Sucker Punch (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter 27)

They both had a moment of looking at me, of doing that guy math. Physically they could totally take me—we all knew it—but it wasn’t about physical prowess. It was about other kinds of power.

“You are endangering our mission,” I said, “so your superior skills mean shit to me right now. You are making me babysit your egos while Otto is over there looking at Angel and Pierette like they’re fucking steaks. Get your priorities in order, gentlemen, or get the fuck off my team.”

“You heard her,” Nicky said. “Go make coffee.”

Custer and Milligan had been calming down, but suddenly I felt their hackles rise. I pointed a finger at Nicky. “Don’t you start. We are not going to play ‘Who has the biggest dick?’ right now.”

“Sorry,” he said, but not like he meant it, and there was the problem with this many big, dominant men working together. Until dominance was established, and sometimes even after, they’d push at one another. Add that they were all wereanimals, and it was just worse.

I walked toward Olaf and the women. I did not look back to see if everyone was doing what I’d told them to do. I was either the boss of them, or I wasn’t. Looking back to double-check made me appear weak, and it wouldn’t change a damn thing. Micah had already established his leadership over the new guys. I thought I had, but apparently I hadn’t in the field. When I’d told Micah to stay home, I hadn’t thought what that might mean with the rest of his crew. Ethan wasn’t dominant enough to be the boss of these guys, and sometimes Nicky and the Team’s guys clashed, which left me to be boss. Damn it, you fix one problem and then cause another. Fuck unintended consequences all to hell.

48

“ANGEL, PETRA, WHAT are you both doing here?” I said with a big smile that didn’t reach my eyes. The tone in my voice matched my eyes, not the smile.

Angel turned with a smile until she saw the look in my eyes, and then it wilted a little around the edges. “Hey, Anita.” She moved to the side so she could keep an eye on Olaf and still see me and the men with me as we came up through the cars. Her base makeup was almost white to highlight the scarlet lipstick and the black-and-red eye makeup. There was a tiny cluster of fake cherries pinned at the center of the rounded collar of the white button-up blouse. More black lace traced the collar. She had a red heart-shaped enamel watch pin on the left side of the blouse. The small touches of red brought out the red in the makeup, or maybe it was the other way around. Either way, it was adorable and sexy.

Pierette’s makeup was subtle in comparison, a natural look except for the eyeliner around her dark eyes. The slight uptilt to them was emphasized and made her look more exotic than her original French and English ancestry. Though she might have been older than either country—I wasn’t sure when France and England officially became countries. Pierette, through her vampire master’s marks, was a lot older than that delicate triangle of a face looked.

I wanted to ask out loud, What the fuck are you doing here? You know you’re his perfect victim, but that seemed a little blunt, so I tried, “I asked a question, ladies. What are you both doing here?”

“You know I travel with the Coalition to help new Therianthropes control their shifting,” Angel said with a smile.

“You and Ethan are two of the best we have at helping the newbies. I need the help with Bobby, so great.”

Angel smiled at me. It was a version of a smile that I’d seen a lot—mischief with an edge of evil. That expression reminded me so much of her twin brother, Mephistopheles, that it was disturbing. I still had some issues with the fact that both of them were my lovers now. It just seemed a little incesty. Was that smile on purpose to pull on Olaf’s tail and see what would happen, or was it just her smile, too? When we got some privacy, the good Angel and I were so going to talk.

I turned then and said, “But Petra doesn’t have your skills with keeping weak little Therianthropes in human form, so I’ll ask the question one more time. What are you both doing here?”

Pierette gave me the full weight of those big brown eyes and said, “I have come to be whatever you need, my . . . Anita. Whether by sword or flesh, I am yours.”

She’d almost used the title, my queen. She had lived more centuries with kings and queens than presidents, but I really hoped she didn’t forget and call me queen in front of Leduc or even Newman. Oh, hell, anyone but the people who came with her on the plane.

“What does she mean by that?” Olaf asked.

“Oh, let me explain,” Angel said, and the mischievous smile that went with the words blossomed until it was mostly just evil. It was the smile that Mephistopheles, our Devil, Dev for short, wore when he was about to do something unfortunate.

I shook my head at her. “No. Whatever you’re thinking, just no.”

“Well, you are the boss of me,” Angel said, but the tone implied strongly that she was humoring me.

“You are not the boss of me,” Olaf said, voice almost growling low.

I looked up at him, and for a second, he let me see all that creepy-as-fuck murder lust. The puzzlement at Pierette’s phrasing hadn’t been enough to dampen it, as if he was tired of wearing his civilized mask the way that Edward seemed to be getting tired of being Ted so much of the time.

“No, I’m not, but you heard what I told Duke about the SEALs.”

“I did.”

“That applies to Angel and Petra, too.”

&nb

sp; “I don’t know what you mean,” he said.

“The hell you don’t,” I said.

Olaf smiled at me, and he put all that happy creepiness into it that usually spooked me, but in that moment, I was done. Maybe later he’d creep me out again, but not now. For now I was done with this shit. My lioness raised golden eyes and stared up through me.