Page 88 of Smolder (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter 29)

“What’s that mean?” Richard asked.

“It means you need to see me with Nathaniel and Damian together, before you agree to letting Jean-Claude share the fourth mark with us.”

“Can we do that before dawn?” he asked.

I stared at him, he looked so calm. I didn’t bother to look at Jean-Claude as his face wouldn’t give away anything unless he wanted it to. “Damian should be home by now, so yeah, we can do show-and-tell tonight.”

“If we are to do that on top of everything else, we must make haste, or the sunrise will find us before we have secured our power base,” Jean-Claude said.

“I haven’t agreed to do the fourth mark with the three of us,” I said.

“Night will fall again, and Deimos will still be out there.”

“I know that.”

“We must have enough power to destroy him once and for all,” Jean-Claude said.

“We won tonight without the fourth mark.”

“Did I mention that Deimos is a fire breather?” Jake asked.

We all looked at him then. “No, you left that part out,” I said.

“I will tell you everything I know about him once all of you are securely downstairs and Jean-Claude has done what he must do before dawn.”

“Fire breathing,” Richard said.

“A real fire-breathing dragon?” I said.

“I’m afraid so,” Jake said.

“I guess it’s lucky he doesn’t just want us dead, then,” I said.

“He can only make fire when he is in full dragon form. He would not fit in the alley or side streets. He would have to march up the main road in front of Guilty Pleasures. He will not want to show himself where humans could see him, not like that,” Jake said.

“Good to know,” I said.

“I have so many questions,” Richard said.

“Be a biologist later,mon lupe, in this moment I need you to be my beast half. Dawn must not find me unprepared.”

“Is Edward still here?” I asked.

“He wouldn’t leave until he saw you in person and made sure you were okay,” Nicky said.

“Good, because if we’re going to plan how to take out a fire-breathing dragon I want him in on it.”

“Didn’t he burn a house down once with you and him still inside it?” Richard asked.

“Yeah, no one knows fire like Edward does.”

Richard looked at me like I’d lost my mind, but thanks to the vampire marks I felt the fear behind the arrogant, angry look. He was afraid of Edward; he saw him as careless and danger-seeking. He was afraid he’d get me killed someday.

“He saved me that night, Richard, I wouldn’t have had the guts to use a flamethrower inside a house with us in it, but it was the only way for us to kill the vampires and save ourselves.”

“I know you believe that, Anita.”

“And there we go, Richard, right back to the arguments we started having almost from the moment we started dating. You hate my job. You hate my best friend.”

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