Page 82 of Smolder (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter 29)

“How can you say that when even your nickname for her means ‘my little one’?”

“Physically, she is petite, but I do not see her as small. She is and always has been larger than life to me.”

Richard frowned so hard it looked painful. “She’s accomplished great things, amazing things, she’s incredible at everything she does.”

“But you still see me as the pretty, pretty princess to be protected and taken care of?”

“I was raised to protect the woman I loved.”

“I’ve met your mother, she’s got a temper almost as hot as mine, and she takes no prisoners when she’s defending her family. Your dad, on the other hand, is this laid-back, easygoing guy.”

“They balance each other,” he said.

“With a mother like that, how can you still want to put me in the princess box?”

“What’s wrong with the princess box?”

“You climb into it for a while and see how it feels, then get back to me.”

He got that guy look, that I’m-the-big-strong-man-and-you’re-being-silly look. The fact that Richard had that look in him anywhere was an issue for me, but that he directed it at me ever was the real problem.

“I don’t fit into the princess box,” he said, all smug at being over six feet tall and big and athletic and male.

“Neither do I,” I said, “and never aim that look at me again.”

“What look?”

“The guy look, the smug, big, dominant, athletic, guy look, that says with a glance that I’m just a little girl and I don’t know what I’m talking about.”

“I never think that about you, Anita, ever. I may not get the dynamics the way I need to between us, but I never treat you as less just because you’re a woman. My mother and sister would both kick my ass if they caught me doing that.”

“Shit, maybe I’m projecting, I don’t know anymore.”

“You’re not projecting,” Nathaniel said.

“But Richard is correct as well,” Jean-Claude said. “He did not think as badly of her as she projected, but his attitude toward her is not what she wishes it to be.”

“You could hear us both thinking,” I said.

“Oui.”

“So, we’re both right and both wrong?” Richard asked.

“Oui.”

And that about summed up Richard and me when we tried to date. I was just suddenly exhausted, as everything caught up with me all at once.

Wicked leaned in and said, “If you want to lean against me I would be honored to guard your rest.”

“I won’t sleep, I never sleep in cars.”

“I’m just offering a place to rest.”

“You could lean against me if you’re tired,” Richard said.

“No,” I said, “I can’t, because you see it as weakness, and I can’t be weak right now. We have a dragon, a real dragon to fight. A dragon vampire, which is a new category for me. How do we fight him?”

“You defeated him tonight with theardeur,” Jake said.

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