Thork stood with legs splayed, shifting impatiently from foot to foot. “Put on the damn shoe and stop dawdling.”
“Don’t be so darned cranky,” Ruby muttered.
Olaf watched them both with amusement.
“Those shoes—naught would they be worth in a storm or in the midst of battle,” Thork commented, disdain ringing his voice. “A sword could slice right through the fabric.”
Ruby couldn’t help but smile. “You’re right. They wouldn’t be worth much in battle, but they’re great for jogging.”
“Jigging? What the hell is that?”
“No, silly. I said jogging. I’ll show you. Come on.” Ruby took off onto the street in the direction they had been heading. It took Thork and Olaf several stunned moments before they realized she was running away from them. A few seconds later, they caught up with her. Grabbing her forearm tightly, Thork pulled her to a halt.
“Think you to escape from me? Wouldst you leave me to answer to Sigtrygg?”
“No,” Ruby protested. “I was just demonstrating jogging to you. It’s what people—men and women—do for exercise in my country.” Aware of his annoyance, she goaded him by pulling her arm out of his grip and jogging around him in a circle to demonstrate.
“Thor’s blood!” Thork exclaimed. “Why would people do such? Do your men not use their bodies each day in hard work or military drills? And women! ‘Tis unseemly that women would run so!”
Ruby started to answer but knew it would be impossible. How could she explain that men in her time often worked in offices where they sat all day, that service in the military was voluntary and that the most exercise some men got was to hit a small ball with a stick on a field of grass? Or that modern women did a lot of things that would appear unseemly to Viking men? She shrugged.
Thork looked her over with disgust.
His cool appraisal hurt Ruby. “You don’t believe we’re married, do you?”
Thork made a rude, snorting sound. “Humph! Best you forget that lie. Granddaughter to Hrolf, some might believe, but marriage to me? Never!” He flashed a mocking smile at her. “Mayhap you lust after me. Verily, many women do. Perchance your hot blood caused you to follow me from your land to ours. But I never married any women, least of all the likes of you.”
“Why, you egotistical chauvinist! What’s wrong with me?”
Thork gave her a disdainful once-over from head to foot. “Thor’s toenails, girl! You be mannish, with your short hair and bold manner. And little flesh have you on your bones—nothing to cushion a man when he sinks into your sheath. A man likes softer, more feminine women.”
“I saw the look in your eyes when I stood in the hall,” Ruby argued, despite her embarrassment. “You weren’t immune.”
“Hah! Didst thou expect anything less? Thor’s blood! You raised the staffs on every man in Sigtrygg’s hall when you removed your clothing and flaunted those scandalous undergarments.” His glittering eyes assessed her frankly, reminding her he knew exactly what lay beneath her shirt and pants.
“Staffs! Flaunted!” Ruby sputtered. Then she grinned and gave him the same once-over. She knew this man inside and out. She’d learned his sexual tastes from years of practice. Who was he kidding? “You’re wrong if you think I can’t attract you,” she challenged with her chin raised haughtily. “Or that you’d never marry me. I know more about your sexual libido, buster, than any woman alive. Would you like to make a little bet?”
“A wager?” Olaf hooted, laughing at the two of them. “Do you not see what Thork means, wench? Men make wagers, not women.”
“By all the gods, I must admit, never have I met the likes of you afore.” Thork shook his head in wonderment.
“Well, is it a bet?”
“Nay, I do not wager with women, especially when it is a sure win for me.”
Ruby was pleased to see a speck of uncertainty in his eyes, despite his cocky words.
“Come,” Olaf urged impatiently. ” ‘Tis two years I have been gone from Jorvik and sore anxious I am to see my wife again.” He jiggled his eyebrows suggestively.