Page 59 of Smolder (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter 29)

I smiled, and Graham looked puzzled. “You’re too big a voyeur not to enjoy it,” I said.

“I’m such a big voyeur that after you feed theardeuron Graham and it’s my turn, it will be an amazing amount of energy, because I will find it so incredibly hot.”

“It’s not seeing me with Anita that will make it hot, it’s watching her with someone else, right?” Graham asked.

“You’re handsome, so that’s a bonus,” Nathaniel said. “The two of you looked good together onstage, but you’re right, it’s not about you, it’s about watching Anita with someone.”

“Then if there’s a wolf in the other room that Anita likes better than me, I’ll bow out.”

I stared up at him. “You’d give up your only shot at me?”

“I’d love to have sex with you, you know that, but I’m your security and Jean-Claude needs you to feed theardeur, so if there’s another wolf here tonight that you’re more willing to feed on, we need them in here now.”

There was a knock on the door, but it opened before we could say anything. Another wolf stood framed in the doorway, but it wasn’t a wolf I’d expected to be on the menu tonight.

23

I HADN’T SEEN RICHARDin so long it was a shock to see him standing there, all six feet one inch, broad-shouldered, athletic body in a suit and tie. “You look fabulous,” he said as he reached back and undid his hair. It fell in long brown waves around his shoulders, framing his face with those high sculpted cheekbones, the dimple that softened the utter masculinity of his face. Nothing ever seemed to take away from his physical beauty.

“Richard, what are you doing here?”

“You need a wolf to feed on,” he said.

“We haven’t seen each other in almost a year, and you just march in here expecting sex?”

His dark brown eyes that could look so friendly narrowed. “Would you prefer sex with Graham?”

I glanced at the man whose hand I was still holding. Graham put his free hand up as if to show he was unarmed. “You don’t want me, Anita, I can smell that I leave you cold without Jean-Claude to help things along.”

“I don’t want anyone right now,” I said, and that was true. Minutes ago, it had been hot and wonderful onstage, but I now knew that Jean-Claude had been very deliberate with me and Graham. He’d chosen what he saw as the lesser evil when it came to sharing mewith yet another person. I couldn’t even argue with the division of labor, but the choice of someone I wasn’t attracted to, or an ex who had broken my heart more times than I could count? Surely there was a third option?

Jean-Claude’s thoughts were suddenly loud in my head. “You must feed,ma petite.”

“On Richard?” I said.

“He felt our distress and came to help, and this is the help I need,ma petite.”

Richard stepped farther into the room. “I left a date tonight because Jean-Claude let me feel what he’s sensing in the audience. No vampire could have rolled Jean-Claude and the audience like this, Anita. Jean-Claude has the energy of all the vampires in the country that are blood-oathed to him; nothing should be able to touch him, especially not when he’s in his element here at Guilty Pleasures.”

“They screwed with me, too, until I had a wolf to touch.”

Richard took another step toward us. “Let me be the wolf that you and Jean-Claude need tonight.”

Nathaniel’s hand tensed in mine. It made me look at him. I realized he was shielding about as hard as he ever did from me, so that even holding his hand I couldn’t feel what he was feeling or thinking. “You were encouraging me to have sex with Graham.”

“I was.”

“I’m UIfric leader of our pack; by wereanimal law I don’t need to get anyone’s permission except for Anita’s, but we aren’t just animals, and before you sleep with another man’s girlfriend in a poly relationship you have to have his permission, too.”

Nathaniel looked startled and didn’t try to hide it. “I don’t know what to say, that’s... I appreciate you treating me like Anita’s partner and asking my permission.”

“You’re welcome, and do I have your okay for this?”

Nathaniel let out a breath I hadn’t known he was holding. “I hate the way you’ve treated Anita and me in the past, but if tonight hasproved anything it’s that Jean-Claude needs his own wolf to call, so if Anita is okay with it, then so am I.”

“Ma petite, I am close to needing you to release theardeurand simply feed without all the civilized niceties.” He let me feel that whatever was inside the audience was trying to spread, and where it wanted to go was back inside him. He’d been powerful enough to cast out the compulsion the first time, but that had been with me at his side. Now he had more wolves, but he didn’t have my hand in his and he was the king of us all; he shouldn’t have needed my hand to hold in the dark.

“We’re out of time,” I said.

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