Guilty Pleasures - Laurell K. Hamilton [77]
“Yes, you do,” she said.
I stood then, not that it would help. I was actually taller than she was. She was tiny, a delicate fairy of a child. Right. “What do you want?”
“Don’t do it, Anita.” Willie was standing away from us, as if afraid to come too close. He was smarter dead than he had been alive.
“Quiet, Willie.” Her voice was conversational when she said it, no yelling, no threat. But Willie fell silent instantly, like a well-trained dog.
Maybe she caught my look. Whatever, she said, “I had Willie punished for failing to hire you that first time.”
“Punished?”
“Surely, Phillip has told you about our methods?”
I nodded. “A cross-wrapped coffin.”
She smiled, brilliant, cheery. The shadows leeched it into a leer. “Willie was very afraid that I would leave him in there for months, or even years.”
“Vampires can’t starve to death. I understand the principle.” I added silently in my head: You bitch. I can only be terrified so long before I get angry. Anger feels better.
“You smell of fresh blood. Let me taste you, and I will see your zombie safe.”
“Does taste mean bite?” I asked.
She laughed, sweet, heartrending. Bitch. “Yes, human, it means bite.” She was suddenly beside me. I jerked back without thinking. She laughed again. “It seems Phillip has beaten me to it.”
For a minute I couldn’t think what she meant; then my hand went to the bite mark on my neck. I felt suddenly uneasy, like she’d caught me naked.
The laugh floated on the summer air. It was really beginning to get on my nerves.
“No tasting,” I said.
“Then let me enter your mind again. That’s a type of feeding.”
I shook my head, too rapid, too many times. I’d die before I’d let her in my mind again. If I had the choice.
A scream sounded in the not so far distance. Estelle was finding her voice. I winced like I’d been slapped.
“Let me taste your blood, animator. No teeth.” She flashed fang as she said the last. “You stand and make no move to stop me. I will taste the fresh wound on your neck. I won’t feed on you.”
“It’s not bleeding anymore. It’s clotted.”
She smiled, oh so sweetly. “I’ll lick it clean.”
I swallowed hard. I didn’t know if I could do it. Another scream sounded, high and lost. God.
Willie said, “Anita . . .”
“Silence, or risk my anger.” Her voice growled low and dark.
Willie seemed to shrink in upon himself. His face was a white triangle under his black hair.
“It’s all right, Willie. Don’t get hurt on my account,” I said.
He stared at me across the distance, a few yards; it might as well have been miles. Only the lost look on his face helped. Poor Willie. Poor me.
“What good is it going to do you if you’re not feeding off me?” I asked.
“No good at all.” She reached a small, pale hand towards me. “Of course, fear is a kind of substance.” Cool fingers slid around my wrist. I flinched but didn’t pull back. I was going to let her do this, wasn’t I?
“Call it shadow feeding, human. Blood and fear are always precious, no matter how one obtains them.” She stepped up to me. She exhaled against my skin, and I backed away. Only her hand on my wrist kept me close.
“Wait. I want the zombie freed now, first.”
She just stared at me, then nodded slowly. “Very well.” She stared past me, pale eyes seeing things that weren’t there or that I couldn’t see. I felt a tension through her hand, almost a jerk of electricity. “Theresa will chase them off and have the animator lay the zombie to rest.”
“You did all that, just then?”
“Theresa is mine to command; didn’t you know that?”
“Yeah, I guessed that.” I had not known that any vampire could do telepathy. Of course, before last night I hadn’t thought they could fly either. Oh, I was just learning all sorts of new things.
“How do I know you’re not just telling me that?” I asked.
“You will just have to trust me.”
Now that was almost funny. If she had a sense of humor, maybe we could work something out. Naw.
She pulled my wrist closer to her body and me with it. Her hand was like fleshy steel. I couldn’t pry her hand off, not with anything short of a blowtorch. And I was all