Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter Colletion_ Books 11-15 - Laurell K. Hamilton [943]
“You think it’s that serious?” I asked.
“If I were a vampire, and you had a vampire servant, I might kill you just for that. But if you guys rolled Augustine, one of the most powerful masters in this country, then yeah, Anita, they’ll be nervous. I’m just surprised the Harlequin didn’t hit St. Louis earlier.”
“I think they needed the excuse of Malcolm and his misbehaving church. The council is truly divided about Jean-Claude and his power base. I think maybe the council wouldn’t agree to let the Harlequin near us, but now that they’re here checking out the Church of Eternal Life, well, two birds with one stone.”
“Sounds reasonable,” he said. “I’ll be there as soon as I can, Anita.”
“Thanks, Edward.”
“Don’t thank me yet.”
“Why not?”
“I’ll see you in a few hours, Anita. Watch your back like a son of a bitch; if these guys are masters they may have wereanimals and humans to do their daywalking. Just because the sun is up doesn’t make you safe.”
“I know that, Edward. I probably know that better than you do.”
“Maybe, but be careful until I get there.”
“I’ll do my best.” But I was already talking to an empty phone line. He’d hung up. I hung up, too.
11
NATHANIEL WAS ASLEEP in Jean-Claude’s red silk sheets. Jean-Claude himself was in Asher’s room for the day, but he’d made a point of telling me he’d had the sheets changed to red because the three of us look so lovely against red. Micah’s eyes caught the light from the partially opened bathroom door. His curly brown hair was a heavy darkness around the delicate triangle of his face. The door was our version of a night light here, since there was no bedside lamp, and the other light switch was across the room by the door. Micah’s eyes caught that faint glow and glittered with it. His eyes were leopard eyes, or looked like leopard eyes. A doctor had told him that the optics were still human, but the eyes themselves weren’t. Splitting hairs, I guess. Chimera, the same bad guy who’d made the ambush that caused Nathaniel to pick up a gun and shoot for real, had also forced Micah into animal form so long that he couldn’t come all the way back. His eyes were never human. I’d asked him once what color they’d started as, and he’d said brown. I couldn’t picture it. I couldn’t picture his face with anything but the green-gold of the eyes he’d come to me with. They were simply Micah’s eyes; anything else would have made it the face of a stranger.
His voice was quiet, that voice you use when you’re trying not to wake someone in the room. “What did he say?”
“He’ll be here in four or five hours. His backup will be following.” I came to the edge of the bed.
“What backup?”
“I don’t know.”
“You didn’t ask.”
“No.” Truthfully, it had never occurred to me to ask.
“You trust him that much?” Micah asked.
I nodded.
Micah rolled under the red silk so he could reach my hand. He tried to draw me onto the bed, but in a silk robe, on silk sheets, I’d learned better. They were too slippery. I took my hand back and undid the robe’s sash. He lay back and watched me with that look a man can get—the look that is part sex, part possession, part just male. It’s not a look that has much to do with love, not the kind that includes hearts and flowers anyway, but it has everything to do with being together, being real. Edward was right. Micah was my lover. Not my boyfriend. We dated. We did movies, theatre, picnics even, at Nathaniel’s insistence, but in the end what had drawn us together had been sex. Lust like a forest fire that could have burned our lives down around our ears, but instead had saved us. Or that’s how I felt. I hadn’t really asked him in so many words.
“Serious face,” he whispered.
I nodded and let the robe slip to the floor. I stood in front of him naked and had the feeling I’d had from almost the first moment, that my skin was thick with need. He reached for me again, and this time I let him help me