THE MOTEL HAD all the charm of a chain motel, which is to say none, but it was clean. One window in each room looked out on thick green forest with more evergreens reaching up toward the cloud-bedecked blue sky than we ever had in Missouri. The view made the generic room not matter. I could see getting up and going hiking, bird-watching, tracing down the scent of water on the air and finding the closest lake. So many possibilities and I wasn’t going to get to do any of them. Traveling as a marshal meant that it was all about the case. Sometimes the scenery was pretty, even glorious like this, but it didn’t matter. Unless I had to chase a shapeshifter through the forest outside, it might as well have been a big-screen TV set to New Age wilderness music.
“Anita.” Edward’s voice came from behind me, and just by the tone, I knew it wasn’t the first time he’d called my name.
“I’m sorry, Edward. What were you saying?”
I turned from the window to look into the room. It was ridiculous that we were having this discussion at all, as if I would ever really have sex with Olaf. But since he was a shapeshifter and might be able to smell if we were lying, we all had to pretend that we weren’t lying and that there was a snowball’s chance in hell that Olaf and I could date.
Nicky was standing with his back to the wall nearest me so he could see the room and the window. We were five stories up, but I’d seen shapeshifters climb up and down the outsides of buildings higher than that. Edward was sitting on the corner of the queen bed closest to Nicky and me. Angel was sitting on the bed with him, but she had taken off her heels and scooted all the way up on the bed so she could sit with her back to the headboard and the pillows she’d propped up behind her. Olaf was sitting in the corner of the couch that was almost at the foot of the bed. Custer was in the doorway to the connecting room. He was leaning his shoulder against the doorframe almost the way that Angel had cocked her hip at the sheriff’s office. I wondered if he realized that he was echoing her; with Custer, I was never quite sure.
Milligan was leaning near the outer door that led into the hallway. The fact that both of the ex-SEALs had taken up posts by the only two doors hadn’t been accidental. Custer might not have realized that he was doing the guy equivalent of what Angel had done earlier, but he knew why he was in charge of one of the doors. I knew that Olaf was very aware that both of the men were between him and the exits; if he was bothered by their positioning, he didn’t show anything.
Pierette and Ethan were on the other bed. Ethan sat on a corner of the bed, almost mirroring Edward. They both wanted their feet flat on the floor so they were ready to bounce up in case they needed to move quickly and decisively. Pierette sat against the headboard like Angel, but her back was against the bare headboard. The only pillow she was using was the one she was hugging to herself. Where Angel was stretched out and happy on her bed, Pierette was huddled in on herself. I’d seen her in the gym, at martial arts practice, on guard duty, and she never looked like this. It wasn’t her. It was an act for Olaf’s benefit, but she’d played it wrong. Olaf liked women to be afraid of him eventually, but I’d never seen him be attracted to anyone who already seemed so beaten down.
If everyone had run their big plan by me beforehand, I’d have been able to give the women pointers, but it was too late now. It was almost a shame, since Olaf had been willing to like them in that serial killer way when he first laid eyes on them. Now he watched the room, but his gaze didn’t slow down when he ran it over the women.
We had sodas and water that we’d picked up from the shop downstairs, and a coffeemaker that was doing its best to make coffee. It made sad little sounds, and the aroma was anemic, as if the generic coffee the motel offered wasn’t going to cut it. Almost everyone had taken water. I had a Powerade that Nicky had insisted I take. He’d also offered me a protein bar, which I would have turned down, but he gave me that look that people have been getting from their significant others since probably before written language. The look said I was being unreasonable, and after what had happened at the strip club, he was right. The healthy bars never taste right to me, and the unhealthy ones . . . honestly you might as well eat a candy bar and be done with it, but I took the bar. He opened the end of it before he gave it to me. Now he knew I wouldn’t just shove it into a pocket and forget about it. He knew me too well. The wrapper said it was triple-chocolate good and it managed not to be, but it wasn’t terrible. It certainly wasn’t as terrible as me losing control again. I took another bite and a drink of the Powerade, which helped. It was almost like chocolate cake and Kool-Aid at a kid’s birthday party—okay, it wasn’t, but I looked at Olaf sitting on the couch and thought about losing control when he was the nearest snack. I finished the bar in record time.
Olaf sipped his water and looked at me. It was like he was waiting for me to say something. What had I missed while I was staring out the window?
