"Are you actually threatening me, Marshal?" Flannery wasn't smiling when he said it. I couldn't blame him, but I was pissed.
Nathaniel leaned in and spoke low. "Don't piss off the local police because you're worried about me, Anita."
"Just for future reference, Flannery, I'm seriously protective of Nathaniel."
"I understand that you and Devereux are both dating him," he said, looking at the two men holding hands, "but I didn't realize that all your men felt the same way."
"I just like being scary," Domino said.
"Peer pressure," Ethan said. "I never could resist peer pressure." He said it flat with no hint that he was kidding.
Flannery looked at him, obviously trying to figure out if he was kidding. He didn't look at Domino; I think he just believed him. Sometimes I forgot that Domino had started life working for the old-fashioned mob. He had no police record from it, or he couldn't have come on this trip, but the lack of record was probably not due to him never having done anything worth getting arrested for, rather to him just never getting caught. As he leaned into Flannery, invading the hell out of his personal space, and implying, though not stating, that he'd hurt him if he made me unhappy, Domino seemed very comfortable. Maybe I was wasting his talents on bodyguard and police work; too bad I didn't have need for a leg-breaker, and if I did, I had Nicky. Or me, for that matter. I tried to never give an order that I wasn't willing to follow personally--lead from the front and all that.
Nicky spoke low to me. "We're all picking up your anger and your worry for Nathaniel. Tone it down."
I took a deep breath and let it out slow, counting the seconds as I did it. My worry for Nathaniel was at the base of all of it. Fear so often leads to anger. I was better than this. I could do better than this, so I did my deep breathing, my slow count, and finally had to close my eyes with Nathaniel's hand still in mine, and the solidity of Nicky's arm across both our shoulders. It didn't help all that much. I had to let go of Nathaniel's hand and sit forward enough that I couldn't touch Nicky's arm, and try to find just me in the metaphysical mix. I had to find my quiet center devoid of anyone else, which was a lot harder than it sounded with them all sitting so close to me.
I opened my eyes slowly and was able to look at Flannery without that spurt of fear and anger. I felt almost nothing as I looked at him across the table. I'd told my metaphysical mentor, Marianne, that the quiet peace of meditation was similar to the quiet before I shot someone. She hadn't liked that much, but one kind of emotional calm is very like another. Sociopaths must be some of the calmest people on the planet.
Both Ethan and Domino had eased back from Flannery, giving him elbow room at the table again. "That was intense," Domino said.
"I don't normally pick up your emotions that strongly," Ethan said.
"My apologies to everyone on that side of the table," I said.
"We'll forgive you almost anything," Domino said. "It's our host you need to convince."
I looked into Flannery's brown eyes. "Do you forgive me, or am I on your shit list for letting my anger leak all over everything?"
"As the person being threatened, no, but as a practitioner of the arts, that was fascinating."
"I'll take halfway forgiven," I said. "It's probably more than I deserve after that. I really am better at control than this, normally."
"Jet lag can affect a lot of things, Blake."
"Are you worse at controlling your powers when you travel internationally?" I asked.
"Yes, but I have to convince the local Fey to cooperate with me before I'm dangerous, so it's not as large an issue for me." He glanced at the two weretigers still sitting on either side of him. "Would you have really hurt me here in the pub, in front of witnesses?"
"I'd prefer no witnesses, but if Anita said go, then yeah," Domino said.
Ethan shrugged, and said, "You seem like a nice person, but she's the boss."
A voice from behind them said, "She's a great deal more than that to you."
We looked up and an elderly woman was just standing there, only a few feet behind Ethan. I'd have sworn that she hadn't been there before, and because the room was too open and not that crowded, there was nowhere for her to have come from. If she'd been a vampire, I'd have said she'd mind-fucked us, but she so was not the walking dead. In fact, I don't know if I'd ever felt so much life. It was the way I'd felt a few times in the forest or in the mountains--those moments when you just suddenly feel how alive everything around you is, and you can almost breathe in the energy of every humming insect, flying bird, windblown tree, or silent, heated moment of sunlight.
The woman was shorter than me, a little bent forward over a cane. Her dress was long enough to touch the floor and covered in small blue flowers over a lighter blue background. A red shawl that looked soft and hand-knitted covered most of her upper body. Her skin was browned from years of being outdoors, so her face reminded me of a dark brown walnut. A cheerful, smiling walnut with eyes that were a rich blue and seemed to belong to a much younger face. She leaned heavily on the dark wood of her cane as she moved smoothly toward us, with only the slightest hint of a limp. It was obvious that whatever had caused her to need the cane had happened long ago since she used the cane so expertly.
Flannery got up, smiling, and went to meet her partway. "Auntie Nim," he said, and kissed her on her cheek. She laughed when he kissed her, and for just a moment, I thought I heard birdsong.
Flannery's auntie Nim made me want to smile, but I didn't know why, which made me suspicious and not want to smile at all. He offered her his arm, which she took with more bubbling laughter. It made me think of a burbling stream in some pristine forest with birds singing, so why didn't I just give in to the good feelings and enjoy them? It was me and I was wearing a badge. I was on the clock to try to save lives in Dublin. I'd give in to euphoric magic and happy l
ittle old ladies after we'd accomplished something. Besides, it was magic that I didn't understand, but it seemed like it was trying to cloud my mind, and that wasn't cool.
Domino and Ethan were watching her come this way, and they seemed to be fighting not to smile.
"It's okay, Anita," Dev said.
"How do you know that?" I asked.
He smiled. "I'm not just here because I'm pretty."
"What?" I asked, because the comment made no sense to me.
He reached his free hand across the table to me. I didn't want to compromise my gun hand in a strange bar in an alien city with known magic walking this way. Did I think I'd need to shoot our way out? No, but . . . holding hands with both hands right that moment would make me feel less relaxed, not more.
I shook my head.
"Does he mean so little to you, Anita Blake?" the woman asked as Flannery pulled a chair out for her and helped her settle herself with the shawl and long skirt.
"It's not that," I said.
Flannery made Ethan move a chair down so he could sit beside his aunt, which put her closest to Nicky on the other side. If he was fazed by our new tablemate it didn't show, not even in so much as a twitch of the arm he had across our shoulders.
Auntie Nim smiled at us, and it was as if the sun had come out from behind the ever-present clouds. I felt like a flower that had to turn toward her. It was as if the air in the pub was suddenly fresher and easier to breathe. Her eyes, which were like the rich blue of autumn skies or like cornflowers, were startling in the dark brown of her face. Had they been that color a moment before? Surely I'd have noticed eyes that blue even from a distance? I couldn't remember.
Dev stood up and moved around behind Nathaniel and me. His hand was incredibly warm against the side of my face. I started to ask him to sit back down, because no matter how good it felt, it seemed inappropriate for a business meeting, but then he touched Nathaniel's face, too. It was like Dev's touch was a key inserting itself in the lock of us. He turned that key with the near fever heat of his skin against ours, and suddenly things looked different.
Now Auntie Nim's eyes weren't the blue of sky and flowers, but gray like clouds and rain. Her face stayed the same, as if the lines of age in her face and the weathered tan of her skin didn't bother her enough to use illusion to change it. I liked that, or she didn't have enough magic to hide that part of her appearance, but I hoped it was the first, and not the second. She seemed tireder, and less bursting with sunlight and birdsong.