"Well, you weren't the only one who got hurt last time Asher threw a hissy fit. Remember, he bit my mouth so badly that I'd have needed stitches if I'd been human. Hell, I might have needed plastic surgery or lived with permanent scars on my lips."
He touched my cheek, then traced his fingers delicately across my lower lip. It brought my breath in a sigh. He caressed his finger over my mouth again, then said, "Later I want to do that again, but push my fingers and other things between your lips."
I shivered at the thought of it, which made him laugh, pleased with himself, but he'd earned it. He was as good as his promises in the bedroom.
"Now stop that, or we'll both get too distracted to go in and talk to Asher."
The laughter faded around the edges, leaving his eyes angry again. "I really hate Kane. I don't like Asher sometimes, but Kane is just . . ."
"Irritating as hell," I finished for him.
"Yes."
"I know, but you be careful as hell around both Asher and Kane. He doesn't practice as hard as the rest of our guards, but he's still been doing this longer than you have. If you get hurt I will never forgive myself, or you. But you have a right to be in on the group discussions, and you're right, Jean-Claude hasn't seen you in fight practice."
"Kane has."
"Then be extra careful of him, because he knows how you move." I stepped away and offered him my left hand, and we went for the door. Cynric, I mean Sin, came with me smiling, happy to be included. I hoped he would be as happy afterward.
57
OF COURSE, IT wasn't that easy to get to Jean-Claude and the rest, because they were in the underground. The miles of stairs stretching downward meant there was no way to walk and be that quick. My phone buzzed at me. I fumbled it out of my pocket and saw a text from Nathaniel. "Jean-Claude is backing down. Need you."
Micah texted while I was still reading the first text. His text was shorter. "ETA?"
I showed Sin the texts. "Estimated time of arrival, what do you think?" I asked.
"At my speed, less than five minutes."
"You have to stay with me, not ahead of me," I said.
He grinned. "Well, then what's your mile time?"
"On stairs?" I said.
He nodded, still grinning.
"Shit, it's less than two miles." I texted both of the men back using a group message, and typed, "On stairs, less than 10 ETA."
"It'll be a lot less," Sin said.
I put the phone back in my pocket and started down the stairs. I was a little afraid of trying my top speed on the stone steps, but the guys needed me now. Jean-Claude had only two weaknesses: me and Asher. I said a little prayer and let myself run, really run, down the steps. I was glad I'd worn jogging shoes to work today. Sin stayed with me in his less-stair-friendly boots. He could have gotten there sooner, but he stayed with me like I'd told him to; it helped me move faster knowing that I was slowing him down, and that Nathaniel and Micah needed me with them. I prayed that Jean-Claude wouldn't do anything too stupid before I got there, and I ran.
58
I GOT TO the bottom of the steps in a rushed breathlessness that left me stumbling. Sin caught me, or I might have fallen. I was breathing too hard to speak, my heart in my throat like a drum. Sin was looking down at me with a huge grin on his face, deep blue eyes sparkling happily. "You did good!" he said, voice excited, but completely even.
I wanted to ask how much faster he could have run it on his own but didn't have the air to waste on it. There were two guards on the door, which wasn't typical. One was new, but the other one was Clay, tall, blond, athletic-looking, but he'd been taken off security at Guilty Pleasures for letting underage people slip past him because one of the ladies was flirting with him and vouched for her friend. Not my favorite guard. But he led the rush toward me, asking, "What's wrong?"
Sin answered, because I still didn't have enough air to speak. "Micah wants Anita at the meeting."
"So do I," Clay said. The other guard just watched everything quietly, dark eyes taking in details. I saw him clock all my weapons, or most of them. He'd have had to pat me down to find some of them.
"How bad is it?" I managed to gasp.
"Bad enough." He touched his earpiece, which they didn't always wear, and said, "It's Anita."
The big door swung open, and I could hear raised voices before I saw that it was Dino at the door. "Glad you're here, Anita, but he can't come into the meeting. Jean-Claude's orders." He motioned at Sin.
Micah's voice: "Anita is on her way, Jean-Claude. I'd rather wait for her before any decisions are made."
