Sucker Punch (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter #27) - Laurell K. Hamilton Page 0,235

don’t do complete submission.”

“She bottoms harder than most submissives I’ve ever been with,” Nicky said.

I so wanted out of this conversation, but if we were going to have it, I’d be a grown-up about it. “I cannot imagine a set of circumstances where I would be willing to be tied up with Olaf in the room, let alone with him topping me. I have to trust someone completely to give myself to them like that, and I don’t know how I would ever be able to trust you like that, Olaf.”

“Even if I let you release the ardeur on me?”

I looked at Nicky. “You tell me. Does the ardeur make you safer as a lover for me?”

“The ardeur is what turned me into your Bride, so yeah.”

“She feeds the ardeur on the rest of us, and it hasn’t turned us into Brides,” Angel said.

“And she has Brides that she has never had sex with,” Pierette said.

“I think I make Brides when I’m desperate. It’s like a Hail Mary pass.”

“So you’ve never tried to make a Bride when you weren’t in dire straits?” she asked.

“No.”

“So Anita could feed the ardeur on me and not turn me into her Bride?” Olaf asked.

“I believe so,” Pierette said.

“Only if I felt safe, and like I said, I can’t imagine a set of circumstances where I would feel safe with you like that.”

Olaf looked at Nicky. “If she had not unleashed the ardeur on you, would you have hurt her that first time you fucked her?”

“No, I can enjoy sex without pain.”

“So can I, but that is not my question.”

“Was it gentler lovemaking than I would have done on my own without her magic?” Nicky asked.

“That is what I am asking,” Olaf said.

“It was gentler.”

“But still satisfying?”

“The ardeur is a rush. It makes every touch more intense.”

Everyone in the room nodded except Edward and the two SEALs. Edward caught it in time to say, “I don’t let her feed on me.”

“Why not?” Olaf asked.

“I am not food, not even for her.”

Olaf nodded as if that made sense to him.

I was never, ever going to have sex with Olaf, but I didn’t say so out loud, because we were still trying not to pull the pin on the grenade. But it was like a game of chicken between a car and a train. If you didn’t get off the tracks, eventually you were going to lose.

“How can gentle be satisfying to you, Nicky?” Olaf asked.

“The first time was gentle, and sometimes it still is, but the bondage we do together is RACK.”

“I do not know the term,” Olaf said.

“Risk-aware consensual kink, RACK,” Nicky said.

“I prefer the term edge play,” I said, “but RACK is more descriptive, I guess.”

I fought not to squirm, because it had taken me a long time to be comfortable with just how much I enjoyed rough sex and bondage. I still wasn’t entirely happy that was part of my sexual orientation, but I was working in therapy at accepting all of myself, and that was part of me. You didn’t get to pick and choose your sexual orientation. You could choose not to act on it, but it was still what flipped your switch. It didn’t go away because you stopped doing it or tried not to start doing it.

“Does Anita do this with anyone else?” Olaf asked.

Angel raised her hand, smiling.

“I’ve co-topped Angel and Anita with Nathaniel,” Nicky said.

“I’m really not wanting to do details in front of everyone in this room,” I said. I was fighting not to blush, but since it’s an involuntary thing, I was losing.

Nicky smiled at me. “You are so uncomfortable with the things you enjoy in the dungeon.”

I nodded. “Yep. Yep, I am.”

“I thought Nathaniel was an extreme submissive,” Olaf said, “even a pain slut.”

“He can be,” Nicky and I said together. We shared a smile over it.

“Are you telling me that you have sex with Nathaniel?” Olaf asked.

“I think that’s for you, Nicky,” I said. “He knows I’m with Nathaniel.”

“It could be aimed at me,” Angel said.

“I assumed you were having sex with the men in St. Louis,” Olaf said.

She looked at him and raised an eyebrow. “I’m not doing all of them. Even I have my limits.”

“Hell, so do I,” I said.

Angel grinned at me, all pleased mischief. “We can’t sleep with everyone.”

I shook my head. “I know I can’t.”

“Are you having sex with Nathaniel, Nicky?” Olaf asked.

“I don’t fuck him. He helps me top and fuck Anita and sometimes Angel with her.”

“It’s