Dark Promises (Dark #29) by Christine Feehan Read Free Book Online Page B

That’s going to be brutal.”
    â€œHow long before I lose my emotions?” Gary asked.
    Gregori’s gaze sharpened. “Do not even think about living with Gabrielle, Gary. Do you have any idea how dangerous that would be?”
    â€œThat’s for us to decide. I want to know how long I’ve got.”
    â€œGary,” Mikhail said, turning Gary’s attention back to him. “We had no idea you would lose your ability to see in color, at least not for a couple of hundred years. We should have known better. You have the blood, the memories and experience of the ancients. Of course you would also have the loss of emotion and color as so many of them had no lifemate and neither do you.”
    Gregori swore in the ancient language. “Gary. When you lose emotion too fast, it is dangerous. Horrendous. You cannot be with Gabrielle when that happens. You will need help through those first dark months.”
    Gary cursed his own intellect. He had known. He didn’t want to know, but he had. He had lost Gabrielle. “I can’t face her. If I see her cry one more time, or if she pleads with me, I won’t be able to resist the love I have for her.”
    Mikhail let out his breath slowly. “Andre has found his lifemate. She believes she has the ability to extend the ancients’ time before they become so dangerous they cannot hunt the undead or feed from innocents. Gregori was going to go to the monastery up in the mountains to talk to Fane, who seems to run the place. We were hoping that if Andre’s lifemate could really do such a thing, the other healers could be taught as well. Perhaps you should go in Gregori’s place.”
    Gregori stirred as if to protest, but Mikhail’s gaze lifted to his just once and Gregori subsided.
    It is possible she can aid him as well.
    Gregori took a deep breath, glided a step closer to Gary as if he would shield him from what was coming in the future.
    Gary glanced at Gregori, held his eyes for a long moment and then nodded. It would give him time and distance, something he needed to separate himself from Gabrielle. He would either find a solution in that time, or he would learn to accept that he had lost her forever.

3
    G abrielle streaked through the dark sky. She was going to be too late. She felt it. That terrible buildup of tension. Of dread. It was there, a tremendous pressure in her chest. Her belly was in knots. Her heart hurt. An actual pain. No one would tell her where Mikhail had sent Gary, but he’d definitely been sent away. He was gone the following rising when she went looking for him. She’d done what she’d never attempted to do before. She’d used her deep connection with him to call to him—and then she had tried shapeshifting on her own. Flying on her own.
    The echo of his answer was faint—very faint. She knew he was a very long distance away from her, but it didn’t matter, she could follow his psychic trail. She’d had time to really think about what her life would be like without him, and she knew she didn’t want to live in the Carpathian Mountains. She would go away, far from everything and everyone she knew. Disassociate. That was what she did. She lost herself in her research so she didn’t have to face life. A lonely life. Gary was the only one who “saw” her. She needed him to be real. To exist.
    She didn’t even care if she was chasing after him, needy as hell. Psycho ex-girlfriend. Because she knew without a shadow of a doubt that he loved her. He would walk through fire for her. If she didn’t get him awayfrom the prince and Gregori, she would lose him forever and she would lose herself.
    Below her the mountains streaked by. She caught glimpses of the dense forest and craggy mountaintops. Ahead were the mists surrounding the monastery where the ancients went when they wouldn’t walk into the sun but could no longer be trusted around humans or