Page 69 of Even Vampires Bleed
Someone is already using it.
The next after is empty, and I prepare the bed the same. Léandre is helping and brings the blanket to the bed as I catch the butterfly in my hands.
“This one is yours. Do whatever you need. You must be tired. I’ll be back with some food for you too,” I say softly and then approach my hands to the blanket.
It takes more time for the butterfly to leave me and drop to the blanket than it took for the lizard, but in the end, it still happens.
Slowly, I get away from the bed and the butterfly flies in my direction.
“No, no, no,” I tell them. “This is your room. I have one, too, but each of us needs to sleep in their room. I’ll be back very soon though. I promise you.”
The butterfly seems reluctant, but it still goes back to the blanket. Léandre and I leave the room once again.
We do as I said and get down to the kitchens to get food for the two new occupants of Notre Dame, and without surprise, they’re both asleep when we get back to their rooms.
I leave the food on their desk with aclocheon top to avoid the chicken, green beans and rice but also the chocolate cake to go bad.
It’s also a way to ensure those two shifters try to get back to their human forms so we can meet them, have a normal conversation, and see where to go from there.
Léandre is silent while I deal with everything, but it’s not awkward. It’s more like he’s trying to study me.
He’s never seen me in any other situation than planning a robbery or executing said plan.
If you forget the first time he found me crying, of course.
He’s silent, and that leaves me with the chance to think.
“Did you have anything with you when you came to pick me up?” I finally ask as we make our way to Elhyor’s office.
The team is bound to be back soon and some things need to be addressed before I go back to the Sacré Coeur.
“Not much,” Léandre answers, but seems to stop himself. “Wait, that’s wrong. I had my holo. It slipped my mind when we shifted and flew away. But it’s still there and has the blueprints of the entire palace.”
“Where did you get those?” I ask.
But I know the answer even before the words pass his lips.
“Luc.”
“We’re screwed,” I tell him as I hear the front door.
I don’t know what’s worse for Léandre, though. That no one talked about the fact his memory could be erased again or the fact that when—not if because I know it’ll happen—Michaël’s soldiers discover our clothes in the darkest corner of the cell, and Léandre’s holo at the same time, the archangels will have proof to incriminate Elhyor by association.
The archangels like their freedom and don’t usually have cameras inside Versailles’s castle, so there was no recording of the attack we launched against Versailles a few months ago. The only trace left are the currently-being-mended wings of Gabriel and my still-in-a-coma dad.
But now, they’ll have a way—tangible proof—to show in court that one of Elhyor’s men invaded the privacy of their home.
It’s going to be a mess.
Not sure that it would be a worse mess than what this is already, but I don’t think adding a layer of lawyers on top of everything is going to make anything easy.
My thoughts are still spiraling inside of me when Elhyor arrives at my side and hugs me from the side.
“Are you okay, Cassie?” he asks with genuine care.
“I’m good,” I say.
Because, yes, physically I’m good. My mind is a place I would wish on no one—even my worst enemies—but my body is completely fine.
