Incubus Dreams

by Laurell K. Hamilton

Chapter 32~33

  32

  The rest of the afternoon appointments were damned boring compared to the Browns. Thank God. Nathaniel sat, quietly, in a corner of my office through all of them, just in case. Bert didn't argue now. I'd had two appointments with lawyers to discuss wills and other privileged material. They'd objected to Nathaniel, but I'd told them that legally the conversation with me wasn't privileged, so why did they care. Legally, I was right, and lawyers hate for a non-lawyer to be right. Or at least the ones I meet get cranky about it. So then, they'd wanted to know who he was and why he got to sit in on their meetings.

  I told the first one, do you want this meeting, or don't you, and he let it go. The second one didn't let it go. My fingers hurt where I'd torn off the nails. My face hurt even if it was healing. My pride was hurt from having sex in the office. I was not happy, so I told the truth.

  "He's here in case I have to have sex. " I smiled when I said it, and knew that it didn't reach my eyes, but I didn't care.

  Nathaniel had laughed and done his best to turn it into a cough.

  The lawyer, of course, didn't believe me. "It was a perfectly legitimate question, Ms. Blake. I have every right to protect my client and his interests. You don't have to insult us with ridiculous lies. "

  So I stopped insulting him with lies, and we got down to business.

  Every client, or group of clients, had to ask about Nathaniel. I told them he was everything from domestic help, to lover, to office boy, to personal assistant. Nobody liked any of my answers. I stopped caring long before I stopped seeing clients. I actually started telling the truth again, and the two new groups that I told it to got insulted. Insulting lies, they called it. Try to tell the truth, and no one believes you.

  What I'd wanted to talk about all afternoon had been my beast. I had a lycanthrope right there, and we didn't get five minutes of peace to even begin the discussion. I had so many questions, and no time to ask them. Maybe that was why I was so grumpy to the clients. Maybe, or maybe I'm just grumpy. Even I wasn't sure sometimes.

  It was seven o'clock by the time we climbed into the Jeep. Bert had passed my 7:30 cemetery appointment on to Manny without me having to ask. He even apologized for overbooking me. He always overbooked me, and he'd never apologized before. I think the realization that I could call a vote and get his ass kicked out had made him a better boy. Or maybe it was just the realization that I knew that any one of us could call a vote and kick him out. If Bert had any weakness in business it was assuming that those of us without a business degree didn't understand business. A little fear isn't always a bad thing. In fact, it can be downright therapeutic for some people. I didn't expect for the nicer version of Bert to last, but I'd enjoy it while I had it.

  I'd actually turned off onto Olive in the direction of the city. I had just enough time to drop Nathaniel off at Guilty Pleasures and be only about fifteen minutes late for what was now my first outside appointment of the evening.

  "Where are you going?" Nathaniel asked.

  "Guilty Pleasures," I said.

  "You need to eat first. "

  I glanced at him as I slowed for a stoplight. "I don't have time to eat. "

  "You know how when you don't feed one hunger the other hungers get worse?" His voice was so gentle when he asked, but I'd begun to mistrust that particular gentle tone. It usually meant he had a point to make, and he was right, and if I'd only accept it, I'd see that he was right, too. It usually meant that the argument was lost before it had begun. But I never considered defeat a reason not to put up a fight.

  "Yeah, I know. If I deny the ardeur the beast wants meat more, or the vampire wants blood. I know all that. "

  "So what happens if you don't feed your human stomach, you get hungry, right?"

  The light changed, and I eased forward. Saturday night traffic on Olive was always fun. "Yeah," I said. I was looking for the trick, and didn't see it.

  "So if your body gets hungry for normal feeding, then doesn't that make all the other hungers worse?"

  I almost hit the car in front of me, because I was staring at him. I had to slam on my brakes and endure much horn blowing, and, if it hadn't been so dark, I'm sure I'd have seen some hand gestures. "What did you say?"

  "You heard me, Anita. "

  I sighed and started paying better attention to the traffic. But inside I was kicking myself, because it was so simple. So terribly simple. "I don't eat regularly when I'm working, and that usually means that I'm running home with the ardeur riding me every night. "

  "Sometimes twice a night," he said. "How much do you eat on those nights? Real food, I mean. "

  I tried to think, and finally had to say, "Sometimes nothing. "

  "It would be interesting if you kept a food diary to see if there was a correlation between starving your human body and the other hungers rising. "

  "You talk like you know this already," I said.

