I licked my way down his body, and his hand on the back of mine, guided me to him. I drew him into my mouth, and the texture of him so small, so loose, was wonderful. I sucked him, rolled him with my tongue. Small, I could have my way with him, and not have to fight for it. I sucked him as hard and fast as I could, in and out, in and out, until he cried out above me. I used my hand to lift the loose tenderness of his balls up, so I could draw them gently into my mouth. It was hard having all of him in my mouth at once, even this small, there was barely room. I had to be so careful of him, so careful, not to hurt him, not to crush such delicate pieces. Like rolling some precious priceless work of art between your teeth. When I didn't trust myself not to bite down on those tender bits, I spilled them out of my mouth. But I kept that soft, flexible, givable, forgivable bit to roll and coax, until he cried out above me, and his body thrust forward, but he couldn't complete it. I could have teased him all night, and he couldn't have finished it. I was ready to offer to open a vein myself, when I felt hands on my hips.
I felt Richard push himself against my body. He wasn't soft now, he was oh, so hard. He kept one hand on my hip, and used the other to guide himself in. He pushed against the opening in my body.
I started to raise up, but Jean-Claude's hand pushed on my head, kept me where I was, kept my mouth wrapped around his body, sucking him deep into my mouth, as Richard pushed his way into my body. I was wetter now, more open, but Richard still had to work his way in, push, and shove, for each tight, wet, inch. The feel of him inside me forced small sounds from my throat, made me whimper and moan, all of it with Jean-Claude still in my mouth.
Richard pushed his way in, until there was no more. Until he hit the end of me, and had nowhere to go but to draw himself back out of me, slowly, so slowly. I didn't want slowly. I wanted fast. I wanted hard. I wanted Richard at his best, not this careful dance.
I raised my head up off of Jean-Claude, and this time he let me, but he kept his hand against my hair. I raised up enough to gaze back over my body and see Richard there on his knees. Seeing him with his body inside of me, rolled my eyes shut for a moment, but the feel of all that thick potential being so carefully used, made me want to scream at him.
"Fuck me, Richard."
He looked at me, and the control on his face in his body, stopped for a moment. He looked at me, and said, "Anita."
"Fuck me," I said, "fuck me, God, fuck me, just fuck me. Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me, fuck me, please, please, please just fuck me."
"I am."
I shook my head, hard enough to send my hair flying around my face. Jean-Claude moved his hand enough for me to do it. "No, no, no, no!" Freed of Jean-Claude's hands I could move. I shoved myself onto him. I shoved myself down hard and fast until the sound of our bodies hitting slapped together. Having him shoved that hard, fast, deep, inside me, made me cry out, but not in pain.
I leaned my upper body forward, and angled my hips, and I fucked him, as hard and as fast, as I could. It wasn't quite as good as he could have done on his own, but it was still good. Still so good.
Richard caught the rhythm of my hips and started shoving himself inside me, as hard and fast as he could. Harder and faster than I'd been able to manage on my own. So hard, so fast, so deep, hitting that spot deep, deep inside my body, until I cried out around him.
Jean-Claude's hand pushed me back down, and helped my mouth find him again. Helped me feed on his soft, soft flesh while Richard pounded himself inside me. Jean-Claude moved up high on his knees, and his hand helped me stay where he wanted me.
It wasn't until I heard Richard's voice, "Jean-Claude," and felt Richard's rhythm falter, that I suspected what Jean-Claude was doing up there, behind my back.
Jean-Claude was suddenly not soft, or limp. He grew in my mouth like ripened fruit, like something sweet and tender that had waited a very long time to spread and grow thick and heavy. He filled my mouth. I drew back to breathe, and he forced my head farther down, forced himself deeper into my throat.
I suddenly had both of them as deep inside me as my body could hold. Richard pounded himself between my legs, and Jean-Claude thrust himself between my lips. They found a rhythm together, so that they mirrored each other. I fought to open my mouth wide enough, to keep teeth out of the way, while Jean-Claude mouth-fucked me. I'd never let anyone do that before, not like this, not so that what was happening at my mouth was almost exactly what was happening between my legs.
