AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I kept my shudder to myself, but Juan Carlos was less capable of controlling his reactions.
“What did you say to me?”
“Tell me, Juan Carlos, what is it that has made you loathe the girl from the moment you laid eyes on her?” Sig asked.
“I knew from that very first day she didn’t belong. What kind of vampire—half-blood or otherwise—willingly asks to kill her own kind? She was eager to become our assassin. She reveled in the deaths of our brothers and sisters.”
“Deaths we demanded of her. She may have carried out the executions, but the sentences were ours. You cannot blame her for doing her job.”
“I don’t approve of her enjoyment of it.”
“You hate me because I was good at killing vampires?” I asked. “Or did you hate that I was so good at it I kept coming back?” He’d always wanted me dead, there was no great secret there. I hadn’t been able to figure out the source of his loathing though. Now, it seemed, I was finally going to get my answer.
“You were never meant to be one of us. Never.”
“And even after the council said I was going to be on the Tribunal, you couldn’t let it go. Everyone accepted me but you.”
“I won’t accept you. Not now. Not a thousand years from now. And I won’t have to, because you are mortal. You’ll wither and die, and others will come to replace you. Centuries from now I will still have my seat, and you will be erased from even the longest of memories.”
It was hard to argue with him. I was mortal, and though I didn’t know if my vampire blood would extend my natural life expectancy, if I did live to old age, I would still succumb to the ravages of time one day. That was the theory, anyway. The likelihood of me getting to test it out was slim to none, especially now.
“So the reason you hate me is because I’m human.”
“I hate you because everyone thinks you’re special and worthy of great praise. I hate you because even you think you’re above the laws. But most of all I hate you because he can’t see you for what you really are.” He was pointing at Sig, his hand trembling. The whites of his eyes were almost invisible thanks to the inky-black pools of his irises.
Understanding struck then, and I got it. All the hatred, all the anger, all the barely repressed violence. Juan Carlos didn’t want to fuck me at all.
“You’re in love with him,” I said, hardly believing the words even as I spoke them.
Everyone’s attention was on me now.
“Wh-what?”
“You don’t want to sleep with me. You want to sleep with him. You’re in love with Sig.”
Sig glanced from me to the other man. In spite of Juan Carlos being impeccably dressed in his usual Armani, and not a single one of his black hairs out of place, he appeared to be coming apart. His eyes took on a glassy sheen, and he couldn’t look at me or at Sig.
“This is madness,” Arturo said, coming to his feet. “We’ve come together to determine whether or not the girl is a traitor, not to trade malicious gossip about her fellow Tribunal leaders. I insist this discussion come to an end now.”
Juan Carlos appeared relieved for his reprieve and returned to his seat, still visibly shaken. I wasn’t quite ready to let my discovery go though, because it all made so much sense. In all the years I’d known him, Juan Carlos had never had a lover. He did not take human consorts like some of the other vampires, nor did he have any ongoing relationships with the other vampires around us.
At the time, I’d assumed it was because he was an asshole and no one wanted anything to do with him, but now it all made perfect sense.
Sig had shown a special interest in me from the very start, and that was why Juan Carlos had hated me. He saw all Sig’s extra attention was turned in my direction, and any preference Sig might have had for him had slipped away.
All his anger—years’ worth of resentment—all came down to simple jealousy. I could have laughed at the absurdity if he hadn’t made my life such a living hell because of it.
“Could you be a bigger idiot?” I snapped. “I wasn’t trying to steal him from you. Not ever. And what’s more, he’s not mine to be stolen.”
“Shut up,” Juan Carlos grumbled, turning his face into his open palm. “Just shut up.”
“Enlightening,” Sig added, though he didn’t seem to mind the revelation one way or the other. I suppose after living as long as he had, he’d had his fair share of lovers, probably of both sexes. At the very least, I doubted Juan Carlos was the first man to fall in love with him.
“Sometimes I’m not even needed.” Monica came to stand closer to me. “No wonder he trembled at the thought of me reading him. And over such a boring secret too. As though anyone should care who he loves except for him.”
While most vampires were too old or too experienced to bother themselves with things like homophobia, Juan Carlos had been a military man. A conquistador. I was speculating, but perhaps his hatred had more to do with personal shame because he believed himself to be less masculine for loving another man. What the hell did I know about the inner workings of his mind, though?
“He’s not the traitor.” I brought the focus back around to what mattered. “Juan Carlos hates me, and he wants me dead, but he didn’t conspire to kill me.”
