“Ethan, what are you doing here?”
“Something strange just happened and you’re the only one I can talk to about it.”
“Strange in what way?” Jean-Luc pulled the robe a little tighter around himself.
“I was outside, checking the cameras we’ve set up there, and I know this is going to sound crazy but I’m certain there was a lion out there. Just for a moment… And not only that but Marcus was among the vines and I’d swear he was naked. Maybe I’m losing it, but…” He stopped, stilled into silence by Jean-Luc’s fierce expression.
“Have you told anyone about this?”
“No.”
“Good. I want you to keep it that way. No one must know what you saw.”
“Jean-Luc, what’s going on here?”
Jean-Luc walked over to the bed and sat on it. “I love my brother-in-law but sometimes he acts like an idiot. I was watching the lunar eclipse through my telescope and I happened to see him walking down to the vineyard. I can’t blame him for what he did—it’s difficult for all of us when the moon’s call is so strong—but I wish he could have shown a little restraint, given that we have guests.”
Nothing Jean-Luc said made any sense but Ethan tried not to let his bafflement show on his face.
“Ethan, I really didn’t want to have this conversation with you—not when everything between us is still so new and particularly not given the job you do.”
“Now you really have lost me. What does my working for a television show have to do with anything?”
“It’s the nature of that show. Your role is to look for things that lie outside of normal human understanding and expose them. Find answers for the most bizarre events.”
“Yeah, but until now we’ve never found any evidence of the paranormal. And even though Kim swears she’s been getting responses from the spirit of some unknown person down in the cellar, I honestly think it’s what she wants to happen. I bet when we play the tape back there’s some logical explanation for every last noise she’s heard.”
“You might want to hold back your cynicism. What would you say if I told you the legends about the Château LeBlanc are true—well, most of them, anyway.”
“Are you serious?” Ethan stared at Jean-Luc in disbelief. “Wild beasts guarding the property whenever it’s under threat? A fortune in paintings hidden on the premises that can’t be found?”
“Now, that second one’s the only tale you shouldn’t pay any credence to. As for my family? We’re different from you and your colleagues.”
“Well, yeah. You own a freaking sixteenth century castle, for a start.”
“Ethan, come and sit with me.” Jean-Luc patted the bedcovers beside him. “I’m sure you’ll find this hard to believe but…despite my appearance, I’m not human.”
“What?”
That’s such a ridiculous thing to say. He’s got to be kidding me.
“I’m a shifter. I have the ability to transform my shape into that of a lion.”
Ethan almost laughed out loud. This had to be some kind of prank the rest of the guys were playing on him. Unable to stop himself, he glanced round the room, looking for any evidence of a hidden camera. He’d bet anything Kim and Dex were sitting at one of the monitors downstairs, watching Jean-Luc spin this ridiculous story and laughing their heads off at Ethan’s reactions.
“Come on, man, you’re kidding me, right?”
“I’ve never been more serious.” Jean-Luc fixed him with his amber-eyed gaze.
The sadness in his expression reminded Ethan irresistibly of a wild beast, trapped behind bars. He shook his head. Surely there couldn’t be any truth in his lover’s ridiculous assertion.
“My kind has walked the earth for centuries,” Jean-Luc went on, “but we have been forced to hide our existence for fear of what would happen if the truth were discovered. We’ve largely been viewed with hostility and distrust, and in some parts of the world we have been hunted almost to extinction.”
“So you’re trying to tell me that not just you but Thérèse and Marcus—?”
Jean-Luc nodded. “Marcus is originally from the biggest pride in England. When he first came to work for me, he realized at once I was a shifter, too. And the moment he met Thérèse, he recognized her as his mate, just as I recognized you.”
“But that can’t be possible,” Ethan said stubbornly. “I mean, if what you’re telling me is true, then you and I can’t be meant for each other. How can I be if I’m not one of your kind?”
“I thought that, too. But Marcus’ sister knows a shifter in Bath who has a human mate. It’s very rare but it does happen. Fate threw us together for a reason, Ethan. You can’t deny that.”
“So, Benoît. Was he—?”
