“If you didn’t bore Asher out of his mind in the bedroom, he wouldn’t still be letting Richard chain him up and press his body against his; you know Asher would let Richard fuck him in a heartbeat.”

“That’s not true!”

I let him see my version of a pleased, unpleasant smile, and said, “It is, you know it is.”

He screamed and tried to hit me, but I moved just enough for him to smash his hand into the lockers behind me, and I touched his bare chest. I fed on his anger, the way I’d fed on Ricky earlier.

Kane dropped to the floor, and I rode him down, keeping my hands on him, draining all that delicious rage. I fed until I felt my eyes go all vampire, and I knew when I looked down at him he saw them like cognac diamonds with the sun shining through them, as if brown could be the color of fire.

I felt Asher down that long cord that bound them together now, more surely than the wedding ring he’d denied Kane, and far more permanent. But Asher was still hours dead and couldn’t give extra power to his beast to call, so I could feel the tie between them, but the vampire couldn’t help him.

I took my hands back from Kane, forced myself to stop feeding from him, so he could look up at me and still hear and understand what I was about to say to him. I could have fed him into unconsciousness and he’d have woken not even remembering why he was so tired.

“If I find out you hurt one of the guards, because you made them afraid to hurt you first, I will make certain that you step into the practice ring with them again, and they get to kick your ass. Narcissus is going to want you and Asher dead for this amazing insult to him. He is the Oba of your entire clan, one of the most powerful groups in this territory, and you just superseded him as Asher’s beast to call. He will not forgive, hell, in hyena society, he can’t forgive and forget this, because it would make him appear so fucking weak that his own people will turn on him. You and Asher have left Narcissus with no choice but to punish you. If Asher had told him first, discussed it with him, but he didn’t, did he? Just like he didn’t mention it to Jean-Claude first.”

Kane managed to say, “No.”

“No, what, Kane? No, he didn’t discuss it with Jean-Claude first? No, you didn’t talk to your Oba first? No, no, no isn’t going to save you from whatever Narcissus is going to do to you.”

“Jean-Claude . . . will save . . . Asher.” He couldn’t quite make his eyes focus, as if he were struggling to stay conscious; maybe I’d taken a little too much energy from him?

“No, Kane, not this time. I won’t let Jean-Claude endanger us all because Asher lets his fucking heart overrule his head again and again.” My towel was loose; I didn’t try to keep myself covered but took the towel off and sat across his waist as naked as he was. The only thing that made it not a preamble to sex was that I was a few inches too high.

I put my glowing eyes just above his, and he still couldn’t move enough to do anything to stop me. “I haven’t made anyone my hyena to call yet, Kane, did you remember that? One of the things I learned from the Mother of All Darkness was how to break the bonds between vampires and their servants. I could just take you from Asher, bind you to me, and thanks to the ardeur I would be your exception, Kane. You’d fuck me, because you’d crave me like a drug.”

“No . . . lies.”

“Oh, I’m not lying. Why tell a lie when the truth is so much more terrible?”

“Bitch.”

“Oh, Kane, you can do better than that.”

“He’ll never . . . top you . . . again if you hurt me.”

“Narcissus is going to kill Asher if he can, so he won’t be topping, or fucking, anyone.”

“He loves Asher.”

“You know, I think he does, but Asher never loves the people who love him the most; he always chases the ones who don’t want him, haven’t you figured that out yet?”

“He loves me enough to . . . do this.”

I nodded. “Yes, he does, because in you he’s finally found someone more problematic, more jealous, more of a shit, than he is—it’s only taken him six, seven hundred years to find someone who exemplifies his own worst traits. He’ll keep you close, Kane, I don’t know why, but he sees something in you he wants.”

Kane swallowed, and his eyes were able to look at mine again. I got up still nude and left him lying on the floor with my towel curled up beside him. “You and Asher deserve each other, Kane, you really do.”

“Thank you,” he said.

“It wasn’t a compliment,” I said. I got my weapons out of the locker and since I’d totally forgotten fresh clothes I carried all of them, mostly in one arm, because the other hand was for my Browning BDM naked in my hand. I left Kane lying on the floor to recover, or pass out. I didn’t shoot him, not even to wound. And people say I have no sense of humor.

45

I LEFT THE showers nearly vibrating with energy, but the combination of being buck naked and juggling all my holsters, guns, knives, and ammo pouches because they had nothing to attach to was just awkward, and then I started seeing the early-morning shift of the guards coming and going. Have you ever tried nodding good morning to people while naked and holding a small arsenal of weapons? It was a first for me, too, and I didn’t care for it. Though they were almost all lycanthropes, which means technically they don’t give a damn about nudity, they kept doing the little eye flicks. It may have been the guns and stuff, but I was self-conscious enough to want to start snarling, What are you looking at?