Sin of Fury

Epilogue


A few months later...


Jamie looked up at the knock on the door. She was sitting with the kitten Talon had gotten her as an engagement present in the large greeting room, waiting for him to return with their lunch. After two months of being with him, he still didn’t let her leave much, and when he did, Talon was always with her.

“Yes?” she asked, picking up the black ball of fur. The small bundle stared up at her with bright blue eyes and mewed softly, pawing her in the face. She laughed and answered the door, shocked to see Zyn.

“Hey,” he greeted, standing there awkwardly. His shoulders were down, nervous.

“Hi. Come in.” Jamie stepped back from the door to their house, swallowing as his hulking frame fit through the door.

“I just wanted to come say hi, and talk to you about wedding plans. Your mother has been on my ass -- er, butt, about it and I figured I’d come to the main lady.”

Her mother had flown in from Texas several weeks ago. It had been awkward, watching her cool eyes land on the man that she had conceived Jamie with. She had expected to see tears, love, or something, but there had been nothing. Evidently, Jamie hadn’t been made out of love.

It hadn’t bothered her. Jamie was planning on matchmaking for the solemn man that kept his distance. As soon as he had found out they were actually getting married, he’d backed off to the point where he only said two words to her.

Insecurities warred in her as she watched him look around. Talon had said it’d been a present from a friend of theirs, but she had yet to find out who it was. Whoever had given it to them, though, was amazing. It was all she had ever imagined and was big enough to host parties and had the most amazing kitchen.

Which, fortunately, was full of lucky charms.

“Ah. She gets a little uptight about party planning, I guess. She’s trying to make this the wedding of the century,” Jamie said drolly, rolling her eyes. The kitten in her arms purred, rubbing its head against her shoulder.

She handed the ball of fluff to Zyn, and walked to the kitchen. “Let’s go into the kitchen. I can get you something to eat.” Jamie didn’t look behind her to see if he was going to follow her, just went to the kitchen, grabbed two bowls and two spoons, and then a box of lucky charms.

She heard the fridge open behind her, and then a jug of milk appeared in her face. She smiled at him and poured the cereal, stomach already growling. Jamie was just bringing him the bowl of cereal when he blurted out, “You’ve grown to mature. And pretty.”

Her lip kicked up in a smile, and she set it down, handing him the spoon. “You haven’t grown at all... Well, except more hairy. But that’s fixable,” she laughed, trying to play off her nerves.

“Thanks... I think.”

She nodded, taking a bite of the cereal. He set down the kitten, and it ran off through the large house. All of the windows were open, the sun was pouring in and illuminating the lights in his eyes.

They stared at each other till the urge became so great, she couldn’t stop herself. “What did you do with me? After I...died.”

He choked. She reached over and pat his back, watching him with wide eyes. “I gave you to your mother -- Did you have to ask that while I was in the middle of swallowing?” he asked, grimacing and rubbing his neck.

“I’m sorry about that. Can you just tell me...what you were doing that night? What you thought?” She prayed he didn’t ask why. The thoughts that ran through her head were embarrassing, and would only make her seem weak in front of him.

He didn’t ask. Instead, he stared off into the distance with haunted eyes, struggling to talk. “I was... horrified. It was the second time that I was too late to save someone I loved, so it was all a bunch of deja vu for me. It was worse, though, because you were my daughter. I was growing to love you even more than I had loved...

“I saw that fryst when I was on my way to find you.” He turned solemn eyes to hers. “I never thought you would actually leave the house at night, but I should have told you sooner why you shouldn’t. I should have introduced you to your world... As an heir, you’re meant to know everything there is about it. If anything happened to me, you would take immediate place as queen.”

She tensed, inhaling. “Go on.”

“I hadn’t thought he had actually done anything, but when I found you... it was too late. Your body was already splitting apart and your powers, which had been latent, were starting to burst. I wanted to kill myself -- and you, to end the pain that I knew you were... feeling.

“But I couldn’t. So I sat there, watching you die. I couldn’t touch you, I couldn’t do anything at all. It was the second time in my life that I cried. I didn’t cry when I watched my parents burn to death at the stake. I didn’t cry when I saw my brother die. But Jamie...

“I know I never knew you, and I know that I didn’t have any real right to love you like I did. I have lost everyone that’s ever mattered to me. I was so attached to you -- to the idea of you. When you actually started to open up to me, I realized that there were a lot of things... different between us. I never understood why you didn’t want to go to school -- well, I did a little. But things were happening quickly, I wanted you to have an education and I wanted you to be social again.”

“So,” she said slowly, trying not to notice the crack in her voice. “You gave my... what to my mother?” He’d said she’d split apart, and Jamie really had no clue what that meant.

