Chapter 11

Catherine already had her Café Americana and was waiting for Tess, when she walked in the café. Tess got her Dry non-fat Double shot and sat down with Catherine.

"Good Morning," Tess greeted Catherine.

"Don't you Good Morning me, spill it!"

"Jeez give a girl a moment to caffeinate will ya?" Tess laughed. "Look I am sorry I did not tell you about JT. It's just you were going through so much after Thanksgiving and I really wasn't exactly sure what was going on with JT, so I just never said anything."

"Forgiven"

Tess looks at Catherine questionably,

"Really, just like that?"

"Yes, really just like that, after everything I have done in the last year and a half, no judgments, but I do want details, lots and lots of details!"

Tess smiled, "not much detail to give, we kissed on Thanksgiving, slept together on Valentines Day and have been together since then."

"That is so not what I am talking about. I don't want a play by play but I want details; how do you feel about him?

"I think I am falling for him, he is like no guy I ever dated, he's smart and he is sweet and tender and is the first guy to make me feel mushy." Tess blushes.

"MUSHY, no way you?"

"Yes, me! Catherine, you know me, I come across as tough and intimidating and I can be both those things, and most guys really like a girl who can kick their ass and wears a gun, but that gets exhausting. With JT, I am just Tess, he talks to me, and he has the ability to make me feel small and dainty. I never feel small and dainty, especially hanging out with you all the time."

"Hey" Catherine smiles.

"You know what I mean. But seriously, JT is just real; I mean he's the guy who hid and protected Vincent for 10 years, that says a lot about a guy and his character. He would never hurt me. I feel really safe with him.

Catherine has the decency to look awkward as she asks, "What about you know….sex?"

Tess grins, "He is very smart and really knows his anatomy, and I think he had like 12 units of it!"

They both laugh and just like that all is right in their world.

Tess and Cat meet up with Vincent and JT at the storage facility.

"Hey" Vincent says in that sexy way that is his alone.

Catherine smiles at him and then turns to smile even bigger to JT. "Good Morning JT, sleep well last night?"

JT looks at Tess, who is looking at the floor smiling.

"Ah yeah, sure, slept like a baby. Thanks for asking." JT looks chagrined.

Catherine nods her head and then gives JT and huge hug.

"What was that for?" JT asks Catherine. Again looking at Tess, who is now looking back at him with a smile.

"No reason, just happy is all." Catherine says still grinning stupidly at him.

Vincent sees how uncomfortable JT is and steps in to the rescue. He slides his hand around Catherine's waist and asks.

"Where is my hug this morning?"

Suitably distracted, Catherine gives Vincent a kiss and a hug.

All right, let's get this party started.

It took forever to load up all the boxes in the van JT borrowed from the university. As they were getting ready to leave, Tess wondered out loud. "Where should we go through this stuff?" Looking at JT and Vincent, "You are both out in the open now and our apartments aren't a secret either."

Vincent had already thought of this, "I have someplace in mind, we can use the Curio Shop."

"The Curio Shop?" Catherine said looking at Vincent.

"Yeah, Tori never actually sold it, and she made me her heir, so now I technically own it, but I can't imagine anyone actually looking for us here."

There was stunned silence and all three of them were staring at Vincent. He looked at all of them, "What?...Do you think this is a bad idea?"

JT and Tess decided they desperately needed to double check the storage container and ran back into the building.

"What?" Vincent looks at Catherine.

"Tori made you her heir? And just when were you planning on telling me about this?"

"I figured you already knew. I have no job, and at this point while I would like to go back to being a Dr, I have been a little busy and saving the day does not exactly pay the rent. What in the world did you think I was doing for money?"

Catherine looked sheepish, "To be honest I had not thought a lot about it, I figured you had money left over from your Beast Mission days."

"Nope, that stopped when you stopped your father. Look, it's no big deal, Tori did not have anyone else and I tried to get her to leave it to charity, but she felt she owed me for not abandoning her and teaching her how to control her beast. So when she was meeting with the lawyers after her Father's death, she took control of her Father's assets and listed me as her heir"

Vincent looked sad, "In the end, I was all she had. I gave a lot of the money to charity and just kept enough to live on, it's not a lot, but it's invested and I can live off it. I kept the curio shop just because of its connection to the beast skeleton."

Catherine took a deep breath, she had no cause to judge Vincent, they had been broken up and Tori had every right to do what she wanted with her money. Vincent had taken Tori in, even if it was because of the beast attraction, he still had helped her cope with being a beast. What was important now was that they were together and they had a safe haven to operate out of.

Vincent looked at Catherine "Are we ok?" He wondered, he wasn't sure how Catherine would take this news and that was one of the reasons he had not brought it up.

"Yes, we're good, I'm sorry Vincent, it just caught me off guard, but its fine."

Catherine placed her hand on Vincent's arm, "Once again we owe Tori, not just for saving JT, but for this too. This is a good thing Vincent." Catherine said as she rose up and kissed him.

Vincent smiled and yelled for JT and Tess to come out of the storage. "Let's go."

At the curio shop they started going through the boxes. There was a ton of medical files and more green notebooks, like the one Vanessa had kept on Vincent. In going through the green notebooks, it became clear that Vincent was different.

He was the only one who had never exhibited the uncontrolled rage and transformation that had doomed the other members of his unit. Every one of them had fugue states, when their bodies were in the process of developing a new ability. According to Vanessa's notes there was no way to determine when or how long the fugue states would last and what abilities would present.

After poring over the files for several hours, Tess finally found something significant. She found a journal, it looked old. It was leather, with weathered pages and the whole thing was held together with string. Tess carefully opened it and read the inscription.

"Whoa" she said, "This you have to see Catherine."

Catherine took the journal from Tess and looked at the inscription.

These are my private thoughts, ones I dare not put in the file I have been working on for Scotland Yard, yet I do not want to forget even a moment of this time with Lucas. I am not sure how long it will last, but no matter what; I want some proof that he existed, that we loved each other and that we were together.

Rebecca

London 1836

"Oh my God, this is Rebecca's personal journal."

"Vincent" Catherine said looking at him, her eyes bright with unshed tears "Lucas must have been Rebecca's beast."