Page 8 of Born Free

Just as the doors open, I release Roman’s hand. And instantly, the world feels a little less secure.

We step out into a restaurant that looks like it was built for billionaires only. The place drips money. And it’s entirely empty, except for one table by the windows and one server who walks away from it.

Sigrid, Jon, Elena, and Mason are already waiting. Every one of them has already changed as well, though each looks like they’re hanging onto reality by their last nerve.

“I hope you can tell us what the hell is going on, because I’m about to have a full-on freak-out,” Elena says, her eyes wide with panic. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen her look so frazzled.

Roman pulls my chair out for me, and I know not a single one of the other occupants of this table misses it. I take my seat, Roman sinking into the one next to me.

“I did some calling around,” Jon says. There’s an edge to his voice. He knows the danger of this world, he’s by far and wide the most experienced of us all when it comes to the vampire world. “That man was an actual Royal. Orlando Badillo, of the House of Badillo in Spain.”

Roman nods. He keeps his hands folded on the table, his intense eyes sweeping from one council member to the next, to Jon, who we might as well elect now, because he has so much more knowledge than the rest of us. “That was Orlando Badillo, and those were his House members.”

“What the hell are they doing in Chicago, and why were they looking for you, Roman?” Mason asks. He’s always so calm, so even, so caring. But he’s scared. This is exactly what Chicago is trying to stay out of.

I notice Sigrid studying Roman’s face, a reflective expression on her own. And I know she alone is piecing the truth together.

Roman takes five deep, drawn-out breaths through his nose. Beneath the table, his knee bounces up and down.

Roman held this secret on his own for twenty-four years. He never told a soul that he didn’t remember his life before his Resurrection, not until he told me.

But he can’t tell them all the truth, which is vital to our survival right now, without telling them this, too.

“Before I came to Chicago twenty-one years ago, I traveled around a bit with the only other vampire I knew of. When I Resurrected, I had no idea there were others like me.”

I reach across and place a hand on Roman’s knee. I can hear the way his heart is racing. I can smell the change of emotion from him. Nerves. Fear. Uncertainty. Roman’s hand covers mine, and his knee stops bouncing.

I’m sure the others can tell what is going on beneath the table, but I don’t care.

“When I Resurrected, I woke up in a landfill,” Roman says, his voice sounding thick. “From the blood all over me, from the shredded state of my clothes, it was clear I died a very violent death and I was stabbed in the back as the final blow.”

I hate imagining it. Roman waking alone in a literal garbage heap. Covered in dried blood. But the worst of it is coming.

“I couldn’t remember anything,” Roman says. His eyes are fixed on the table. I should be curious to see the reactions of the other four, but I can’t take my eyes off Roman. “Not how I’d gotten there. Not if I was from that area. I didn’t even know my own damn name.”

Sigrid mutters a curse in Norwegian. Mason leans back in his seat, taking in a deep breath.

“There was a passport in my pocket that had the name Roman De Luca, so of course I assumed it was my name,” Roman continues. “I later learned it was a fake. Roman De Luca didn’t actually exist, though the passport was good enough to buy me into the name. I searched for the truth of who I was for a few years, but nothing ever came of it. So I let it go, and I moved into the life I’ve built.”

“We’ve known you for as long as we can remember, and this whole time, you never knew who you actually were before?” Elena asks. She’s never been one to beat around the bush. “Did our dad know?”

Roman shakes his head. “He prodded at my past, but I kept things vague. I never told anyone, not until I told Juliet last year.”

I feel all four sets of eyes slide over to me.

But Roman’s part of the story isn’t over. “I woke up in a landfill in Mississippi, just an hour away from the House based there.”

Jon curses this time. “You tangled with that massive mess in Mississippi? Roman, do you understand what is happening there? Their actual Royal rejected the House system, and they’ve got some imposter posing as a Royal, with a house full of crazies who don’t really abide by any kind of rules. Of any House to get involved with, why the hell would it be with the broken House of Conrath?”

I’ve only heard the bare minimum of what is going on in Mississippi, but never this much, and until right now, I’ve never heard the name House of Conrath.

I’d never thought of it too much, that there would most certainly be a connection, until now, now that I know who Roman really is.

A Royal.

“I never considered it for years,” Roman says, not backing down from Jon’s fear-driven aggression. “But then last night changed things.”

Everyone grows quiet for a solid minute. It’s as if we can all sense it, that something big is coming, that a shift is about to happen, that things won’t ever be the same after the coming words are spoken.

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