Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter Colletion_ Books 11-15 - Laurell K. Hamilton [385]
“Nikolaos would never let him feed like that,” a quiet voice said from behind me.
I turned to find Buzz just behind me. I hadn’t heard him, or sensed him, which meant that I’d been more caught up in the show than I’d realized.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Nikolaos knew that he was feeding off the audience without ever touching them, so she forbade him to touch any of the customers.” His gaze went past me to the stage. “I think she had some clue what he could have been, and she did everything she could to make sure he didn’t come into that power.”
“She’s been dead almost three years. You make it sound like tonight is the first time you’ve seen this show.”
He looked at me. “It is.”
I gave him wide eyes. “Nikolaos was dead, she couldn’t stop him.”
“But you could,” he said.
“What do you mean?”
“Do you really think three years ago you would have dated him after you saw this?”
I glanced back at the stage. I watched him kissing a strange woman as if she were his deepest love, or at least deepest lust. Would I have tolerated it three years ago? No. Would I have used it as an excuse to dump his ass? Oh, yeah.
The woman swooned in his arms. Her mouth falling away from his as she seemed to half-faint, as if the kiss alone were so intense that she couldn’t stay conscious. I would have thought she was play-acting, or exaggerating, but I had to believe it, when the waiters carried her off stage and gave her back to her friends at their table.
Jean-Claude gazed out at the audience with fresh crimson lipstick smeared across his entire lower jaw. It looked eerily like blood, and I knew him well enough to know that the resemblance was not accidental. His blue eyes had bled to solid blue light, as if a summer’s dusk could burn in his eyes. “Who will be next?” And it was as if he whispered along my skin, as if he were standing just behind me. The illusion was so strong that I had to fight not to turn around and look. I was supposed to be immune to this crap, if this was how I was feeling, what must the women connected to all those eager faces be feeling?
I lowered my shields just enough to see Jean-Claude shining with power. This was what he was meant to be. This wasn’t just feeding the ardeur. This wasn’t a substitute for a blood feed. This was an end in itself. This was something I’d never seen, not in Jean-Claude, not in anyone. It was akin to all his other abilities, but more, somehow this was more.
I turned back to Buzz. “Him feeding like this is what saved me.”
He looked puzzled, vampires under twenty years dead have so many more human facial expressions. “Saved you from what?”
“If he hadn’t fed, then I’d have had to feed for him. That’s one of the things a human servant is for. We feed when the vamps can’t. I would still be trapped backstage fucking my metaphysical brains out.” I shook my head. “No, thank you.”
“So you’re not disappointed that’s he’s doing strangers?”
I felt my face go sort of unfriendly. “You sound disappointed that I’m not upset about this, why?”
He raised his hands, making his big arms flex. I think by accident. He meant it to be a harmless gesture, but he was too muscle-bound for it to look anything but impressive, or scary, depending on how you looked at it.
“It just seems like a fast turnaround, that’s all.”
I sighed. “The last time Jean-Claude asked me if he could feed off the audience, I didn’t really understand what he was asking.” I smiled, but not like I was happy. “Besides, I wasn’t fucking strangers to feed the vampiric powers then. Strangely, that’s changed my mind about a lot of things.”
He looked way too serious for my tastes.
I didn’t know what was up with Buzz, so I decided to change topics. “Primo all tucked away in the spare coffin?”
“We put him in while you were cleaning up.”
I nodded. I’d been told about it, but I’d also laid my hands on the coffin and felt Primo trapped