“I’m sorry, really. It’s not like me to be this distracted.”
“Drink your Powerade,” Nicky said.
“I ate a big lunch.”
“You haven’t eaten enough today, Anita.”
“Stop fussing over me.”
Ethan said, “Do you really want Nicky to stop fussing about your health and well-being?”
I realized what I’d done. “I’m sorry, Nicky. I don’t mean that I want you to stop taking care of me. If that includes fussing, so be it.”
“Thanks, Ethan,” Nicky said.
“Would you truly have had to stop fussing over Anita if Ethan had not interceded?” Olaf asked.
“It was a direct order, so yeah.”
Olaf made a movement that in anyone else I’d have said was a shiver. I’d never seen the big guy that unsettled. “I cannot believe you are happy with being Anita’s Bride.”
“If you had asked me ahead of time, I’d have said hell no, but now it’s just peaceful. Like I told you earlier, I’m happier than I’ve ever been.”
Olaf shook his head. “I do not think I would be happier as someone’s slave.”
“He’s not my slave,” I said.
Olaf gave me the full weight of his cave-black eyes. “He must obey your every word. He has no free will of his own. Your happiness means more to him than his own. If he is not your slave, then I have no word for it.”
“If you’re in love with someone, then sometimes their happiness is more important than yours,” Edward said.
“Then love is just another kind of slavery.”
“It’s not,” I said.
“It’s really not,” Edward said.
“It’s wonderful,” Ethan said.
“It can be better than almost anything,” Milligan said from his piece of wall.
“Better than being out in the field with your brothers-in-arms?” Olaf asked.
Milligan smiled. “I said almost anything.”
“If your wife was here, you’d say it different,” Custer said.
Milligan shook his head. “No, I wouldn’t. She understands. That’s why we’ve been married for ten years.”
“Congratulations,” Edward said.
“Yeah, Millie here is the old married guy in our unit,” Custer said.
“Ten years is a long time for one of the Team’s guys to be married,” Edward said.
Milligan smiled and nodded at the compliment.
“Olaf, if you see being in love as slavery, then why do we need to have this big talk?” I asked. I took a sip of my Powerade, too. I really did want to do better, but I’d still rather have had one of the soft drinks.
“I am offering sex, not love. We’re having the big talk, as you put it, because you’re afraid to have sex with me.”
“Do you blame me?”
“No, but I am offering to have ordinary sex with you, not my normal way.”
“What do you mean by ordinary sex?” I asked.
“Plain vanilla sex.”
“We’re going to have to define terms,” I said, “because one person’s plain vanilla can be someone else’s rocky road with sprinkles on top.”
Olaf frowned and sipped his bottled water. “I do not know how to answer that.”
Angel said, “Some men that say straight vanilla mean missionary position with no foreplay and doing it for God and making babies.”
Olaf made a face as if the water tasted bad, but apparently it was more Angel’s words. “No, no, that is not what I mean by the phrase.”
“That’s what I mean about needing to define terms,” I said, and leaned my butt against the edge of the window frame while I sipped my almost yummy sports drink.
“If we can have such different definitions, then yes, we need to discuss what vanilla sex means.”
“Why are you fixated on vanilla sex?” Angel asked.
“Perhaps I am using the wrong words.”
I glanced back at Edward. I raised eyebrows at him, hoping he’d understand that I needed a little help here.
“Anita doesn’t really do vanilla sex,” he said.
“What does she do?” Olaf asked.
Normally I’d have told Olaf not to talk about me as if I weren’t sitting right there, but honestly, I didn’t want to answer the question. I did not want to talk about my sexual preferences with him, ever.
“Multiple partners for starters,” Edward said.
“I know that most of her men prefer a second man in the bed when they are with her. I would not need that.” Olaf’s voice held disapproval now, almost disdain.
“You make it sound like it’s every man’s idea to have another man in the bed with us,” I said.
“Are you saying that it is your idea?”
“It depends on the man. Sometimes it’s Jean-Claude’s idea, and sometimes it’s mine. Sometimes it’s Nathaniel’s.”
“Sometimes it’s mine,” Nicky said with a smile so fierce and happy that it was almost a snarl.
“You are able to ask for things you want?” Olaf asked.
“Yes.”
Olaf looked at me. “How is that possible if he has no will of his own?”
