Danse Macabre   ::   Гамильтон Лорел

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«Anita, you wouldn't have told me if you weren't pretty sure you needed a pregnancy test.»

«When Nathaniel and Micah get back, they'll jump in the shower, we'll get dressed up, and go straight to Jean-Claude's. There won't be time tonight.»

«Friday, promise me that Friday you'll get one.»

«I'll try, but…»

«Besides, when you start asking your lovers to use condoms, won't they figure something out?»

«Jesus,» I said.

«Yeah, I heard you say if you'd used condoms you'd be safe. Don't tell me that you're not going to want to use them for a while. Could you really have unprotected sex right now, and enjoy it?»

I shook my head. «No.»

«Then what are you going to tell the boys about this sudden need for condoms? Hell, Micah had a vasectomy before you even met him. He's like super-safe.»

I sighed again. «You're right, damn it, but you are.»

«So pick up the test on the way to the thing tonight.»

«No. I'm not going to rain all over Jean-Claude's meeting. He's planned this for months.»

«You didn't mention it to me.»

«I didn't plan it, he did. The ballet isn't really my thing.» Truthfully, he hadn't mentioned it to me until they were coming to St. Louis, but I kept that part to myself. It would just give Ronnie another reason to say that Jean-Claude was keeping secrets from me. He'd finally admitted that the Masters of the City all coming here had been something he hadn't planned, at least not from the beginning. He'd just negotiated it so the vampire dancers could cross many different vamp territories without problems. Jean-Claude agreed the meet was a good idea, but he was also nervous about it. It would be the largest gathering of Masters of the City in American history.

And you don't bring that many big fish together without worrying about shark attacks.

«And how will Mr. Fang-Face feel about being a father?»

«Don't call him that.»

«Sorry, how will Jean-Claude feel about being a daddy?»

«It's probably not his.»

She looked at me. «You're having sex with him, a lot. Why isn't it his?»

«Because he's more than four hundred years old and when vampires get that old, they aren't very fertile. That goes for Asher and Damian, too.»

«Oh, God,» she said. «I'd forgotten that you had sex with Damian.»

«Yeah,» I said.

She covered her eyes with her hands. «I'm sorry, Anita. I'm sorry that it's weirding me out that my uptight monogamous friend is suddenly sleeping with not one, but three vampires.»

«I didn't plan it that way.»

«I know that.» She hugged me, and I stayed stiff against her. She wasn't being comforting enough for me to relax in her arms. She hugged me tighter. «I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm being a jerk. But if it's not the vampires then who else but your houseboys.»

I pulled away from her. «Don't call them my houseboys. They have names, and just because I like living with someone, and you don't, don't make that my problem.»

«Fine, that leaves Micah and Nathaniel.»

«Micah is fixed, remember? So it can't be him.»

Her eyes went wide. «That leaves Nathaniel. Jesus, Anita, Nathaniel as the father-to-be.»

A moment ago I might have agreed with her, but now it pissed me off. It wasn't her place to disparage my boyfriends. «What's wrong with Nathaniel?» I said, and my voice was not entirely happy.

She put her hands on her hips and gave me a look. «He's twenty and a stripper. Twenty-year-old strippers are the entertainment at your bachelorette party. You don't have babies with them.»

I let the anger seep into my eyes. «Nathaniel told me you didn't see him as real, as a person. I told him he was wrong. I told him you were my friend, and you wouldn't disrespect him like that. I guess I was wrong.»

She didn't back down or apologize. She was angry and staying that way. «Last time I checked, Nathaniel was supposed to be food, just food, not the love of your life.»

«I didn't say he was the love of my life, and yeah, he started out as my pomme de sang , but that doesn't…»

But she interrupted me. «Your apple of blood, right, that's what pomme de sang means?»

I nodded.

«If you were a vampire you'd be taking blood from your little stripper, but thanks to that bloodsucking son of a bitch you have to feed off sex. Sex , for God's sake! First that bastard made you his blood whore, and now you're just a — «She stopped abruptly, a startled, almost-frightened look on her face, as if she knew she'd gone too far.

I gave her a flat, cold look. The look that says my anger has moved from hot to cold. It's never a good sign. «Go on, Ronnie, say it.»

«I didn't mean it,» she whispered.

«Yeah,» I said, «you did. Now I'm just a whore.» My voice sounded as cold as my eyes felt. Too angry and too hurt to be anything but cold. Hot anger can feel good, but the cold will protect you better.

She started to cry. I just stared at her, speechless. What the hell was going on? We were fighting — she wasn't allowed to cry in the middle of it. Especially not when she was the one being a cruel bastard. I could count on one hand the times I'd seen Ronnie cry and still have fingers left over.

I was still angry, but I was puzzled, too, and that took a little of the edge off. «Shouldn't I be the one in tears here?» I asked, because I couldn't think of what else to say. I was mad at her and I'd be damned if I would comfort her right now.

She spoke in that breathless, hiccuping voice that serious crying can give you. «I'm sorry, oh, God, Anita, I'm sorry. I'm just so jealous.»

I raised my eyebrows at her. «What are you talking about? Jealous of what?»

«The men,» she said in that shivering, uncertain voice. It was like she was someone else for a moment, or maybe this was just part of Ronnie that she didn't let people see. «All the damned men. I'm about to give up everybody. Everybody but Louie, and he's great, but damn it I've had lovers. I hit triple digits.»

I wasn't sure that being able to number your lovers at over a hundred was a good thing, but it was something that Ronnie and I had agreed to disagree over a long time ago. I did not say, Look who's the whore , or other hurtful remarks I could have made. I let all the cheap shots I could have made go. She was the one crying.

«And now I'm giving it all up, all of it, for just one man.» She leaned her hands against the cabinet as if she needed the support.

«You said sex with Louie was great. I think you've used words like fantastic and mind-blowing .»

She nodded, her hair spilling around her face so that I couldn't see her eyes for a moment. «It is, he is, but he's just one man.