Sucker Punch (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter #27) - Laurell K. Hamilton Page 0,172

just listening,” Nicky said from the backseat, where he had been unusually quiet.

“You are a sociopath. Do you feel anything for the woman we just left?” Olaf asked.

“I can feel what Anita feels.”

“Do you have no feelings of your own anymore? Have you become only an echo chamber for Anita?”

I heard Nicky sigh. It made me reach back over the seat so he could take my hand. It was an awkward position for hand-holding, but any touch felt better than no touch. I didn’t like that heavy sigh, and I really didn’t like that I might have been the cause of it.

“I have my own thoughts and feelings.”

“Can you act on them?” Olaf asked.

“Of course.”

“If you wanted to hunt Brianna Gibson, could you do it, knowing that Anita would disapprove?” Olaf used the rearview mirror to glance at the other man.

“I have no interest in Brianna Gibson, so it doesn’t matter.” Nicky rubbed his thumb over my fingers as he spoke.

“Your reputation for forcing information from informants was almost as good as mine. You don’t get that good at torture without enjoying it, Nicky.”

I tried not to feel anything about that statement, because if Nicky felt how unhappy it made me, it would mess with his answer. His hand had stopped moving in mine.

“I enjoyed some of it,” Nicky said, “but after a certain point, it stopped being fun and was just part of my job.”

“I don’t believe you,” Olaf said, glancing back in the mirror again.

“I don’t care if you believe me or not.”

I said, “I know you took pride in that part of your job. You liked having the reputation for being a bad guy.”

Nicky nodded and started rubbing my fingers again with his thumb. “I liked having a reputation that scared other bad guys. Yeah, I enjoyed that part.”

“You enjoyed causing pain,” Olaf said.

“Up to a point, absolutely, but beyond that point, not so much.”

“What point?” Olaf asked.

“I don’t think Anita would enjoy us talking shop until we figured out exactly what point it stopped being fun for me.”

“I would enjoy it,” Olaf said.

“Maybe over late-night drinks sometime but not now,” Nicky said.

“I would like to understand how we are different from each other.”

“We talked about that earlier. You’re a born sociopath, and I was made this way. It probably means I have more of an emotional range than you do.”

“Did you feel sympathy for your victims? Is that why it stopped being fun for you?”

“No, it just didn’t please me anymore. I like rough sex, rougher than most people, but after a certain point, torture isn’t sexual for me. It’s just information gathering. It’s taking pride in how long I can keep someone alive, how much pain I can cause them and get the truth out of them. I saw people in the industry that did shit that would make anyone talk, but making them talk isn’t the same as getting the truth out of them. People will lie to save themselves, to get the torture to stop. They’ll tell you anything you want to hear, but lies won’t keep you and the people you work with alive. Lies won’t help you accomplish your mission. Put people through enough, and they can start hallucinating from the pain. Once that happens, their information is useless.”

“You can heal them and question them later,” Olaf said.

“Most of my pride’s jobs were time sensitive. We didn’t have time to nurse our prisoners back to health. My job was to get useful information, details that helped our unit stay alive and accomplish our objectives.”

“What did you do with the people once you had all the information you needed?” Olaf asked.

I fought to not feel, to try to be empty of emotion so Nicky could answer truthfully. I tried to go into the big static emptiness where I used to go when I knew I was going to have to pull the trigger on someone. It was an empty, quiet place.

“Killed them or let someone else kill them.”

“Fast or slow?” Olaf asked.

“Fast. Once they talked, it was over.”

“Didn’t you enjoy the kill?”

“Not really. Killing them was just part of the job at that point. Sometimes I was glad to kill them.”

“You enjoyed it.”

“Not in the way you mean,” Nicky said. He let go of my hand and sat back in his seat.

“You said you were glad to kill them,” Olaf said. “That implies joy in the kill.”

“I enjoy a good hunt. I enjoy killing people that are trying to kill me. I