Or maybe they had found it…
CHAPTER two
Early Sunday Morning
It was time. Neither mate said anything to Jolie as she put away all of her purchases, but they had to believe she was aware it was coming. By now, she had to know them well enough that this wouldn’t slide. From the way she was stalling to avoid the inevitable, Jacques and Flynn knew she suspected the oncoming discussion.
How could she not?
Jolie wasn’t herself.
In fact, she was morphing into something they couldn’t tolerate.
Closed off.
Secretive.
Deceitful.
It wasn’t going to work for them. No, what was coming was due, whether she wanted it or not.
Despite how hard she tried to control it, Jolie’s heart thumped in her chest. From the way the men were watching her, she knew they heard it.
She was the prey.
Damn their abilities…
Knowing them, she was about to be pounced upon and enough was finally enough. The tension was so thick that she decided to stop it right then and there. Her heart couldn’t handle it any longer.
“Get it over with,” she stated out of the blue. Already, Jolie began shaking with fear. The truth was coming, and she wasn’t sure how they would react to the bomb she was about to drop.
That was a lie.
There would be anger at what she kept from them.
Flynn went first. “What’s going on with you? You’re moody since waking and distant after we were together again last night. I need to know if I did something wrong. Is it me, Jolie? Do you want me to go back to New Orleans? I can pack my things and leave you alone. I mean, if you aren’t in love with me, I can back away and give you space to be alone with Jacques. People fall out of love all the time.” Brogan almost felt bad for setting her up, but this was their plan. Nothing else got through to her, but this just might break through the ice. “This is your Paris, and I don’t want to intrude where I obviously don’t belong.”
She was horrified. “No! Flynn, my love! Please don’t think that!” Jolie was genuinely alarmed that her silence, as she tried to protect them from her past, had given them that impression. “It isn’t you, Flynn! I’m very much in love with you! I swear that’s the truth, and I need you here with me,” she whispered, fear squeezing her heart.
Oh God!
Had this terrible curse cost her one of the men she loved?
If it did, Jolie knew she deserved it.
Jacques continued, “Then is it me? Do you want me to leave, Jolie? I don’t have to be your mate. If your feelings for me have changed, I can go away if that’s what you want. I love you and Flynn, and I’ll willingly go back to just being your guardian if that’s what you need. I’ll sacrifice my happiness for yours any day. We both will.”
She gasped at his words. The pain would have hurt less if one of them had physically slapped her.
This was a mess.
Their plan was working. When Jacques’s eyes met Flynn’s, they equally shared the guilt that they had to push this hard to get to the core of what was hurting her. Sometimes, you just had to play dirty.
Jolie was keeping secrets, and it was their job to get to the bottom of it.
“No! Please! It’s not either of you!” Jolie’s hands began to shake even more. “I really don’t want to talk about this,” she stated, as she jumped up from her chair to pace.
They could see she was close to cracking.
“It’s not a pleasant topic, my loves. I wish you both could just believe that it has nothing to do with you. I love you both, and I want to protect you! Why can’t you just trust me this one time?” Hysteria was building deep within her because she had never considered that they would think it was her falling out of love with them.
What a mess!
The men knew they were close. As her accent got thicker, it was a sign that she was deep in panic mode.
Jacques was the first one to cross to her. “Jolie, my love, we’re here for you. Anything that you share with Flynn and myself will remain between us. We just want to help you heal. You’re hurting so much. Let us help carry some of the burden from your shoulders.”
“He’s right, Jolie. If we can’t help you, then we don’t belong by your side. We’re in a relationship--a couple-- and while it’s a very unusual one, it is still one none-the-less. Let us carry some of your sadness. We hate seeing you this way. Can’t you see it is breaking our hearts?”
This was a defining moment in their lives. If she held it all back, certainly, it would break them. Jolie didn't want to risk losing them. Instead, she’d have to trust them. After all, they were absolutely right.
“Okay. I’ll tell you what’s bothering me.”
They looked relieved.
Jolie crawled across their bed to sit with her back against the headboard. She had no idea how to even begin this conversation. When she felt the bed shift under their weight, the panic welled up. They must have felt it because their fingers linked lovingly with hers.
It was time to begin.
“We have you, baby,” said Flynn, kissing her fingers. “I promise.”
“I’m changing,” she said anxiously.
“Can you elaborate on that?” asked Flynn, confused by what that could mean.
Both men went still, waiting for her explanation. If she still loved them, then what the hell was going on?
“I had a nightmare last night while with Death.”
Flynn and Jacques said nothing, and to their credit, neither man’s face registered any shock. Jolie was impressed by their control.
“What was it about?” asked Jacques, as he caressed her arm softly. “You can tell us. We can help you work through it.”
“It was like a flashback to my past.” She said nothing more because the words were caught in her throat, strangling her.
Flynn shifted to curl protectively against her body. “What about your past, baby?”
“It’s all centered around what happened to me after my parents were killed.”
Jolie leaned her head back and closed her eyes. What she was going to tell them was quite possibly the most difficult thing in her life to have to put into words. She was queen of keeping the deep, dark secrets buried inside her. This was going to break a piece of her--she was sure of it.
