Chapter 45
New York, United States
June 2011
Darcy couldn’t contain her curiosity.
Bord’s warning had been appropriately cryptic to imply that there was someone in the State Department trying to help the Avengers. It was entirely plausible. Ross wasn’t exactly coming over for Sunday dinner at the tower, but if someone was sending a message her way, then it was worse than she had imagined.
She settled her nerves. Darcy knew she’d need all her wits for the game of wits she knew was about to happen. Bord was more than just a messenger boy. He was involved in this too, somehow. And Darcy decided, as she pushed open the door to her favorite coffee shop, that she would use him however she needed to in order to keep the Avengers protected.
They were the first family she’d had since Lizzie died. And Darcy wasn’t going to just give up on this opportunity so easily.
She ordered a frappuccino and watched Bord examine the menu with a critical eye. He finally settled on an expensive imported Italian roast, ordered it black, and collected his drink right after hers.
They sat down at a corner table. Darcy noted the way Bord angled toward the seat with its back to the room, but she pretended not to notice him and took it for herself, careful to leave her lanyard with her keys right next to her left hand.
“So,” Darcy said. “Messenger boy. What’s your message?”
Bord fixed her with his gaze. It was startlingly intense, and—had his eyes always been that green? She didn’t think so.
“My message…” he said. “It regards an external threat to the Avengers. One of which you are as yet unaware.”
Darcy grinned. “I’m not an Avenger.”
“I shall pretend I believe you for now. In the interest of keeping this conversation moving.” Bord raised an eyebrow at her and took a sip of his coffee. “However, I must confess that this threat does not come from the State Department.”
Darcy set her frappuccino down with a thunk. “No?”
“I had to find some method by which to catch your attention,” Bord said, and shrugged. “I apologize for the deception, but it was necessary.”
Darcy considered. She’d probably have done the same thing. She nodded for him to continue.
“What would you say if I told you I have knowledge of the involvement of a third party in the Battle of New York? A third party who was influencing the actions of the Asgardian, Loki?”
“I would say… that it is a possibility which has already presented itself to the Avengers,” she said slowly. Her fingers curled around her drink, mostly as a way to keep them occupied so she didn’t fidget and betray her anticipation.
Bord smiled. “Has it now.”
Darcy took another drink and didn’t reply.
“The Avengers are more intelligent than one might expect,” he mused.
“I’m not exactly unfamiliar with being underestimated,” Darcy said. “I’m practically a professional at this point. The Avengers… not so much.”
“You are often overlooked, are you not?” Bord asked.
“Depends on what’s being looked at,” she retorted. “My mind or my other assets.”
He laughed.
I like his laugh, she thought. Sharp and surprised, as though he didn’t laugh often and wasn’t used to people who amused him to the point of laughter.
“So what’s this threat you keep alluding to? And how do you know about it?” Darcy asked.
Bord hesitated.
Darcy tapped her fingers against her car key ring, careful to keep the side showing Tony’s alterations hidden behind her wrist.
“My name is not Derek Bord,” he said at last. Softly.
Darcy’s spine tingled. It was the gut instinct that told her she’d stumbled across something big. Something she could use. She leaned forward. “You don’t seem like a Derek,” she agreed, keeping her voice light.
“My name… is Loki.”
A flicker of green light played about his temples. The guise of Derek Bord faded away, torn apart in strips like paint peeling off a door, until Darcy sat looking at Loki of Asgard once again.
This time, there was no glass between them.
“Well,” she said. “That’s one hell of a plot twist.”
“Thank you for not screaming,” he said.
She shrugged, using the movement to get her fingers around the key fob. Her heart pounded but her voice remained steady. “I have a funny feeling you’d silence me before I got a word out. With your weird voodoo powers and shit.”
Loki’s brows furrowed. Darcy hid the fear and excitement in her gut that were ramping up to eleven (and why did he have to be so unfairly attractive?) and fingered the buttons on the key fob. One was a red panic button; the other Avengers would be there in minutes, suited up and guns blazing.
The other, the blue one, would bring just one or two of them. Subtly. To check things out. A message that said “I’m in a situation, I might need backup, but don’t come in shooting”.
“What is… voodoo?” Loki asked. “Forgive my lapse. Allspeak fails on occasion when using technical or colloquial words.”
“Uh… your witchy magic,” Darcy said. He hadn’t hurt her yet. He’d had plenty of opportunity to snatch her off the street and she had no doubt he could’ve wiped her mind and turned her into a drooling idiot, given proper preparation. This was Loki. She and Jane had heard plenty of stories from Thor. He wanted something else, and she wanted to know what it was. “Apparently you’re a famous magician. You could make a fortune here pulling rabbits out of hats.”