“I give Nicky as much free will as I can,” I said.
“She feels guilty about trapping me forever,” Nicky said, “so she works really hard at letting me be myself.”
“You are a sociopath and a mercenary that took money to torture and kill people,” Olaf said. “How can Anita let you be yourself?”
“I don’t torture and kill people for money anymore.”
“Don’t you miss it?” Olaf asked.
“Not as much as I thought I would.”
“What do you miss most?”
“Being able to fight full-out, no-holds-barred, and beat the shit out of another guy.”
“You train with the other guards at home,” I said.
Nicky shook his head. “It’s not the same thing, Anita.”
“When you say you want to beat the shit out of someone, you don’t mean like an MMA fight with rules and a referee, do you?” I said.
He just shook his head.
“He means fighting for his life, Anita,” Edward said.
“He means beating people to death,” Olaf said.
I glanced at Olaf, but Nicky spoke up and got me to look at him. “I mean fighting when it’s all on the line. When if I don’t win the fight, he kills me.”
I stared at him, studying his face and trying to see if he was serious, and of course he was. “I’ve fought people to stay alive, knowing if I lost, they’d kill me. I didn’t enjoy it.”
“I know you don’t, and if your life is at risk, or the lives of any of the people we care about, then it’s not fun.”
“But you still miss it for yourself?” I asked.
Nicky nodded.
“I understand what he means,” Edward said.
“Okay. Explain it to me,” I said.
“It’s the same thing that makes me want to test myself against the biggest and baddest monster I can find.”
“It’s a way of knowing who’s the best,” I said.
Edward nodded.
I looked from my best friend to one of the loves of my life and back again. Then I looked at Olaf. “And you understand what they’re talking about, don’t you?”
“I do.”
I looked at Ethan. He raised his hands. “Don’t look at me. That’s not how I think.”
I looked at the two SEALs still guarding their respective doors. “How about you guys?”
Custer shook his head. “I like to test myself, but not like that, and I don’t want to ever fight Nicky for real.”
Milligan laughed. “I’ll second that part, and I’m not one of your lovers. I’m not even trying out for the job, so I don’t have to answer the other question, or are there questions? Either way, I don’t have to answer.”
“You’re right. It’s pretty personal. Sorry. I have bad boundaries sometimes.”
“You’re just used to dating almost everyone in a room,” Angel said.
“You didn’t ask us the question,” Pierette said, voice quiet but firm enough to fill the room.
“What question?” I asked.
“What we miss by being bound to you.”
“I don’t think Angel misses the kind of things that the guys do, but if I’m wrong, then say something.”
“It was sexist of you to ask only the men,” Angel said, “but I don’t want to fight for my life with fists or weapons. I’ll fight if I have to, and you know I train, because we all train, but I don’t train like the rest of you do. It doesn’t interest me the way it does you.”
“You’re a social worker and a counselor. You don’t usually have to resort to fisticuffs in your line of work,” I said.
“You’d be surprised, but it’s not nearly as dangerous as your job.”
“So, you don’t miss anything?”
“I miss New York, even with the terrible rents and the terrible pay for jobs. I hated giving up my life there at first, but I really enjoy working with Micah and the Coalition. I think we do a lot of good work for a lot more people across the country than I could have reached as a standard social worker.”
“I’m sorry that you had to give up your life in New York,” I said. “Do you want to go back there? I mean, I know you said you enjoy working with the Coalition, but I want you to be happy, so . . .”
Angel slid off the bed and came to me, putting her fingers gently against my lips, so I had to stop talking. “And that is why we love you, because you really, truly want all of us to be as happy as humanly and superhumanly possible.” She took her fingers away and kissed me gently; it was barely a brush of lips.
“She does not want us all to be happy if what makes us happy makes her uncomfortable,” Pierette said.
Angel moved so I could see the other woman. Pierette wasn’t huddling over the pillow now. She was more just sitting with it in her lap.
“I told you that you can start traveling out of the country soon.”
“And I thank you and Jean-Claude for that, but I miss what we did when we traveled. You won’t let us do the things we need to do to make all the vampires and shapeshifters fear us again. Jean-Claude tries to be a good king, a fair ruler, and he won’t let us do what is necessary to keep our threat strong.”
“Pierette,” Ethan said, and reached a hand toward her.