  "Haven't you noticed that lycanthropes cook and eat?"

  I shrugged. "I don't know. " I thought about it. Richard cooked, and had always been either taking me out to dinner or wanting to cook for me. Micah cooked, though Nathaniel did more of it. We usually had a house full of wereleopards for at least one meal a day.

  "You mean there's a reason that all the lycanthrope men I've dated have been domestically talented?"

  He nodded. "We need to eat a nice balanced diet, heavy on protein. It helps keep the beast at bay. "

  I glanced at him, and in the near dark of the streetlights, he was mostly in shadow. His lavender shirt was the palest thing about him. "Why didn't someone mention this to me before?"

  "We've been treating you like you're mostly human, Anita. But what I saw today. . . " He seemed to be searching for words. Finally he said, "If I didn't know that you were human and couldn't slip your skin and be a leopard for real, I'd think you were one of us. The way you felt, the way you fought, the way you smelled, everything was shapeshifter. You did not come off like a human. Turn into the parking lot here," he said.

  "Why?" I asked.

  "Because we need to talk. "

  I did not like the sound of that, but I turned in to the strip mall that had Culpeppers at one end. I parked in the first space I found, which was far away from any restaurant. Most of the stores were dark and closed. When I turned off the engine, the world was suddenly very quiet. The traffic on Olive was still snarling by, and in the distance was music from one of the restaurants, but inside the Jeep it was quiet. That silence that you get inside cars after dark. With one switch of a key, the space inside a car becomes private, intimate.

  I turned to face him, having to work against the seat belt, but I wasn't comfortable taking if off until I was ready to get out of a car. "So, talk," I said, and my voice sounded almost normal.

  He turned in his seat as far as his seat belt would allow. He knew my thing about seat belts. He faced me, putting one knee up to prop himself against the center panel. "We've been treating you like you're human, and now I'm wondering if we were right. "

  "You mean I'm going to shift because I'm in a new triumvirate?"

  He shook his head, and his long braid slid across his lap like a heavy pet. "Maybe what happened with that has made it worse, but I think one of the reasons you haven't been able to get a handle on the ardeur is because you've been taking almost all your advice from a vampire. He doesn't need to eat, Anita. There is only blood lust and the ardeur for Jean-Claude, that's it. A lycanthrope doesn't stop being human. You still have to eat like a person, you just add the hunger of the beast, but you don't lose a hunger, you just add on to it. "

  I thought about it. "So you mean that since I'm already fighting off normal hunger pangs, that it makes it harder to fight the ardeur?"

  He nodded, and his hair slid across his lap again, as if the braid were moving closer to me. "Yes. "

  I thought about it, and it seemed utterly logical. "Okay, say you're right, what do I do?
I'm still running late tonight. I'm usually running late. "

  "Tonight we go through a drive-up. You get something easy to eat behind the wheel, and I get a salad. "

  I frowned at him. "A salad, why? Most drive-up salads suck. "

  "I have to eat before I go on tonight. "

  "So you'll be able to control your beast better," I said.

  "Yes. "

  "But why a salad? I thought you needed protein. "

  "If you were going to take off all your clothes in front of strangers, you'd get a salad, too. "

  "One burger a few hours before you go on won't make you gain weight. "

  "No, but it might make me bloat. "

  "I thought only girls did that. "

  "Nope. "

  "So you're eating a salad so you'll look good tonight," I said.

  He nodded, and his hair slithered over the edge of his leg and across the gear shift. I had this horrible urge to touch that heavy band of hair. A little voice in my head said, Why not? After what we'd done this afternoon, what's a little hair touching. Logical, but logic didn't have much to do with how I acted around Nathaniel.

  I clasped my hands together in my lap to keep from touching him, then felt silly. What the hell was I doing anymore? I reached out to that heavy curl of hair and pet it, like it was more intimate to him than it was. The hair was soft and warm. I petted his hair while I talked. "The beast isn't conflicted about anything, is it?"

  "No," he said, and his voice was both loud and soft in the quiet dark.

  I began to pull his braid, gently up from around his body where the end had slid. "It's not just the hunger for flesh and blood that you fight, is it?"

  "No," he said.

  I got to the end of his braid and spilled it into my hands. "I thought that the hunger was the beast. That desire to chase and feed; I thought that was all of it. "

  "And now?" he asked.