“When my parents were killed, our society was taken over by Master Goethe. He took us into his home, continuing reign as primus.” Jolie felt herself getting lightheaded and nauseous.
“Go ahead,” urged Flynn. He could see how hard this was for her. Yet, he couldn’t let her stop. They had to know what was eating away at her.
Jacques sat there quietly observing the pain on her face as he lovingly stroked her inner arm.
“He had a sick fascination with me, and I was his personal toy for one hundred and fifty years.”
“Toy?” asked Flynn, beginning to feel sick. All he could hope was the horror wasn’t evident on his face at what he suspected she meant by the word. As a cop, he’d seen the evidence of abuse in many victims, and Jolie had that look on her face.
“Yes, Flynn, I was his toy, but that is too nice of a word to describe my role for those years in hell. I was nothing more than his property.”
Jacques’s eyes flashed as his gaze flickered from one mate to the other.
Jolie took a deep breath, but she was helpless to stop the tears from falling down her cheeks. There was no way that she was going to be able to tell them all of it. With that one sentence, she was ready to break.
“Please, baby, continue.”
“I can’t. Please let me show you what my life was like. If I speak of it,” she admitted, pausing while her breath caught in her chest, “I’ll break down.”
“Jolie, let us help you. It doesn’t matter how you do it, but let us in. Please,” begged Brogan, squeezing her hand. He glanced over helplessly at their other mate. Already, he could tell that Jacques was on the edge. He’d plaster
ed a blank look on his face--the one he used to hide his feelings from everyone.
She nodded.
“You can’t carry this alone anymore.” Yeah, their Jolie had been a victim of horrible abuse at Master Goethe’s hands.
Flynn could see it in her eyes.
Well, it was time.
Releasing the men’s hands, she touched their foreheads with chilly fingertips. The second she made contact, the barrage of visuals hit them.
It was a recount of her existence. There were pictures of her being chained to a wall while being beat, her repeated rape by the horrible monster for the fun of it, and her body broken and battered almost beyond repair.
Both men tensed.
The pictures flew by at an incredible speed while everything that had been done to her was laid out for them to see and judge her. Unable to open her eyes to see their faces, she continued by showing them the tiny room where he kept her for all those years, chained like an animal to the wall.
At that visual, Flynn gasped.
Yet, she didn't stop. After all, they wanted to know the truth. Well, here it was.
Jolie showed them how even during the beatings, she never cried, and never let him defeat her. She showed them the moments that made her what she was today, indelibly marked and damaged. It was risky, but she knew that she had to let them feel her pain, anguish, and humiliation. If she didn't, they would go on believing that they weren’t loved.
For them, she’d share the degradation that threatened to break her.
Jolie pushed on, showing them men how no one would help her free herself from the monster who owned her body. It overwhelmed her, making Jolie sick.
She wasn’t the only one.
When she pulled her fingers from their faces, she had to get away from them. The entire thing had stolen her voice and the ability to breathe. Against their will, Jolie fought to escape their embrace. She couldn’t bear to see the pity that she knew would be there. Everything had now just changed, and she needed some time to adjust to it all before she could face them again.
Now, she had to run.
Like a chicken.
When the door slammed, and she was gone from the room, Jacques wiped the moisture from his eyes. His anger was beginning to build. He glanced over at Flynn and saw the same emotions filling him too.
“I only wish the bastard was still alive so I could kill him all over again,” Flynn snarled, his heart breaking at the torture she had to endure. It infuriated him that some animal had put his hands, so brutally, all over what was theirs to love.
“My God! I never knew that happened, and I have no idea how she kept me from seeing that for all these centuries.” Jacques felt his own rage readying itself to explode from his body.
“What do we do now?” asked Flynn, his heart breaking for Jolie. He knew that victims of such atrocities suffered from guilt over what they’d lived through. Jolie would be the same.
Flynn could feel it.
“Mon ami, I don’t know. I’ve never seen her like this. How do you heal a century’s worth of pain, especially the kind that has reopened because of coming back here?”
“No wonder she has so much compassion for Mathew, Clariel, and Trina. Jolie had lived it for one hundred and fifty years.” He lowered his head, mourning for his mate’s heart and promising to find a way to heal it.
“We need to put our anger aside and fix this. As Jolie’s mates, it’s our duty.”
Flynn was well aware. “Yeah, and we need to do it now. I can’t sit here knowing that she’s alone and living through this again.”
“Let’s go find her and see what we can do.”
Jolie sat beneath the stars in the rose garden, breathing in the sweet scent of the flowers. She was still sick from having to share what her life was like long before her two mates. From here on out, all that she could hope was that they would treat her normally, and not like a wounded animal.
Jolie didn’t want sympathy and pity.
All she wanted was unconditional love.
She heard them approaching well before she saw them. Deep down, Jolie wasn’t surprised that they had sought her out. After what she had just dropped into their laps, did she honestly expect to be left alone?
Yeah, right.
Jolie kept her eyes closed. It was a way for her to hide from them and hold on to that last shred of dignity that was now laid bare for all to see.
