Anita Blake 14 - Danse macabre (67 page)

"Not true," Jean-Claude said. He sat up, suddenly, brisk and almost businesslike. "
Ma petite
can feed the
ardeur
from me, as I can feed my
ardeur
from her. We can be the victim of each other's
ardeurs
."

"I'm sorry, I know that. I know that you were as much enthralled by Belle as any. But still, you can feed the
ardeur
, and gain the rush of it. I have nothing unless I can find a partner who carries it. I had hoped that one, or both, of you would love me, truly love me, truly want me. I'd hoped to bargain love for the
ardeur
, and now I watch you both." Again, he looked away, as if he couldn't stand to look at either of us. "And you are not moved by me. You, Jean-Claude, you watch as Belle used to watch me. She"—he pointed at me—"she watches me like she hates me. So cold, so angry. I don't understand it. Did my power work on her, or only on me? I feel the draw of her body, but she doesn't seem to feel anything for me, except anger."

"
Ma petite
does not like to be in love. It always angers her, most especially in the beginning."

Auggie shook his head. "I don't understand that."

I shrugged. "Join the club." I went to the love seat. Nathaniel trailed me. "Why hasn't Travis shifted?"

Micah answered, "He's waiting for you."

"Waiting for me to do what?"

"Bring my beast," Travis said, and his face was almost gray with pain.

"What you do here on your little visits would be a secret from your so-conservative fellow criminals," Jean-Claude said.

"Just shift, Travis. Heal yourself."

He shook his head, huddling over his arm.

Auggie said, "And what would I be doing on these visits?"

"Perhaps we could even visit you in Chicago."

I was suddenly paying attention to their conversation. If we went to Chicago, oh, my God, the energy there would…

"No, no fucking way. You'd feed on all my people then. I felt what one feeding off me and the few people I had here did to your power level. No way."

"So you do not want to visit us again?"

Auggie forced himself to stand very straight, shoulders back, an echo of military something. "You know that I do, but I won't trade my people and all my power for it. I won't crawl for you, Jean-Claude."

"I don't want you to crawl, Augustine."

"What do you want?"

"You to stop trying to manipulate us. Accept that we hold the
ardeur
and you want it. Supply and demand, dear Augustine."

"You bastard."

Jean-Claude was suddenly standing, so fast I hadn't seen it. Magic, again. "You abused my hospitality first. You manipulated my human servant so you could feed on the
ardeur
again. You opened the way for Belle Morte to possess
ma petite
. I am not the bastard here."

"Fine, I'm the rat bastard. You're right; saying that I didn't understand I was inviting Belle in doesn't fix it. Yeah, I want to take back one of the women of Belle's line, but no one but Anita carries the
ardeur
. She and you, so yeah, I came with the idea that if I had a chance at it, I'd raise the
ardeur
."

"You came here wanting the
ardeur
one more time; what do you want now, Augustine?"

"Don't make me say it, Jean-Claude."

"
Ma petite
is not a subtle woman. Unless you say it, she will not understand it."

Auggie looked at me, but his eyes flinched, like someone who was expecting to be hit. "I won't sell my people, or my power base, I won't humiliate myself, but short of that, I will do anything, anything, to have you and Jean-Claude feed on me again." The flinching gave way to fear. "Want someone killed, I'll do it. Money, drugs, designer anything, whatever you want, whatever you need, just don't tell me that I'll never be in your arms again." His face turned away, but not before I saw the shine of unshed tears.

"We do our own killing. We've got enough money. We are a drug-free zone; don't bring that shit here. If I want designer stuff, I'll buy it myself."

Auggie stood there, face averted, shoulders hunched, waiting for the blow to fall. "I have nothing to offer you then." His voice was thick when he said it.

"I am way past uncomfortable about what Jean-Claude and I did with you. It felt so fucking good to feed off you, and that terrifies me."

Auggie looked back at me. His eyes held the tears back by sheer willpower.