  I stroked the tip of his braid across my palm, and just that made me shiver. My voice was shaky when I said, "Richard always talked about his beast like it was all his baser impulses, you know, lust, sloth, the traditional sins, but to sin implies a knowledge of good and evil. There was no good or evil, there was nothing like normal thought. I hadn't really understood how all my thoughts are based on things. I'm always thinking about how one thing affects another. The consequences of your actions. " I lifted more of his braid in my arms, and it was like holding a snake, a soft, thick serpent. I gathered his hair into my arms and let myself cuddle it against my body. I was about at the limit for the seat belt, and I wanted to be closer to him. The seat belt stayed.

  I hugged an armful of his braid to my chest as I said, "I stopped thinking about the Browns' grief, their dead son. It wasn't that I chose to ignore it. I wasn't being callous, it just never entered my mind. It was just that they hurt me, and I got mad, but mad translated directly to food. If I killed them and ate them, then they couldn't hurt me anymore, and I was hungry. " I met his eyes on that last word.

  Some trick of reflected light made his eyes shine for a moment, like the eyes of a cat in a flashlight's beam. He turned his head, and it was gone, his eyes lost in shadow again. The turn of his head tugged on his hair, and I had a second to decide whether I would let it go, or keep it. I kept it, and it put a strain down the line of his hair, a strain like pulling on a rope, and knowing it was tied tight.

  His voice was a little breathy when he said, "You're always hungry when you first change shape, especially if you're new at it. "

  "How do you keep from tearing into the crowd at the club?" I asked, and my voice was a little shaky, too.

  He leaned back away from me, and it made the pull on his hair tighter, harder. "By channeling the hunger into sex instead of food. You don't eat your mate. If you can fuck it, it's not food. " His voice was lower, not deeper exactly, but lower.

  "So how did I not eat anybody? I wasn't thinking about sex with the Browns. "

  "At first you are just the hunger, but after a few full moons, you can think, but you don't think like a person. You think like your animal. A few more full moons after that and you can choose to think like yourself in animal form. "

  "Choose?" I said, and began to pull him toward me, using his braid like a rope, but this rope was attached to his skull, and he didn't come easily. He began to pull against me, and I knew that it had to hurt just a little.

  His voice was low and soft. "Some people enjoy the purity of the animal. Like you said, no conflicts, no inner struggles. Just decide what you want and do it. "

  "Undo your seat belt," I said.

  He undid his seat belt.

  I pulled him to me with his hair tangled around my arms, like you'd coil a rope or a strings of lights. "Does anyone use the animal for a patsy, you know, crime? A lot of what keeps some people good is their conscience. The beast doesn't have one of those. "

  He was close enough to kiss, his face lower than mine, because of his braid holding him just a little to one side. "The animal is very practical," he whispered. "It's why so few people use their animal form when they commit murder. I don't mean accidental kills, because they don't have the control, but deliberate murder. "

  I leaned over him. "Example. "

  "Say, your uncle will leave you a fortune but he needs to be dead so you can inherit it. Unless your beast is hungry, it won't kill your uncle for money, because the beast doesn't understand money. "

  I leaned close enough to almost kiss him. "What does the beast understand?"

  He spoke with his lips almost against mine. "It will kill someone you truly fear, or someone who's hurt you, especially physically. The beast understands being hit, being injured. "

  I almost asked if he'd hunted down the man who beat him and his brother, but I didn't. I'd seen his memories. If someone had done that to me, what would I have done? Bad things, most likely. And I didn't want to fill the car with hurt and bad memories. I'd had enough of those.

  I laid a kiss on his mouth, and he pressed me back against my seat. I found that still being seat-belted, I couldn't move well. My arms were tangled in his braid so that it felt like I was being bound. I had a moment of panic, then I relaxed into it. Nathaniel would not hurt me, and it was my own fault about the hair being where it was. He hadn't wrapped me up, I'd done that.

  He drew back just enough to talk, his lips brushing mine. "What about your clients?"

  I drew my head back as far as I could, which wasn't far, and said, "I'm not offering to fuck you here and now. "

  "You're not?"

  That made me mad, though I wasn't exactly sure why. "No, I'm not. " I started trying to untangle myself from his hair.

