Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter #16 - Blood Noir by Laurell K. Hamilton

sooner, or my sisters. They could have called me, but they all sat around waiting for the big bully to give them permission.”
    “Is he really a bully, or are you just pissed?”
    Jason hugged me, burying his face in my hair, as if to breathe me in. “You’ll meet him in a little bit. Judge for yourself. I’ve hated him and tried to love him for so many years I can’t see him clearly.”
    I hugged him back, then said, “Let me put the heels back on. Do we call a cab?”
    “Yeah,” he said, and reached for the phone.
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    THE TAXI COULDN’T get out of the drive in front of the hotel unless the driver was willing to run over members of the press. That would probably qualify as some sort of First Amendment violation, and I’m all about defending the Constitution. Besides, manslaughter sucks, too. The driver turned around. “I can’t get through, Mr. Summerland, I’m sorry.”
    “My name is—oh hell!” Jason stared at the crowd that had descended from the road to surround us. Where were the valets who had been at the road earlier? Cameras were exploding everywhere. Reporters shouting questions. “Who is she? Did you break up with Lisa? Is the wedding off?”
    “Shit,” he said softly, but with feeling.
    The windows were covered by people and cameras. It was suddenly hard to breathe. I forced myself to breathe slow and even, but the press of people around the cab was claustrophobic. Fuck. Finally uniformed security and the spiffily dressed valets appeared in the crowd of press. They began to push them back, an inch at a time. The cab tried to ease forward, but even with the guards and valets we were stopped.
    The cabbie turned around and looked at us. “You want to just give up?”
    “I think we’re going to have to,” Jason said.
    I looked out in time to see a guard and a photographer get into a pushing match.
    “I can’t get through this,” the cabbie said.
    Jason looked at me. “If I hadn’t done the kiss in the alley I’d say fuck them, but it’s my fault.”
    I just looked at him. I mean, what was I supposed to say? He’d wanted to cause a scandal, and he’d succeeded.
    A uniformed security person knocked on the window. Jason opened it a crack. The man said, “I think you should come back inside, Mr. Summerland. We need more people to guarantee your safety, and they’re going to follow you wherever you go. It’s not safe.”
    “What do you want us to do?”
    Another guard pushed in against the window; he stumbled as if he was being shoved from behind. “We can’t clear the road enough for the taxi to move, unless we start busting heads.”
    “We don’t have permission for that,” the first guard said. That seemed to imply that with permission they would have happily waded into the press. What kind of guards were they?
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    “We’re going to force them back, and then you get out of the taxi. There’s enough of us to form a circle around you both. Stay in the center and it’ll be fine.” His mouth was saying fine , but his eyes weren’t as certain.
    I leaned around Jason. “We’ll be stampeded.”
    “No, ma’am, we’ll protect you. It’s our job.”
    “He’ll keep us safe,” Jason said, “because otherwise the governor will be very, very unhappy with him. With all of them. Isn’t that right?”
    The uniformed guard licked his lips. His eyes actually showed too much white. He was well and truly scared. Either his nerve was weak, or Governor Summerland was scarier than your average politician. Or maybe it was the whole lose-your-job thing; yeah, that might do it.
    “Yes, sir,” he said.
    He turned and started shouting orders to the other uniforms.
    “You spooked him on purpose,” I said.
    “I did.”
    “Why?”
    He