Loki appeared to disregard her humor. Possibly he didn’t understand it. She would have to teach him Midgardian cultural ref-
No! Darcy scolded herself. She shouldn’t be making these plans as if… as if they were going to be seeing more of one another. This was Loki. She should be mashing the red button flat.
But she couldn’t deny… she was intrigued.
Darcy pressed the blue button and narrowed her eyes at him. “Okay. So I’m assuming this has to do with your dumbass invasion plan-” Loki choked- “the mysterious orders to Selvig for him to build a fail-safe into the portal, the way you left the scepter for us, the fact that a supposedly brilliant strategist tried a chokepoint invasion with an army on a connected neural network? Care to explain any of that?”
Loki smiled. He looked like a wolf, or something equally predatory. “I am impressed,” he said. “The young Midgardian woman picked up on all the hints I left before any other of the Avengers. I admit I underestimated you as well. No longer.”
“Everyone does. You gonna tell me or do I have to guess?”
“I’ll tell you,” Loki promised. “But I have a few… conditions.”
Darcy sighed and tossed back the last of her coffee. “Had to be a catch. What do you want?”
“Sanctuary,” Loki said simply.
Darcy blinked. “Come again?”
He shrugged and swirled the remains of his coffee. “It is becoming rather exhausting to maintain an illusion whenever I am out among the Midgardian population. Your special forces have my face programmed into every one of their facial recognition… algorithms, I believe you call them. And especially as a significant portion of my power is going into keeping myself concealed from Heimdall’s sight…”
“Heimdall. The all-seeing gatekeeeper dude,” Darcy said. “Right?”
“Indeed. His power is far-reaching. It took me centuries to develop a method of hiding myself.”
“So what would he see right now?” Darcy asked, stalling.
Loki smirked. “Merely a silly Midgardian woman out on a vapid date.”
“Flattering,” Darcy muttered. “So you’ll answer all our questions in exchange for rent?”
“If I may inhabit your Tower, then I need not concern myself with detection by Midgardian sources,” Loki said.
“You’re going to have to give us more than answers,” Darcy said. “Help on the voodoo side, for example. Protecting the tower with it. Whatever you can do. And I’ll bet, between Jane and me, we have a pretty good handle on what your abilities are, so no cheating.”
“We can discuss it,” Loki said simply.
Darcy’s eyes were caught by a vehicle pulling to the curb outside. One she recognized. “So what now?”
“I explain to you. You may return to your Tower and speak with your team, convince them. Or not, as the case may be. When you next exit the Tower, I will find you,” Loki said.
The door jingled as it opened. Tony and Steve stepped inside, wearing semi-decent disguises—Steve was in his typical leather-jacket-sunglasses-and-a-baseball-cap-now-I’m-totally-invisible suit. Tony was also wearing sunglasses, and with his hair flattened by a beanie and a hideous oversize hoodie, he was much less recognizable than Steve. They scanned the room. Darcy saw their gazes turn incredulous, then furious, when they spotted her and her coffee date.
Darcy shot Loki her own wolf grin. “Actually, it’s gonna go down a little differently.”
Tony dropped into the empty third chair at their table while Steve leaned against the wall behind Loki. “Good to see you again, Reindeer Games,” Tony said. “You owe me for that broken window. And the broken city.”
Loki sneered, any humanity gone from his face. “It is not yours to claim reparations for.”
“Quit,” Darcy ordered.
Amazingly, both men backed down.
Steve shot Darcy a shocked look.
She winked back at him and focused in on Tony and Steve. “So remember how we were saying it sucks we can’t interview Loki?” she asked.
Steve sighed and, thankfully, kept his voice down. “I didn’t mean for you to go find him without telling us-”
“I found her, actually,” Loki said. “You’re not exactly keeping a low profile, Captain.”
Steve’s jaw tightened fractionally.
“He’s telling the truth,” Darcy said. “Anyway. Back to my point. All we have to do for answers and some voodoo protection for the Tower is give him free rent for a bit.”
“Rent? Like in an apartment in Queens?” Steve asked.
Darcy rolled her eyes. “I really can’t see that ending well, do you?”
“So what, we keep him in the Tower?” Tony asked.
“We can buy a big dog kennel if it helps you feel better,” Darcy said.
“I will not sleep in a cage like some common criminal,” Loki snapped.
Darcy glared at him. “You’re ruining my joke, idiot. Shush.”
He looked extremely taken aback. Definitely the pampered little prince wasn’t used to people talking to him like Darcy did. She was going to enjoy this.
“We can… discuss it,” Tony said reluctantly.
They looked to Steve.
At last, he sighed and nodded.
“Looks like we got ourselves a new pet,” Darcy said with a grin.