Chapter 10
After gleaning every juicy detail she could from Selena, Sunshine packed up her stand early and decided to go back to her loft. When she got there, Talon was still sleeping on the sofa.
Her lips twitched as she watched him. He looked so adorable and uncomfortable. He was really much too large for the pink and white couch, and his arms and legs dangled off into nothingness.
He'd pulled his shirt and jacket off and left them folded neatly on her coffee table, and his large Harley boots were on the floor underneath it.
His blond hair was tousled and his features relaxed while his sinfully long lashes were nestled against his cheeks. His two thin braids lay on the pillow as he breathed in blissful slumber.
He had one large, tanned masculine hand up by his face.
Looking at him now, she found it hard to believe he was an ancient immortal warrior whose very name was synonymous with death. But one who made her heart soften and her pulse race.
He was scrumptious.
Sunshine stared at the intricate tribal tattoo on his body. So, he really was a Celt. A real live, breathing, run-naked-through-the-heather-and-moors Celt.
Her grandmother would love it.
Closing her eyes, Sunshine let her memories as Nynia wash over her. But those memories weren't really hers. They were like memories of a movie she had once watched.
They were real to her and, at the same time, they weren't. She was no longer Nynia, and Talon...
He wasn't the same man he'd been then either.
Speirr had been full of fury and volatile emotions. Talon had bursts of emotion, but for the most part, he was calm and detached from his feelings.
Neither one of them was the same and yet she couldn't shake the feeling that they were somehow meant to be together.
But if what Selena had said was true, then he had a much higher calling than being her lover.
Not to mention that she was no longer Nynia. Parts of Nynia lived inside her, but she was a whole new and other person.
Did she love Talon because she was Sunshine or was it something left over from her previous life?
Would she ever know for sure?
"I will never love anyone but you, Nyn." His Celtic words echoed in her head.
Bit by bit, all her memories of their former life together were coming back to her. It was as if someone had opened a sealed door and the memories came pouring out.
She knew about his sister, his mother, his father. Even his uncle and aunt and bastard cousin.
She remembered the way he had looked as a young boy the first time the two of them had sneaked off together to play by the lake.
She remembered the way the clan had treated him. The scandal of his queenly mother being seduced by his Druid father. How Talon's parents had run off in the middle of the night to keep the clan from killing his father and beating his mother for their forbidden affair.
Everyone had hated Talon because of it. They had blamed him for his mother's weakness, for the fact that she had seduced their High Priest and left them without leadership.
They had blamed him for the fact that his mother had put her needs and wants above those of her people.
To atone for her actions, Talon had put everyone's needs and wants above his own.
Sunshine's throat tightened as she remembered everything he had suffered.
Nynia had been there that cold, snowy night when Talon had stumbled, frozen, into the hall, holding a screaming baby in his arms. His cloak had been wrapped around his sister to keep her warm. His shoes had been sold to buy Ceara milk that she had refused to drink.
Talon had stood defiantly before them all. His young body braced to take whatever malice they offered. Even now she could see the raw determination that had made his young amber eyes blaze.
"Your mother?" King Idiag had asked. "Where is she?"
"She has been dead almost two weeks now."
"And your father?"
"Six months past he was killed during an attack, protecting us from the Saxons." Talon had looked down at the screaming baby he held, then back up at his uncle. His face had softened and betrayed his fear. It was the only chink in his brave facade. "Please, Your Majesty, please have mercy on my baby sister. Don't let her die too."
Idiag had eyed him curiously. "And what of you, boy? Do you ask for mercy for yourself?"
Talon had shaken his head. "No, Majesty. I ask nothing for me."
His uncle had adopted Ceara as his daughter, but he had never really acknowledged Talon. He had scorned him just as everyone else did.
Idiag had never protected him from the clan's malice or blows.
Instead, he had told Talon to take it like a man because he deserved it and to never snivel.
And so Talon had.
Sunshine couldn't count the times she had found Talon by the lake practicing with his sword.
"I will make them accept me, Nyn. I will be the best warrior ever born and they'll never dare to speak to me with anything less than respect."
She had watched the angry, hurt boy grow into an embittered, fierce man. He had walked with a deadly swagger and a scowl so stern that even the stoutest of heart shrank at his approach.
He had fought his way into his uncle's heart. Fought until even the clan that hated him knew he was the only one capable of leading them against their enemies.
No one had dared meet Talon's gaze and only in fearful whispers did they dare to disparage his mother or him.
His uncle had had no choice but to accept him. It was either acknowledge Talon or lose his throne to him in war.
Talon had been invincible. Strong. Unyielding.
A man of power.
Until she was alone with him. Only then did his features soften.
Only then did he dare to laugh and smile.
And what haunted her most was the memory of Talon whispering his love to her as she died in his arms...
Her throat tight, Sunshine set her bag and thermos of coffee on the table, then knelt on the floor by his head. Tenderness flooded her.
She really did love this man.
She had changed in many ways.