  He drew back with a smile that showed for an instant in the lights. "I want to encourage you to touch me. God knows I do, but if you do too much with the ardeur not fed, and neither of us fed, then the night is over. You'll be pissed with yourself, and me, and I don't want that. "

  I got most of me free from his braid, except for the part that was caught on the back of the Browning. If it hadn't been a gun, I'd have jerked, but even with the safety on, I didn't trust it enough. Stupider accidents have gotten people shot. Neither Zerbrowski nor Edward would ever let me live it down. So I took a deep breath and forced myself to carefully untwine Nathaniel's hair from my gun.

  Nathaniel had buckled himself back into his seat. "I would love to repeat this some time and place where we didn't have to stop. "

  I was still trying to get his hair off my gun. The fact that he was in his seat but his hair wasn't told you just how long his braid was. "You had your chance," I said, and I sounded mad.

  "Don't be grumpy at me," he said, "I wasn't the one who pulled you into my lap. "

  I had the last of his hair free of my gun. I started to fling the end of his braid back at him, but stopped myself. He was right. Right about who started it. Right about how mad I would have been if the ardeur had risen before I got my work done. He
was right. When people are right, you shouldn't get pissed at them. Or that was the new theory.

  "Fine, I'll go through a drive-up. I'll eat a burger, you can have your salad. Will that make you happy?" I turned on the engine and started pulling out of the parking space.

  "No, but it'll get us both to work tonight. " He sounded sad.

  I glanced at him as I maneuvered may way through the parked cars. "Don't be sad. "

  "I'm not sad," he said, but he sounded it.

  "What's wrong?"

  "It's just that you reached for me. There wasn't a metaphysical emergency. The ardeur hadn't risen, yet. The beast was nowhere in sight. Blood lust wasn't anywhere, and I had to say, stop. But the ardeur will rise tonight, Anita, and having sex with it not being fed yet is just inviting trouble. " He leaned his head against the window. His shoulders were rounded, as if he'd hunched in upon himself.

  "You're right about the schedule and the ardeur and needing to eat, Nathaniel. I don't know what came over me just now. "

  He turned to look at me, and we were in the bright halogen lights of the street, so I could see his face clearly. He looked almost in pain. "Couldn't it just have been that you wanted to touch me, is that so wrong?"

  I sighed and concentrated on the road, because I had to. But also, it gave me time to think. I turned us back the way we'd started, but this time I knew we'd go through the drive-up at McDonald's. Honest.

  I finally did the only thing I could think of to take that miserable look off his face. I touched his thigh, because it was the only part of him I could reach easily. He'd pulled so far away in his seat that I couldn't reach anything else without straining. I was driving, and that had to take priority over offering comfort, even when it was my fault for saying stupid things. I touched his leg, gently, tentatively. I wasn't always good at touching when sex wasn't involved. I was trying to get better at it, but the learning curve seemed to rise and fall depending on my mood, or someone else's.

  He touched my hand with his fingers. I held my hand up to him, eyes still on the road. He laid his hand in mine.

  "I'm sorry, Nathaniel. I'm sorry that I'm such an ass sometimes. "

  He squeezed my hand, and when I glanced at him, he was smiling at me. That one smile was worth a lot more than hand-holding to me. "It's alright," he said.

  "I notice you don't disagree that I'm being an ass. "

  He laughed. "You don't like it when I lie. "

  I stared at him for a second, mouth open, then I went back to staring at traffic. "I can't believe you said that. "

  He was laughing so hard that our hands jiggled up and down on his leg. "Neither can I," he said.

  But I didn't get mad. When you've been an ass to someone you care about, you should just admit it, move on, and try not to do it again.

  33

  There is almost no parking on The Landing. The streets are narrow, and most of them are cobblestoned. It's very quaint, but the streets were originally planned for horses, not cars, and it shows. There is no employee parking at Guilty Pleasures, because there isn't room. So I had to park the Jeep down a ways, and we got to walk, but Nathaniel touched my arm before I got too close to the bloodred neon sign and the front entrance. He took me down an alley that I hadn't even known was there. I mean, I knew it was there, but not where it went. I'd never really thought that there must be a performers' entrance just like for Circus of the Damned.

  The alley was an alley, which meant it was narrow, cramped, not as clean as you'd like, not as well lit as you'd prefer, and made my claustrophobia complain. Not badly, but enough to let me know that any alley that I could touch both sides of was too damn narrow for comfort.

  I'd meant to simply drop Nathaniel at the club and run to my next appointment, but a call on my cell phone had taken a lot of the angst out of my schedule. My second appointment for the night, now my first, had to cancel. Mary said that the lawyer had told her that he had to tend to the needs of another client unexpectedly. Translation: He needed to bail someone out. It didn't have to be that, but it probably was. I'd gotten better at translating lawyer over the years, though no better at legal jargon. Jargon is meant to be as unclear as possible, and it's good at its job.