“I know I am spoiling our plan, but it wasn’t working anyway. I look the part, but I played it too scared. He likes to break his victims down, not start with them broken.”
“You were the wrong bait,” Olaf said, “and so was she.”
“I’m serious when I say if we could find a way to guarantee my safety, I would totally fuck you—at least once,” Angel said.
I looked at her. I think I looked shocked, or like I didn’t believe her.
“Oh, come on, Anita, he’s hot. If you weren’t scared you’d end up on the menu, you’d have done him by now.”
“I don’t think so.”
“I have offered sex to Anita without her being on the menu, though menu is incorrect,” Olaf said. “I do not find cannibalism titillating.”
“Good to know,” I said.
“Should I be offended that you’re not making the offer to me?” Angel asked.
“Anita is the Woman for me, the only one I want to be with more than once. The only one that makes me want to find ways to satisfy my desires without destroying her.”
“She and the others tell us that you want her to hunt monsters with you so you can cut them up and kill them together as foreplay,” Pierette said.
“Yes,” he said.
“I miss hunting down vampires that have broken our laws. I miss tormenting them, making examples of them. I miss doing terrible things in the name of those I serve.”
Pierette sat up straighter with every word. By the last one, her pillow had fallen to the floor, and she sat cool, confident, centered in herself in a way I hadn’t seen before. Was it real, or was it an act? Would the real Pierette please step the fuck forward?
“This is much better bait for me, but I do not believe this lie any more than I did the other,” Olaf said.
Pierette looked at him. “I’m not lying about this.”
“You are good at hiding it. Your breath, your pulse, nothing changes, but your scent does. No matter how controlled you are, you can’t control that. Even one of the great fallen Harlequin cannot control the smell. Lies smell bitter on your skin.”
“You are only guessing that I was one of the Harlequin.”
“You keep almost calling Anita your queen. Only the bodyguards of the old queen of vampires would do that.”
“And if I was one of them, then I would be a spy and assassin extraordinaire. I would hunt monsters with you, Olaf, and I would have far fewer morals about it than Anita does.”
“I think if you got me alone, you would try to kill me. You would say later that I had attacked you, and you were forced to defend yourself. How brave of you, how tragic for me.”
“I admit that was the original plan, but as Angel says, you are attractive and far more compelling than I expected.”
“You seek to distract me, but I am not that easily put aside from my goals.” He turned back to Edward as if the women had ceased to exist. “Have you slept with Anita and any of her girlfriends?”
“No.”
“I will not ask the other. It is insulting.”
“It’s not insulting. It’s just a question,” Edward said.
“Are you saying you have shared her with another man at the same time?”
“We usually have sex when we’re in the field away from home, which means it’s usually not an issue.”
It was everything I could do to keep my face blank and not give away how big a lie he’d just told. I wished I still had my sunglasses on so my eyes wouldn’t give it away, but luckily for us, Olaf’s attention was all on Edward.
“So she is your work wife?” Olaf asked.
“She’s my partner. Donna is my wife.”
“I meant no insult to either woman. I am just trying to understand.”
“It’s not my relationship with Anita you need to understand. It’s her relationship to the others that’s important for you.”
“Why is that more important?” Olaf asked.
“Because you and I will never be comfortable sharing Anita in a bed together, but I think for her safety, you will need to find men that you would be willing to do that with.”
“I do not understand.”
“The only way I would trust you with Anita romantically is if there were men in the room that I thought could win against you or at least fight you long enough for Anita to escape.”
“I still do not understand.”
I was beginning to, and it was both brilliant and frightening, but then it was Edward, and that was how his mind worked. “He means that I would never feel safe one-on-one with you, but with some of my other lovers with us, I’d have a fighting chance if things went wrong.”
Olaf was disgusted and didn’t try to hide his reaction. “The only thing I have ever enjoyed doing with other men is torturing them or winning against them. I enjoy causing anyone pain. It is simply better if it is a woman.”
“The only other option I’ve come up with is if you allowed yourself to be chained down while Anita topped you,” Edward said.
“No, I will not submit to anyone.”
“Then how do we keep Anita safe?”
“My word is not enough for you?”
“Not on this, Olaf. I knew this day was coming, and I have been trying to think of ways that your needs can be met at least partway without risking Anita’s life.”
