Sociopaths and Serial Killers

BY: Montana

Disclaimer: I do not own Jean-Claude, Richard, Anita, Edward, or anything else that belongs to LKH.

Author Note: This is set after Obsidian Butterfly.

After a few moments I pushed away from Edward. “Thanks. I needed a good hug.” Edward held my arms lightly, just above the elbows.

“Are you ok?”

“For now.”

We sat down to breakfast. The bacon and eggs were good, and the coffee was great. I realized it was the first real breakfast I had had in a long time. But the breakfast made me think about Richard’s homemade breakfasts after spending the night at his house after a full night’s festivities. Which made me think of Jean-Claude. Which made me think of the dream, and how…cheap it was to say goodbye through something so intangible as a dream. Which made me push around my eggs.

Edward, seated at the other end of the table, asked, “What’s got you down now?”

I shrugged. “I was just thinking about the boys. Jean-Claude invaded my dreams last night.”

Edward frowned. “I thought you had broken everything off with them.”

“I have, I did. Through the dream.”

“You’re having second thoughts.” I shook my head as an immediate response. I hate second thoughts. To me second thoughts are indecision, which is weakness. I can’t afford weakness. “Yes you are,” Edward insisted. I might be crazy, but I thought I heard a thread of anger in his voice.

I really stopped to think about it. “Not about Richard. But maybe, just maybe Jean-Claude.”

Edward growled. “The vampire. Always the god damned vampire. The one who’s the worst of them all!”

I frowned at Edward. I stood up from my chair at the opposite end of the table, and leaned on the table so I could look down at him. At his scowling face. He was truly pissed. “I’m not going back, Edward. It doesn’t matter how many second thoughts I have. They’re gone for good.”

Edward stood as well, and leaned down so we were eye to eye. “But when you do have second thoughts, they’re always about that damned vampire.” His eyes were cold. I saw anger, and…a flash of jealousy. Yes, jealousy. It came and went, surfacing and diving back down fast as Edward tried to hide it.

“You’re not my father, Edward.”

“No, Anita. No, I’m not your father. But after all we’ve been through, I would think my opinion would at least have some weight with you. After everything we’ve been through, after all the times I’ve saved your life.”

“I’ve saved your life too, you know. Lots of times. Enough times that I would say we’re equals.”

“Equals.” Edward stood there, a terrible storm of emotions, and seemed to roll that word over and over in his mind and on his tongue. “Are we equals, Anita? Truly?”

“Yes.” And right then, I believed it.

He stared at me. Took in every bit of me. The look wasn’t sexual, he was sizing me up. We should have been long past this stage, he knew me well enough. He knew size had nothing to do with it. “I have to know, Anita.”

“What?”

“If we’re equals. I have to know who’s better.”

“You’re calling out the draw down, aren’t you.” It wasn’t a question. Not but ten minutes ago he was comforting me. Now he was challenging me to what was the equivalent of a dual between us. Like a tame leopard, you never really knew when he would strike out.

“Yes.”



Edward's POV or the NEXT CHAPTER or the INDEX