  So suddenly my first appointment of the night was at nine o'clock, and I had time to escort Nathaniel inside and talk to Jean-Claude. God knows there was enough to talk about. So that's how I came to be threading my way down an alley, following Nathaniel's broad shoulders. His shoulders almost brushed the walls. I don't think Dolph would have fit at all.

  Nathaniel hesitated, and I couldn't see around him, but just his posture let me know something was wrong. Women's voices, high and excited, called, "Brandon, Brandon!"

  He waved, then turned sideways so I could see past his chest. There was a handful of women near the steps leading up to a door with a bright light over it.

  I leaned in to him and whispered, sort of, "Why do I think you're Brandon, and are they supposed to be here?"

  He whispered back, smiling and waving at the women, who were beginning to come down the steps, as if trying to decide whether to come meet him. "My stage name, and no. Security is supposed to keep this area clear. " He started to walk toward them.

  I grabbed his arm. "Shouldn't we go back the way we came?"

  "They probably just want an autograph or to touch me. It'll probably be okay. "

  "Probably," I said.

  He patted my hand. "If I tell you I'm sure that they won't get bad weird, then I'd be lying, but probably they don't mean any harm. "

  "I'd feel better if we went back," I said.

  "No," he said, and he sounded very firm. "These are my fans, Anita, and this is my job. I'm going to smile and talk to them, and you can pretend to be my bodyguard, or pretend to be security, but it's bad business for you to be my girlfriend. It hurts the illusion. "

  "The illusion?" I made it a question.

  He smiled. "That they can have me. "

  I gave him the long blink, the one that means I've just received more information than I wanted and don't know what to do with it. "Okay," I said, "I'll be security. " There, I was cool. I could handle this. Sure, I could.

  He let me go in front, because that's what I'd do if I were security. He didn't try to argue, since he could wave and smile and call to them over my head. I fought to keep my face blank and not cranky, but I think I failed.

  There were four of them: two blondes, one brunette, and one with hair as black as mine. Though I could tell hers came out of a bottle, because it was too solid, all-over black, no highlights. Black hair isn't supposed to look like you've poured ink on your head. But again, maybe that was just me being cranky.

  Nathaniel, alias Brandon, chatted the women up like a pro. The two blondes were regulars, apparently, on a first-name basis. "We were so excited when we got the E-mail that you were going to be here tonight," one gushed. She kept touching his arm while she talked. They'd brought a friend, the one with black hair, who was new, but had seen his pictures on the club's Web site. I hadn't known that Guilty Pleasures had a Web site. Of course, I didn't own a computer, so what did it matter to me?

  Raven-hair said in a voice that was breathy with nervousness, "Your pictures were amazing. " She looked at him with little covert glances, as if she was afraid to stare at him head-on. One of the blondes got an honest-to-God autograph book out for Raven-hair, who was quote, too shy to do it herself, unquote.

  The brunette wasn't joining in the squeal fest. She was looking at me, and it wasn't a friendly look. "Who's she?" she asked.

  I was standing beside the door at the top of the steps, hands loose at my sides, trying to look bodyguardish, and probably failing. My little blue and black skirt outfit, complete with high heeled boots, didn't look much like security detail.

  "Security," he said smiling, and signing Raven-hair's book.

  "She doesn't look like security," the brunette said.

 
; "I'm new," I said.

  Brunette didn't look like she believed me. She crossed her arms underneath her small, tight breasts and glared at me.

  I smiled back sweetly.

  That deepened her scowl and gave her little lines between her eyebrows. I felt better.

  Nathaniel gave me a little flicker of a look that said as clearly as if he'd spoken, "Be nice. " I was nice. I smiled and stood and let the blondes touch his arms, his back, but when one of them patted his ass, that was it.

  I pushed away from the wall, and said, "Ladies, Brandon here needs to get inside and prepare for his performance. " I managed to keep smiling even when one of the blondes threw her arms around his neck and kissed him on the cheek. Then the other blonde grabbed him and kissed him on the other cheek.

  I grabbed his arm and moved him back far enough so I could open the door. The two women were still clinging to him. Raven-hair was blushing, and the brunette was still scowling at me. I kept my smile in place, though it felt more like a grimace.

