Лорел Гамильтон - Rafael

He murmured into my wet hair, “Will you come watch me fight tonight, Anita?”

“I thought it was wererats only,” I said.

“Usually, but I am allowed a mate who is outside the power structure.”

“What does that mean, outside the power structure?”

“I am not the only king in our history who had problems dating within his clan. I am allowed a girlfriend, even a spouse who is not a wererat.”

I rubbed the side of my face against his chest, carefully, so that I didn’t end up with a face full of water. “If it won’t cause more problems for you and the rest of us, then sure, I’ll come and cheer you on tonight.”

“I want you to see what a challenge is like, and I want you to see Hector before the fighting starts.”

“Why do you want me to see him before the fight?” I asked.

He held me tighter, closer, and I wrapped my own arms around his waist and held him harder as if just that would make things better. It didn’t, but it didn’t make them worse either.

“You should see him clean and strong before I hurt him.”

“You’re going to kill him, Rafael, what does it matter what he looks like alive and healthy?” I asked. I wanted to see his face, but we were holding each other too tightly; if I raised my face up, I’d drown.

“If I win, yes, but if he wins, then you need to seduce him, Anita. You need to do everything you can to protect those closest to both of us in my clan.”

“That’s it,” I said, and tried to pull away from him, but he held me in place. I raised my face to try to see him and got a face full of high-pressure water. At least I hadn’t breathed in, I thought as I tucked my face back against his chest. “Rafael, why are you talking like this?”

“It is always a possibility that I will lose, Anita, you know that.”

“Damn it,” I said, and fumbled behind him for the shower controls. I turned the wrong one and we were suddenly covered in icy water. I cursed and found the correct knob. The water stopped and it was suddenly quiet. He held me close, putting one hand against my head so I couldn’t move enough to even see his face. I could have struggled and maybe made him let me go, or maybe he would have let me go just because I struggled, but in that moment I felt the strength of his arm around my body like iron made flesh and coated in a smooth, wonderful brown skin. His hand was like steel holding me in place, my face pressed against his chest. I could hear his heartbeat now, thick and sure of itself.

I let him hold me but didn’t hold him back. I rested my hands on his hips; under other circumstances it would have been sexy, but not now. “What is going on, Rafael?” I felt ridiculous talking like this, all pressed to his chest, but I wanted him to answer my question more than I wanted to fight him over where I was standing.

“I have told you what is happening tonight,” he said, his voice rumbling up through his chest against my face.

“I’ve seen you before other fights, Rafael, and this is not right, you’re not right tonight. I don’t know what is wrong, but you have to delay the fight.”

“Why?” he asked, and he kissed the top of my wet hair.

“Because if you are convinced you will lose, then you will, that’s true of all fighting.”

“I will do my best for my people tonight, Anita.”

“Tell me you will win tonight. Tell me you will kick his ass. Tell me you will kill him, Rafael.”

“I will try.” But his voice made a lie of it. He would try, but he didn’t believe it would work.

I started pushing against him then. I couldn’t stay pressed to him like this; I needed to see him, I needed to move. “Don’t make me force you to let me go, Rafael.”

“Do you think you could?” he asked, and there was just a hint of amused arrogance that a lot of the big athletic guys had. Good, at least that sounded like someone who planned to win, though I didn’t really want it aimed at me.

I said, “I’d have to hurt you badly, but unless you were willing to hurt me back, yes, I can make you let me go, but I don’t want to hurt you.” Then I had an idea. “Would you being hurt postpone the fight?”

He laughed then and let go of me, stepping back as much as the shower stall would let him. His face was alight with laughter even as it faded. That was better already in so many ways.

“Do not hurt me to keep me from the fight tonight, Anita. If they thought that you were able to injure me that badly, it would be another weakness on the long list that my enemies have collected.”

“Could you say that you were injured in training?” I asked.

“Why should I lie?”

“Because this is the most confident I’ve seen you in the last few minutes, and I don’t want to send you into battle unless you know you can win.”

He looked me in the eyes, probably the best eye contact he’d ever given me when we were both naked and alone, but this moment wasn’t about sex, so the nudity truly didn’t matter.

“I did not care about the first few challengers, they were no great loss to the rodere, or the organization I have built, but now we are starting to lose the future of our people. I have had my eye on Hector for a few years now. I was thinking of bringing him here and starting to train him, groom him to take over from me someday.”

“Won’t he have to kill you to do that?” I asked. I hugged my arms, because without the hot water it was starting to get chilly.

“No, he would have to kill the challenger who just killed me.”

“I don’t understand.”

He handed me one of the towels from the hook outside the shower stall. I took it and started to dry off as he continued to talk. “I wanted to find a young wererat to train up to be my successor. Hector was on the list. In another five to ten years he could be what the rodere need, what the Coalition needs, but now he is too new, too inexperienced to lead us. It would be a disaster if he wins tonight.”

“Yeah, you’d be dead,” I said, and had to carefully towel-dry my hair without rubbing it or wrapping the towel on it, which breaks the curl. I and Micah had had the towel lecture from Jean-Claude for weeks as the wedding got closer. I’d be the bride, but Micah would be standing with us and God forbid our hair not look fabulous for the day. Even listening to Rafael now, I was careful to remember. So stupid, but it made Jean-Claude happy.

“My death would be a disaster now with no one to lead us, but someday I will lose, Anita. Someday all warriors grow old and weak, or when two people are of the same size and equally well trained it is sometimes luck that chooses the winner of a fight. In boxing or MMA, the loser lives to train harder, to learn from their mistakes and come back and win another day, but tonight will be a final loss for one of us.”

“Before you were talking as if you couldn’t win tonight. Is he really that much better than you?”

He shook his head. “No, I don’t believe so, but I see his death as a waste of potential. I will mourn his loss to the rodere, but he will celebrate my death. I cannot afford to think like a king tonight and see a great warrior and the potential for so much more. I must be the fighter I once was not just in body, but in mind and attitude. I need the tunnel vision that Hector has, because he believes in his cause. He believes that I am selling us into slavery to the vampires through you and Jean-Claude.”

“That’s not true, you know it’s not.”

“And yet I cannot prove it to Hector or to any of my enemies. Even now I want you to feed on me tonight and take power from all of them.”

“Proximity makes vampire abilities stronger, Rafael. If Hector has never been this geographically close when I fed the ardeur on you, then it’s just going to convince him even more that I’m going to give you all to Jean-Claude as food and slaves.”