She responded in kind, raking his back with her manicured nails as hard as she could, digging into his flesh and drawing tracks of blood. He knew she was aware that the marks would quickly heal, and it seemed to Cade that it was her way of indulging in violence without consequence.
When it was over, she remained beneath him and resumed their shop talk without missing a beat. Her only concession to what had just transpired was a sigh as she spoke. “I’ll veto any proposed ordinance to close the parks at night, but I can’t promise my veto won’t be overturned.”
“What other complaints does the city have?”
“You won’t like it.”
He smiled. It was a habit of hers to leave the really bad news until hard sex took his edge off. “Tell me.”
“Neighbors living near the vampire clubs are complaining. Noise, cruising, littering . . .”
“It’s not the vampires doing that—it’s the mortals.”
“I know. But it’s the clubs people blame. Vamphasia is at the top of the list, but Noctule is on it as well.”
Noctule. His own club. No, The Honorable Deborah Dayton didn’t pull punches. “I’ll handle it. What other clubs?”
“Fusion and Future Shock.”
Those named in addition to his were three of the city’s newer “vampire clubs,” a misnomer in itself, for the clubs catered to mortals, not vampires. The humans who congregated there were advertising themselves as prey, hoping to catch the eye of a vampire on the hunt. “I’ll take care of it.”
“There’s more. There’ve also been complaints about your blood whores.”
She underscored the final two words with an exhalation so cold he was surprised not to see their breath plume in the ensuing drop of temperature. As if they were my personal whores, lined up at my door to trade blood for sex with the undead.
“As I said before—preferable to dead bodies, wouldn’t you agree?”
“Nobody wants to see your sluts, with their bite-scarred breasts hanging out, lolling on some street corner like it was a piece of property they were proud to own.”
He wanted to laugh. She was naked and lying beneath him, but she obviously saw no connection between herself and the aforementioned sluts. Her Honor was starting to annoy him. “I’ll take care of them, too.” She could take that any way she wanted.
At his words she pushed him off her, stretched her limbs like a satisfied cat, and pivoted off the sofa. He could set his watch by her moves. Once sex was over, she never remained in the bottom position more than three minutes, regardless of whether the tone of their shoptalk was in harmony or discord. She disappeared into the adjoining bathroom, and he took the opportunity to dress. There’d be no more sex tonight.
When she came out, her hair was combed and her underwear was all in place, looking like so much armor on his steel queen. “Look, Cade. The License and Liquor Control Commission is determined to make some changes.”
“So appoint a new department head.”
She pulled on her skirt and zipped it. “No. We’ve had this discussion before. Midnight Storm ripped this city apart. This alliance between you and me is just starting to stabilize things. But I will not hire and fire department heads at will, and I won’t fire experienced people just because their agenda doesn’t match yours. Mayors before me had revolving door policies.” She shook her head. “It doesn’t work. It weakens city government, and I won’t do it.”
As she loved to point out, he’d heard all this before. Life in the old days had been simpler. If someone, mortal or vampire, got in his way, he killed them. Sometimes he yearned for the days of a century ago, or even fifty years ago.
He knotted his red tie and gave it a yank. “I said I’d handle the club problems, and I will. Good Night, Madam Mayor.”
THE PHONE RANG just as Thor was in the middle of tallying the nine o’clock cash drop.
“Thor here.” Not for the first time he was glad his name was too short to carry with it his irritation.
“Cade. Meeting’s over. Come get me.”
“Right.” He kept it short and hung up, saving his frustration for the office walls. “Bitches’ riches.”
There were days Thor felt that “tyro” was just a fancy name for “lackey.” Managing the club wasn’t bad, but he could do without the chauffeuring, the errand boy drill, and running every time Cade called his name. A tyro was supposed to be a young master in training, but Cade more often than not made him feel like a dog obeying commands. He put the money he’d been counting into the wall safe, left the office and locked it. Then he told Salt he was going down to City Hall to pick up Cade.
Once in the car, his thoughts returned to Cade and his attitude. It wasn’t that Thor didn’t appreciate everything Cade had taught him over the years, and he knew how lucky he was to be chosen as tyro to one of the country’s top doyens. There were hundreds of thousands of vampires in Chicago, and not one of them had a more humble beginning than he’d had. It was just that if Cade would only let him, he could do so much more. He could prove himself.
