Anita Blake 15 - The Harlequin by Laurell K. Hamilton Read Free Book Online Page B

fighting in the middle of the fight, not because he'd lost, but just because he didn't want to fight anymore. How do you fight with someone who won't fight? Answer: you don't.
    The real trouble was, he was right. I was embarrassed about his job. I shouldn't have been, but I was. When he was a teenager, he'd been a runaway, and a prostitute, and on drugs. He'd been off drugs for nearly four years. He'd been out of "the life" since he was sixteen. He'd done porn, and I knew that. But I didn't dwell on it. I assumed he'd stopped doing the movies about the same time he stopped hooking, but I wasn't sure of that. I hadn't really asked, had I? He was a wereleopard, which meant he couldn't catch any sexually transmitted disease. That helped me ignore his past. The lycanthropy killed everything that could injure the host body; it kept him healthy. It made it so that I could pretend he hadn't had more sexual partners than I wanted to know about.
    I was trapped at the light across from St. Louis Bread Company when I said, "Want to hear what Jean-Claude told me about the mask?"
    "If you want to tell me." He sounded mad.
    "I'm sorry that I'm not completely comfortable with your job, okay?"
    "Well, at least you admit it."
    The light changed, and I eased forward. We'd had two inches of snow, and everyone here forgot how to drive in it. "I don't like to admit when I'm uncomfortable, you know that."
    "Tell me what Jean-Claude said."
    I told him.
    "So they may be here for Malcolm and his church."
    "Maybe."
    "I'm surprised you didn't demand more answers on the phone."
    "I didn't know what the happy couple wanted. Jean-Claude said we're not in danger, so I hung up."
    "It's not my fault that they recognized us."
    "You. They recognized you."
    "Fine, they recognized me." He was back to being mad again.
    "I'm sorry, Nathaniel, I'm really sorry. That wasn't fair."
    "No, you're right. If we hadn't been out together they probably wouldn't have spotted you."
    "I am not embarrassed to be seen with you in public."
    "You hate it when fans recognize me."
    "I thought I was pretty cool when that woman passed you her phone number at dinner, when you were out with Micah and me."
    "She waited until you went to the bathroom."
    "And that's supposed to make me feel better?" I turned onto 44 and headed toward the city.
    "She didn't want to intrude on our date."
    "She thought you and Micah were escorts, and that I was paying you for the evening."
    "The last time she saw me that's what I was doing for a living, Anita."
    "I know, I know. She passed you her number because she wanted to see you again, and the old number wasn't working. You're right, she was polite about it."
    "I told her I was on a date-date, and she was embarrassed."
    I still remembered the woman. She'd been slender and elegant and old enough to be Nathaniel's mother. Thanks to Jean-Claude I knew clothes, and she'd been wearing expensive ones. The jewelry had been understated, but very nice. She was one of those women who headed charity balls and sat on committees for the art museum, and she'd been hiring male prostitutes young enough to be her son.
    "I think what bothered me about her was that she didn't look like someone who would…"
    "Hire an escort," he finished for me.
    "Yeah."
    "I had a lot of different kinds of customers, Anita."
    "I figured that."
    "Did you, or did you try never to think about it?"
    "Okay, the latter."
    "I can't change my past, Anita."
    "I didn't ask you to."
    "But you want me to quit stripping."
    "I never said that."
    "You're embarrassed by it, though."
    "For God's sake, Nathaniel, let it go. I'm embarrassed about being up on stage myself. I'm embarrassed that I fed on you in public." I gripped the steering wheel so tight it hurt. "When I fed the
ardeur
off you that night, I fed off the entire audience. I didn't mean to, but I fed on their lust. I felt how much they enjoyed the show, and I fed on it."
    "And you didn't have to feed again for twenty-four hours."
    "Jean-Claude