Page 137 of Even Vampires Bleed
But wait. I killed Michaël and Gabrielle. He should be okay now, right?
“I have to thank you for the first,” he tells me with a knowing smile, but it’s like my brain is slow to find what he means because it’s only when he adds, “The electrician found a way,” that my mind manages to focus on where I was before the assassinations.
“That’s awesome! How did she do?” I exclaim before remembering it’s the middle of the night and that there are dozens of bats trying to sleep.
Instead of answering me, Léandre shows me the ring on his finger and the new earring that adorns his left ear.
“What?” I ask.
Yes, I’m that slow today—or is it tonight?—but I’ll blame it on the past few days and the trash smoke I inhaled just minutes ago.
I still don’t know what I’m supposed to look at. The ring and the earring are simple, so I don’t see what this is about.
“She gave me more chips. One in the earring, one in the ring, and another in my ankle. I’m now a faraday cage all by myself,” he says with a bright yet sleepy smile. “It’s been hard to use my holo though, because it doesn’t work when on my wrist, only if I use it with my fingers. And it has to be on a table or something else.”
I can’t help it. I jump into his arms and squeeze.
It seems to take him by surprise, but his arms wrap around my back almost right away, and I feel him squeeze me too.
Oh god, I needed that hug.
“What is that smell?”
I’m torn away from Léandre’s warm embrace at his question.
Oopsie.
“I might have burned something,” I say with a sheepish smile.
“Might?” Léandre asks with a raised eyebrow. “It smells like you set a trash can on fire. And I don’t mean the oneyouhave at your desk that’s probably only filled with paper. I mean, the trash bins at the back of the kitchen when the city service is once again on strike.”
Double oopsie.
72
Cassiopé
“My last mission wasn’t the cleanest of them all,” I tell him as I try to close my door so we don’t have to smell the garbage scent anymore.
“What was it?” Léandre asks with a pointed look. “What did she make you do this time? What could possibly involve stinking your entire room?”
“I wasn’t on a mission forLibération,” I say with a small voice, but he hears me all the same.
Léandre tips my chin up, so I look him in the eye.
I didn’t even realize my eyes were avoiding him, but it makes it all the more obvious.
I don’t know what it is that he does with his eyes, but the way he’s looking at me makes me believe I can tell him anything, and he won’t recoil.
“I wasn’t sure that the electrician would find a way, so I went to the palace and murdered Michaël and Gabrielle.”
It’s barely a whisper. I can’t let anyone hear what I’ve done.
I’m a little ashamed, too.
Not for doing anything in my power to protect the man I love.
No.