“Oh, he was a shifter. He grew up in
É
pernay.” Tears welled in Jean-Luc’s eyes. “I thought he was all I would ever need. When he was taken away from me so suddenly, I didn’t know how I would live without him. And I know now I haven’t been living. I’ve simply been existing, just like Marcus always said.”
Mention of Marcus brought Ethan back to the incident that had sparked Jean-Luc’s revelation. “So when I saw the lion earlier on, it wasn’t a figment of my imagination. You’re telling me it was actually Marcus.”
“That’s right. And the reason he was naked when he changed back into human form is because we don’t transform while we’re clothed if there’s any way we can avoid it. Shifting has a nasty tendency to ruin whatever we’re wearing.”
Ethan thought back to the comic books he’d read as a child. They’d featured heroes who’d transformed into wolves and all manner of other monsters. In the process much of their clothing had been ripped to shreds yet somehow they’d always managed to keep their trousers on. What Jean-Luc described made more sense—as much as anything in this whole crazy tale could.
“So if you wanted to, you could turn into a lion right now?” He did his best to sound flippant, wanting to disguise the curiosity Jean-Luc’s bizarre confession had aroused in him.
“Are you asking for a demonstration?” Jean-Luc reached for the belt of his robe.
Ethan knew he only had to give the word and his lover would bare himself to him. Even if the line about being able to shift was a joke, having Jean-Luc naked and aroused would be decent compensation for a fruitless night’s ghost hunting. He stood then took a couple of paces back from the bed, not at all sure what he wanted. Then his gaze fell on the LeBlanc crest, carved into the wooden footboard.
“You know, you really had me going there for a moment.” He let out a sour laugh.
“What are you talking about?”
“There’s nothing in this shifter story, but well done on almost making me believe it. You thought you could spin me a line and I’d fall for it because it’s right there on the family crest. What were you going to tell me next—that Oriel LeBlanc actually did turn into a lion on the battlefield at Agincourt to try and defeat the English?”
“Ethan, this isn’t a joke.”
“Yeah, right, and I really am your chosen mate. The one true replacement for the sainted Benoît. Thanks, but I don’t think so. Goodnight, Jean-Luc.”
He slammed the door behind him as he left, only grateful that he’d discovered how he’d been played before he’d given his heart to Jean-Luc completely.
Chapter Eighteen
Well, that could have been handled better.
Jean-Luc put his head in his hands. The doorframe still seemed to reverberate from the force with which Ethan had made his exit.
He could cheerfully have throttled Marcus at the moment. If it hadn’t been for his brother-in-law’s stupid indiscretion, he’d never have had to try to explain the truth of his nature to Ethan. They could be lying in each other’s arms, making the most of the time they had left before the
Spirit Seekers
team was scheduled to leave. Though he’d still hoped, somehow, he could persuade Ethan to stay permanently. That now seemed unlikely, to say the least.
He stood, in need of a drink to calm his rising frustration. There was a bottle of cognac in the little cabinet built into his bureau, along with a heavy-bottomed glass. Jean-Luc poured himself a generous slug then drank half of it in one mouthful. The spirit burned its way down to his belly and he let out a growl of satisfaction.
Playing back their conversation in his mind, he could see why Ethan would question his story. From what Jean-Luc could gather, the man had spent his whole professional life actively pouring skepticism on anything relating to the paranormal. He’d been presented with all the evidence he could need that some things could not rationally be explained away. Yet he’d chosen to believe he was being tricked.
When they’d had the opportunity, the LeBlancs had adopted the lion as their symbol, realizing it gave them the ability to hide in plain sight. Their motto should have been caution, not strength, for that was what had ultimately driven their actions. Ethan couldn’t understand what it was like to be forced to keep his true nature a secret. He’d been lucky enough to grow up in a time when diversity was not only tolerated but openly welcomed in many places. If Jean-Luc had been given the chance, he’d have explained to Ethan there were shifter prides in America who’d been living there long before the land had been settled by incomers from Europe. One of the biggest still lived in and around the town of Salem. They had seen first-hand how humans could turn on and persecute their own, driven by fear and hysteria.