"But for better or worse, I look at you and my heart aches. I want to comfort you, and that pisses me off. I've had people I loved, really loved, use vampire powers on me. I cut them off at the knees for it. I've run from them for months, not seeing them, not even talking to them." I moved toward him as I spoke, a little closer with every sentence. "I just met you. You aren't my friend. You forced me to love you, but I don't know you."

He tried to give me angry eyes, but the unshed tears that hovered there ruined the effect. "I underestimated you, Anita."

"Most people do," I said.

"I thought you were just Jean-Claude's human servant. I felt your power as a necromancer. It should have been a warning, but I went ahead with my plan. I wanted the
ardeur
. I wanted it so badly." He smiled, but not like he was happy. "And I was arrogant. I am Master of the City of Chicago. I've been a mobster since the 1930s. I have been powerful, and a threat to anything in my path for centuries. The only thing that ever truly defeated me was Belle." The tears trembled, but still he held them back.

I stood there, staring at him, needing to look up only a little, because he wasn't that tall. Normally I liked that in a man, but now I was just pissed. I was going to hold on to that anger, because rage was the only thing that kept me from running my hands over his bare chest. My hands itched with the desire to touch him. It wasn't just love, it was more and less than that. It was a sort of magical compulsion. It felt like love, but it held elements of almost addiction. I realized that Auggie had rolled me, well and truly. His power had rolled me. I had fought free of some of it, and Jean-Claude had helped, but I wasn't free of what he'd done to me. But staring into his face, those angry, teary eyes, I realized he wasn't angry at me. He was angry at himself.

"You rolled yourself," I said.

He closed his eyes and turned away. He spoke with his face averted from me. "The blade cuts both ways," he whispered.

"But if we've got better armor, then more of your power hits you than us, doesn't it?"

He nodded, still turned away.

I had a flash of satisfaction. Served him right. But on the heels of that petty pleasure came regret. Regret like bitter ashes. "Jesus," I whispered.

He turned. He'd lost the battle with the tears. They ran in pale pinkish tracks down his face.

"Of all the powers from Belle's line that I've had used on me, Auggie, yours is the most awful."

"How can you say that?" he asked. "The
ardeur
can enslave. Requiem can rape with a thought."

"Yeah, Requiem's power would be the ultimate date-rape drug, but he doesn't use it that way."

"He did once," Auggie said.

I processed that information, tested if it was a lie, but I didn't think it was. I shrugged. "Whatever he was as a young vampire, he's not that now. But the
ardeur
is just lust, and so is Requiem's power. It doesn't steal the emotions; yours does."

"And you think that is a worse crime?"

I nodded. "Yeah, I do."

"You hate me." He whispered it.

I nodded. "Yes."

He turned away, and took a step. I caught his arm. He froze under that one small touch, as if I'd turned him to stone. I knew that reaction. That was the reaction when the merest brush of someone's hand meant more to you than almost anything in the world, and it meant nothing to them. It was how I'd felt off and on with Richard. As if my entire life were in the hand that touched him, and he didn't care. It was one of the reasons that I'd fought free of him. It was too hard to love that much, and hate that much at the same time.

I used that touch to turn Auggie back to me. He let me do it, though he could have fought and won. I was stronger than a normal human now, but Auggie's bicep was thicker than my thigh. In a fair fight, I'd lose, but Auggie's own power had made certain he'd never have a fair fight with me.

I looked into his eyes, watching him try to be angry, instead of hurt. "What a terrible power you have, Augustine," I said, softly, "to offer true love and mean it. People must have been willing to trade anything, everything, for such a gift."

He nodded. "Without the
ardeur
to trap me back, I could have made you love me without risking this much of myself. I know everything about my power, Anita. I can make a person love me, really love me, and not love them back."

I dropped his arm. "Have you done that?"

"You're right, Anita, I have a terrible power. At first it was just the ability to make people like me, then love, but what I didn't realize, at first, was that it was a two-edged blade. I could only cut my prey as deep as I was willing to be cut."

"That changed," I said.

He nodded. The tear tracks were drying on his face. He made no move to wipe them away. "I learned control. I learned to trap others without trapping myself, as Jean-Claude learned with the
ardeur
. I don't know if Requiem ever learned how to cause lust in only one side of his equation."

