Лорел Гамильтон - Dead Ice

“Leave us, Seamus,” he said.

Seamus got out of bed. I turned so I could see him; he was well over six feet so I didn’t have to turn my head that much. “I’m not sure us alone is a good idea.”

Seamus hesitated, standing there looking down at both of us.

Heat and energy rose off Narcissus, as if I’d opened the door of an oven set to broil. I looked down at his hand and it almost burned against my skin. God, he was so powerful. I’d known that, felt it before, but not in a long time, and not like this.

“Either I am your king, or I am not!” He spat the words out. “If I am not, then stay, but if I am—get the fuck out of here!”

Seamus dropped to one knee, head bowed, but eyes up the way Magda had been earlier. “You are my king.”

“But that bitch vampire, Jane, calls to the hyenas, all of them, like some fucking siren.” His hand was tighter on my arm now. His beast rose like nearly visible flame around him. It called to the newest beast inside me. I’d been so careful to stay away from the hyenas up to now, so careful. Most of my animals to call had all been accidental, whoever was nearest me at the time that I had some major power-up metaphysically. I hadn’t wanted to tie myself to any more people, and Jean-Claude had urged me to think carefully before I chose someone for political and personal reasons, since the animals to call could become part of our poly group.

Narcissus looked at me, a low animal noise sliding out of his thin, well-shaped mouth. He usually wore lipstick to make his lips fuller and pouty. Now they were just pink and I could trace the line of them. I realized two things: First, someone had turned on the light in the room so I could see the paleness of his skin, the deep brown of his eyes, and the pink of his natural lip color; second, I’d tried to move my hand to touch his mouth and trace the line of it.

He still had my arm, so I couldn’t reach him, but my hand was raised trying to touch his face. We looked at each other.

“Get out,” Narcissus said, and neither of us looked as Seamus went for the door, but someone else was in the room now. I could feel them, and Narcissus just had to raise his gaze and see them.

“All of you, get out!”

“I am not one of your hyenas, and you don’t sign my paycheck.” It was Dino. If I hadn’t been inches from the most powerful wereanimal in the room, I’d have turned and looked for the big guy. I wondered how Seamus had even moved past him with both of them being so big, like two trucks getting stuck in a tunnel.

I almost smiled at my own joke, but staring into Narcissus’s face, feeling his hand grip my arm ever tighter, I didn’t think he’d get the joke. I was having trouble breathing this close to all that energy. He was heat, and sun, and . . . I smelled that dry grass, burned under the sun that I smelled when my lion came to me. I smelled the native land, or territory, of my beasts; I knew that, and I knew that hyenas and lions shared the same landscape, but it jarred me to smell the same land. It called my lion awake, as if the hyena smelled like home.

Narcissus jerked me those last few inches closer, so that he snarled in my face. “It’s not your lion I’ve come to see.”

I felt Dino loom up above the bed, before Narcissus’s gaze rolled upward. “Be very careful what you do next, rat.” His voice was low, growling, but very calm, each word enunciated carefully. I knew why he was controlling his voice so tightly, because if he lost control of even that much he wasn’t sure what else he’d lose control of. I’d had moments like that, usually when I had a gun pointed at someone.

“Back off, Dino,” I said, keeping my voice low and even. I stared into Narcissus’s eyes from inches away, bathing in the heat of his beast, his grip almost painful on my arm. He wanted to lash out at someone, so badly.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea, Anita.”

“I didn’t ask your opinion; I gave you an order,” I said, looking only at Narcissus. My hyena was awake and looked at him but didn’t try to come closer. She was much more cautious than most of my beasts when they smelled a potential mate.

“Anita . . .”

“Get out, Dino. Send someone in here who won’t make things worse.”

Narcissus looked at the big man. “You heard your mistress, and she does sign your paycheck.” His words were calmer, some of the horrible tension easing.

In my head I thought, well technically I didn’t sign the paychecks, but I decided not to quibble since things were improving. Dino did what we told him to do, and we were suddenly alone just inches from each other, naked, with his power spreading over me like a warm bath that was just this side of too hot.

“Thank you for helping to heal me,” I said, voice still low and calm, as if I were afraid of spooking him.

He frowned, his eyes losing some of that angry edge. “You’re welcome, but aren’t you going to ask why Jean-Claude sent me in to sleep with you?” His voice was growing calmer, and his energy was easing down, more like a bath you’d enjoy relaxing in, and not one that would boil your flesh from your bones. He had so much power to offer, which was why he was Oba of the clan, and why the other leaders tolerated his ultimatums. They all respected power.

“To help heal me,” I said, almost whispering.

“I am tired of games, Anita. Do you know what has happened, or don’t you?”

“Do you mean the dickwad stupidity that Asher pulled with Kane?”

He gave the tiniest smile. “ Dickwad , I haven’t heard that since junior high.”

“Would you prefer jackass, idiot, fucking bastard, asshole? Stop me when I get to an insult you like, I’ve got a million of them.”

He smiled a little more. “Well, I do like assholes.”

That made me smile. “So I’m told.”

The energy eased down a little bit more, and he stopped squeezing my arm so tight. “I have called Asher every name I can think of today.”

“How’d he take that?”

“I don’t know, I haven’t seen him yet.”

“You mean you’ve cursed him in absentia?” I asked.

He smiled. “I like that, yes, I’ve cursed him in absentia. I was afraid of what I’d do to him if I saw him.” He let go of my arm and just lay down on his side of the bed. I did the same so we lay on our sides, facing each other, but not touching.

“I told Kane you’d want to kill them both.”

“I heard you spoke with him.” He laughed, but it left his eyes bleak and starting to fill with anger again. “I heard you fed on him and left him on the floor to twitch, after threatening to make him your hyena to call and break his tie with Asher forever.”

“I was pretty angry myself when he told me what they’d done.”

“Would you really tie yourself to Kane for all eternity?”

“Nah, I don’t do stupid, and he had to be stupid to not understand what it could mean for him to be Asher’s animal to call.”

“I am within my rights to kill him.” His face was calm when he said it, his eyes looking down the bed as if he were thinking.

“If you’d seen him, or Asher, when you first found out, you might have.”

He looked at me then, the anger flaring back. “His life is mine if I so will it.”

“It is, but part of the reason you’re in here with me is that you didn’t kill him, or Asher.”

He laughed then, a real laugh, and hugged me. “He is so stupid; how can I love someone who is this fucking stupid?”

I hugged him back and answered with my face in the bend of his neck. “I don’t know, but Jean-Claude loves him, too, and so do I, or so did I.”

He drew back enough to look into my face. “You don’t love Asher anymore?”

“I don’t think I do anymore.”