Danse Macabre ab-14 Read online

  Jason, Jean-Claude's pomme de sang, was great, but he couldn't feed both me and Jean-Claude every day. I needed to find someone else to fill the spot, or maybe a couple of someones, until I got more control of the ardeur.

  Graham had been one of the local men that Jean-Claude had encouraged me to "interview" as my new pomme de sang. Jean-Claude thought that if I'd "interview" them a little more intimately, I'd have a new pomme by now. He'd called me stubborn. Asher had called me foolish, to refuse to sample such bounty. Maybe it was foolish. I hadn't told Ronnie that all the men in my life had given me a short list of other men to try out. She'd have freaked even worse than she already had, because if Louie had been that generous with her, she'd have been a happy camper. But Ronnie wasn't me, and what might have made her happy just seemed to confuse me.

  Of all the men who had come to my bed, to sleep and cuddle, Graham had been the most pushy. He'd made it clear he wanted more from me than I wanted to give. Of course, if I hadn't been so stubborn, he'd be in the run­ning for would-be daddy. The thought made me cold down to my toes. Let's hear it for not fucking everyone who bunks over.

  "I beg forgiveness, lupa." His face still showed the shock of hearing me invoke Bolverk, but the words were not begging words. Not really. To beg forgiveness among the wolves meant only one thing—something closer and more intimate than I wanted from Graham—but if I refused the gesture, then it would be a breach between us, one that could grow and eventually harm Richard's pack. Shit.

  "Then beg, Graham." My words didn't come out uncomfortable, they came out angry. Anger was always my shield. I was trying to learn other things to hide behind, but anger was still my tried and true, and for that moment, it worked.

  He stood, and standing he towered over me. So broad, so muscled, so big, but there was fear in his face. Finally, he believed that I might, if he pissed me off enough, hurt him. That I might have the right to hurt him. It was not a bad thing to see fear on his face. He was overdue for it. We'd tried being nice, Micah, Nathaniel, and me, but some people won't take nice treatment. If a person won't take nice, there are always alternatives.

  He could have used the submissive gesture to take me in his arms, but he did it the way it had been shown to me. He touched my face lightly with his fingers, just enough to steady himself. If we'd been in public he would have laid a very light kiss against my lips, but we weren't in public so it got to be more interesting. He leaned over me, and the prelude was too like a kiss for my comfort.

  It made me want to back up, but I was dominant to him. A dominant does not back away from a submissive, no matter how much bigger he is. It's not about size and strength. It's about who's tougher, and no matter how big he was, Graham was not the toughest person in the room. Not even close.

  He bent down, and down, his mouth hovering over mine so that I could feel his breath warm against my lips. I think even at the last second he thought about stealing the kiss I'd never allowed him, but he thought better of it. He did what he was supposed to do, though frankly the kiss would have been less embarrassing. In some ways, at least.

  He was supposed to lick across my lower lip. It was a version of the ges­ture a submissive wolf uses toward a dominant. It's based on the food-begging behavior of wolf pups. But saying all that didn't change the fact that his fingers were gentle against my face, and his breath was warm against my mouth. The tip of his tongue touched my lip, and slid across it. Wet, glid­ing, sensual, wetter than the first real kiss should be. Wet, as if I'd taken a drink of wine and spilled just a little across my lower lip. Just enough so that I had to lick across my lip in an echo of what he had just done to me. As if I were drinking down the touch of his mouth.

  He shivered, his breath trembling on the air. "That was nice."

  "It was supposed to be you begging the forgiveness of your pack's lupa," I said, but my voice was a little shaky, and not nearly firm enough.

  He gave a quick smile, the one that ruined the hip-tough-guy image, and made him look his age. Graham had yet to see twenty-five. "I do ask for­giveness, but it's still the most you've ever let me touch you."

  I shook my head and pushed past him. Micah and Nathaniel followed me. Nathaniel was carrying the overnight bag that held, among other things, the pregnancy tests. I knew when he came out of the store with them why I'd put off buying them. It made the whole problem more real. Stupid, but it did.

  "You've slept in the same bed with me, Graham," I called back over my shoulder as I headed for the big door that led underground.

  "Sleeping's not what I want," he said.

  I stopped at the door, and just turned and stared at him. The other men moved to either side to let me see him better.

  Graham looked at me, his eyes peeking through the silky fringe of his overly long bangs. It always made me think of an animal peering at me through the grass. The upper layer hadn't been this long when I met him.

  "I do not need your shit tonight, Graham."

  "Why are you always mad at me?"

  "I am not always mad at you, Graham."

  "If you're not mad at me, then why don't you like me better?"

  "I don't dislike you, Graham, I just don't want to fuck you. I'm allowed not to fuck you, even though you want to fuck me."

  "Don't fuck me then, just feed the ardeur off me. Feed it the way you fed off Nathaniel for months without intercourse."

  I shook my head. "I don't want to introduce the passion of the ardeur to someone I'm not keeping. It's cruel."