"Why are you even here, king of cats?" Asher asked. "You're not in my bed, or Jean-Claude's."
"I am in Jean-Claude's bed a lot more than you are."
"You little bitch," Asher said.
I told Dino that Sin was with me, and he accepted it, because I think he was more worried about the meeting than obeying Jean-Claude's orders. I touched the drapes that were the walls to the living room, but Sin's long arm reached over me and held it for me. He stayed behind me, but he held the "door." I was okay with that.
I entered the room with "I think I'm the bitch here" to find that Micah and Nathaniel were sitting in the love seat by the door with Nicky, Dev, Bram, and Domino behind them as guards. I was glad to see Domino well enough to be back on duty. Nicky and Nathaniel were still in the suits they'd worn to Sin's awards ceremony.
"Well, you're certainly everyone's pussy," Kane said, from the big white couch across the room, with Asher at his side. The vampire's hair fell in glittering gold waves past his shoulders, and I mean gold, not yellow. I'd never seen hair that looked metallic, but his was; some mix of blond and brown had made magic, and then those eyes--a pale, icy blue so pure in color that it was a pale match to Jean-Claude's darkest of blues. Belle Morte, their originator, had collected beautiful blue-eyed men, and these two had been two of her greatest finds. Asher had spilled that shining hair over half his face to hide the burn scars, so that he peered out at us like some sort of feral angel, showing only the perfect half of his face to the room--the face that looked down from the painting above the fireplace where his perfect profile had made Belle commission him painted as Cupid to Jean-Claude's Psyche in the same picture. The painter had taken some liberties, as they do, but they really were that heartrendingly beautiful, or could be.
I looked around the room and nodded. "I am actually sleeping with almost everyone in this room, but I don't think my pussy belongs to everyone here; I see it more as, all the cocks belong to me."
"Slut," he said.
"Who's your daddy, Kane?" I asked.
"What? Asher is."
I shook my head. "Not in the locker room earlier today he wasn't."
He actually started to get up, but Asher pulled him back down and cuddled him closer to his side; he'd already put him on the far side against the couch arm so he wasn't in touching distance of Richard and Jean-Claude. I hadn't expected to see Richard here, especially not with his arm around Jean-Claude's shoulders. He'd put his arm across the back of the couch, but not actually around the other man's shoulders, especially not without me sitting with them. They looked as they usually did, like they didn't match: Jean-Claude in one of his white shirts with all the lace at the sleeves and collar and going down the V to midchest, black leather pants that looked like someone had sewn him into them with the stitching on the sides of his long legs, and a pair of boots that only went to his knees, conservative for his footwear. Richard in blue jeans and a plain white T-shirt that made his spring tan look even darker, with nice brown leather hiking boots that had begun to soften because he actually hiked in them. Jean-Claude's black curls that fell almost to his waist, Richard's shoulder-length brown waves. Jean-Claude's almost androgynous beauty, Richard's face so very masculine in its handsomeness. Richard was only an inch taller, but with the swell of his muscled arm across Jean-Claude's shoulders it made the other man seem fragile, though I knew he wasn't. Richard was one of those
big men who doesn't look that big most of the time, until he does.
Richard's main bodyguards were Shang-Da, the only six-foot-five Chinese man I'd ever met, and Jamil, who was darkly African American with cornrow hair to his waist. One was dressed in a black suit tailored big to hide the weapons I knew he was carrying, and the other was dressed in a white suit, red shirt, and tie to match the red beads in his hair. Jamil was the only man I'd ever known who could really pull off a white suit and not look silly. He made it look just right.
Sin took my hand and said, "I think I missed something, but it sounds good."
"I told you to stay away, Sin," Jean-Claude said.
"He's earned the right to be here, Jean-Claude."
"She defies you at every turn, Jean-Claude." Kane again.
"Even your young prince obeys her over you, mon amour," Asher said.
"The guards were all talking about how Anita handed you your ass in the locker room," Nicky said. "They found you flopping around on the floor. You couldn't even stand up."
