Incubus Dreams - Laurell K. Hamilton [175]
“The way you’re acting, yeah. Besides, I know your reputation. If anyone can resist temptation it’s you.”
“Everyone keeps telling me that, but I don’t seem to be resisting much anymore.”
“I have lived with others more powerful than I in Belle Morte’s line for centuries, Anita. I, more than most, know just how much you must fight every night of your exisitence not to be consumed by their power.” He paused and then whispered so that it filled the darkened car, “If you are not careful, their beauty will become both heaven and hell, you will betray every oath, abandon every loyalty, give up your heart, your mind, your body, and your immortal soul to have them near you but one more night. Then one cold night, a hundred years after the passion is spent, and nothing but ashes remain, you look up and see someone gazing at you, and you know that look, you’ve seen it before. A hundred years later and someone gazes upon you as if you were heaven itself, but you know in your heart of hearts that it’s not heaven you’re offering them, it’s hell.”
I didn’t know what to say to that, but Graham did.
“Now I know why they call you Requiem. You’re poetic, but fucking depressing.”
Tonight, I just thought he was accurate.
40
SUNSET CEMETERY WAS a nice combination of old and new. Big monuments of angels and weeping virgins combined with flat, modern stones—so much less interesting. It was still a place for the rich and famous to be interred, like our local famous brewery family, the Busches.
In his day, Edwin Alonzo Herman had been a very important man, and his monument showed that he thought so, too. It loomed up into the darkness like some winged giant. There was enough light to see that the huge angel had a sword and shield, and it gave you sense that it was waiting to pass judgment, and you wouldn’t like what it decided. Of course, maybe that was just the way I was feeling tonight.
There were more than a dozen people waiting at the paved road, most of them lawyers, though with enough family members to have nearly caused a fistfight when I introduced myself and briefly explained what I’d be doing. I’d started telling people up front that I’d be using a machete and beheading chickens, for two different reasons. I’d had an overzealous bodyguard of a very wealthy man nearly shoot me when I drew the big blade. At a different graveside for a historical society, the secretary of said society had jumped me and tried to save the chicken. She’d turned out to be a vegan. That’s like a rabid fundamentalist vegetarian. I’d been glad later that it hadn’t been cold enough to wear a coat, because leather is the only kind of coat I own.
Tonight was cold enough for coats. October isn’t usually that chilly in St. Louis, but tonight had decided to be cold. Or maybe it just felt colder because I was wearing a thong. I’d been surprised by two things about the skimpy underwear: One, once I got over the sensation of having something in the crack of my butt, the thong wasn’t uncomfortable; two, a thong under a short skirt on a cold night was damn cold. I’d never fully appreciated how much warmth a little extra bit of satin or silk could hold in against my ass. I certainly appreciated it as I walked over the grass in my little boots and skirt. I huddled in the borrowed leather jacket, but kept my face away from the collar. I did not want a repeat of what had happened in the car. I willed the warmth in my upper body to travel downward. I was suddenly wishing I’d taken one of the taller men’s jackets. It wouldn’t have looked as good, but it would have covered my ass.
I stood in front of the grave, though, since it had been nearly two hundred years in a cemetery that was as well-maintained as Sunset, there was no way for me to truly be sure of where the grave had been, not really. A lot of the graves had been moved here from smaller cemeteries over the years, as increased population had needed the land. But I had dropped just enough of my shields to know exactly where Edwin Alonzo Herman’s grave lay. His bones were under there, I could feel them.
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