  "The ardeur is the greatest orgasmic experience that any of the vampire lines can give to a mortal." Graham's face was full of such eagerness, his hands reaching out to the air as if he could draw the ardeur out of it, and hug it to him. "I just want to know what it feels like. The real deal, not the little tastes I've had by accident. Why is that wrong, Anita? Why is it wrong to want that?"

  "She's afraid you'll become addicted," Micah said, voice soft.

  Graham shook his head. "I've never been addicted to anything in my life."

  "Lucky you," Nathaniel said.

  "Please, Anita, don't go to strangers to feed the ardeur. Don't go to strangers when there are people right here who would do almost anything to feed your need."

  I made an exasperated sound, almost a scream of frustration, and went for the door. I opened it and we headed down the stone steps that led down, down, to the actual home of the Master of the City.

  The steps were too wide, too something, as if they'd been carved for something that didn't walk on two feet. The stairs were always awkward, which was why I was still in jogging shoes. Micah took my hand anyway, and I let him. If it looked to Graham like I was needing help down the stairs, fuck him, or rather don't. I needed the comfort of touch tonight. Nathaniel stayed on my other side, but didn't try to take my right hand in his. I'd need that hand for the gun or the blade. Yeah, these vamps were supposed to be Jean-Claude's friends. But they weren't my friends, not yet.

  We were at the landing just before the stairs took a turn. It was a blind turn, but if you hugged the far wall, you didn't stay blind for long.

  "Wait," Graham said, "please, wait. I should go first."

  We all turned and watched him walk the few steps down to us. He gave a smile that was almost nervous. "I am the bodyguard, remember?"

  I looked him up and down, and said, "Are you carrying?"

  He sighed. "No. Richard says we're dangerous enough without guns."

  I shook my head. "Not if everyone else has them, Graham. Silver bullets don't let you get close."

  He shrugged those massive shoulders. "Richard is Ulfric; if you want to change policy, take it up with him. I'm just doing what I'm told."

  I sighed. I loved Richard, really I did, but we had some serious differences of opinion.

  Graham eased past us, but stopped on the step below the landing. He looked up, but not like he was happy. "I was hoping that Jean-Claude would have joined us by now."

  I gave him a look. "What do you mean, joined us?
Jean-Claude is waiting downstairs with our guests, right?"

  He shook his head. "There was an emergency upstairs."

  "Asher is managing the Circus; he should be able to take care of any emergencies."

  Graham licked his lips. "I don't know the details, because I was left down here to wait for you, but Meng Die did something. Something that made Asher call for Jean-Claude to help him."

  Meng Die was a petite Chinese doll, or that's what she looked like. But she, like me, didn't really match the packaging. She'd been the second-in-command in San Francisco, before Jean-Claude called in all the vamps he'd made in this country to help bolster his defenses. Her master had been happy to let her go, because she'd been nights away from a palace revolt that would have left him dead and her in charge. In fact, he wouldn't take her back, though Jean-Claude had offered.

  Meng Die wanted to be Jean-Claude's second-in-command, but that was Asher's job. Then all the vamps had come from London after their master went cra2y and had to be killed. Suddenly Meng Die was just another mas­ter vampire in a kiss that was lousy with master vamps. She was powerful enough to be third, or maybe even second, but temperamentally, she wasn't suited to be that close to any throne. Too dangerous. Too ambitious.

  "What the hell did she do now?" I asked.

  Graham shrugged. "I don't know."

  "I thought you were almost her pomme de sang" Nathaniel said.

  "I was," he said.

  "You don't seem too worried about her."

  He shrugged those big shoulders. "She keeps promising to make me, or Clay, her pomme de sang, but she never makes the decision. She was still fuck­ing Requiem, too, until he started turning her down."

  "Requiem isn't sharing Meng Die's bed anymore?" I asked.

  "No."

  I frowned. "Did he find a new girlfriend?"

  Graham licked his lips again. "Sort of."

  "I know that look, Graham, that's your I-have-more-bad-news-and-I-don't-want-to-tell-it look. Spill it, all of it."

  He sighed again. "Damn it, if you're not my girlfriend you shouldn't be able to read me that easily."

  It was my turn to shrug. "Just tell me."

  "Requiem thinks that the reason you've turned him down as your new pomme de sang is because he was fucking Meng Die. He said you're not a woman who shares your men."

  I didn't know whether to scream, or curse, or laugh. "Did he tell Meng Die that?" I asked.

  "I don't know. He told me. He told Clay."

  "Did you tell Meng Die?" I asked.

  He shook his head. "I am not that stupid. She takes bad news a hell of a lot worse than you do."

  "Is Clay that stupid?" I asked.

  "Requiem told her," Micah said, voice soft.

  We all looked at him. "You know that?" I asked.

  He shook his head. "But it would be something he would do, not to cause trouble, but to be honest with her."

  I thought about it, then had to agree. "Damn, he would. I wonder if he told her recently?"

  "Did you turn her down?" Nathaniel asked Graham.

