Page 69 of Vanessa’s Bravery

“I respected his choice. Thomas exiled him. We made sure he left the country the same night. And we notified the council and every vampire clan we knew, that if they harbored him, we would destroy them, and then hunt him down.”

Gabriel grunted.

Samson nodded. “We never got any alerts that Milo was trying to seek help from any of the clans in the US. He probably knew that nobody would dare to give him shelter. I guess he figured, if he couldn’t join another clan, he would create his own.”

“After such a long time?” Patrick asked. “How many years ago was that? Forty?”

“Thirty-seven years ago,” Samson confirmed. “And now he’s back to take his revenge.”

“With a bunch of incels he turned into vampires?” Patrick asked, shaking his head. “The one Ethan and I captured was so easy to overwhelm, I can’t imagine them to be a real threat to us.”

“That may be the case when it comes to a fight between us and the incels, but there are more ways than one to destroy what we’ve built for ourselves here in San Francisco. Unleashing the incels on an unsuspecting human population will wreak havoc, and has the potential to expose our secrets.”

“But—”

Gabriel interrupted Patrick’s protest. “Your father is right. Milo doesn’t have to attack us directly to harm us.”

“I need to tell Thomas,” Samson said. He dreaded the conversation.

“It’ll be a blow for him,” Gabriel guessed.

Samson rose slowly. “He’ll blame himself.

“As he should,” Patrick added.

Samson turned his head to his son. “No, he shouldn’t. I don’t blame him, and neither should anybody else. He’ll be his own harshest critic.”

For a long moment, Patrick didn’t say anything. “So, what are you gonna do now?”

“You and Gabriel get everybody to HQ for a crisis meeting. And I mean everybody, particularly the hybrids, even Isabelle. Have Virginia fetch Grayson and Monique and her brothers from New Orleans. We’ll need every hybrid we can get.”

“Why every hybrid?” Patrick asked.

“I’ll tell you at the meeting,” Samson said, an idea already forming in his head. “In the meantime, I’ll talk to Thomas. Alone.”

And that wasn’t a conversation he was looking forward to. But Thomas had a right to find out the identity of their enemy, before he announced it to everybody at the meeting.

33

Vanessa snuggled up to Cole, her cheek resting on his chest, her hand caressing his muscled torso, one leg across his thigh. She’d never felt so satisfied and happy than when in Cole’s arms, knowing that he accepted every part of her. After the most amazing sexual experience with him, they’d taken a quick shower together.

Now, they were in bed together, but they weren’t sleeping. There were so many things she wanted to talk to him about.

“You surprised me,” she began.

“Surprised you how? By coming to see you?”

She lifted her head to look into his face. “No. By asking me to show you my fangs.”

A soft rumble rolled over Cole’s lips. “I honestly don’t know what came over me, but when you showed them to me, fuck, it was such a turn-on…” He stroked over her ass, simultaneously moving her closer so her thigh rubbed over his cocks. “Just thinking of it now…”

She followed his gaze to his lower body, and noticed that his cocks were slowly but surely hardening again, even though he’d come only a few minutes earlier. Now was probably the best time to confess one last thing.

“Cole,” she said, hesitating.

“Yeah, babe?”

“There’s something you should know.”