He was lying again, and Olaf didn’t call him on it. Either Edward’s body gave nothing away for the werelion to sense, or Olaf was so upset that he couldn’t sense it. It might have been a bit of both.
“What of the ardeur? What of Anita’s ability to feed through lust?” Olaf asked.
“What about it?” I asked.
“If she fed on me, would I be able to harm her while she did it?”
“I thought you told me that you weren’t food, not for anyone,” I said.
“It is merely a question, Anita. I am trying to understand what options are open to us.”
“I can answer this one,” Nicky said. “Once the ardeur is released, then all inhibitions go. For Anita it means she can take even rougher sex than without it.”
“I asked in the car when the three of us were alone if you and Anita did bondage together. You avoided answering the question.”
“I was embarrassed, okay?” I said. “I’m still embarrassed, but if we’re really going to answer the question, then yes, we do bondage together.”
“Do you dominate him?”
“No, he’s my top.”
“He is your dominant?”
I shook my head. “I’m a switch, which means I like to go both ways in the dungeon. I can bottom, but I don’t do complete submission.”
“She bottoms harder than most submissives I’ve ever been with,” Nicky said.
I so wanted out of this conversation, but if we were going to have it, I’d be a grown-up about it. “I cannot imagine a set of circumstances where I would be willing to be tied up with Olaf in the room, let alone with him topping me. I have to trust someone completely to give myself to them like that, and I don’t know how I would ever be able to trust you like that, Olaf.”
“Even if I let you release the ardeur on me?”
I looked at Nicky. “You tell me. Does the ardeur make you safer as a lover for me?”
“The ardeur is what turned me into your Bride, so yeah.”
“She feeds the ardeur on the rest of us, and it hasn’t turned us into Brides,” Angel said.
“And she has Brides that she has never had sex with,” Pierette said.
“I think I make Brides when I’m desperate. It’s like a Hail Mary pass.”
“So you’ve never tried to make a Bride when you weren’t in dire straits?” she asked.
“No.”
“So Anita could feed the ardeur on me and not turn me into her Bride?” Olaf asked.
“I believe so,” Pierette said.
“Only if I felt safe, and like I said, I can’t imagine a set of circumstances where I would feel safe with you like that.”
Olaf looked at Nicky. “If she had not unleashed the ardeur on you, would you have hurt her that first time you fucked her?”
“No, I can enjoy sex without pain.”
“So can I, but that is not my question.”
“Was it gentler lovemaking than I would have done on my own without her magic?” Nicky asked.
“That is what I am asking,” Olaf said.
“It was gentler.”
“But still satisfying?”
“The ardeur is a rush. It makes every touch more intense.”
Everyone in the room nodded except Edward and the two SEALs. Edward caught it in time to say, “I don’t let her feed on me.”
“Why not?” Olaf asked.
“I am not food, not even for her.”
Olaf nodded as if that made sense to him.
I was never, ever going to have sex with Olaf, but I didn’t say so out loud, because we were still trying not to pull the pin on the grenade. But it was like a game of chicken between a car and a train. If you didn’t get off the tracks, eventually you were going to lose.
“How can gentle be satisfying to you, Nicky?” Olaf asked.
“The first time was gentle, and sometimes it still is, but the bondage we do together is RACK.”
“I do not know the term,” Olaf said.
“Risk-aware consensual kink, RACK,” Nicky said.
“I prefer the term edge play,” I said, “but RACK is more descriptive, I guess.”
I fought not to squirm, because it had taken me a long time to be comfortable with just how much I enjoyed rough sex and bondage. I still wasn’t entirely happy that was part of my sexual orientation, but I was working in therapy at accepting all of myself, and that was part of me. You didn’t get to pick and choose your sexual orientation. You could choose not to act on it, but it was still what flipped your switch. It didn’t go away because you stopped doing it or tried not to start doing it.
“Does Anita do this with anyone else?” Olaf asked.
Angel raised her hand, smiling.
“I’ve co-topped Angel and Anita with Nathaniel,” Nicky said.
“I’m really not wanting to do details in front of everyone in this room,” I said. I was fighting not to blush, but since it’s an involuntary thing, I was losing.
Nicky smiled at me. “You are so uncomfortable with the things you enjoy in the dungeon.”
I nodded. “Yep. Yep, I am.”
“I thought Nathaniel was an extreme submissive,” Olaf said, “even a pain slut.”
