“Don’t trust Frederick,” he says to me, and now the subject of Sebastian is closed forever. I know he will never open up about it again. “You cannot trust him, Aefre.”
I heave a sigh and pull away from him, standing up to stare into the darkness. “I do trust him. I always have. You know how I...felt...about him. I know that’s not what you want to hear, but I do trust him,” I say.
“Why, because y
ou are screwing him again?” Constantine spits out before I hear him curse under his breath. So maybe not completely a changed man then?
I wanted him pissed, with me and Frederick no less, and I got my wish as he is seriously pissed. “No,” I say calmly. “Because ever since you sent me on that blasted journey to Florence with him as my guard, I have known him. I trust him.”
“You wouldn’t if you knew who his sire was,” CK says with such spite, I almost laugh out loud until what he said, sinks in. My stomach twists into a knot and I stay looking away from him as I swallow and whisper, “Gregor.”
“Oh no,” CK says almost in triumph at my agony. “A man who repulses you far, far worse.”
I spin around, horrified. I had always thought it was Gregor, when I allowed myself to think about it, but CK has just made it very clear that I couldn’t have been more wrong or more stupid. “Lance,” I whisper, looking straight at the charge of the Vampire I fear and loathe more than anything in my eternal life. Frederick couldn’t have arrived at a worse time if he tried. He glares back at me before he turns those malicious eyes to CK.
“You truly are an evil bastard,” he says.
“Why?” I whisper. “Why did no one ever tell me?” I am shocked and appalled. Not only that I let a man so close to the Vampire who tortured me endlessly for years, into my life as I did all those centuries ago, but that CK put him there. Made him my protector, gave him my life to look after.
“You fucker,” I spit out at him as no one answers me.
“Aefre, it wasn’t as simple as that,” CK says, now regretting his actions. He told me to hurt me and now that he has, he knows this is a game he had convinced himself he would never play again.
“I was the one who saved you,” Frederick says, now the one to give me a triumphant look. “Always your protector, Lady Aefre. Don’t ever forget that.”
“Saved me?” I hiss at him. “Saved me? After how many years?”
The victorious look disappears and his eyes cloud over. I shake my head and turn back around to look out of the window.
“I think both of you need to piss off right now,” Devon says quietly, approaching from where he had been hovering at the top of the staircase.
“Aefre,” Constantine says, his voice pleading. “I’m sorry. I’m overwrought with today and I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“No, that’s the point, you should have. Seven hundred fucking years ago!” I snap at him.
“You can trust me, Aefre,” Frederick says steadily. “That has never changed.”
“We’ll see,” I say mutinously and wait impatiently while they both take their time leaving.
When they have gone, I say to Devon, “What an idiot. I should have known.”
“Does it matter now?” he asks, standing next to me.
I blink up at him in surprise.
“You can’t keep letting that fucker ruin your life, Lizzie. He’s dead. Gone. Never to return. You can’t judge a charge by their sire. Christ knows you should realize that better than anyone…twice over….”
The smirk on his face makes me laugh. “You are right. I know you are. I’ll forgive them eventually for lying to me.”
“Not lying, leaving out. You know it’s a thing,” Devon waves his hand around to indicate that blabbing about one’s sire is up to the individual concerned and is also considered quite gauche in the upper echelons of Vampire society.
“Semantics,” I mutter, making him chuckle.
“Come,” he says, taking my hand. “I really need some time alone with you.”
“Me too,” I reply and let him lead me to my old bedroom.
We snuggle happily on the bed for a few minutes before he ruins it by asking how I am.