Blood Noir - Laurell K. Hamilton [112]
I sighed. “It’s too late to be mad, Jason. If there’s a way to avoid a war between St. Louis and Vegas, just tell me. I am like all ears.”
“If there is a baby, it could just as easily be mine. That would make it human, or to the tigers, lukoi. They’d have no interest in the child of a werewolf.”
I was back to thinking again. If Jason hadn’t told me all the weird and bad news about the weretigers I might have been mad, or at least upset.
“You told me all the shit about the weretigers first so this would seem like better news.”
“Yes,” Jason said, still not looking at me.
“If we can convince the tigers it’s your problem and mine, then can I get a morning-after pill?”
“Your body, your choice.”
“How do we convince them it’s mostly yours?”
“We lie.”
“You can’t lie to wereanimals; they smell a lie.”
“You’re so upset today that you smell like shock and fear already. Even your heart rate is up and down. They won’t be able to read you right now.”
“What’s the lie?”
“That we had an accident with a condom before we left. Hell, Anita, we could bring in the fact that you had sex with Nathaniel just before we came here. He’s a wereleopard; they wouldn’t want a leopard any more than a wolf.”
I thought about it. “Okay, wait, can you lie well enough to fool two wereanimals?”
“Five,” he said.
“What?”
“We can’t bring Richard, Jamil, and Shang-Da in here to tell them the plan. We have to lie to everyone in the room about this, or it won’t work.”
“Richard will…be…” I couldn’t even finish the thought.
“Pissed,” Jason offered.
“He’ll be pissed I didn’t tell him we had an accident with the condom.”
“Yes, but if it gets the tigers off our backs then he’ll forgive us when we have a chance to explain. But Richard and Shang-Da don’t lie well enough for this.”
“Jamil does?” I asked.
“Jamil lies like butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth; he can even control his pulse.”
“Nifty,” I said.
Jason nodded.
“Can you control all that, too?” I asked.
“Nope.”
“Then it won’t work,” I said.
“Anita, I got mind-fucked too. I’m a little shocky myself. But more than that, I am worried that it’s mine. I mean, how do I tell my best friend in the world that I took the love of his life off for a weekend and got her knocked up? I mean, Micah will be pissed, but it’s Nathaniel I can’t face. Trust me, Anita, I’ve got enough emotion about this to hide any lie in all the truth.”
I reached out and touched his shoulder. He leaned his face against my hand. “I should have protected you better. I’m so sorry, Anita.”
“You couldn’t have protected me against this, Jason.”
He looked at me, his eyes haunted. “We go out there and lie our asses off, Anita. We get you to a pharmacy and we undo what we can. I can’t undo it all, but we can do this much.”
I nodded.
He took my hand in his and it wasn’t scary or bad. He was my friend, and we both needed the touch of someone’s hand.
47
I COVERED MYSELF in towels and Jason and I went out there and lied. He was right, it was easy. I was still damn near in shock. Even I couldn’t tell what I was feeling from moment to moment.
In a way it was the first time I’d ever met the red tiger. I wondered if he felt the same way about me, or if he had more memories of the last two days than I did. Part of me wanted to ask, and part of me never wanted to know.
Knowing how tall everyone else was, I could estimate his height at around five-ten. His hair was the deep red of his tiger fur. It looked like a good dye job, if you were into shades of red that didn’t occur in human hair. I think he understood that, because the cut was short and designed, I think, to look spiky on top. If your hair doesn’t conform, you might as well get a haircut that doesn’t conform either.
He’d found the other white robe. I think his clothes were part of the mess on the floor, well, except for the jacket I’d borrowed.
His eyes were the deep, rich golden yellow with an edge of deep red-orange that I remembered from my…dream. But it hadn’t been a dream. It was a memory. A memory that Marmee Noir had fucked with. If I hadn