“He can be,” Nicky and I said together. We shared a smile over it.
“Are you telling me that you have sex with Nathaniel?” Olaf asked.
“I think that’s for you, Nicky,” I said. “He knows I’m with Nathaniel.”
“It could be aimed at me,” Angel said.
“I assumed you were having sex with the men in St. Louis,” Olaf said.
She looked at him and raised an eyebrow. “I’m not doing all of them. Even I have my limits.”
“Hell, so do I,” I said.
Angel grinned at me, all pleased mischief. “We can’t sleep with everyone.”
I shook my head. “I know I can’t.”
“Are you having sex with Nathaniel, Nicky?” Olaf asked.
“I don’t fuck him. He helps me top and fuck Anita and sometimes Angel with her.”
“It’s a recent addition,” I said, and realized I was still embarrassed about it. I sighed. Would I ever really be comfortable with what I enjoyed in the bedroom or the dungeon?
“I did not think Anita would submit to or bottom for anyone,” Olaf said.
“Neither did I, honestly,” I said, and I was doing my best not to make eye contact with anyone.
“Is it only with Nicky?”
I glanced up at Olaf and then back down at some vague point in the middle of the room. “No, it’s not just with him.”
“Who else?”
“How is this conversation helping us figure things out with Olaf?” I asked.
“You know I wouldn’t ask this if I didn’t think it was helpful,” Edward said.
I gave him eye contact. “You’re the only one in this room that I would keep answering these questions for.”
“I know, and thank you,” he said.
“For Edward, but not for Nicky,” Olaf said.
I glanced at Nicky, and he said, “I top her in the dungeon, but she takes Edward’s orders outside of the bedroom better than mine.”
I didn’t like the wording, but I couldn’t exactly argue with it, so I let it go. “What was the question again?” I asked.
“Who else dominates you or tops you?”
“Besides Nicky, you mean?”
“Yes.”
“Does it really matter who?”
“Perhaps not, but how many besides Nicky?”
“Edward,” I said, looking at him.
“Please answer him, Anita,” Edward said.
“Fine.” I counted mentally. “Two.”
“I count more than that,” Nicky said.
I frowned at him. “Asher and Richard, that’s it.”
“Jean-Claude joins you and Richard sometimes, or you and Asher, so he counts.”
“Okay, three.”
Nicky looked at me as if I was missing something.
“What?” I asked.
Angel said, “I’ve been with you when you had sex with a lot of the others, and you really don’t ever do just straight vanilla sex.”
“I do, too,” I said, and meant it.
“Not often,” she said.
I shrugged. “I don’t know what to say to that.”
“I’m probably the closest to straight vanilla that Anita has,” Edward said.
Again, Olaf didn’t know he’d just lied his ass off. But just his saying it made me want to squirm with embarrassment, which was probably what kept me from smelling like lies. I was so embarrassed, I was masking Olaf’s werelion senses.
“Anita likes rough enough to keep me happy,” Nicky said.
“So when I said I would be willing to do straight vanilla sex for Anita, that is not what interests her either?” Olaf asked.
“Not usually,” Nicky said.
“I don’t want to have edge-play rough sex every night,” I said.
“No, you don’t,” Nicky said. “That’s why I’m not your only lover. You have other people in your life to meet the needs I don’t.”
“It’s one of the best things about polyamory,” I said.
“Totally agree,” Angel said. “I mean, I like rough from time to time, but I don’t like it as much as Anita does.”
“Edward, I need you to help us make some kind of point here, because I’m getting tired of talking about this in depth in front of everyone.”
“Don’t mind us,” Custer said. “I’m finding it educational.”
I glared at him. He laughed.
“Leave it alone, Pud,” Milligan said.
Custer raised his hands up as if to say he was sorry.
Edward said, “The point is that I’ve seen what Olaf does to women when there’s no one to stop him. I wanted to know if there was anything short of that that would satisfy him with you.”
“I would need to know what Anita does in her RACK play before I could answer that question,” Olaf said.
“I can answer some of it, but for other stuff, you’d need to talk to Nathaniel or even Asher,” Nicky said.
“No,” I said.
“Anita, if there’s a way to do this without either of you dying, isn’t it worth the embarrassing conversation?” Edward said.
Put that way, it seemed yes, but . . . “Damn it, Edward.”