  Nathaniel said, "Beth Ann, Patty, if you don't let me go, I can't get on stage. "

  "Stay out here with us, and we wouldn't care," one of them said.

  I glanced behind me and saw a black-shirted man. It was Buzz, the vamp that usually worked the door here. He had the same black crew cut that he had always had, small pale eyes, and more muscles than you should need as a dead man. His black shirt said GUILTY PLEASURES SECURITY in red letters. I didn't usually like Buzz much, but tonight I was glad to see him. Help had arrived.

  I could have cleared the steps if I was allowed to be mean, but having to be nice at the same time I was trying to be firm was beyond me. My skill set simply did not include it.

  He forced his face into a smile before the women behind me could see him clearly. He was the newly dead, around twenty years, which meant he looked very alive for a dead man. Most humans wouldn't have spotted him in a crowd. Most people think that vamps gain the ability to pass for human, but that's never been my experience. Older is less human, just better at the mind games so humans don't notice.

  "Ladies, you're not supposed to be back here," Buzz cajoled. He moved past me, and his chest was so muscle-bound that it looked like there wasn't room for all of us and his upper body to stand on that small landing.

  The brunette said, "Is she really security?"

  "If that's what she said," he said in the same good-fellow-well-met voice. He was cheerfully extracting Nathaniel from the blondes. He managed to make a game of it, and they spilled around Buzz's muscular body, as if to say, if they couldn't cling to Nathaniel, any male would do. Of course, from the sound of the joking conversation, the blondes knew Buzz, too.

  Raven-hair had backed down the steps, eyes a little wide. She didn't want to play. It made me think better of her.

  I drew Nathaniel in through the open door, with the brunette giving me a murderous glare. She was taking this way too personally. It was sort of unnerving. Nathaniel and I were safely through the door, but I didn't like closing it and leaving Buzz out there alone. I mean, he'd helped us. What were the rules about security guards? Did they get protected, too, or just the dancers and customers? If you cut a security guard did he not bleed? So I stood there uncertainly with Nathaniel. It was Nathaniel who gently closed the door.

  "Buzz will be fine, he knows how to talk to them. "

  "What, you read my mind?"

  He smiled. "No, I just know you. He helped us, and now you feel obligated. "

  I fought the urge to squirm or shuffle my feet. I hated when anyone figured me out that clearly. Was I that transparent? Apparently so.

  I decided to change the subject. "How did they know that 'Brandon' would be here tonight?"

  "When we change headliners, we have an E-mail list that we notify. There's even a list just for Brandon. "

  I looked at him. "You mean that some of these women dropped everything, changed all their plans, because they found out that Brandon was going to be here tonight?"

  He shrugged and managed to look a little embarrassed. "Some of them, yes. "

  I shook my head. I changed the subject again, because I was losing again. "Who was supposed to be keeping the fans away from this door?"

  The door in question opened. Buzz laughed and joked, until the door closed behind him, then he leaned against it and looked tired. "Primo was. "

  It took me a second to realize that he'd answered the question I'd asked with the door closed. "You heard me ask the question?"

  He nodded. Then he grinned flashing fangs, the sign of a new vamp. "You didn't know I could hear you through the door?"

  "Hear, yes, but I thought you were too busy concentrating on the women outside. "

  He looked past me at Nathaniel. "Are you alright?"

  "I'm fine. "

  Buzz pushed himself away from the door and stood, settling his big, overdeveloped shoulders like a bird settles its feathers. "I better go talk to Primo, for what good it will do. "

  "What do you mean, good it will do?" I asked.

  He looked at me. "Primo is old, really old. He wants to be one of Jean-Claude's vamps, but he had his eye on like the number two, or at least number three slot. He's pissed that he's having to be security at a strip club. He's more pissed that a baby like me is his direct boss. " Buzz looked worried. "He's old school, and he thinks if he keeps pushing me, that I'll call him out. But I am not going to challenge that thing. He'd kill me. "

  "Have you told Jean-Claude what's going on?"

  He nodded. "He told Primo that if he couldn't stomach this job and obey me, then he could get out of town. "

  "Did that help for awhile?" I asked.

  Buzz smiled. "Have you heard this story before?"

  "No, but I know how the really old vamps can be. They are proud bastards. "

  Nathaniel touched my arm. "I need to talk to Jean-Claude about tonight's performance. "

  "I'll join you in the office in a minute. "

  Nathaniel started to say something, then seemed to think better of it and just went down the white hallway. I watched him go into the office that was just a few doors down. Then I turned back to Buzz. "Is it just not doing what he's told, or is there more?"

