Night Embrace (Dark-Hunter #3)(27)
Author: Sherrilyn Kenyon

Sunshine froze, torn between excitement and trepidation. Selena didn’t look right. She looked rather sick at the news.

"You know him?" she asked incredulously.

Uncomfortable, Selena glanced around. "Oh Lord, please, please tell me he’s not the sexual athlete who got hit with the Mardi Gras float. Please tell me that the guy I’ve been fantasizing about isn’t Talon. I’ve had dinner with him, for goodness’ sake."

"Okay, I won’t tell you it’s him, but… it’s him. Ain’t he great?"

Selena groaned. "Oh jeez. I’d heard rumors about him, but who knew they were really true? I can’t believe this."

Sunshine was relieved. Finally, someone who could give her some answers, provided she pried them out of Selena. But Selena looked like she was going to be less than forthcoming.

"Lainie, you better spill what you know about him."

Selena opened her mouth, but by the set of her jaw, Sunshine knew what she was about to say.

"Don’t you dare tell me you can’t tell me anything," she said before Selena could. "I’ve heard enough of that from him."

Selena closed her mouth. "Well, he’s a good guy for once. He’s not your usual out-of-work biker and he does have a future. A really long future."

"And what else?"

Selena hedged.

Sunshine opened up Selena’s folding chair that Selena used for her clients, then sat down beside her. "C’mon, Lainie. I really, really like this guy, and it’s driving me crazy that he won’t tell me anything, not even his birthday. So what do you know?"

"I’m not supposed to say anything, Sunny. I was sworn to secrecy."

"Sworn by whom?"

Selena set her tarot card box on the table. "I’m not supposed to say," she repeated.

"What is he, Mafia?"

"Oh no," she said, her voice thick with warning. "They make the Mafia look like Boy Scouts. These are guys no one crosses with impunity."

Someone worse man the Mafia?

"Who are they?"

"Look," Selena said. "Let’s just say he’s in Tabitha’s line of work, okay?"

Sunshine frowned. "Ladies’ lingerie? He hardly looks the type to sell that."

"No, goof-ball. What she does at night."

Sunshine formed a small O with her mouth as she understood. "He’s a vampire slayer?"

"Yes, and a really good one too."

That explained how they had met in the alley. Sort of, except the people who had attacked her hadn’t looked like vampires. They’d actually looked like yuppies.

"There’s a lot more to it than that, isn’t there?" Sunshine asked.

Selena nodded.

She smiled devilishly. "And you, my best friend on earth, my soul sister who shares Chunky Monkey scoops and beefcake e-mails at the drop of a hat, the woman who made me wear a frothy, ruffled lime-colored bridesmaid dress that added fifteen pounds to my hips, are going to spill your guts to me, aren’t you?"

Selena stiffened. "No fair and the dress wasn’t lime, it was mint."

"It was lime-icky green and I looked like a sick pistachio. But that’s beside the point. You’re going to spill everything because all’s fair in love."

Sunshine wasn’t sure which of them was most startled by the last part of that statement.

Selena turned to face her. "What? You’re telling me you love Talon?"

Sunshine sat back as she tried to sort through her feelings for Talon. There was so much about him that she adored, so much about him that she craved, and at the same time she knew nothing about who and what he was now.

All she knew was how he made her feel whenever she looked at him. The way she wanted to go home right now and be with him.

"Honestly, Selena, I don’t know. Every time I’m around him I feel so alive. So warm and protected-like nothing in the world can touch me or blight my happiness. He just fits with me. I know this sounds crazy…"

She paused as she glanced at Selena’s psychic stand, which was filled with trinkets, rune stones, and tarot symbols. On second thought, crazy to Selena was par for the course.

Sunshine stared at her, trying to make her understand. "Talon and I were married in another life."

A dark light appeared in Selena’s eyes. When she spoke, her voice was scarcely more than a whisper. "Does Talon know this?"

She nodded. "He even called me his wife last night when I made him sleep on the couch."

"Sleep on the couch?"

"Long story."

Selena turned one of her cards over. She looked at the Death card, then looked at Sunshine. "Did he say it was in his former life?"

"No. In fact, when I dream about him I look different, but he doesn’t. He even has the same tattoos and that is weird beyond weird. I even recalled him getting those tattoos done. Now I’m not sure if I’m insane or what."

Selena covered Sunshine’s hand with hers and gave a light, sympathetic squeeze. "No, hon. You’re not a loon, at least not about this."

"Then what is going on?"

Selena looked around, then leaned closer and lowered her voice again as if fearful someone would overhear them. "Sunny, tell me truthfully, what are your intentions toward Talon?"

Sunshine was irritated by the question. "What are you? His mom? I promise I’ll respect him in the morning."

Selena rolled her eyes. "This is really serious, Sunshine. Your current interest plays with some seriously bad things that wouldn’t hesitate to kill either one of you if they thought you or he would betray them."

Sunshine winced at the deadly earnest tone of Selena’s voice. This wasn’t good. "He’s a vampire, isn’t he? I knew it!"