“Am I wrong?” he asked.
I sighed and just let myself lean against the wall. Okay, maybe I sagged more than leaned. I was so tired of all of this. Surely I didn’t play over the edge enough to satisfy a sexually sadistic serial killer. I mean, I played rough, but not that rough.
“Fine. I can’t argue with the logic of gathering as much information as possible on this.”
“So, can I answer Olaf’s questions or not?” Nicky asked.
“You can, but not with all of us here. Milligan and Custer don’t need to know that much detail about my sex life.”
“Aww,” Custer said, trying to pretend to pout, but the smile ruined it.
“Leave it alone, Pud,” Milligan said again.
Custer stopped talking, but the smile stayed. I could ignore him as long as he didn’t talk.
“Ethan doesn’t like this kind of stuff, and neither does Pierette,” I said. “I think they’d rather not be here for details.”
“I’m your bodyguard. I’ll do my job,” Ethan said.
“As will I,” Pierette said.
“Fine, but I’m not sure I can be in the room with this many people and have this discussion,” I said.
Nicky said, “How about if I give a list, and I stop when you tell me to?”
“I’d rather not have anyone here I’m not sleeping with.”
“I’ve given my word of honor that I will not harm anyone unless you harm me first,” Olaf said.
“That’s his way of saying that Milligan and Custer can wait outside the door or in the other room,” Edward said.
“I know what he means,” I said, and my words sounded cranky even to me.
“She likes breath play,” Nicky said.
“That does not interest me,” Olaf said.
“And we have to clear the room before we do any more on the list,” I said.
I don’t know what we would have done next, because my phone rang. It was a number I didn’t recognize, but I was hoping it was someone who would get me out of this conversation.
“Blake, this is Livingston.”
“Hi. What’s up?” I asked.
“I need you to meet me at Sugar Creek ASAP.”
“Why is it an emergency to meet you at the restaurant?”
“Hazel just came from the hospital.”
“Newman told us that Carmichael didn’t make it. I’m sorry his girlfriend is having to deal with it.”
“Yes, she came back here to talk to Pamela. I think you need to hear what she has to say.”
“Did she talk to Newman at the hospital?”
“Hazel doesn’t trust anyone local.”
“You’re local.”
“She trusts me because of Pamela. You need to hear what she has to say, Blake.”
“Care to give me a preview?” I asked.
“Just get over here, and don’t mention this call to the sheriff or any of his people. And don’t bring any of your deputies. It’s a regular murder case now, and I’m not sure what involving deputized Therianthropes will do to any evidence we find.”
“I’ve used them before on other cases.”
“Those were supernatural cases through and through. This one isn’t. Regular Marshals Service doesn’t have the ability to deputize anyone, so let’s not give a lawyer the chance to use preternatural deputies against us later.”
“I’ve never had a case go from preternatural to ordinary murder, so I can’t tell you that it won’t negatively impact the case later.”
“Then you agree to leave them out of the rest of the investigation?” he asked.
“I guess so.”
“Then you, Forrester, and Jeffries are the only people I want to see from your branch of service.”
“All right.”
“Good. Now get down here ASAP.” He hung up.
Olaf stood up. “I heard. We need to meet him at the restaurant.”
I filled Edward in since he didn’t have super hearing.
“I can’t tell Livingston he’s wrong about the extra manpower being a problem later in court,” he said.
“Neither can I.”
“We’re your bodyguards,” Nicky said. “We’re not much use if we aren’t with you.”
“I gave my word,” Olaf said.
“His word really is good,” I said.
“It really is,” Edward said.
Nicky and the others didn’t like it much, but in the end, they agreed, so the three of us left them at the motel. They couldn’t even finish the discussion about edge play, because we took Olaf with us, and without him there was no reason to have the talk. Edward and I rode together so I didn’t even have to finish the talk with Olaf. Yay! I did have to ask Edward one question on the quick drive to the restaurant though.
“You know I’m never going to have sex for real with Olaf, right?”
“That was the original plan.”
“I do not like the way you just said that.”
“I’ve never seen him try this hard with anyone. I honestly thought he’d bail on the whole bondage conversation.”
“So did I.”
He glanced at me. “Olaf is being so damn reasonable that we may run out of reasons to say no.”
“It’s not we that he wants to fuck. It’s me.”
“True.”
“True? That’s all you’re going to say?”
