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Chapter 65

IT WAS LESS than two hours before dawn I was so tired I ached, but the vaurneys in the ned for only one vamp at a time, the coroner and all of his people hadn&039;t been too happy to see ten of theuards The guard duty was volunteer only, but his ood thing, it was Besides, he&039;d explained it like this: "No one died tonight; if we do this, no one dies tomorrow either"

Edward hadn&039;t been happy with ht in his own thoughts that I wanted no part of I&039;d actually let Sergeant Rocco drop me at my hotel because Edward didn&039;t offer Nors, but not over this

"I&039;ve never tried my talent on a real vampire before," he said in the quiet of the car

"How different was it?" I asked, still gazing out at darkened buildings on the street Likewas closed on this street Just before dawn, even the strippers get to go home

"They&039;re still people, but it&039;s as if their thoughts are slower No," he said, and so about how he said it ht and shadow of the streetlights was very serious "It was like those insects frozen in amber, as if the memories that were clearest to theht with our killer was mistier for them"

"I&039;ll bet that was only true of Henry Jefferson and Sarah," I said

He glanced away from the road to me "Yeah, how did you know?"

"They were the oldest You knoith soet old, the past is more clear than the present to them?"

He nodded

"I think for some vampires, it&039;s like that, too The ones who haven&039;t succeeded but just survived I think they look back on their glory days"

"Does your vae to ask, Which one? and played nice "No, but then he&039;s thehe&039;s happy now"

"Yeah"

"Henry earing a watch that costbad, so as hisdresses and curls, and he was in vest and suit with a pocket watch and a top hat?"

"Did he love the woht about that, then said, "Yes" He looked at es before, Anita I&039;ot soft i to me when I read you?"

"Not on purpose," I said, "but I tend to have an effect on vampire powers"

"I&039;m not a vampire," he said

"We&039;re alone, Rocco, and you wanted to talk to me alone, so no more lies You know, and I know, and your ather"

"They don&039;t know"

"Cannibal is your call sign They know; at some level, they know" I settled back into the seat, and we turned onto the Strip, and I suddenly knehere everyone was; they were here The street looked the saht New York was the city that never slept," I said

Rocco laughed "I&039;ve never been there, but the Strip doesn&039;t sleep hts and the animated billboards "You fed on my memory, too"

"You showedon one memory, you learned how to turn it on me, just like that?"

"Apparently," I said

"Where are you staying?"

"The New Taj," I said

"Max&039;s place" He said it like it was a bad thing

"Max knows if he lets anything happen to us, itHe&039;ll keep us safe to keep the peace"

"Your boyfriend that big in the vampire world?"

"We do okay," I said

"That didn&039;t answer the question"

"Nope, it didn&039;t"

"Fine" We were at the light in front of the Bellagio, with the fake skyline of New York close by and the Eiffel Tower in sight It was like the world had been pared down and squished into one street

"Ask the question you wanted to ask, Rocco"

I half-expected him to protest, but he didn&039;t; he finally asked, "You&039;re likethe dead? I don&039;t think so"

"It&039;s so to do with sex or love I feed on violence, the memory of it, but you feed on softer emotions, don&039;t you?"

I debated on how to answer; maybe I was just tired because I told the truth "Yeah"

"As?"

"I don&039;t know It&039;s like we traded a little power" I looked at the pirate ship, the fire, and it was surreal, unreal, like so makes sense

"Have you ever shared power like that before?"

"I can act as a focus for psychic ability for raising the dead"

"What does that mean?"

"I can share poith other animators, and combined we can raise more, or older, dead"

"Really," he said

"Yeah, I wrote it up for the azine The Animator a few years back"

"Email me the back issue, and I&039;ll read up on it Maybe practitioners here can do so similar"

"Your abilities aren&039;t very similar"

"Ours weren&039;t either"

"We&039;re both living vah"

He glanced at er look "The law hasn&039;t expanded to psychic vampires yet"

"They don&039;t want to understand it enough to regulate it"

He grinned "Tooside of it"

"Probably," I said

He gave ain "You know any?"

"No, just being cynical"

"You&039;re good at it"

"Why thank you, always high praise fro that he still hadn&039;t asked all of his questions I waited in the bright neon silence, punctuated by darkness between the lights, as if the night were thicker anywhere the light didn&039;t shine Myincircular drive at the New Taj I realized I should have called ahead and had some of our people meet us I&039;d expected to be dropped off by Edward and the boys, and I would have been safe enough Noas just me

"You want me to walk you up?"

I sirl"

"This vampire has a serious hard-on for you, Anita"

"You ask all the questions you wanted privacy for?" I asked

"Anyone ever tell you that you&039;re blunt?"

"All the dae of nerves to it "Do you ever get tempted to feed on more than you should?"

The doorman, or the valet, or someone, was at the door I waved them off "What do you mean, Rocco?"