"Not exactly."

"That’s what he said. So I’ll ask you what I asked him- what is ‘not exactly a vampire’?"

"A Dark-Hunter."

Sunshine was stunned that she finally had an answer. Of course, the answer made no sense whatsoever, but still it was a long-awaited start. "And that would be… ?"

"An immortal vampire slayer who sold his soul for an Act of Vengeance."

A chill went up her spine. "Sold his soul to who, the devil?"

"The goddess Artemis."

Sunshine scowled. Now that was the last thing she’d expected to hear. But then, given how weird this whole conversation was, she shouldn’t be surprised by anything. "You’re kidding, right?"

Slowly, Selena shook her head no.

"But that doesn’t even make sense. I mean, there aren’t that many vampires in the world, are there? Just how many Dark-Hunters could there be? Is he the only one?"

By Selena’s expression she knew the answer wouldn’t be pleasant. "There are thousands of Dark-Hunters and countless vampires. More correctly, they’re called Daimons since they’ve been around a whole lot longer than the word vampire."

Sunshine sat there in a stupor as she tried to take it all in. "I don’t get this. I mean, I always believed in vampires in theory, but not really in the flesh, and I’m having a hard time believing that there are so many out there that we have to have real slayers for them." She locked gazes with Selena. "No offense, but I always thought your sister Tabitha was a bit wacked."

Selena gave an odd half-laugh. "She is, but that’s beside the point."

Sunshine tried to come to terms with what Selena was telling her. She still wasn’t sure if she should believe it. Could Talon really be an immortal vampire slayer?

And yet, in a very odd sense, it explained a lot of things. A lot of things.

Oh Lord, he really was a vampire slayer!

She felt ill. "Where do the vampires come from?" she asked Selena, "Are they demons or are they made from people, like in the movies?"

Selena paused, then spoke softly. "Okay, let me give you a short history lesson and see if that helps you make some sense of this. Aeons ago, two races were created-the human race and the Apollites. The Apollites were the children of the god Apollo. He wanted to create a super race that would outdo us in every shape, form, and fashion. They were beautiful, extremely tall, and they had massive psychic powers."

Sunshine swallowed as she recalled her attackers. That definitely sounded like them.

"But like many others who have such powers," Selena continued, "the Apollites abused them and started warring against humans, trying to subjugate mankind."

"The Apollites were vampires?"

"No," Selena said, "you’re getting ahead of me. During the war between the Greeks and the Apollites, the Apollites killed Apollo’s mistress and son. In anger over their murders, Apollo destroyed the Apollite homeland, Atlantis.

"For their betrayal, the Apollites were cursed so that they would have to drink each other’s blood to survive, and they were forbidden to ever set foot under a single ray of daylight where Apollo could see them. Because his mistress was twenty-seven when they killed her, the Apollites were all condemned to die a horrible death on their twenty-seventh birthday."

"Die how?"

"They disintegrate and decay slowly over a twenty-four-hour period."

Sunshine gaped. "Oh, how horrible."

Selena agreed as she picked up her card and returned it to the deck. "They avoid that fate one of two ways. They either kill themselves the day before their birthday or they turn Daimon and start killing humans and gathering their souls into their own bodies to prolong their lives."

"How?"

Selena shrugged. "I’m not sure exactly. I just know that they drain the blood out of us until we die, then they take our souls into their bodies. So long as the soul is alive, they can live longer. But the problem is, the human soul starts to die as soon as they capture it. So it’s a constant quest to gather new souls to maintain their lives."

"And this gathering of souls is what makes them vampires?"

"Daimons, vampires, ghouls, whatever you want to call them. They suck your blood and your soul and leave you with nothing. Kind of like lawyers." Selena smiled. "Oh wait, I just insulted my husband."

Sunshine appreciated the attempt at humor, but she was still trying to digest all this. "And the Dark-Hunters? Where do they come from? Are they Apollites too?"

"No, they’re ancient warriors. After Atlantis sank into the ocean, the Greek gods were angry that Apollo had created and then unleashed the Daimons on us, so his sister Artemis created an army to hunt and destroy them. The Dark-Hunters. Talon is one of her soldiers."

"She created them how?"

"I don’t know. She does something to capture their souls and then returns the Hunter to life. Once they’re brought back, the Hunters are given servants and money so they can concentrate on hunting and killing the Daimons. Their only job is to free the stolen souls before the souls die."

Sunshine breathed deeply as she absorbed all this information. It wasn’t looking good for her or for Talon. "So Talon is sworn into Artemis’s service forever, then." Sunshine let out a ragged breath. "Jeez, I can really pick them. Talk about a go-nowhere, hopeless relationship."

"Not necessarily."

Sunshine looked up and caught the sneaky look on Selena’s face. "What?"

Selena shuffled her cards. "You know, Kyrian was once a Dark-Hunter…"

Sunshine’s heart leapt at the words. "Really?"

Selena nodded. "They do come with an out clause. True love can restore their souls to them and free them from Artemis’s service."

"So there’s hope?"

"Honey, there’s always hope."

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.