George must really have been distracted to not see him sitting there the whole time.
His frown deepened and he looked at me. “What’s he doing here? I thought you broke up.”
I shrugged. “That was actually a lie. We’re still together, but nobody knows.”
George clasped his hands over his ears and his eyes widened. “Do not tell me things like that! Please!”
“Why not?” I glanced at Thierry. “It’s good gossip, isn’t it?”
Thierry nodded. “I’d say so.”
“That’s the problem!” George got up from the couch and paced to the other side of the room where he peeked through the curtains to the street outside, before spinning dramatically around to face us again. He wrung his hands. “Okay… I can’t believe I’m going to do this, but I have to. I’ve been keeping a secret so big that it’s literally been killing me.”
Thierry leaned forward a little. “Do you mean the secret that Gideon Chase is still alive and you’ve been working as his informant?”
I tensely studied George’s reaction. It didn’t come right away.
“You know?” His voice sounded strangled.
I nodded. “We both do.”
Instead of immediately trying to escape the house or explain it away in a rush of words, he let out a long, loud sigh of relief. “Thank God you know! I’ve been dying inside a little bit each day with this. You don’t know what it’s like to keep a secret this freaking big!”
“Actually—” I began, but George rushed back to the couch and grabbed me in a tight bear hug that squeezed the breath right out of me. He kissed me hard on the side of my face.
That was not the reaction I’d expected. At all.
George then hugged a very reluctant Thierry before sitting down hard on the floor and crossing his legs. “Gideon has been blackmailing me. He said he’d kill you, Sarah, if I didn’t keep him informed about everything you’re up to.”
Even though I’d already mostly figured it out, the confirmation still managed to stun me.
George was Gideon’s spy. That’s why he always knew where I was going and who I was with.
But, hold on a minute…
“He said he’d kill me?” I asked, surprised.
“Yes! And he said he’d kill Amy, too. I swear, I never would have helped him if I had any other choice. But I had to protect my girls.” He paused. “And myself, of course.”
Thierry stood up and came to sit next to me. He took my hand in his. “So you’ve been in touch with Gideon daily about Sarah’s whereabouts and activities?”
George nodded. “I only told him the bare minimum. Things like Quinn being back in town and dating Sarah.” He glanced at us each in turn. “Two men again, Sarah? Still impressed.
I’m currently mortified, humiliated, and unemployed, but I’m very impressed.”
“Forget about Quinn,” I said.
He raised an eyebrow. “Perhaps I should be telling you the same thing.”
“Why didn’t you tell me what was going on?” I’d been so ready to hear the worst—that
George had betrayed me over a stack of money, or something petty like that, but he wasn’t a good liar. He was telling the truth right now. I knew it. And it was such a total and complete relief I nearly burst into happy tears.
“Gideon said if I breathed a word he’d kill you and Amy.”
I shook my head. “I can’t believe he said that.”
“Gideon Chase,” George said the name shakily. “The leader of the vampire hunters?
Hello? He’s crazy. Certifiably insane, I think. And angry. And tall. And he had a lot of scars and then, poof, he didn’t have any scars anymore. What’s that all about? He threatened me and, based on his history of death and destruction, I wasn’t exactly in a position to argue with him.”
I nodded in agreement. “He’s desperate, sure. The pain from the hellfire made him do some fairly crazy things in the beginning, but I don’t know if I’d call him insane. Nicolai was insane. Peter was insane.” A vampire and a hunter, respectively, who’d both died when trying to kill me. “But Gideon is just… I don’t know… focused.”
George, who didn’t have any idea of my connection to the hunter, just stared at me with confusion. “What in the holy hell are you talking about?”
“Why are you defending him?” Thierry asked me quietly.
“I’m not defending him.”
“It sounds as if you are.”
I swallowed. “I’m just saying that he’s made a lot of mistakes in his life and the rich, hunting family he was born into didn’t exactly help. Maybe this situation—getting burned and now being turned into a vampire—is what he needs to finally change his ways.”
“You witnessed him kill two hunters tonight in cold blood. And he almost killed me.”
“I know that.”
“And even though he’s obviously lied about having any assassins or spies on call—other than his connection to George—he’s threatened the people you love with death.”
Thierry’s face had gone expressionless.
George’s eyes were very wide. “What’s going on here?”
Thierry raised a dark eyebrow. “It’s obvious. Despite what she might want me to believe, Sarah is smitten with the hunter.”
“I really hate that word,” I said, feeling sick to my stomach. “And I’m not. At all.”
“Gideon is very intelligent. He knows how to manipulate others to get what he wants. In
George’s case he wanted to use fear against him with threats. With you, Sarah, it began with threats, but obviously changed into something else he found more effective. Perhaps gifts? Compliments? Did he use his infamous charm on you? Is that why you enjoyed the kiss you shared the other night?”
“Hold on,” George cut in. “Sarah kissed Gideon? What the f—”
“Forget it, George.” I crossed my arms, feeling very uncomfortable suddenly at how perceptive Thierry could be. “It was nothing.”
“This is why you wouldn’t do the eradication, isn’t it?” George said. “Maybe you didn’t want to forget the softer side of Gideon?”