Richard had taken me at my word. He pounded into me so fast and so hard, until the sound of it was like a continuous thud of flesh on flesh, and though it felt wonderful, if Jean-Claude hadn't been in my mouth I might have begged him to go. It was almost too much, almost pain. Jean-Claude was more careful up front, because he had to be, but he still forced me to hold the same rhythm, fast, hard, thudding, swallowing almost continuously, barely time to breathe between one thrust and the next. One minute I was fighting to breathe, fighting not to start begging, the next, orgasm hit me, and I was screaming, but it wouldn't stop. I screamed my orgasm around Jean-Claude's body still shoved deep in my mouth. I screamed, and my body spasmed around them both. I sucked hard and harder, I drove my hips into Richard. A moment before I'd been ready to stop, and now I helped them fuck me. I drove my body into them both, as hard and fast as I could, while my body danced between them. The orgasm grew, grew until it wasn't enough to just scream, and I raked my nails down Jean-Claude's thighs.
I felt their bodies tighten at the same time. Richard spasmed at my back, driving himself so deep inside me that I screamed for real this time, but Jean-Claude drove himself down at the same moment, and my scream was lost to the sensation of him spasming inside my throat. He wasn't as long as Richard, but he was far enough down, that it wasn't a matter of swallowing. It was simply a matter of not choking it back up. Of letting that hot thickness go down my throat, and not struggling against it. I let them have my body in that instant. I let their pleasure fill me and pour down me, through me.
It was at that moment when our bodies were joined, sharing things as intimate as blood, that it clicked into place. That we'd done enough to bind us without bleeding Jean-Claude. Maybe it was what it needed to work, or maybe we just all three had to let down our guard enough to stop fighting.
We collapsed in a breathless, panting heap. Jean-Claude drew himself out of me, gently, and lay on his back with me on top of him, pinning his legs. Richard was still on top of me, still inside me, but now he was almost dead weight, and I was short enough, and he was tall enough, that he was lying partially on Jean-Claude. I was just pinned between them.
Richard got to his knees, just enough to pull himself out of me, then collapsed onto his side, half-spooning me, but not quite touching Jean-Claude. In a voice that was still breathless, he asked, "Did I hurt you?"
I couldn't help it, I laughed. I laughed, even though my jaw was beginning to ache as the endorphins faded. I laughed, as I began to feel the ache of him between my legs. I laughed, not because it hurt, but because it felt so good.
Jean-Claude started to laugh, too.
"What?" Richard said.
Jean-Claude and I lay on top of each other, too tired to move, and laughed. It took Richard a few minutes, but finally, a deep chuckle escaped him. He moved his body enough to throw an arm across mine, and laughed. The three of us lay unable or unwilling to move, and we laughed. We laughed until we could move, then we moved up on the bed and lay quiet, in a big, warm, naked, puppy pile. Me in the middle, but when Jean-Claude's head touched Richard's arm, neither of them moved away. It wasn't perfect, but damn, it was close.
61
I'd tried to call my friendly neighborhood vampire hunter in New Orleans to see what I could learn about the vamps we were after, but Denis-Luc St. John, vamp hunter and federal marshal, was in the hospital, still in intensive care. They'd damn near killed him before they left town. Worse and worse.
The sun was a bloody strip of red against the western sky when Zerbrowski and I got out o
f his car to question the first witness. I always felt like I should have to wash my jeans when I got out of his car. The backseat was so full of paper and old fast food bags that it looked like a landfill. The front seat wasn't actually dirty, but the rest of the car was so messy that it just felt like the entire car was icky.
"Do Katie and the kids ever ride in this thing?" I asked as we started up the steps to the first apartment on the list.
"Naw, she and the kids take the minivan."
I shook my head. "Has she seen the inside of it recently?"
"You've seen our house, it's perfect, everything in its place. Even our bedroom is immaculate. The car is the one place that's mine. It gets to be as messy as I want it to be."
Strangely, it made more sense to me now than it would have a few months ago. I understood the fine art of compromise between a couple in a way that I never had before. I'm not saying I was good at it, just that I understood it more.
