Essence (Nectar 3)

Tristan got a lot of insight about the past from Sergey’s father, Dmytro Voitenko. He’d found out his father had been put in that pit in time out by Alexander due to the fact that he was ready to take off with his pregnant wife and join the coalition. Alexander found out and stopped it. He got caught up in a war with the coalition that took up so much of his time that he opted to keep Taryn and Tristan safe and secret. He had them guarded from a distance while she raised Tristan alone. He had a plan B. He was trying to raise an alternate, so he could choose which prince might become king, but that didn’t work out. Tristan told Kyla that when he was a kid his mother had always joked how she never knew how she stretched a dollar so well. Taryn got periodic infusions into her bank account and was mesmerized into thinking nothing of it.

Some coalition members took out that plan B Kovac family. Violently. Some reorganization had to happen within the coalition and possibly with Lucian’s involvement. That was still being investigated. Some of them were exterminated.

Now the coalition was getting stronger. Key members were going public. Adrian was gone. The European breeding program was on the verge of being shut down, too.

The remaining human pets at The Compound were being relocated. Some were being given new identities, some were being turned. Some were being moved overseas. Some were so far gone from what they’d been through that a task force was being put together to figure out what to do for them.

There was still hedonism in vampirism. There were still women being taken from their lives and fed on, sexually interfered with, and then returned to their lives none the wiser, but things were on the right path and there was now a democracy going into place to deal with things in a way that didn’t come from a place of elitism.

Tristan decided to contact Andre Tsakos. He had to talk to Andre about some Kovac business. He asked Andre to relocate from Cyprus and step in for the USA, taking over Brandt Brooks’ position with Kovac Capital. Tristan said that Andre and Rebecca were going to travel to The Constantin Center and that was where Tristan had planned to approach Rebecca, make her the offer of trying out Sasha’s formula. He was planning to keep Kyla far away from her, though.

Kyla had asked Tristan to recommend that The Center be renamed. Perhaps to The Jasper Voitenko Center. Sergey’s mother Anya was also a doctor and she’d been instrumental in helping Sasha.

One of the European doctors worked with Adrian’s serum to block mesmerization and decoded the recipe easily. It worked on Kyle. Kyle was still pondering whether or not he wanted to be vampire. He and Sasha had a conversation about it and he told Kyla he was still thinking things over. It was nice that he was lucid all the time. He and Tristan even got along pretty well. He still had his issues with vampires after all he’d been through, but he was coming around, thinking about his future. She wasn’t sure where things were at with him and Sasha, really, but he told Kyla he wanted to find their mother and sisters and talk to them. He knew Lyle and Katya from occasional visits to the compound and he’d known the sisters before they were turned; they lived at The Constantin Center with him for a while. He wanted to approach them about the serum as well but agreed to wait until Taryn and possibly one or two others had seen some results. There was a niece, as well. She was okay for the time being at boarding school but Kyla and Kyle were interested in learning more about her.

Sam took a stock of that anti-mesmerization serum for himself and had planned to start dating. He wanted to connect with someone, he’d said. He was planning to play the field a little bit and see how that went. He said he’d sworn off female vamps for the foreseeable future, after what’d happened with Brandy, who Kyla suspected he was actually falling for, before things went wrong.

There was a lot happening with the dismantling of the breeding program at The Constantin Center. A lot happening with some of the medications and formulas to help vampires with their urges, their hormones. It was still early days.

Despite Brandt, Claudio, and Adrian now out of the way, there were a few unhappy elitist council and board members to deal with. Tristan, Sergey, Sergey’s father Dmytro, and a few other elders all met with the top North American vampire council to discuss proposed changes, including an elected council government of sorts, and either royal, true vamp, or turned vamp could run for office. A court would be appointed as well. Lucian Kovac would go on trial for multiple murders. He was involved with the coalition against the breeding program but had been twisted, apparently mostly due to jealousy of Alexander. Adrian claimed Lucian had taken out dozens of people housed at The Constantin Center almost thirty-six years earlier in order to stop the breeding program. He’d allegedly murdered pets or wives of several senior council members as well as elders. One of those women was Sergey’s wife, Anastasia Voitenko. No one could seem to read Lucian for the truth. He was quite demented, which might have been why.