"I did not." Requiem came in, moving slowly, carefully. He was wearing his usual black cloak, so the injuries were hidden, but he moved like things still hurt. Someone had used cover-up on the worst of the facial bruises. It was a good job. You had to look to see the discoloration; even then, if I hadn't known it was bruises, I might not have seen.

Auggie glanced at him, then back at me. "But most of us do, eventually."

"So if our power hadn't tripped you up, you'd have been willing to make me love you, really love you, and not love me back?"

"I didn't think that clearly, but I would not willingly have loved you, no."

"You really are a bastard," I said.

He nodded. "Chicago has no mob but the old-school Italian. I've kept out the Russians, the Ukrainians, the Chinese, the Koreans, the Japanese. No one, absolutely no one, takes power from me. While almost every other mob stronghold has been whittled away, I've held my territory against everyone. To do that, Anita, you have to be a bastard. A cold-blooded, murderous bastard."

"You hide it well," I said. "The laugh is great."

"I work at appearing human; it makes the other bosses be less afraid."

"The head of Vegas is an old-time mobster, too."

Auggie shook his head. "He stopped being a force in the mob when he became a vampire. It takes a while to recover from it, and by the time Maximillian was powerful enough to take back some of it, times had changed, and he didn't change with them. He's powerful, and runs Vegas, but he's not a boss anymore."

We stood there staring at each other.

Jean-Claude came up behind me. He touched my shoulder, and when I didn't pull away, he hugged me from behind. The look on Auggie's face, seeing us together, was painful, and strangely satisfying. If he'd had his way, it would be me with that stricken look, and him cool and calm. Evil bastard, but even thinking it, I couldn't own it. Damn it.

"The night wastes away. Soon we will have to change for the ballet," Jean-Claude said.

Auggie nodded. "Yeah, yeah."

"We need to decide if
ma petite
is too dangerous to go out among the other Masters of the City."

Auggie nodded again. "I'll help you figure it out, if I can. I owe you for the breach in hospitality. I owe Anita for what I tried to do to her." He looked away from both of us, staring at nothing. "It's been a long time since I've felt the full weight of my own power. I'd forgotten how much it fuckin' hurts."

"Excuse me." Noel was standing beside us.

We both turned and looked at him. I don't know what he saw on our faces, but he backed up fast until he was out of reach of both of us. "May I approach?"

"No," Auggie said.

"Yes," I said.

We looked at each other.

Noel dropped to all fours. He didn't bow, just dropped to all fours where he was standing. "I don't know what to do; I can't please you both."

"What is your problem, Auggie?" I said.

"He asked a question, I answered it," Auggie said.

"Fine, you answered it for yourself, not for me." I stepped away from Auggie, closer to Noel. Auggie grabbed my upper arm.

I tensed, but didn't try to pull away. I knew I'd lose if it was just brute strength. I looked at him, then at the hand on my arm. I looked back at him. "You did not just do that."

"And you did not just step away from me to go to anyone this submissive."

"Do you ever want to experience the
ardeur
again, Auggie?"

He looked puzzled for a moment, but I knew in a way that that was an act. He might have been truly puzzled, but he worked at human facial expressions. "You know I do."

"Move the hand, or you won't ever touch me again."

We stared at each other for a moment, then he let me go. "I heard you were dangerous, powerful, and quick to kill. What none of my spies caught, is that your force of will is the most dangerous thing about you. God, your eyes, the determination in your eyes." He shook his head. "You mean it. You would truly cut me off because of this."

"Damn straight."

"Why, because I grabbed your arm?"

"Because you're acting like you own me. Nobody owns me."

Micah got off the love seat and started toward us. It drew Auggie's gaze to him. "Your lion injured Travis and abused Noel. I think you owe them some consideration."

"Spoken like a leopard," Auggie said, "so practical, so willing to negotiate." He made those all sound like bad things.

"You really are very much your animal to call, aren't you?" Micah said.

Auggie nodded.

"For those of us who are confused, could you explain a little more?" I said.