Cerulean Sins( Anita Blake - 11 )(130)

I wasn't afraid of him. I knew Asher wouldn't hurt me, on purpose. I knew more that Jean-Claude wouldn't allow it. But I'd had enough. Enough of Asher and of me. In some perverse way Asher and I were well matched in a bad need-therapy sort of way. We both had so many issues about personal intimacy and so many hoops that people had to jump through, that even I was tired of it.

I unbuckled my belt and started sliding it through the loops, when it was far enough back; I slid the belt out of the loop on my shoulder holster.

Asher asked in a voice that echoed through the room, crawled down my spine, "What are you doing?"

I finished taking my belt off, then shrugged out of my shoulder holster. "I'm getting undressed. I assume that Jean-Claude's got some clothes around here somewhere for me, too. Though I am so not wearing an outfit that matches yours if it has like petticoats and stays and stuff. You can't move in that shit."

"Have no fear, ma petite, I have held your preferences in the forefront of my thoughts, as I chose the clothing." He held his hands out to the side and struck a lovely, if overly dramatic poise. "Even our clothing is comfortable and easy to move about in."

We were both ignoring the vampire that was glowering at us. Nothing takes the wind out of your sails when you're trying to be scary like being ignored.

I started to take my shirt off, but stopped. I did not want to have to go through the glowing cross routine again. I did not want to mess with it. So I went for the bed, where I could take off my shoes in comfort.

"So Jason told you what else Belle did?"

"She has given you the first mark, oui."

"She knows, Jean-Claude, she knows that Richard and I don't have the fourth mark." I hopped up on the bed, laying my belt and shoulder holster beside me. I concentrated on untying my shoes, because I did not want to go where I feared the discussion would go.

"You will not look at me now, ma petite. Why, is it that you fear what I will say?"

"I know that if you gave me the fourth mark that she couldn't mark me again. I'd be safe from her."

"Non, ma petite, no lies between us. She could not mark you as hers, but you would not be safe. I could use this as an excuse to claim that last bit of you, but I will not, because I fear what Belle would do."

I looked up at him, one shoe in my hand. "What do you mean?"

"For now, she thinks she may be able to claim you as her human servant. She may be able to use you to increase her own power. If she finds you are beyond her reach in that way, she may decide that you are better off dead."

"If she can't have me, then nobody else gets me either, is that it?"

He gave a small nod, and an almost apologetic shrug. "She is a very practical woman."

"No, she's a very practical vampire. Trust me, Jean-Claude that is a whole new level of practicality."

He nodded. "Oui, oui, I would argue if I could, but it would be lies."

Asher was walking towards us now. His eyes were still glowing that drowning blue as if a winter's sky had filled his skull, but for the rest, he looked as ordinary as he ever did. Which was extraordinary. But at least he wasn't raising a small wind of his own otherworldly power or levitating a few inches off the floor.

"You are both weakened by not sharing the fourth mark. Neither of you is as powerful without it. You know that, Jean-Claude."

"I do, but I also know Belle. She destroys that which she cannot use."

"Or casts it aside," Asher said, voice soft, holding sorrow enough to make my throat tight.

I had my shoes off, my jogging socks tucked into them on the floor. "Casting you aside did destroy you," I said. I meant it to be soft, but it came out pretty much like I usually sound.

He glared at me, his pupils swimming up through the blue fire like an island reborn from the sea.

"What I mean, Asher, is that she chose what would hurt you worse than death. To be cast out from her affections, from Jean-Claude's bed, since his bed was hers."

"She would not kill me because she promised Jean-Claude she would not."

I glanced at Jean-Claude.

"I came back to her for a hundred years, if she could save Asher's life. If he died, I was free of her."

"So she worked to keep me alive," Asher said, and his voice was bitter enough to choke on. "There were nights when I cursed you for my life, Jean-Claude."

"I know, mon ami. Belle Morte often pointed out that if only I would allow you to die, you could be spared such humiliation."

"I did not know that she gave you that choice."

Jean-Claude looked away, not meeting the other man's eyes. "It was selfish on my part. I would rather you alive and hating me, than dead and past all hope." He looked up then, and his face was raw with emotion, so unlike his usual polite blankness. "Was I wrong, Asher? Would you rather have died all those years ago?"