Richard laughed, and once he did the guards joined him in a round of very masculine laughter. Micah joined them; only Nathaniel and Jean-Claude stayed somber. Nathaniel was watching Asher with a very solemn look as he sat holding hands with Micah. Jean-Claude's hand was playing with the lace on his shirt, which was something he did to calm himself, or when he was trying to calm himself. Richard had his other hand pinned against his thigh. I wasn't sure if they were holding hands, or if Richard had just pinned Jean-Claude's hand so it wouldn't keep petting his thigh, which was another nervous thing he did. It was usually my thigh, or Asher's, or occasionally Micah's.
"Did you hit him that hard?" Sin asked.
"I didn't hit him."
"She ate his anger," Nicky said. "I hear that leaves you pretty messed up afterward, Kane." He stared at Kane; it was a speculative look, somewhere between sizing someone up on the practice mat and watching someone you were thinking about fucking, or maybe just about tearing their throat out and eating them. It was an incredibly predatory look, the kind a serial killer might give his victims, all violence, sex, and cannibalistic speculation.
"Not as messed up as being her fucking Bride makes you." Kane said it with an unpleasant smile.
Nicky smiled back, but it was a pleased smile, an anticipatory smile.
Kane's smile wilted around the edges. He knew something was wrong, but not quite what. He might have been intelligent, I'd give Asher the benefit of the doubt that he didn't fuck stupid, but one thing was for sure; Kane was not wise.
"I say again, why are you even here, Micah?" Of course, Asher wasn't the wisest cookie in the jar either.
"I'm here because I have a relationship with more people in this room than you do, and I represent the interests of all the shapeshifters in Jean-Claude's immediate territory and beyond."
"Tell that to Narcissus, whom you have imprisoned," Asher said.
"He wanted to kill you both, when he learned what you had done." Jean-Claude's voice was as empty as his face, as if he couldn't bear to show any emotion.
"I know you bargained for our lives, mon amour, and I am grateful," Asher said.
"Then act like you're grateful," Micah said.
"Was it you who made Jean-Claude deny me my own bodyguards, as due me?"
"Due you? Nothing is due you, Asher."
"I am a master vampire and my animal to call is the most powerful shapeshifter group in this city." His eyes flared to icy blue fire for a second, then calmed.
"Was," I said, "your animal to call was the most powerful shapeshifter group in the city. Past tense." I wanted to sit down, but I didn't want to sit that close to Kane, or Asher, and I sure as hell didn't want to take Sin closer. I could sit beside Nathaniel and Micah, but if I did then it might bother Jean-Claude, and Kane would certainly remark on it; that would not go well.
"I know you've been plotting behind my king's back," Kane said.
"It was Narcissus who tried to persuade Asher to overthrow Jean-Claude and take over the city," I said.
Kane frowned. "No, that's not true. He lied to you about my Oba." He pointed at Micah, rather dramatically I thought.
I looked at Asher. "He doesn't know, does he?"
Kane looked at Asher. "What don't I know?"
"Narcissus did try urging me to help him in a bit of kingmaking, but I refused like a loyal second-in-command should." Asher gave a little bow toward Jean-Claude, but sitting on the couch made it a halfhearted gesture at best.
"Yes, Asher, technically you are still my temoin, my second-in-command."
"Jean-Claude, what do you mean, technically?" He reached out as if to bridge the space before him and touch the other man.
Richard drew Jean-Claude in tighter against him and moved his other hand so that it was free, leaving room to wonder what he'd do if Asher tried to touch Jean-Claude. It was the kind of thing you do when someone is touching your girlfriend too much in a bar, and Richard gave him the challenging look that went with it. It was a way of saying, Mine, stop touching it, without having to say anything. Unless the other man was drunk, they usually backed off, and Asher wasn't drunk.
It startled him enough that he moved his head and let the hair spill back from all of his face so he could look at Richard and Jean-Claude together. The scars on his face were white and didn't cover much of the right cheek at all; the full, kissable mouth was untouched, as if even his torturers hadn't been able to bear the thought of ruining that pout.
