Skin Trade(67)
I frowned at him. “I’m no one’s victim, Edward.”
“I know that, and you know that, but the media won’t know that.”
“So you’re saying that if I were a man, they’d have asked for my badge by now?”
“Not necessarily, but being a girl helps you here; don’t begrudge that.”
I shook my head. “Fine, fine, whatever, fuck it. Do you really think that SWAT will insist on coming with us?”
“If we’re serving an active warrant, yes.”
“Well, then a trip to the tigers is almost useless. I can’t talk freely enough in front of them.”
“We can see the priestess first, but you’re not going to avoid Grimes and his men.”
“Damn it.”
“Most of the time it’s nice to have that much extra firepower and technology behind us. Just for you, me, Otto, we can do and say things on our own that we don’t want SWAT to see or hear. You for all the secrets, and us for practical solutions.”
“I’m pretty practical myself, Edward.”
“Ted, Anita; you need to work on that and use the right name.”
“Fine, Ted, I do my share of practical solutions.” I took a deep breath in and blew it out, slowly. “We can see the priestess while we’re waiting for the warrants. It’ll give me the illusion we’re doing something useful.”
Bernardo and Olaf had sidled back over. The fact that I hadn’t realized they were within hearing distance said I was a lot more distracted than was good for my job.
“You sound bummed, babe, did your undead boyfriend not come through for you?” Bernardo said.
“Do not call me babe, or any other term of endearment, okay?”
Bernardo spread his hands, as if to say, Fine.
“Did your vampire lover disappoint you?” Olaf asked, and whereas it had been pure teasing with Bernardo, Olaf made it sound way too serious.
“My relationship with Jean-Claude is none of your business.”
He just looked at me, and even through sunglasses I could feel his stare, heavy and uncomfortable.
“What?” I demanded.
Edward stepped between us, literally blocking my view of the other man. “Drop it, Anita. We’ll go see Sherman’s priestess; by then the warrants will be up. We’ll deal with our police escort when the time comes.”
I realized that Edward probably needed to know some of the potential problems with the weretigers. But I didn’t owe the other two men the explanation. “We need to talk, Edward,” I said.
“Talk,” he said.
“In private.”
“You just had a private discussion,” Bernardo said.
“No, I got upset, and both of you bailed on the hysterical woman, and left Ed… Ted to deal with me. Now I need to tell him things that really are private.”
“We are your backup; don’t we need to know what’s going on?” Bernardo said.
“I’ll tell… Ted, and then if he thinks you need to know, I’ll tell you.”
They didn’t like it, but when they got to sit in the car with the air-conditioning, Bernardo liked it better. Olaf went because he had no choice, but he didn’t like it.
When we were alone in the pounding, bright heat of the Vegas desert, I told Edward. I told him about Max and his queen wanting me to sleep with their tigers. I told him about accidentally giving powers to Crispin.
Edward took off his hat, wiped the area of the sweat band, and settled the hat back on his head. “You do have the most interesting problems.”
“Is that a complaint?”
“Just an observation.”
“You know everything I know now; do we need to tell the other two?”
“Some of it.”
“I’ll let you tell as much, or as little, as you think we need.”
“What if I tell them all of it?”
“If you think that’s best; I trust your judgment.”
He nodded, and started for the car. “Let’s get out of the heat, and I’ll tell them something while we go see a witch.”
“She’s a Wiccan high priestess; not all Wiccans like to be called witches.”
“I’ll remember that.”
“You already know that,” I said.
He smiled at me. “You know, if we really were sleeping together, Olaf would back off.”
I gave him the look the comment deserved. “You aren’t serious?”
“About doing it for real, no. Donna would never forgive either of us, and it would destroy Peter. Besides, it would just be…” He made a waffling motion with his hand. “Wrong.”
“Like doing family,” I said.
He nodded. “Something like that. It’s not what we are to each other.”