Harcourte Vampyre Society 01 Dangerous Revelations

by Unknown

  “I’ll feed him this morning, mon amour,” he said as Jolie pulled her hand away from Flynn’s.

  At that moment, she was incredibly thankful that her mate was willing to let her escape.

  “Jolie, I don’t know what to say,” he said, feeling like a part of him was being ripped out of his chest.

  She couldn’t even address that comment. She knew what she longed to say, but she couldn’t. “I have to go prepare for council. I hope that you find that path and happiness at the end of it, Flynn,” she murmured, walking away.

  “Wait,” said Brogan, standing up. He walked to her and turned her to face him. “I’m sorry, Jolie. It’ll be okay, because you have Jacques. One day, you’ll forget about me.”

  He couldn’t be more wrong.

  Jolie would never forget this man. From day one, her heart knew that he was meant to be her human mate.

  Now, he was walking away.

  This was why they never bonded anyone to them before. This hurt wasn’t worth any benefit in her book.

  As he slowly leaned down, he took a chance by bringing his lips to hers in a soft kiss. The ache that he was feeling grew the second they came together.

  Maybe he had been wrong. If he wouldn’t forget, it was possible that neither would she.

  Jolie refused to let him hurt. She took the higher road and brought her hand to his cheek in a gentle caress, even as he stared into her eyes, the lavender ones filled with tears. She fought valiantly, but the emotion slipped past.

  “I’m sorry too, Detective. Goodbye, Flynn,” she whispered, knowing that she needed to escape, or she would turn into a bawling mess.

  When the door clicked shut, without even a slam, his heart hurt more. Turning, he knew who he needed to face down next.

  Brogan turned toward the vampyre behind him. Where he expected anger on his face, it was completely blank. There was no emotion, no feeling, and no anger. He couldn’t even tell if he was mad or not. “I’m sorry, Jacques. I just don’t know if I can live in this triangle,” he admitted, motioned to the three of them.

  “Mon ami, you don’t need to apologize to us. You’re allowed to have feelings and needs that don’t include Jolie and myself. We would rather know the truth than believe a lie.” Flynn felt like he was abandoning them.

  “Now, come let me show you how to feed. It’ll be vital for your survival.”

  “Will I change back?” asked Brogan.

  “No, Flynn. You’ll always be connected to us. Don’t worry. We won’t interrupt in your life. You’ll still be stronger, faster, and live longer, but you won’t be able to reach us. Since you have chosen to leave, we’ll have to close you out. I have to protect Jolie from what this is going to do to her.”

  Brogan flinched at his brutal honesty.

  “As you can imagine, this hurts us just as much as it does you. Like you told Jolie about forgetting, with time we too will fade from your memory until we’re a shadow of your past.”

  He could only imagine how that had to hurt Jolie when he said it, since it slashed at his heart too.

  More loneliness washed over Brogan. This was going to be hard. Not only would he be alone, but he would live forever alone.

  Now, he saw the hell of immortality and understood why they didn't want to bond him.

  Brogan snapped back to reality just as Jacques continued on with the feeding lesson.

  “Put your hand on my chest,” said Jacques. He watched the misery in Brogan’s eyes and felt for the man, but Jolie was right. This had to be his choice. “Picture yourself drawing energy from my body.”

  Brogan listened to him and tried to do what he was teaching him. He closed his eyes and Jacques’s energy slowly began sliding into the palm of his hand, and then to his wrist. When he suddenly got a flash of Jolie in the shower crying, it caught him off guard. As quickly as it came, it was gone. She must have realized that he got through, because it slammed shut fast, and actually made him jump.

  “Are you alright, Flynn?”

  “What? Oh yeah. Let me try again.”

  When the lesson was over and Flynn was fed, Jacques knew that he needed to get to his mate. The pain on the man’s face was too much for even him to ignore.

  “Good luck, my friend. I know I told you that we were going to disappear from your life, but if you ever need us, call me. I’ll make sure you can always find your way home.”

  Brogan was awash with emotions.

  “Jacques,” he began, before being cut off.

  “Don’t forget to take your H2,” he added, tossing Brogan the keys that were in his pocket. With that, he turned and walked away from a man he had come to respect a great deal.

  He would miss him.

  Brogan sat on the couch, staring around the room and listening to the silence of the house. Shit. Could that have gone worse? He felt like the biggest fool on the planet. Here he felt like a part of a family, and yet he wanted to walk away.

  What was wrong with him?

  He was an idiot.

  Jacques sat in the room watching as Jolie moved around getting ready to leave for the council. She said very little in the hour since Brogan had informed them that he was leaving. He knew how she felt, since he had been in her mind most of the time, trying to offer her comfort.

  Jacques crossed to her and kissed her on the forehead as he pulled her into his arms. “It’ll work out, Jolie.”

  “I know, Jacques. I just didn’t expect him to want to leave us, and certainly not this soon. I know that I frightened him, but I assumed that we would be together for a long time. I let myself grow attached.”

  “You’re not the only one, mon amour. He doesn’t wish to stay, and we can’t force him.”