Zerbrowski read off the number of the apartment, and it was on the second floor, in a line of concrete walkway and metal railing. The doors were all identical. I wondered if the neighbors knew that they had a vamp living next door. You'd be amazed at the number of people that don't figure it out. Vampires hit my radar hard, so they don't pass unnoticed for me. More humans than I'm comfortable with get fooled. I don't know if it's because they want to be fooled, or if it really is harder for them to spot a vamp. I don't know which would bother me more, that normal humans can't spot them, thus implying that I am even more outside the norm, or that people want to be fooled that badly.
Since we were looking for vampires that had killed at least two people, I stretched out that part of me that sensed the dead. It wasn't the same part that raised zombies. Though explaining the difference was like explaining the difference between sky blue and turquoise. They were both blue, but they weren't the same color.
Zerbrowski reached for the doorbell, and I touched his hand. "Not yet."
"Why not?" he asked. His hand swept back his wrinkled trench coat and suit jacket, to touch the butt of his gun on his hip. "You hear something?"
"Ease down, it's okay. He's just not awake yet."
Zerbrowski looked puzzled at me. "What does that mean?"
"I can feel vampires, Zerbrowski, if I concentrate, or they're doing something powerful. He's not awake yet. I was hoping he would be, he's supposed to be the oldest one of the three, longest dead. Longest dead usually wakes up first, unless one of them is a master. Masters wake up first."
"I knew the part about longest dead," he said. "So a master vampire that is two years dead can wake up before a vampire that is five years dead, but not a master?"
"Yeah, though some vamps don't accumulate enough power in five hundred years to rival masters I've met that were under five years."
"That'd be a bummer. A flunkie for all eternity."
I nodded. "Yeah." I felt that instant spark inside the room. It hit me almost like a punch to the stomach, or lower. Once I could only sense vamps that I had a connection to, to this degree, and once it was just a small quiver of recognition. Apparently, I'd gone up a power level or two.
"You okay?" Zerbrowski asked.
"Yeah, just, yeah. Now you can use the doorbell."
He gave me a look.
"I was concentrating too hard when he woke up, okay? My bad."
I don't know if he really understood the comment, or was just used to me being weird, but whatever, he pushed the button. We heard the strident sound inside the room beyond. So many people think that being a vampire automatically gets you the big house on the hill, or a coffin in a dungeon somewhere, but most of the vamps I knew had apartments, houses, and lived pretty much like everyone else. Vampires living in a central location surrounding their master, the way Jean-Claude had it, was becoming a thing of the past.
I missed it. Not nostalgia. If I had to kill a bunch of vamps, having them spread miles apart made my job harder. But we weren't here to kill anybody, not yet. Of course, that could change. All we needed was proof, or, depending on the judge, strong suspicion. Once I'd been okay with that. Now, it bothered me. To my knowledge, I'd never killed vamps that hadn't done the crime, but I had to admit that at the beginning of my career, I hadn't checked as carefully as I did now. They were just walking corpses to me once, and making them lie down and be still hadn't felt like murder to me. My job had been easier then, fewer conflicts. Nothing helps you sleep at night so much as being absolutely certain that you're right, and everyone else is evil.
The door opened, and the vampire stood blinking at us. His blond hair was tousled from sleep, and he'd thrown jeans over his boxers, or maybe slept in both. They were wrinkled enough. He squinted at us, and it took me a second to realize the squint was permanent, like someone who'd worked outdoors all their life, and not worn sunglasses. His eyes were pale and washed almost colorless. He looked tanned, but he was five years dead, and it couldn't be a tan. Artificial tan was starting to be big business among the recently dead. The ones who hadn't gotten accustomed to that paler than pale look. His looked better than most, a professional job, not homegrown.
"Jack Benchely?" Zerbrowski made it a question.
"Who wants to know?"
He flashed his badge, and I flashed mine. "Sergeant Zerbrowski of the Regional Preternatural Investigation Team."
"Federal Marshal Anita Blake."
Jack Benchely blinked harder, like he was really trying to wake up. "Shit, what did I do to get the Spook Squad and the E xecutioner at my door just after sundown?"
