Affliction (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter) - Laurell K. Hamilton Page 0,25

Sheriff Callahan, but once the word goes out that there’s an officer down for any reason, they come to make sure the family has everything they need and that the officer is never alone. They do vigil.’

Juliet turned in her seat so she could see Nathaniel. ‘How do you know that? Your dad a cop, too?’

‘No, but I’ve been with Anita for years. I’ve been at the hospital when she was hurt and visited when other officers were injured.’

‘And they accept you as family?’ Juliet asked.

‘Most of the local police do.’

‘They’re sort of used to my domestic arrangements,’ I said.

Juliet shook her head hard enough to make her curls bounce. ‘Well, I don’t know about the other cops, but our family is probably going to be embarrassing the hell out of us about your domestic arrangements. I’ll just apologize now and get it over with.’

‘Appreciated,’ I said. Micah squeezed my hand. I gave him a smile. ‘If I kiss you, you’ll be having to wipe lipstick off.’

‘I’ll risk it, if we’re careful,’ he said, and smiled.

We kissed gently, and it left a stripe of scarlet in the middle of his lips. Nathaniel said, ‘Share the go-faster stripe, because I may not be able to kiss you for a while.’

Micah turned to him in the narrowness of the backseat. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘It’s okay. We can’t kiss in public in a lot of places. I know you love me even when we can’t kiss.’

Micah leaned into the other man, and Nathaniel was just taller enough in the upper body to have to bend down a little. It was as gentle a kiss as we’d done, but then Micah slid his arms around Nathaniel’s waist, up underneath his jacket so he could run his hands up the muscled warmth of his back with only the thin dress shirt between him and the other man’s skin. I loved that pocket of heat just underneath the jacket myself, so I knew what Micah was doing.

Nathaniel responded, sliding his own arms around Micah, and the kiss grew. I knew I had a big, happy smile on my face. I loved watching them together.

Juliet said, ‘You really don’t mind, do you?’

It took me a moment to realize she was talking to me. I glanced at her, not really wanting to stop looking at my two men. ‘Not mind? I love them, and I love seeing them together.’

‘I guess I thought you tolerated it, but the look on your face just now … You looked so happy.’

I frowned at her. Micah drew back from the kiss, and Nathaniel just sort of wrapped himself around the other man, putting his head on one of Micah’s shoulders, so his face was buried against him and he wasn’t looking at Juliet.

‘I was happy,’ I said.

‘Why wouldn’t Anita be happy to watch us kiss?’ Micah said, holding the other man easily, familiarly.

Juliet had the grace to look embarrassed. ‘I don’t know; I guess I’d be jealous, or … I wouldn’t want to see two men together.’

‘It made you uncomfortable,’ Micah said, his voice quiet and almost neutral.

‘I’m sorry, but yeah, a little. I didn’t know you liked guys.’

‘I don’t, not really, but I love Nathaniel.’

‘Trust me,’ Dev said, ‘there is a trail of brokenhearted boys back home who wish so much our luscious Micah liked men better than he does. Sadly, where men are concerned he’s a one-man boy.’ He gave a pouting face as if he were five, and then that slow grin spread across his face. I wanted to frown at him, but that damn Cheshire grin did me in every time. How could someone so big, so grown up, do mischief so well?

Micah looked at Dev. ‘There are one or two men back home besides Nathaniel that I notice.’ His voice was utterly mild.

Dev’s grin faded around the edges, and his eyes were thinking way too hard. You could almost see him reviewing every interaction he’d seen between Micah and the men back home. It was why Micah had said it: to bedevil our devil.

I turned away to hide my own grin.

Juliet said, ‘You tease like friends.’

‘We are that,’ Micah said, his voice still quiet and mild.

‘Close friends,’ she said, with a little too much emphasis on close.

‘Dev is bisexual, cheerfully so, but I’ve already told you we aren’t lovers.’ He stroked Nathaniel’s hair with the other man still entwined around him. ‘If we were, I wouldn’t hide it.’

She looked at what she could see of Nathaniel. ‘I guess not.’

‘It