  Jolie just sighed.

  “What will you tell the council?” asked Jacques.

  “We must protect him, Jacques. As far as they’re concerned, Cassiel killed him and his body burned in the fire. They won’t let him leave alive. He knows too much about our kind. They’ll destroy him.”

  “Very well,” he said, brushing a hand down her back. “Come my love, we need to face the music,” he added, as he held her hand in his.

  “Let’s go, Jacques. Nothing they can say will make my day any worse.”

  In the garage, she stopped dead in her tracks and stared at Flynn’s blue H2. It made her heart ache, but she had to let it go.

  At that point, there was nothing more important than keeping him safe and alive. It was probably a good thing that he was moving away. Now, at least, he would stay under the council’s radar.

  As they climbed into Jacques’s vehicle, she closed her eyes. Jolie needed to find some inner peace or she’d weep. Leaning back, she relaxed as Jacques pulled out of the garage. She could sense Brogan watching her from one of the windows, but she just couldn’t look back at him. She reached for his mind and sent him a final farewell, before closing the connection and facing Jacques. It wasn’t easy, but that was life.

  “Shall we, Jolie?”

  “I’m ready.”

  Brogan stood in the window as they pulled away. The last thing he had expected was to get a farewell as she drove away. This was turning out to be the most difficult thing that he had ever done in all of his life.

  It sucked.

  When he couldn’t see the vehicle any longer in the distance, he grabbed his bag and headed out to his own H2. It boggled his mind how he was going to look at it and not remember his time with them.

  Ultimately, it would have to go back to them, since the pain would hurt him too much. He could tell Tommy that he broke up with Jolie and have him drop it off. That would explain why he was moving and ditching the pricy present.

  Yeah, it was all worked out.

  Now, if his heart would only believe it.

  The drive to his apartment was one of the longest trips of his life. He could smell both Jolie and Jacques lingering in the air around him. It ripped him apart and made him ache even more. As he pulled into his parking spot, he thought about t
he mess that was waiting for him. Anymore, he was going to make sure his personal space was neat and orderly, just like his room in Jolie’s house.

  Damn!

  There she was again.

  Opening the door to his apartment, something was wrong. He could see and feel the energy moving around him, and it didn't belong in his place.

  When he heard something in the bedroom, Flynn pulled his gun as he started toward the noise. Jumping around the corner, he found Chloe making his bed with fresh silk sheets.

  Yeah, more of a reminder.

  “Detective, you scared me,” she said, hand on her chest.

  “What are you doing here, Chloe?” he asked, pointing his gun to the floor.

  “The mistress asked me to come here.”

  “Why?” he asked, looking around.

  “She wanted me to supervise the cleaning company that she had come in to remove the mess Cassiel left behind,” she answered, motioning to the mirror and bed.

  “Oh,” he said, holstering his weapon.

  Shit.

  “There was blood everywhere. Jolie didn’t want you to have to deal with it.” Chloe stared at him with unusual colored eyes. “So, is it true? Are you really are leaving her?”

  He looked startled.

  This was the first time Chloe asked him something personal.

  “Yeah, I am,” he answered, looking bereft.

  “Well, the mistress instructed me to leave you this.” Chloe handed him a note and something in a large box. “If you will excuse me, I have groceries to put away, and then I’ll be leaving.”

  “Groceries?”

  “The mistress knew that you would still be hurt, and they didn’t want you to not eat,” she said, walking away from him.

  Well shit.

  He opened the note on the violet paper. It smelled of the expensive bath oil Jolie used. He slowly slid the paper out of the envelope and opened it, suspecting it was going to make him hurt even more.

  Dear Flynn,

  We had your apartment cleaned, so you wouldn’t have to deal with the mess Cassiel left behind. She would have never come after you if you weren’t bonded to us. Please keep what’s in the box. I want you to have it to remember me and the little adventure we had together. I wish you much success with your new job. One day, I hope that our paths will cross again when our hearts have had time to heal.

  Je t’aime.

  Jolie

  He read the words over and over again, and continued to get tripped up at ‘I love you’.

  He folded the note back up with a lump in his throat.

  Shit.

  It was all that he could think to say. Here, a beautiful woman, who he was attracted to, had told him she loved him, and he was hiding out in his apartment to get away from her.

  He had to be crazy.

  Crossing to the bed, he opened the large box, not sure of what would be waiting inside for him. Flynn slowly took the lid off and saw another envelope. He picked it up and read the front.

  For your new place and all your needs.

  He frowned, opening the envelope. It contained a cashier check for one million dollars. Immediately, Brogan dropped it like it was scalding hot. That wasn’t what he was expecting to find.

  Didn't most people just send a fruit basket?

  They were digging their way back into his heart as it began defrosting. He bent down and picked up the check to place it back into the envelope. Turning his attention to the box, Brogan began pulling the paper out to see what was underneath.

  One thing was for sure, it had to be very large.

  As he pulled the last of the paper away, his breath caught in his throat. It was the Van Gogh painting that Jolie put in his room at her house because he loved it. Oh shit. He sat on the bed brushing the sunflowers with his fingers.