  He gave the quick grin again. "No. She may not hold the ardeur, but the sex is still amazing. I've done vamps before, but never Belle Morte's blood­line. If Meng Die is an example of what they have to offer in bed, then my new goal in life is to be one of their pommes de sang."

  "I thought you wanted to be Anita's pomme," Nathaniel said.

  Graham looked a little startled, as if he'd said more than he'd meant to say. "If Anita would feed the ardeur off me, just once, I might never look at another woman, but until she does..." He let the sentence fade, but it summed up why Graham was not a strong contender for me. He didn't really want me, he wanted the ardeur. If any of the other female vamps from London had held the ardeur, he'd have chased them instead of me, or as well as me. Not very flattering—to him, or to me.

  "Until I do, you're keeping your options open," I said.

  He shrugged. "I gave all my options up for Meng Die, and she kept Clay and Requiem on her string. I shared her with Clay in a way I've never shared anyone." He looked sad for a moment, then it passed. I wasn't sure if it passed because his sorrow was that shallow, or he had pushed it away. "Anita isn't going to give up all of you guys for me. Why should I give up everyone else just for a chance to be in her bed? I mean, just for a chance, not even the certainty of it."

  "I didn't ask Requiem to sacrifice his libido to me."

  "You never ask anyone to give up other people for you, but if they don't, you don't sleep with them," Graham said.

  And that was a little closer to the truth than I wanted to hear. I hadn't asked Requiem to give up Meng Die, but the fact that he was fucking her had been a point against him. Why? One, because I simply did not like her. Two, Graham was right, I didn't share my men. Not with other women. The fact that I then expected them to share me with about half a dozen other men, well... Not fair. Not fair at all.

  4

  THE STAIRS ENDED in a small room with a door at the other end of it. The door was heavy wood and metal like the door to a dungeon, and in front of that door stood Clay, werewolf and bodyguard. He came toward us, hurry­ing, which wasn't good. The look on his face wasn't good either. He looked worried.

  Graham was all business, the mantle of bodyguardness sliding over him so that that was all that was left. When he actually concentrated on business instead of trying to get into my pants, he was one of the best of the wolves for bodyguard duty. "What's wrong?" he asked.

  Clay shook his head. "Jean-Claude isn't with you?" His tone of voice made it half question.

  "No," Graham said.

  "What's wrong?" I asked, thinking maybe if we kept asking the question he'd answer it.

  "Nothing." He looked at me, and smiled an apology. "Nothing except that we've got a room full of guests and no hosts. It's just me and the four other bodyguards in the room. We aren't even allowed to offer refreshments without one of the dominants being present."

  "Are you this worried because you think we're being bad hosts?" Micah asked.

  Clay seemed to think about it, then nodded. He did that apologetic smile again. "Yeah, I guess I am."

  Clay was as tall as Graham, but his hair was blond, curly, and careless. Where Graham took time and attention with his appearance, Clay just didn't seem to care. He wasn't sloppy, just comfortable. He was wearing the same black-on-black outfit, but he'd put black jogging shoes with his slacks, not dress shoes. He looked good, but a little uncomfortable out of his jeans. I sympathized.

  "Stupid," he said, "but yeah, I think the evening is starting off badly. I mean, Jean-Claude gets a message and has to run out. The two Masters of

  the City are all right so far, but the two women are sniping at each other. The muscle, or food, or whatever they are, just stands around looking grim, or pouty-seductive. It has the feel of something that could go south if we don't have someone to help keep it friendly."

  I took that last seriously. Clay worked security at Guilty Pleasures, and he was good at spotting trouble before it got started. It made him invaluable at the club.

  "Exactly what did Meng Die do to make Asher send for Jean-Claude tonight of all nights?" I asked.

  He sighed. "I'm not a hundred percent sure, but it had to be bad or Asher wouldn't have called him away from the other masters."

  I could have opened the vampire marks between us and found out what Jean-Claude was doing, but he'd warned me against doing that with new vamps in town. One, we were trying to hide some of my powers under the proverbial basket; two, Jean-Claude wasn't a hundred percent certain that some of the Masters of the City might not be able to listen in to such com­munications. His phrase: such communications. So, unless it was a true emer­gency, no mind-to-mind communication until everyone left town.

  Did he need my help? No. Not against Meng Die. She was mean, and powerful, but not that powerful. I also trusted her to be smarter than to start shit bad enough that the only penalty would be death. She was like most of the old
vamps, a survivor at heart.

  Micah was looking at me, almost like he'd followed my line of reasoning. Out loud he said, "Jean-Claude and Asher can handle it."

  "You didn't read my mind," I said.

  He smiled, that smile that made him seem so gentle. "I read your face."

  "Great."

  He raised his eyebrows, and shrugged, as if, sorry.

  Nathaniel said, "How can both of you still be wanting to be Meng Die's pomme} She's not dependable."

  Graham laughed, a loud abrupt sound that almost startled. "Dependable. I don't want to be her pomme because she's dependable. I want to be her pomme because we are fucking amazing together."

  Clay shrugged. "I love her, at least I thought I did."