Affliction (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter) - Laurell K. Hamilton Page 0,228

angry?’

‘Why am I angry? For the love of God, Micah, you’ve been going out of town and having battles to the death and you didn’t think I needed to know that?’

‘Lower your voice,’ he said.

I wanted to yell louder, but he was right; I’d just said he was committing murder according to human law. I lowered my voice and leaned in closer, but my voice was still angry, just softer, like angry whispering.

‘How could you keep that from me?’

His face closed down, his own temper showing. He didn’t get mad often, but when he did it could be as bad as mine. This was going to go so badly.

‘I didn’t keep anything from you. I just didn’t tell you.’

‘That’s the same thing, it’s just words to cover it up,’ I said.

He let go of my hands and said, ‘Do you tell me every time you risk your life as a U.S. Marshal?’

‘No, but that’s different.’

‘How?’ he asked.

I wanted to say, It just is, but that wasn’t an answer. I opened my mouth to explain the difference and stopped. I frowned at him. ‘I see it as different, very different.’

‘Why is it any different? They’re both our jobs, and both our jobs can be dangerous.’

‘But I didn’t know your job was dangerous,’ I said.

He studied my face. ‘What did you think we were doing to get all the other groups on board with the Coalition?’

‘I thought you were persuading them. I thought you were using diplomacy, logic that it just made sense to join.’

‘I do most of the time, but you’ve been around enough shapeshifters, Anita. You know that some animal groups aren’t about logic or being reasonable.’

‘If I’d thought about it, I guess I would have assumed that some of the bodyguards did the one-on-one combat for you the way that most of the Clan tiger queens have a champion.’

‘I’m not a weretiger, Anita. You brought all of them on board when you were able to call all of them to us.’

‘Magic and sex won us the weretigers,’ I said.

‘Yes,’ he said.

‘What won us the rest?’ I asked softly.

‘You know that I sleep with some of the female dominants.’

I nodded. ‘You share me with enough people, I can’t bitch.’

He smiled. ‘You mean you don’t have room to bitch, but you still could,’ he said.

I shrugged. ‘It would be stupid and unfair if I complained.’

He smiled wider and touched my face, gently. ‘A lot of women, and men, are really unfair to their other half, Anita. You have a reputation for being unreasonable and violent, but you’re one of the most practical women I’ve ever been with.’

‘And you’re the most practical man I’ve ever been with,’ I said.

‘Most people wouldn’t think that was very romantic,’ he said.

I smiled. ‘A little ruthless practicality is very important in our lives.’

‘Yes,’ he said, ‘it is.’

‘When you can pick a champion, do you?’ I asked.

‘I do.’

Then I realized that he was taking people who were my friends, or more, and I thought about them being in danger. Fuck.

‘What now?’ he asked.

This time I just answered the question. ‘I just realized that means that anyone who travels out of town with you is maybe in as much danger as you are. I should have known that.’

‘You mean I should have told you, or you should have known?’

‘Both, maybe, I don’t know, but, Micah, you’re my size; most animal groups are led by the biggest, baddest motherfucker they’ve got. How have you been winning so many fights? I’ve seen you in practice and you’re good, but you’re like me; we just don’t have the reach. Most taller people have longer arms and legs; they can just hit us before we can hit them, unless we’re lucky, or they aren’t good at fighting, but to fight your way to the top of a pack, or a pride, you have to be good.’

‘Usually, I do something utterly ruthless and very abrupt before they’re expecting it. Leopards are fast, faster than most lions, or tigers; I just have to make the first blow count.’

‘You mean kill them with the first blow,’ I said softly.

‘Yes,’ he said, and studied my face. ‘Does that bother you?’

I thought about the fact that he had been killing people fairly casually for years and I hadn’t known. I didn’t like that part, but I knew without a doubt that if he hadn’t killed them, they would have killed him. I wanted him alive and in my life more than I wanted some humane ideal of