  "He's started taking money to let in people we don't let in. "

  "Like who?"

  "Men. "

  I raised eyebrows. "You don't let in any men?"

  "Not a lot. It makes the women uncomfortable, and some of the dancers don't like it either. You're either comfortable shakin' your thing in front of other men, or you're not. "

  "I guess that makes sense, but you let some in. "

  "Couples, just like they do at most female strip clubs across the river. "

  "But Primo is letting in single men," I said.

  He nodded.

  "What did Jean-Claude tell you to do about it?"

  "He told me to deal with it. That if I wasn't vampire enough to control Primo that maybe I didn't deserve my job. Jean-Claude is old, too, Anita. I think they're both setting me up for some kind of showdown, and Primo will hurt me, or kill me. "

  "You look like you can take care of yourself. "

  "If it's just strong-arm stuff, yeah, but Primo isn't a brute, Anita, he's dripping with power. I even agree with him that Jean-Claude isn't using him well. He's too powerful to be down here doing this, and he doesn't have the temperament for it. "

  "What do you mean?"

  "He's more likely to start fights than stop them. He'll take money from men to get in, then he'll throw their asses out. "

  I shook my head. "You know, Buzz, this doesn't sound like a problem that Jean-Claude would let go this far. "

  "Not normally," he said, "but it's like Jean-Claude is waiting to see what we'll do before he steps in. I'd just as soon not be dead before he does it. "

  "Is it really that bad?"

  "The women out there were okay, but we've had one dancer that was sta
lked. Another one had an irate husband go after him with a knife, because he was jealous that his wife was a member of the dancer's fan club. "

  "The dancers have fan clubs?"

  "The headliners do. "

  "Nathaniel has a fan club?" I made it a question, because it seemed like it should be.

  "Brandon has a fan club, yeah. " He looked at me and laughed. "You didn't know. "

  "I don't really pay attention to the day-to-day business here. "

  He nodded. He was back to looking worried.

  I'd never liked Buzz. I didn't exactly dislike him, but he wasn't my friend. But, if his version of what was going on with Primo was accurate he was in a bad spot. A spot that I didn't understand. Jean-Claude was a good business vampire, and this didn't sound like good business.

  "I'll talk to Jean-Claude, Buzz. I'll find out what his thinking is about Primo. "

  Buzz sighed. "Well, I can't ask for more. " He grinned, suddenly flashing those fangs again. "In fact, until now I thought you didn't like me. "

  It made me smile. "If you thought I didn't like you, then why pour your problems in my ear?"

  "Who else do I have to go to?"

  "Asher is Jean-Claude's second in command. "

  He shook his head. "I work here, problems stay here, all the businesses are run that way. "

  "I didn't know that," I said. It was probably a holdover from the days when each business was run by a different vamp. "So, because I visit all the businesses, I'm what, an ambassador?"

  He gave that fang-flashing grin again. "Kind of. "

  "I'll try to find out what's going on, that's the best I can do. If Jean-Claude is really setting you up for a power struggle with Primo, I'll tell you. "

  He looked relieved. "I just need to know where I stand, ya know. "

  I nodded. "I know. "

  A black-shirted man came running through the door at the end of the hallway, accompanied by a sudden blast of music and noise. He was blond and looked like a college student, but he ran down the hallway like he was on springs. Lycanthrope of some kind.

  He was talking before he got to us. "We got a problem out there. Primo let a bunch of guys in, they started heckling Byron. You said come get you the next time it got ugly. It's ugly. "

  Buzz was already moving down the hall, not exactly running. I hesitated for a second, then started trotting with them.

  Buzz glanced at me. "You coming along?"

  I sort of shrugged. "I'd feel funny just walking away. "

  "Our job is to tone things down a notch," he said. "Not make it worse. "

  "Are you saying you don't want me?"

  "Hell no," the blond said. "The Executioner on our side. I'll take that. "

  "Who are you?" I asked, running to keep up with their fast walk.

  "Clay," he said, offering his hand over the front of Buzz's body.

  "Be sociable later," Buzz said. He hesitated at the door, as if he were gathering himself. There was suddenly a faint hum of energy coming off of Buzz. I'd never felt anything from him before. His gray eyes glowed--if gray could glow. "I am so tired of this shit," he said, and opened the door.