“Jolie?”
“Yes,” she whispered. “I’m over here by the roses.”
“We want to talk to you,” replied Flynn, as he sat beside her in the dew covered grass. He didn’t want to touch her yet, as she looked so delicate and fragile. His fear was, that at any second, she’d bolt.
“Jolie, please talk to us.” Jacques sat at her other side before taking her hand gently in his. His hope was that it would offer her calm.
“What’s there to talk about? You saw the entire thing, Jacques. It’s what made Death want me as its harbinger. If you wondered why I’m a killer, there you go. Now you see the ugly truth of what lives in me.”
Flynn was up and angrily began pacing. Finally, unable to take any more, he stopped in front of her. “That is such bullshit, Jolie. I can’t even believe you’re saying that to us. Do you think we’re strangers? We’re the men who know you inside and out. This didn't make you some blood thirsty killer, marked by death. If anything, it gave you the ability to see people’s sorrows. Your past gave you a deep well of compassion. It didn't damage who you are today. You’re one of the kindest, most loving women I’ve ever met in my life. You can sit here and pretend that it broke you, but we know the truth.”
Jacques agreed.
“Mon amour, if not for those horrible experiences, you wouldn’t be as compassionate or as tender with the hearts of others around you.” He paused to pull his mate into his lap.
Jolie went willingly. She longed to feel some warmth.
He continued, “Look at Mathew. He was so damaged when he first came to us, and now he’s drawing and shopping. His heart healed just from being near you. When we touch him, he no longer flinches in fear. You didn’t need to take such a wounded spirit into our home, but you did it because you understood and could relate with his pain and humiliation. It makes you a kinder soul that you survived and fought against it. You didn't let the filth taint your beautiful heart.”
“You aren’t a killer, Jolie. What you are, is ours,” Flynn answered honestly, dropping to his knees before her. Without hesitation, he touched her lips with the pad of his thumb. “You’re ours for the rest of eternity, and that’s one hell of a gift--a perfect one.”
Jolie couldn’t hold the tears back any longer. They slid hotly down her cheeks while the men she loved surrounded her. “It was horrible. I can’t believe I survived those one hundred and fifty years. Goethe took my brother and myself and treated us like animals. I tried to protect him, but I couldn’t do it. He knew I would tolerate whatever he wanted, just to keep his hands off Alexzandre. I’m ashamed at what I did to survive.”
She sobbed.
Both men moved closer.
“Jolie,” they murmured at the same time.
The shame flooded through Jolie as she swore she could feel Goethe trying to run his vile hands across her body. When she shuddered, Jacques held her closer.
“What happened to your brother?” asked Flynn, as he sat beside her. When his hand closed around hers, he pulled her wrist to his lips in an intimate kiss. It was a sign of allegiance, and Jolie most definitely had his.
“He was sold, or at least that was what I was told. We were kept apart from day one, and I suspect that he was killed during one of Goethe’s games, shortly after we came to his care. I suspect they lied to me, so I wouldn’t find a way to die. I would have gladly succumbed to death to escape that life.”
Her mates stroked her chilly flesh.
Jolie relaxed into Jacques’s arms. “I wanted to die every damn day. In fact, I begged our mistress to let me die. I can’t
tell you how many times I tried to barter for a way out, but nothing worked. I remained a slave for so many years.”
“How did you escape?” asked Flynn, his heart wrenching in his chest at how she was curled up like a broken child.
“I killed the bastard.”
It was said with no emotion, and yet they could feel all her pain longing to be set free.
‘There’s our girl,’ thought Flynn. Good for her, and he hoped whatever she did was incredibly painful. Goethe deserved to suffer a great deal at her hands.
Jacques reassuringly kissed her cheek. “It’s over, Jolie, and we’ll protect you for the rest of our lives.” Her anger flared around them as Jolie pushed from his arms to frantically pace.
“How can you protect me? Each night when we die, there it is, trapping me with the scenes that I’ve already lived through. I couldn’t wake up, Jacques. I was trapped. Do you know how hellish that is?”
Flynn stood, moving toward her, only to stop short of touching his mate. “Yeah, I understand what that’s like, Jolie. That’s exactly how I felt with Genevieve’s dreams.”
Jolie glanced up at him.
The energy surged, so he stepped back. It was apparent that Jolie wasn’t ready to be consoled. This was survivor’s guilt. First, there would be anger, and then mourning. “I understand the feelings of helplessness, baby.”
Jolie started pacing, the anger boiling just below her skin. She needed to vent before it ate her alive. The combination of her past and being Death’s harbinger was almost too much to take. Jolie wanted to do something irrational. She wanted to lash out, smashing everything around her until the pain stopped crushing her heart.
The men saw her eyes bleed black. It was a sign of what was coming.
Shit!
This was going to be bad.
Jolie clenched her fists, her claws digging into her skin, burying themselves in her flesh.
Then, it happened.
The energy burst from her, ripping into everything around her. It knocked Flynn backward onto the ground, and then it caused every rose in the garden to explode, showering them all with petals.
Dangerous Misery (The Harcourte Vampyre Society Book 3) Page 5