“What do you want me to say, Anita?”
“One minute you tell me to kill Olaf or you will, and the next, you make it sound like you’d sign off on me having sex with him. What the hell, Edward?”
“I’m sorry, Anita, but the big guy just keeps surprising me. I thought I knew who Olaf was, what he was, and that there wasn’t enough human being left inside the monster to have a relationship with anyone, let alone my best friend.”
“You’ll miss him when we have to kill him,” I said, and it sounded like an accusation.
“Won’t you?”
I shook my head, and then I thought about it. “I’ll miss him in a fight, but I won’t miss the constant state of threat I feel because he’s out there. If there was a way to have the useful parts without the scary-as-fuck parts, it would be different, but it doesn’t work that way.”
“Maybe it’s the scary parts that make him useful,” Edward said quietly.
“I know it is, and that’s what makes it all so fucking awful. He’s helped us on multiple serial killer cases, but you and I both know where his expertise comes from. It’s like using the medical notes from the Nazi concentration camps to save lives today. Is the help worth what it cost? Can you take help from the devil without losing your soul in the process?”
“I’m an atheist. You know that.”
“Don’t even get me started on the fact that you don’t have enough faith to make a holy object glow in the face of a vampire. The fact that you’ve survived this long without it just proves that God loves you, no matter how you feel about Him.”
He pulled into the packed parking lot of the Sugar Creek Restaurant and Bakery.
“Is this place always packed?” I said.
He started searching for a parking place without answering me. I guess I didn’t really need an answer.
“I thought I could come up with enough rules or things Olaf would hate that he would just drop the idea of sex with you,” Edward said, “but he keeps surprising me.”
“Yeah, I thought you’d come up with a great idea to make him back off, but then he hung in there through all the bondage-negotiation talk.”
A dark blue truck started to pull out ahead of us. Edward put on his turn signal and vultured while cars started getting trapped behind him. The person driving the truck didn’t seem to know how to back up without hitting the cars behind them. Big trucks were tricky. It was one of the reasons I didn’t own one; that and I was too short to get into them without climbing. I didn’t need to drive a daily reminder that I was shorter-than-average height for a woman.
“What if Olaf agrees to something that you’d do if it wasn’t him?” Edward asked.
I stared at the side of his face, because it was all I could see. He tried to just look at the truck in front of us, but it was taking so long, he finally had to look at me. His face was empty and unreadable behind the sunglasses.
“You cannot be serious,” I said.
“Petra, or Pierette, is right about one thing, Anita: Your beast doesn’t react to someone unless you’re attracted to them.”
“And?” I said. The one word was as cold and empty as his expression.
“Your beast likes Olaf a lot.”
“The last person my lioness liked this much ended up trying to kill Nathaniel. If Noel hadn’t pushed him out of the way and taken the bullet, I’d have lost Nathaniel.”
“I’m sorry you had to kill Haven to protect everyone, Anita. I know it cost you.”
“Then how can you ask me to even consider another werelion that’s even more dangerous? I will not risk the people I love or the people that I’ve given my protection to because we’re too gutless to tell Olaf the truth.”
The truck finally managed to exit without crashing into the cars in back of it. It took the truck even more time to finally get turned so it could start forward enough that Edward could begin to slide into the parking spot. The truck backed up again. Edward had to slam on his brakes and prove the seat belts worked, or the truck would have hit us. The truck began to try to go forward. Some people shouldn’t be allowed to drive big trucks.
“And what is the truth, Anita?”
“I can’t be his serial killer girlfriend.”
“He doesn’t want a girlfriend. He wants to try sex without killing the woman.”
“Say we manage it. Say we find a set of bondage rules that keeps me safe enough to fuck him. Then what? If it satisfies him, then I’m stuck as his lover forever? If it doesn’t satisfy him, then he still wants to fuck me, but now he wants to do it his way, which means he’ll torture and kill me during the process? There is no win here, Edward.”
“You’re probably right.”
“Probably?”
The truck finally left, and we were able to park at last. Edward reached for his door handle. “I’ll just be sorry when we have to kill him, and I’ll be sorrier if he kills us first.”
With that, he got out of the SUV, and I was left hurrying to catch up. We were in the crowd on the porch of waiting customers by the time I caught up, so I couldn’t say any of the things I wanted to say. But then, neither could he.