"Let's go inside and talk about that," Zerbrowski said with a smile.
The vampire seemed to think about that for a second. "You got a warrant?"
"We don't want to search your place, Mr. Benchely. We want to ask you some questions, that's all." Zerbrowski was still smiling. The smile didn't even look strained.
I wasn't trying to smile, I didn't feel like it.
"What kind of questions?" he asked.
I said, "The kind about you being across the river at a strip club, when I know for a damned fact that Malcolm has ordered you all to stay away from shit like that." Now I was smiling, but it was a smile the way a flash of teeth is a smile. Sometimes it's a smile and sometimes it's not. Put your hand close to the dog's mouth and find out.
Benchely didn't look like he wanted to find out. He looked awake now, awake and almost scared. He licked his thin lips and said, "Are you going to tell Malcolm?"
"That depends on how cooperative you are," I said.
"What Marshal Blake means, is if we get enough information from you, there won't be a need to trouble the head of the Church of Eternal Life." Zerbrowski was still smiling and pleasant. I guess I was bad cop for the day. That worked for me.
"I know what she meant," the vampire said. He moved to one side of the open door and was careful to keep his hands where we could see them. Jack Benchely, human, had a record. Minor stuff. A few drunk and disorderlies, an assault charge that started out as a domestic disturbance call. Nothing too serious, and all of it involving too many drinks and not enough common sense.
When we were inside, he shut the door and went to the couch. From a coffee table that had almost as much crap on it as the backseat of Zerbrowski's car, he fished out a cigarette and a lighter. He lit up without asking if we minded. How rude.
There were no other chairs in the room, so we stayed standing. Again, rude. Though the place was so messy that I wasn't sure I'd have taken a seat if it had been offered. There was so much clutter that you expected it to smell stale, but it didn't. It did smell like the inside of an ashtray, but that's not the same thing as dirty. I've been in houses that looked spotless, but still reeked of cigarettes. Being a nonsmoker, my nose isn't dulled to it.
He took in a big drag on the cig and made the tip glow bright. He let the smoke trickle out through his nose and the corners of his mouth. "What do you want to know?"
"Why'd you leave the Sapphire early last night?" I asked.
> He shrugged. "It was after eleven. I don't call that early."
"Okay, why'd you leave when you did?"
He looked up at me, eyes narrowed as smoke oozed past them. "It was boring. The same girls, same acts." He shrugged. "I swear that strippers were more fun when I could drink."
"I bet," I said.
Zerbrowski said, "What time did you leave exactly?"
Benchely answered. We asked the usual questions. What time? Why? With whom? Was there anyone in the parking lot that could verify that he got in his truck and didn't linger in the parking lot?
"Linger," Benchely said, and he laughed. Laughed hard enough to flash fangs. The fangs were as yellowed from nicotine as the rest of his teeth. "I didn't linger, officer. I just left."
I debated on whether I could tell him to put out his cigarette in his own house, and if he'd do it if I asked. If I ordered him and he didn't, we'd look weak. If I grabbed the cig and smushed it out, I'd be a bully. I tried to hold my breath and hoped he'd finish it soon.
He took another healthy pull on the cig and spoke with the smoke coming out of his mouth. "What did I miss? One of the other vamps get out of hand with a dancer? One of the other upstanding church members trying to frame me for it?"
"Something like that," I said softly.
He fished an ashtray out of the mess. It was an older one, pale green ceramic, with upturned sides and a tray of cig holders in the middle, like dull teeth. He stubbed out his cig and didn't try to hide that he was angry. Or maybe five years dead wasn't enough time to learn to hide that well. Maybe.
"Hell, it was Charles, wasn't it?"
I shrugged. Zerbrowski smiled. We hadn't said yes, we hadn't said no. Noncommittal, that was us.
"He's a member of their damn club, did he tell you that?"
"He didn't volunteer it," I said.
"I'll bet he didn't. Damned hypocrites, all of them." He ran his hands through his hair, made the thickness of it stand up even more. "Did he tell you that he's the one that recruited me for the damn church?"
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