I knew what Asher was wondering: Had Richard and Jean-Claude crossed those last inches and become lovers for real? I was betting good money they hadn't, but part of the BDSM relationship that Asher had with Richard was that the Ulfric liked figuring out what the vampire wanted most, and denying him that. Richard's body was one denial, but to imply that Jean-Claude was getting what Asher wanted but had never had, that was sadistic denial and domination of Asher's very thoughts and emotions. It was brilliant, because it would freaking torment Asher. One thing I think we all agreed on was that he'd earned some torment.
Jean-Claude settled more securely in the circle of Richard's arms and gave Asher a look that was all cat that ate the canary. That alone let me know just how angry Jean-Claude was with him, because Asher's jealousy was legendary and this was guaranteed to raise it, but there comes a point where you just want to hurt the other person, logic and common sense be damned.
Sin's hand tensed in mine. He knew this was a bad idea, too, but we weren't the ones pulling the green-eyed monster's tail.
Jean-Claude said, "You didn't consult me at all before you made Kane your hyena to call. What kind of temoin enrages the leader of one of the largest animal groups in the city without telling his master first?"
"One that doesn't give a damn about his master, or his territory," Richard said, and turned more toward the other men, ostensibly so they could look at each other while they talked more easily, but it also meant that Jean-Claude was now leaning his back completely against the other man; with a little encouragement he was lounging against Richard, who put both those strong arms around the other man. Jean-Claude wrapped his own hands around those muscled arms. It was a display of familiarity that I'd never seen from them. It would have been more exciting in so many ways if I hadn't seen the cruelty in both their eyes. I wasn't sure I'd ever seen both of them this angry with Asher at the same time. I guess we were all that angry with him, though strangely their anger was helping me let go of some of my own. I was usually the hothead, but if they got pissy, someone needed to remain calm.
"I did not mean to cause such disarray," Asher said, and used his hair to hide the scars again, so that he was all golden hair and angelic face peeking out. The pale blue shirt made his eyes seem even bluer, like a startling sky that could look back at you. The shirt left a small V of his chest bare, and was bigger than it needed to be so the color complemented, but the size left him looking lost in it, like he'd borrowed the shirt, though I knew better. The black vinyl pants with thei
r slashes of matching blue, on the other hand, were like all good vinyl and looked like a second skin. The black boots barely came over his ankles so they left his long legs looking even longer. The shirt looked careless, almost sloppy, but I knew how hard it was to get into vinyl; he hadn't done that casually. He'd been Jean-Claude's lover for hundreds of years, which meant he knew what the other man liked to see him in, and though it didn't make sense to me, Jean-Claude watched him in the clothes. He held on to his anger, but even wrapped in Richard's arms he watched Asher in that way he did sometimes--hell, the way I did, and Nathaniel did sometimes, and the way Dev almost always watched him.
I squeezed Sin's hand and told him, "Sit with Micah and Nathaniel."
He kissed me, light and chaste, and did what I asked. I went to Jean-Claude, which meant going to Richard, too, but the days when I went to him for anything but occasional rough sex were long past. He was still handsome, and great in bed, but that wasn't enough to get me past the temper tantrums. Asher and he had taken turns making Jean-Claude and me miserable.
I ended up having to sit in front of Jean-Claude so that the three of us were sitting spooned in each other's laps on one end of the couch. Jean-Claude wrapped his arms around me and I put my hands around his arms like he'd been sitting with Richard before I sat down. Then Richard's long, tanned arms came around on either side of us and held us, and his legs settled more firmly on either side of us. It was another reminder of just what a big guy he was, in every way. He'd sacrificed some of his weight-lifting time to hit fight practice more seriously. I'd seen what the length of his arms and legs could do when he sparred; now they made a nest for the two of us. There'd been a time when I'd have given almost anything for this closeness to be as real as what we were advertising, but my reality was sitting on the other side of the room.
"Anita didn't mean that Narcissus has lost power, Asher, she meant that you had," Richard said.
"I don't understand what you mean; nothing has changed for me. I can still call and command the hyenas."
"If you had made Narcissus your animal to call, then you could have commanded the werehyenas, but now you have Kane, just Kane," Richard said.
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