Another long swallow and he’d emptied his glass. He thought about pouring himself more cognac then decided against it. For all he knew, Ethan had gone straight downstairs to round up the rest of his colleagues and was telling them they were staying in a house full of shape-shifting abominations. If he caught up with him before it was too late, he could perhaps persuade him not to say anything. Not for the first time, he wished that when Marcus had first informed him about the imminent arrival of the TV crew, he’d been strong enough to refuse them entry to his home.
He pulled on his slippers. Someone knocked on the door, and he stiffened. In a less enlightened era, this would have been the moment the mob arrived with their pitchforks and flaming torches, seeking to drive the monster from his lair. Now, Jean-Luc expected to be confronted by the glare of a camera lens and have a microphone thrust beneath his nose.
Instead, when he cautiously opened the door he saw only Ethan, whose face was pale, apart from high spots of color that burned in his cheeks.
“I’m sorry,” Ethan muttered. “I’ve been an idiot. I jumped to the wrong conclusions.”
“What do you mean?” Jean-Luc asked. He ushered Ethan into the room then shut the door behind them. Whatever Ethan intended to say, their conversation was clearly best discussed in private.
“I thought you’d cooked up some scheme with Kim or Dex, trying to make me look a fool. You know—get the sceptic to believe in some ridiculous story about people who can transform into lions then tell me it’s all a hoax, with my reaction captured on video. Then I thought there’s no way you’d let any of the crew in here to rig up a camera. And I started thinking—what if you were telling me the truth?”
“I was willing to show myself in lion form to you. I wouldn’t take that risk for any other human. What more did I need to do?”
“I know. But you’ve got to appreciate this is a lot for me to process.” Ethan leaned against the wall. “It explains why Marcus was acting kinda suspicious down in the vineyard, like he’d been caught in the act. And it’s making me reconsider a lot of things I’ve always taken as truth, even before I started working on the show.”
“What sort of things?”
“That there isn’t anything beyond our earthly existence. I was raised in a religious household but my parents always let me make my own choices. They never forced their own beliefs onto me. As time went on, I looked round at the world and saw so many bad things going on. And I wondered what kind of God would allow those to happen if He genuinely loved all his children.”
“Perhaps it’s a test of their faith?” Jean-Luc suggested.
“I don’t know. For some reason, that answer’s never set easily with me. And when I came out, just after my seventeenth birthday, I got a pretty bad reaction from a couple of people who considered themselves to be Christians.” Ethan shrugged. “But I also got the cold shoulder from so-called friends of mine who’d never set foot in a house of worship in their lives, so what does that prove? Anyway, I just grew more certain that when we die, that’s an end to it. We don’t go on to a better place and we certainly don’t remain in limbo, trapped and seeking to be released.”
“So why get a job as a paranormal investigator?”
“Yeah—it’s like being vegetarian and working in a butcher’s shop, right?” The smile quickly faded from Ethan’s face. “I guess while Kim’s trying to prove the presence of spirits, I’m looking for the absence of them. It’s shallow but I just need to know I’m right. And now I discover that even though there may not be ghosts here, the château is owned by creatures who shouldn’t exist… No offense, Jean-Luc.”
Jean-Luc spread his hands wide. “None taken. In most respects we’re not so very different from you. Though we tend to live around half as long again as the average human, and we age more slowly.”
“So if this isn’t a rude question, how old are you? I mean, I had you down as mid-thirties, but…”
“I was fifty in the summer. And Thérèse is a couple of years older than me.”
Ethan nodded as if taking a moment to digest those facts. “Well, at least one thing makes sense now. I was talking to Thérèse and she said that your dad had been the one who’d tried to help out those villagers during World War Two. I thought she’d made a slip of the tongue but she was telling the truth, wasn’t she?”
Jean-Luc nodded. “
Papa
died five years ago at the age of ninety-nine. He became the man of the house when he was only eighteen, after my grandfather died of tuberculosis. He was one of those wise people who understand the responsibilities that come hand-in-hand with a position of privilege. I’ve always tried to follow his example but I’m not sure I have succeeded.”
“It seems like you’re doing a pretty good job to me.” Ethan reached to push a stray wisp of hair away from Jean-Luc’s forehead. His fingers brushed the shifter’s skin, and Jean-Luc was lost.