He swallowed. “As soon as your skin...split apart, it was replaced. The power in you, the strength, gave you a new body. But then it also wiped you of anything you had before.”

“I didn’t remember...until I saw it, I didn’t know it had happened,” she said, dropping her gaze. “So you thought I was dead then?”

“No,” he said, voice thick. “I knew you were dead. I saw it happen, just as quickly as you turned into a long-haired Snow White. I sent you to your mother and she must have taken you to a hospital. Am I right?”

Jamie nodded. “Yeah, it was really...fast. I mean, I woke up and she was crying. And I hadn’t even known they sent me to live with you until I talked to Mike about it.”

“Mike?” he asked, staring at her. Jamie nodded, but didn’t explain. She couldn’t expect Zyn to know who she was talking about when the purple guy was practically a god. Actually, one of the Four Creators.

“Did you ever think that I might...not be?” she asked, twirling her fingers together. The kitten, named Sky, came racing into the room and slid into the wall. He shook his head, mewed, then went off again. She watched his tail leave the room and had to wonder what Zyn was thinking.

“No one has ever survived a fryst before. It’s virtually impossible. One touch from them and you’re screwed more than a nail.” He paused, and she thought they were done. That is, until he asked, “Why did you want to know?”

Jamie stared at him, and then looked away. At that second, Sky ran into the room and clawed at the chair, catching nothing. She reached down, picking him up and holding him to her chest.

“Jamie? Answer me.”

She flicked her eyes over him, raising a brow. “Ordering me around, are you?” Even though, a warmth came over her and suddenly, with her heart in her throat, she blurted, “I thought you didn’t want me. When I was told you just gave me back to my mother, I thought... yeah.”

“But now that I know you are, I’m here, aren’t I?” he asked, gesturing around them. Jamie nodded, closing her eyes against the tears. Sky, mewling in her arms, batted at a random strand of hair that swung down from her face. She pushed it back, scratching his neck before setting him down.

“Yeah, you are... But it doesn’t feel like it. Even Lucian has said more to me than you have, and he practically hates me.”

“I just never know what to say when I see you. I think about what I did to you, about how being your father has given you the most...f*cked up fate anyone could have. I felt so guilty, like this shroud of... fog came over me.”

“Why do I feel as if you’re softer with me than you are with other people?” she asked drolly, trying to break the ice after he fell silent.

“You are my daughter. I can’t treat you like I’m going to rip your face off, nor can I treat you as if you are lesser than me, like I’m accustomed to. This whole entire thing with me... you, us, is just... overwhelming. Maybe later on, we can... start over?”

A car pulled up in the driveway, and he looked at the door before back at her. “I can hear his car. I better get going.”

She frowned. “You’re my father, not my lover. It’s okay if you stay for a bit, you know...”

Zyn did the first thing she had ever seen from him -- smiled. “I still have this fatherly feeling in me that’s telling me to rip Talon apart, no matter how much he’s done for me. Naturally, I’m supposed to hate my son-in-law till we bond over some football.”

Jamie burst into laughter, pushing the forgotten bowl of cereal away from her. “Alright, I’ll see you later.”

In less than a second, he was gone. She shivered, pushing herself back from the chair as Talon came through the door, shopping bags on his arms and a welcoming smile on his darkly handsome face.

“Zyn was here?” he asked, running his eyes over her.

She nodded, smiling at him.

“You guys had a good talk, then?”

Again, she nodded. It wasn’t like she could talk when he spoke to her, or when he looked at her like that. Jamie savored every bit of him, couldn’t even help herself.

She stepped into his chest, laying her head on his chest. “I missed you,” she said quietly, feeling his arms come around her. She felt his breath at her ear, knew that he was enjoying the moment just as she was.

“I missed you too, angel... We still have to put that pocket watch that Mike gave us to use. Tonight?” he asked, waving his brows. Jamie still remembered how much it had hurt to touch the thing the first time, and had even looking at it caused arguments between them that she hated.

Talon understood, though. So he let her chose the time and date, and she had yet to give him the answer.

She bit her lip. “We could just...save it. For when it’s really important that we need it...”

He glowered. “What do you expect to happen? I’m never letting you out of my site again, so any threat to you becomes null void.”

Jamie rolled her eyes. His eyes had darkened to a stark black again, not their normal silver. She touched his jaw, bringing his face down to hers. She threaded her hands in his hair and said, “On our wedding night. That’s when we’ll use it. Until then, all I need to live is you and nothing else.”

He stared into her eyes, desire swirling in his own depths.

“Kiss me,” she said, blushing sweetly.

Talon did just that for the rest of the night.