrids, the remains of the pack charged with protecting them before things went sideways in Alaska. The new Paul and Vicki, members of my father’s security team, wouldn’t fool anybody who’d seen Piper or Atlas, but we wanted to throw as many curveballs at our unknown adversaries as possible.

I was in Las Vegas with my girlfriend, Mallory, spending a few days enjoying my penthouse condo in the exclusive Arroyo Place Towers overlooking the south end of the Strip and enjoying all the exclusive shopping and dining afforded by Sin City. I was happy to have my older brother in town and even happier to meet the woman who had captured his heart.

I’d insisted on driving.

Atlas joined me up front, folding his superhero’s frame into the passenger’s seat while Piper and Mallory got acquainted in the back. My bodyguards had advised me to travel with a driver and security detail, but, like I said, it was a sunny Wednesday morning. Why worry? I never get to drive the Maybach anyway.

So I picked them up and drove north on the Strip, pointing out landmarks and preparing to turn around and back up Paradise Road once we reached Sahara Avenue, but as we made the turn onto Sahara, Atlas shouted a warning and everything went dark.

“
F
rom now on
you should carry an Epi-Pen everywhere you go, Mrs. Rosales,” I explained. “Your daughter is allergic to bee stings, and it’s impossible to predict when she might be stung again. If she gets stung, you must inject her and don’t hesitate to call 911 if you can’t personally transport her to the ER immediately, okay? Follow up with an allergist, I’ve written down several names on the back of my card, and with your family doctor. She’ll be fine in a day or two, just let her rest.”

“Gracias, Doctor Clara,” Guadeloupe Rosales thanked me for saving her four-year-old daughter, Irma. Irma had been stung by a bee while playing in the backyard of her East Las Vegas home, and an allergic reaction caused her face to swell and her airway to become blocked. The ambulance rushed her to the emergency room at my place of employment, the Medical University of Las Vegas, or MULV, as it was more commonly known around town. Moments like these are what made my job worth doing, made all the years of school and residency and the mountain of student loans mean something. Seeing Irma smile, albeit weakly, filled my heart with joy.

I stepped out of the small room, leaving the Rosales clan with a nurse to finish up paperwork. I was heading for triage to pick up my next set of charts when I heard the unmistakable sound of the trauma helicopter landing on the roof of the hospital.

“Gunshot victim, multiple hits, critical! Happened right on the Strip, at Sahara!” shouted a colleague who rushed down the hallway past me. I had, along with all the other locals, noticed the increase in violent crime in Las Vegas that the casino PR departments conveniently left out of their ad campaigns. But it was a shock that even the most hardened gangbangers would be so brazen as to have a shootout in broad daylight on Las Vegas Boulevard.

I rushed to the surgical unit of the trauma center to scrub up for emergency surgery. “Multiple gunshot wounds” didn’t sound promising, but there wasn’t a doctor in Las Vegas, or anywhere, who would fight harder for the life of a shooting victim than I would. Not after losing my own husband, Dr. Callum O’Grady, to a hail of senseless gunfire those six long years ago.

Just the word “gunshot” stung my eyes with tears, but I couldn’t spare them at the moment. The OR was a frenzy of activity as a table was prepped.

The doors flew open, a gurney rolling into the room accompanied by two paramedics and a large man wearing a shirt soaked in blood.

“Patch him up. Now!” The burly man barked orders in a clipped, military fashion, walking the room, scanning it with a practiced eye.

His commanding tone and sheer size intimidated the nurses and they worked quickly with the paramedics to get their patient onto the operating table.

“You’ll have to leave. If you care at all about this patient, you’ll have to leave right now, sir!” I’d abandoned fear long ago, seeing the tragedies and miracles occur in my ER every single day. I’d worked through my grief and come out the other side a better doctor and a stronger person, even if my life would forever be marked by loneliness.

“He’s my brother. He’s in danger and he’s dying. Help him!” the large man snarled. Realizing that his approach might not be the most helpful given the circumstance, and glancing at the damage the man on the table had suffered, he softened. “Please,” he begged. “Please help him.”

Just then, security arrived and drew their weapons on the intruder, who seemed to weigh his options for a moment before raising both hands over his head.

“Get out of here! All of you! Talk to him, he’s not the bad guy. He says this man is in danger. Do your jobs, keep this room secure and let us work!” I implored, referencing the man who was bleeding out in front of me as my team worked to cut him out of his clothing and take his vitals.

Even scrambling and in of the OR, I could hear the argument in the hallway just beyond the door.

“This was a hit. An assassination attempt. There’s no reason to believe the man or men responsible for this won’t return to finish the job if that doctor in there can’t save him,” I heard the large man say.