  What had he done?

  Chloe checked on him to see if he was hungry. Heading into his bedroom, she found him lying on his bed, staring at the priceless painting.

  “She’s insane,” he muttered, trying to not fall further in love with her, but it was already too late. He was slipping down the slope and out of control.

  “She thought you would want to have it,” Chloe said quietly.

  “This is priceless,” he said, still staring at the spectacular painting sitting in the plain brown box. He didn't even have words for the million dollars. That was a whole different kind of crazy. “Why?”

  “It made you happy, so the mistress said that it was meant to be yours,” she paused. “It was just in her possession until you came along.”

  “Shit.”

  “Jacques had me pack it up.”

  Brogan just closed his eyes. “Where are they? I need to give this and the money back. I can’t take this.”

  “I’m sorry, but you can’t go to them. Jolie is in front of the council right now,” said Chloe, bending to pick up the packing paper.

  Yeah, she mentioned something about a council, but he had been too selfish to ask what was going on.

  “Why not? I’m bonded to them, so the council won’t care.”

  The young woman looked around uncomfortably.

  Immediately, his cop senses were put on alert. “What Chloe? What is it? Please tell me,” he said, willing to beg if necessary.

  Chloe sighed. “In order to let you leave them, Jacques and Jolie must tell the council that you died in the fire.”

  “What? Why?”

  “You know too much about the vampyres. You’re a liability. Once you’re invited in, you don’t get to walk away. They can’t let you leave alive, so in order to set you free, they have to create this lie.”

  His stomach twisted.

  “They can’t take the chance that the council would send out a guardian to end your life. They’re protecting you.”

  “Yeah, but at what cost?”

  Brogan felt the last hope of leaving Jolie and Jacques fall away. He knew what they were sacrificing for him. “What if the council finds out they’re lying?”

  Chloe looked uncomfortable again.

  “Tell me, Chloe!”

  “Jolie and Jacques can be removed from the society or executed for taking the side of a human over their own people.”

  Shit.

  It got worse and worse. “Is that why I can’t feel them or reach them?”

  “Yes. Master Vlad will search their minds for your true demise. Jacques will be securing their memories in order for them to create the illusion that you’re dead. Jolie was to bring you with her and Jacques. You were to be judged for your involvement, and that usually means one thing.”

  Brogan started for the door. They were going to sacrifice themselves in order to save him.

  “You can’t go there, Detective. They’ll be punished for lying. The mistress and master’s night is going to be bad enough. It’s one thing to be sentenced to death, but it’s another to be tortured for lying to the council. You’ll only make it worse.”

  “Tortured?” He was appalled. “I have to do something.”

  “Just wait here until I hear from the mistress,” said Chloe.

  “Why are you going to help me?” he asked.

  “Because they loved you enough to let you go. They also instructed all of us that if you ever looked for them, we were to take care of you… in case,” she admitted.

  “In case they were dead?”

  She simply nodded.

  The only thing Brogan could think of was how badly he screwed all of this up. He sat back on the bed and looked at the million-dollar painting in the box. He couldn’t believe that he was actually going to walk away from his family.

  He had already lost his parents. How stupid could he be to push them away?

  They were now making the ultimate sacrifice for him.

  Right this minute, they were preparing to die to set him free.

  If that wasn’t love, he didn't know what was.

  ∞ Chapter Twenty-Five ∞

  Tuesday Night

  Jolie a
nd Jacques sat among the council members, feeling the tension swirl around them. There was nothing but intense hostility pouring off her old friend, Genevieve. The woman wouldn’t even look at her, but then again they had just killed her child.

  Jolie wasn’t expecting adoration.

  Keeping her hand in Jacques’s, Jolie tried to remain as calm as possible.

  Master Vlad walked into the room and took his place at the head of the table. He looked around at all the masters and mistresses who had gathered. “Welcome everyone. I wish we were meeting for better reasons,” he began, as he scanned the room again. “Tonight, we must decide what is to be done to rectify the incidents that have been occurring without our knowledge.”

  It was at this point that Genevieve jumped from her chair and began wailing. “She has killed my only child.” She pointed at Jolie. “Mistress Harcourte must pay for killing one of us without council’s approval.”

  Jolie and Jacques stood from their chairs to defend themselves. “We didn’t kill Cassiel without provocation, Master Vlad. She had abducted the police detective who was bonded to us. She then took him to the club, where she was picking victims from, and staked him to the floor with silver daggers. Cassiel destroyed his mind and beat his body into a bloody pulp.”

  Okay, so far she was telling the truth.

  Jolie looked over at her old friend. “I’m sorry that you’ve lost your only child, but she freely admitted that she was responsible for the killings. Cassiel told us that the humans were food, and only that. When she attempted to kill Jacques and myself, by taking one of the women who works for me, we had no choice but to end her existence.”

  Genevieve screamed, pulling at her red hair until it came out in clumps.

  Jolie continued on, “We were forced to kill Cassiel, Muriel, and Dieter.”

  “You killed all of them because they were threatening your police detective!”