Page 126 of Storm of Fury
“She will be a lucky woman,” she said softly.
He knelt on the bedroll before her. The way he cupped her face in his hands and stared into her eyes left her breathless.
Don’t.Please don’t say it.
It would ruin everything between them.
And perhaps he saw it in her eyes, for his own half shuttered, and then he was leaning down to brush the softest of kisses to her lips. “Yes,” he mused, his thumbs caressing her cheeks. “She will be a lucky woman.”
* * *
The dream tore Bryn awake,her heart pounding in her ears.
She suffered a moment of disorientation—the clang of steel still ringing in her ears, and the flash of Tormund’s startled face turning toward an invisible opponent—before the dark of night finally soothed her.
The fire had burned low, the last lick of flame gilding the sculpted line of Tormund’s brow. And he snored under his breath, as if no nightmares plaguedhim.
Bryn sat up, swallowing hard as the blankets pooled in her lap. Tormund snorted under his breath, his arm thrown slackly across her hips.
Damn it. What had that nightmare been about?She used to suffer them when she was younger—flashes of premonition that warned of the day ahead. They always occurred before battle, though she’d not felt prescience grip her like that since she was cast out of Valhalla.
“It’s just a dream,” she whispered to herself, wiping sweaty hair back from her eyes.
Slipping from beneath his grip, she placed several logs on the fire, then paced the hut until the sweat along her spine had dried.
Maybe it was the thought of his loss that had awoken her dormant sense of prescience?
Maybe she was seeing a glimpse of him, far away in the future?
Or maybe her mind was conjuring thoughts because in her heart of hearts, she couldn’t fathom not having this enormous sleeping giant at her side.
Bryn slipped back into the blankets, snuggling into his embrace.
His earlier words still struck at her like hammer blows. This man—this gentle giant who laughed at the world when the world tried to kick his feet out from under him—was unlike any other she’d ever known.
Loyal.
Brave.
Selfless.
The kind of man who would give his life for his cousin without a single hesitation, for he loved him. The kind of man who would protect the weak and shoulder any burden.
Nothing like her.
She rolled onto her back and stared at the roof, a gaping hole in her chest bleeding mercilessly. She didn’t even know herself anymore. Years on this mortal plane had abraded the very core of honor from her being, until she’d become little more than a cold, ruthless mercenary.
Odin’s breath, what had she become?
No longer a hero, for sure. No longer fierce and fearless and bound to serve a higher purpose.
Sitting up, she dragged the furs around her shoulders.
It would be easy to surrender to Tormund’s conquest. She’d seen it in his eyes when he spoke of the wife he would one day protect.Her. He’d been thinking of her.
She could have it all.
Tormund’s warm arms around her. His child in her belly. A home. A… belonging.