“Whoa, slow down there, buddy. How do I know you aren’t the shooter? We’re holding you until the police get here, and you can explain everything to them,” said one of the security guards.

Suddenly, the discussion outside stopped, and two men poked their heads in through the door. They wore suits and sunglasses, just like what pop culture led me to believe Secret Service agents looked like. I looked at the man on the table and glanced at his paperwork for a name, wondering if he was some sort of politician or dignitary. “Odin Titan” was his name. I knew the Titan name, everybody did, but the Titan I knew was much older, a billionaire philanthropist and socialite named Emerson Titan. Was this his son?

“
T
he women have been moved
to a secure location. We have a car waiting for you outside, sir.”

Titan Security was top-notch, and my father’s legal team could run interference long enough to allow me to disappear. The chief of hospital security began to protest, but Odin’s team intervened and I was shortly back outside, climbing into a Lincoln Navigator.

“This one is bulletproof, sir. I’m sorry to hear about-”

I cut the driver off.

“Are the girls at Arroyo Place?” I asked.

“Yes sir, it won’t take us long to get there, traff- “

I interrupted him again. “Call ahead and have them meet me downstairs. We’re not staying there. You’re part of Odin’s security team now. Stay here. Keep us posted. Contact Mallory with any updates until you hear otherwise. Understood?”

The driver seemed startled by the way I took charge of the situation, but it was just natural for me.

“Yes sir,” he replied, rushing into the hospital as I sped away in the commandeered black Navigator.

I hadn’t seen the shooter or even the vehicle. I’d let my guard down, made the mistake of feeling safe and secure, trying to enjoy a moment with my brother, with Mallory and Piper, looking around at all the new construction in Vegas since I’d visited last.

I called a voice mailbox and left a message. Messages left there would ping the devices of my father and all three of my brothers, not that Odin would need to hear it:

I had to get within a few blocks of where the shooting occurred, and lights still flashed as police investigated the scene. As if Las Vegas traffic wasn’t bad enough.

I pulled into valet at Arroyo Place, and a young, smiling kid with “Brad” on his name tag approached. I waved him away.

“Picking up. Two women. They’ll be right down.”

“Sir, I’ll be happy to park it for you or you can pull up to the side here while you wait,” he offered. Just trying to do his job, I suppose.

“They’ll be right down,” I repeated, with unmistakable malice in my voice.

He started to stammer a reply, but the appearance of Piper and Mallory silenced him.

A doorman at Arroyo Place was used to seeing beautiful women, but those two were world class. And Piper looked pissed. And very pregnant. God, she was beautiful.

He rushed around to open the backdoor for them, suddenly remembering his job. Mallory slid into the back, but Piper pushed the door shut and climbed up into the passenger seat all by herself.

“Brad” looked flabbergasted. I couldn’t help but smile.

We pulled out, heading east toward the desert. I hadn’t yet heard from Odin’s security chief, Nathaniel, so I planned to get out of town, at least temporarily. We’d gone only a few miles before my phone buzzed with a message from him.

*
Fausto’s Taco Shop. Nellis and Washington. Park in front, come through, meet me in back
*

I followed the GPS to the Mexican restaurant. Abandoning the Navigator, we entered the front and went immediately around the counter, Piper’s hand in mine. The staff were too surprised to protest. We hit the backdoor to find an idling black Range Rover with Nathaniel at the wheel.

We headed back toward the Strip as Nathaniel filled me in on what we knew. He was a former Green Beret and ex-Las Vegas Metro cop, and had contacts on the force. He would know exactly what they knew, virtually when they knew it.

“Shots came from a yellow cab; traffic cameras show the driver was the shooter. It fled west on Sahara, has already been found in Naked City, no prints found inside yet, no cameras in there.”

Naked City was an area just west of the Strip which had at one time been home to most of the showgirls on the Strip. It was now a collection of crack houses and derelict apartment buildings. Nathaniel had legendary stories about the place in its heyday. The only story I wanted to hear was who had shot my brother. And put Piper and my daughter in danger.

“Drop me off there. Somebody saw that cab. There’s nothing but eyes in places like that. They won’t talk to police, but they’ll talk to me,” I commanded.

“I’m taking you to the safe house, Atlas. We’ve got to focus on getting Odin protected. If anybody in there saw anything, I’ll know. I have informants who never leave that place. Give me a chance to do my job.”

I respected Nathaniel, professionally and personally. Piper squeezed my hand and nodded her head. She needed me by her side, not cracking skulls in a drug den for a fuzzy description of a man seen running from a cab.

“You’re right. Get us to the safe house,” I relented. “Let me know the moment you hear anything on Odin.”

“Absolutely,” he replied.