Лорел Гамильтон: The Harlequin

«I do not want to ask them, Anita. I do not want them to know my sins. I would rather…«He hesitated, then spoke, but I was pretty sure it wasn't the sentence he started to use. «Quietly, I would rather it be done quietly.»

«Why the sudden need for confession and absolution?»

«I am still a believer, Ms. Blake; being a vampire has not changed that. I wish to die absolved of my sins.»

«Why are you expecting to die?»

«Tell Jean-Claude what I have told you about the stranger or strangers in my church. Tell him about my desire for a priest to hear my confession. He will understand.»

«Malcolm…»

He kept walking, but stopped with his hand on the door. «I take back what I said, Ms. Blake, I am not sorry I came. I am only sorry I did not come days ago.» With that he walked out and closed the door softly behind him.

I sat down at my desk and called Jean-Claude. I had no idea what was going on, but something was up, something big. Something bad.

I CALLED JEAN-CLAUDE'S strip club, Guilty Pleasures, first. He'd gone back to being manager there since he had enough vampires to help run the other businesses. Of course, I didn't get Jean-Claude on the phone first thing. One of the employees answered and informed me that he was on stage. I told them I'd call back, and yes, it was important, so have him call me ASAP.

I hung up and stared at the phone. What was my sweetie doing while I sat in my office a few miles away? I pictured all that long dark hair, the pale perfection of his face, and I was thinking too hard. I could feel him. Feel the woman in his arms as she clung to him. He held her face between his hands to keep the kiss from getting out of hand, to keep her from shredding her own lips against the sharp points of his fangs. I felt her eagerness. Saw inside her mind, that she wanted him to take her here and now on the stage in front of everyone. She didn't care; she just wanted him.

Jean-Claude fed on that desire, that need. He fed on it, as other vampires fed on blood. Half-naked waiters came onto the stage to help pry her, gently, from him. They helped her back to her seat, while she cried, cried for what she could not have. She had paid for a kiss, and she'd gotten that, but Jean-Claude always left you wanting more. I should know.

He spoke like some seductive wind through my mind, « Ma petite , what are you doing here?»

«Thinking too hard,» I whispered to the empty office, but he heard me.

He smiled with at least two different types of lipstick smeared around his mouth. «You entered my mind while I fed the ardeur and it did not rise in you; you have been practicing.»

«Yeah.» It felt weird saying it out loud in the empty, dim office, especially because I could hear the hum and murmur of the club around him. The women clamoring to be next, waving their cash for him to choose them.

«I must choose a few more; then we may talk.»

«Use the phone,» I said. «I'm at the office.»

He laughed, and the sound echoed through me, shivered down my skin, made things low in my body tighten. I drew away from him, closed the metaphysical links between us enough so I wouldn't get sucked back into his act. Then I tried to think about something else, anything else. If I'd known enough about baseball, I'd have thought about that, but that wasn't my sport. Jean-Claude didn't strip, but he did feed off the crowd's sexual energy. In another century he'd have been called an incubus, a demon that fed on lust. The thought almost pulled me back to him, but I thought, Think about legal stuff, the law . Something. In this century he just had to put a disclaimer in several prominent places in the club stating, «Warning: Vampire powers will be part of the entertainment. There are no exceptions. By being inside the club, you give permission for the legal use of vampire powers upon yourself and anyone with you.»

The new laws that had helped make vamps legal hadn't really caught up to everything they could do. You couldn't do one-on-one mind control, though mass hypnosis was okay, because the call wasn't as deep, or as complete. One-on-one mind control meant the vampire could call people out of their beds, force them to come to the vampire. Mass hypnosis didn't work that way, or that was the theory. A vamp couldn't drink blood without getting the donor's permission first. You couldn't use vamp powers to get sex. Beyond that, the law stated that you had to notify humans in your place of business, and beyond that the law got really vague. The last no-no about no vamp powers for sex had been added only last year. It was treated like a date-rape drug, for legal purposes. Except that a vampire convicted of its use was sentenced to death, not trial or jail. Malcolm was right about the double standard. Vampires were people under the law, but they didn't get all the rights that the rest of the American citizenry got. Of course, most of the rest of the citizens couldn't tear iron bars from their sockets and use mind control to wipe people's memories. They'd been deemed too dangerous for jail after a few bloody, and very messy, escapes.

So my job as vamp executioner had been invented. I don't mean to make it sound like I was the first one with the job. I wasn't. The ones who took the job first were people who had been slaying vampires when they were still illegal, so you could kill them on sight with no legal problems. The government had actually yanked the credentials of some people who'd had a hard time understanding that they had to wait for a warrant of execution before killing anyone. They'd finally had to put one of the old-style vamp hunters in jail. He was still in jail five years later. That had sent the message they wanted.

I'd come in at the tail end of the old school, but mostly I had never killed a vampire that hadn't been covered by legal paperwork.

I glanced at my watch. I still had enough time to run home, change into date clothes, get Nathaniel, and make the movie.

The phone rang, and I jumped. Nervous, who me? «Hello?» I made it a question.

« Ma petite , what is wrong?» That smooth voice eased over the phone like a hand caressing down my skin. It wasn't sexual this time; it was calming. He'd picked up my nervousness. In the middle of feeding the ardeur , he'd missed it.

«Malcolm came to see me.»

«About the blood-oathing?»

«Yes, and no,» I said.

«Why yes, and no, ma petite ?»

I told him what Malcolm had told me. Somewhere in the middle of the talk, he shut down the metaphysical link between us, shut it down so hard and so tight that I couldn't feel anything from him. We could share each other's dreams, but if we shielded hard enough, we could shut each other out. But it took work, and we didn't do it often lately. The silence when I finished was so complete that I had to ask, «Jean-Claude, you still there? I can't even hear you breathing.»

«I do not have to breathe, ma petite , as well you know.»

«It's just a saying,» I said.

He sighed then, and the sound of it shivered over my skin. This time it was sexual. He could use some of his powers on me and still shield like a son of a bitch. I couldn't. When I shielded that tight, I was cut off from a lot of my abilities. «Stop that. Don't try to distract me with your voice. What is it that Malcolm can't speak of without being killed?»

«You will not like my answer, ma petite .»

«Just tell me.»

«I cannot tell you. I am under the same vow as Malcolm, as all the vampires everywhere are.»

«All vampires?»

« Oui .»

«What, or who, could force an oath like that from all of you?» I thought about it for a second, then answered my own question. «The vampire council, of course, your ruling body.»