My precious, Renee,

My hopes grow that one night y ou will see the love that lives deep inside this shell of a man. On that night, the night that I can truly see that same love come back to me in your eyes, I will then again make it right by giving you the ring to be my bride. All that I can do now is wait and if that time never brings you to me, then I will know it was never meant to be. I would walk the day for you, my love…a thousand times.

Yours forever,

Martin Vegee Lebrun

I folded the note back up and sat down in the high back chair that faced the heat. A part of me wished I had never taken the ring off, and another was glad that I had. In my life as a normal I would have never stood up and spoke my mind, but through all the hell that we had all been through, not just myself, all of us had changed. The things that Martin wanted, like to live out our days in his home somewhere in France, without continuing our fight to free the others living in torment was impossible. Yet, until he could see that what we were doing was the most important thing right now, and was the reason that I felt like I was created to be a part of this black world, he could never have me as the bride that he had wanted from the time he found me on the farm. Which now seemed like it was someone else’s life and from a very long time ago.

Chapter Nine

I woke with my head leaned to the side and still sitting in the same chair. The fire had burned out and my room was extremely dark. I stretched my legs out, yawned in my first breath of the night and jumped halfway out of the chair when I saw Jacob sitting in the matching chair beside me. “I see you chose to sleep as I do, sitting up. How did it suit you?” he smiled. I squinted my eyes to make sure he was smiling, and then began to get up to bring the fire back to life. He put his hand on mine and got up and did what I was just thinking.

“I don’t think I like waking up with my head all twisted like that,” I replied, leaning over in my chair, putting my head into my hands.

“It was the first time that I have seen you wake, yet stay in slumber. Did you dream?”

“I was wondering why you were awake before me. I don’t recall waking to the night and going into any slumber and dreaming. We can do that?”

“In times of slumber. Though I gather you did not,” he laughed, striking his flint and setting the fresh wood to blaze.

“Why don’t you use the long matches?”

“I come from the old ways, and find it hard to forget my skill. Besides, one will not always have the long match out in the woods.”

              He turned around and handed me the folded note that I had the night before. “This fell out of your hand, but do not worry its contents were safe from my eyes.” I smiled taking it, and explained the note to him. He told me that he had found a note in his room as well, that said that Martin would be gone for a few nights, to make this house our own.

“He’s gone? Where?” I asked, sitting up straight.

“It did not say.”

“It’s my fault he left,” I said, leaning back and slumping down into the chair.

“Perhaps he is giving you time to clear your mind,” Jacob replied, sitting back down in the chair next to me.

“I wish he could see what we’re doing as a good thing.”

“And I am sure he wished to find you and take you away from all of it. He could not have known that you would have managed all that you have in such a short time of being a breeder. None of us would have believed it so, had we not been with you.”

“Why is it so hard for him, when y’all just jumped on board and saw what needed to be done?”

“Only he can answer that, Renee. One’s heart is full of many things and you cannot be so quick to judge without knowing those very reasons.”

“I know, but I did and now he’s gone,” I whispered, trying to hold back the tears.

“Only for a time, he will return.” He reached over patting my hand. “Come, let us see who else wakes. I, for one, woke starving.”

“One more thing…how did he leave if he sleeps the same way we do?”

“More than likely left out in the tunnels last night, waking to finish his journey tonight.”

No sooner than we opened my bedroom door, Cates stepped out of his, reaching up to the top of the door frame with his one hand and bending backward, arching out his back. He yawned, putting a loud growl-like yell behind it, then grabbed his lower back. “Stubborn old bones,” he said, not knowing we were watching him with smiles on both of our faces. Jacob whistled as we came down the short distance to his and Tammy’s room, making Cates roll his eyes and smile back at us.

“Now you know I was just complaining to be complaining, cause my back is just fine,” he laughed, straightening up.

“Yeah, sure, we didn’t see a thing,” I half snickered at the big man.

“You didn’t see a thing to tell my woman. Can you imagine what she would do to me if she knew that Fala’s fall broke a piece of my back? The she-devil would have me down for nights,” he proclaimed, stepping out and joining us as we made our way to the kitchen.

“If I didn’t know how fast we heal, due to my own broken bones, your secret may not be too safe. But since I’ve had plenty that have all healed just fine, I promise not to tell,” I replied, going to lift his shirt.

“Hey, what are you doing back there?”

“How on earth did you keep her from seeing this?” I asked, hissing at the discoloration of his lower back and then looked around his girth for an answer.

“Kept her in front, and on top of me,” he winked, bringing a blush to my cheeks and closure to my mouth.

I had once thought that Garvin and Tanda were sharing a room, and possibly Sydney, until we passed Tanda’s room and I stepped over to peek in at them resting. Garvin and Sydney weren’t anywhere to be seen, but Tanda and Derek were wrapped in each other’s arms in the center of the bed. Jacob reached in and closed the door, because I must have been staring a little too much. I thought they looked beautiful together, but it was an invasion of their privacy and when the time came they would tell. We heard the grunting of a pig as we reached the end of the hall that led into the kitchen, and sure enough there was a large male tied to the back door. There was also another note sitting under a glass on the center of the table in the room. Cates was the one who picked it up and read it first, handing it back to me after.

I had my men place your breakfast in the house, just in case those of you whom wake early, wake with hunger.

Martin

“Your maker is a fine host, Renee,” Cates said untying the pig that followed him without protest.

“You can thank him when he comes back,” I softly replied, opening cabinets until I found the one with glasses.

“He left?” Cates asked not looking at me, but Jacob.

“He will return. The real question is should we wait for the others to wake, or give them the joys of cool blood?” Jacob raised one brow.

“I’ll take mine fresh and hot, please,” I responded while placing three, bowl sized wine glasses down on the table, grinning like we we’re doing something we shouldn’t.

That was all that Cates needed to hear. He reached around and pulled a blade from his back area that I hadn’t seen when I lifted his shirt, and then moved it slowly behind the backside of the pig that was leaning into the nub of the elbow that was rubbing him under the jowl. Cates brought the blade up the pig’s side scratching the beast with his fingers, saying things like ‘good boy’ and ‘that feels good, huh, boy’. My body flinched when the pig squealed out and dropped to the side, with Cates half-an-arm trying to hold it up. “The bowl,” he called out, but I just stood there re-seeing what he just did in my mind. Jacob spun around looking for it and saw it hanging on the wall of pots and pans behind me.