"I can take a memory, Anita I can take it and erase it from their mind I did it accidentally a few times It&039;s like it becoh It&039;s a rush I think if I let myself, I could take it all, every bad memory they&039;ve ever had Maybeand leave theht feel to take it all"

"Tempts you, doesn&039;t it?" I said

He nodded and wouldn&039;t look at ave me a look of shock, of horror "No, of course not It&039;d be evil"

I nodded "It&039;s not about being able to do so it It&039;s not even about being teo too far"

"Then what is it about?" he asked

I looked into that very grown-up, very competent face, and watched the doubt in his eyes I knew that doubt "It&039;s about deciding not to do it It&039;s about being te in It isn&039;t our abilities thatin to theood with a gun Just because you could walk into a crowd and take out half of theun up, Anita I can&039;t take this out of me and put it somewhere safe"

"No, we can&039;t, so every day, every night, we uys"

He looked atwheel "And that&039;s your anse&039;re good guys because we don&039;t do bad things?"

"Isn&039;t that what a good guy is?" I asked

"No, a good guy does good things, too"

"Don&039;t you do good things every day?"

He frowned "I try"

"Rocco, that is all any of us can do We try We do our best We resist te"

"I have to be older than you by a decade; why is it that I&039; you for advice?"

"First, I think I&039;m older than I look Second, I&039;ht be tempted in the same way It&039;s hard when you think you&039;re the only one, no matter how old you are"

"That sounds like the voice of experience," he said

I nodded "Soot so much company I don&039;t knohat to do with it"

"Like that," and he nodded toward theIt was Truth and Wicked, patiently waiting for us to finish our conversation Had they been watching for me, or had they just knoas here? Did I want to ask? Not unless I was ready for the answer

"Yeah, like that I turned back to him and offered him my hand "Thanks for the lift"

"Thanks for the talk"

We shook, and there was no ic between us now We were both tired, our fires diot out and helped us unload the car The overeager bell else Most of erous stuff was still locked up at SWAT, but there was enough here that I didn&039;t want the staff carrying it Wicked and Truth took the extra bags Sergeant Rocco offered his hand to theh he probably didn&039;t see the signs of it They shook his hand He said good night to me, and "See you tomorrow"

"We&039;ll start in the area where he found all his vaht"

"Yeah, ot in his truck We went for the doors I wished I felt more secure that Vittorio only hunted near his lair It seemed like an obvious mistake, and he didn&039;t strike me as the kind to make those

Wicked and Truth didn&039;t say ot to the elevator and ere alone "You seem tired," Truth said

"I am"

"You fed on both of us, and you&039;re tired already," Wicked said "Should we be insulted?"

I sht, and no, it&039;s no reflection on either of you You know just how good you both are"

"A backhanded compliment, but I&039;ll take it," Wicked said

"I wasn&039;t fishing, I was just saying you see daed a look, which I did not like "What was that look about?"

Wicked said, "Requieured thatroom"

"That&039;s not what he means," Truth said

"Look, I&039; to feed you," Wicked said

"I fed on both of you less than"-I squinted at o I don&039;t need to feed the ardeur"

"Jean-Claude gave instructions that you needed to have food available more often if you wanted it"

"Did he now?"

The elevator doors opened "He&039;s worried that you&039;ll lose it with the police as your only food, Anita," Wicked said

I thought about that and couldn&039;t argue that it wouldn&039;t be very bad "I do not feel in theyou a heads-up, Anita," Wicked said

"Did you guys tell hiain

"What?"

"We cah the door, and he said, &039;She fed on you She fed on you both&039; "

"How did he know?" I asked

They shrugged, and it was like a esture "He said he could smell you on our skin"

"He&039;s a vampire, not a olf"

"Look," Wicked said, "don&039;t shoot thein your bed, and if you turn hi to take it"

I leaned ainst the wall between two doors that were not ours "Are you saying he&039;s jealous that I fed on you guys?"

"Jealousa word," Wicked said

"Yes, he was jealous," Truth said

Wicked frowned at his brother "You don&039;t have to live up to your naain

"And this is exactly why Jean-Claude put you in charge during the night shift, and not Requiem," I said

"Because he&039;s a moody bastard," Truth said

I nodded "Yeah" I pushed away froot an hour until dawn Shit" I stopped walking, because I was in the lead "Gentlemen, I don&039;t knohat room we&039;re in"

Wicked led the way, and Truth brought up the rear, with ot to the room Wicked used the little key card, pushed the door open, and held it for , a little too red and lush for my tastes, but it was a nice suite We&039;d have no coot back ho room with a table for four near the s that looked out over the brightness of the Strip There was a coffin near the door, but only one

"Where are you sleeping?"

"Our coffins are in the other rooht You have less than an hour; enjoy" They put s by the closed door that had to lead into the bedroom, and then they left

"Cowards," I hissed

Wicked stuck his head back around the door "He doesn&039;t like guys, and neither do we"

"You didn&039;t mind an audience earlier," I said

"We don&039;t, or I don&039;t, but Requie the privacy sign with hie of just the vauess, in fairness, that Requiem wasn&039;t the only moody bastard still in the roootten Requiem moved lower down the food chain for me He was like one of those boyfriends that the harder you try to break up with the that o back to my own house and leave et soo out and hunt Vittorio again

The door to the bedrooh to show the line of his body, one hand, an ar, thick, dark hair In the dith hair looked very black It was hard to tell where the black robe he wore ended and the hair began The skin that showed at chest and neck and face was pale as the first light of dawn, a cold beauty like snow The Vandyke beard and mustache were black, darker than the hair They framed his mouth the way you would frame a work of art, so that your eye was drawn to it