He maneuvered the big luxury sedan through evening traffic as though the vehicle were a shark weaving around schools of little fish. Cars and taxis honked at him, but everyone got out of his way.
Prove myself. No, he was no longer a twenty-four-year-old farm boy with the gruesome name of Peleg Sweet. He no longer had to make a living with his fists and his looks in the Red Light District. He now wore suits purchased on the Magnificent Mile, and immortality guaranteed no more knocked out teeth and broken noses, but dammit, after a century as one of the undead he was still trying to prove himself.
FORTY-FIVE MINUTES later Cade and Thor were back at Noctule. Cade looked up at the white gabled roof and the huge lanterns that adorned the front of the building. The words “Police Station” peered down from the pediment, immortalized in stone, engraved decades ago by some mortal too shortsighted to imagine any other use for the building. Cade loved it nonetheless. Though the inmates had changed, the building watched over its occupants with strength, stately grace, and style. Noctule, Vamphasia, Fusion, Future Shock. Deborah’s imperious voice rang through his mind. Noctule didn’t deserve being on her shit list.
Thor parked in the alley adjacent to the club, and Cade preceded him up the stairs to the private side entrance. “How’s business been tonight?”
“Busy.”
Cade nodded, not surprised. Though it was a week night, the college students had arrived in town for the start of the fall semester, and the weather was unusually warm for early September—the reasons, no doubt, for the recent complaints against the club. “Come upstairs in ten minutes. We have to talk.”
“Sure.” Thor never wasted words.
Cade took the back stairs to his private suite on the third floor and changed into black jeans and an oversize knit shirt he left untucked. As he waited for Thor, he stood at the window that faced the street and gazed out the one-way glass. Halsted was hopping, and even through the closed window the incessant honking of the stop-and-go traffic was audible as cars slowed to drop off or pick up patrons, jockeyed for a parking space, or simply eyeballed those lined up on the sidewalk. He’d told Deborah he’d handle the complaints, but he wasn’t sure how. He could police his own kind, but how did he control the flock of young, moneyed mortals Noctule attracted?
A quick rap sounded at the door. Thor. He’d delegate the problem to his tyro. That’s what he was there for, after all—to take care of the piddling problems Cade had no patience with.
“Come.”
Thor entered, still wearing his suit. “So, did you solve the world’s problems?”
Rule number one. No one was to be trusted with the knowledge that he cared for anyone or anything. And while the liaison with the mayor wasn’t what one could call a love affair, it was serious and on-going, and that was enough to qualify i
t for the Rule.
“No, not even the city’s problems. Sit down. I have a project for you.”
Thor sat and leaned forward expectantly, his blond hair sliding forward to shadow his face. His eyebrows were raised and his lips parted, and he reminded Cade more of a puppy eager to perform a trick for its master than the God of Thunder persona Thor liked to emulate.
Cade told him what Deborah had related about the complaints against the clubs and the proposed action the License and Liquor Control Commission was planning. “Come up with some solutions. I want to hear a plan tomorrow night.”
Thor sat back in his chair and raked his hair away from his face. “Christ, Cade, it’s the fucking college kids, not us.”
Cade knew Thor was disappointed not to be given a more important assignment, although the matter might be trivial, but it had to be addressed. He stared out the window. “I know. That’s what I told the mayor. My objection with her didn’t cut any more ice than yours does with me. Work on it and come up with something. Now go.”
Thor left without debating the issue further.
Cade wanted to be alone. More to the point, he was tired. It wasn’t so much that the sex had made him logy, though he supposed it was true, but his mind yearned for rest. He was tired of holding up the house of cards that was Chicago’s peace. Oh, the mortals had run city government for the decades preceding Hell—the vampire-mortal war Deborah had called Midnight Storm—with no help from him. The Chicago Machine wasn’t called the Machine for nothing. It had run the city for years on the simple premise that satisfied citizens voted for those who kept them satisfied. A piece of the pie and a chicken in every pot got the vote every time. Of course, it was no secret that the grease that oiled the Machine was greed, corruption, and transactions that were under the table, through the back door, and every which way except on the up and up.
Since Hell had ended, though, Cade had been the one to build a network of alliances with mortals he despised, all for the sake of rebuilding his city from the ashes of war and giving his people a chance to survive. Barely twenty years had passed, and already he was tired. Compromise, concessions, and negotiation took a mental toll, and only when that toll came with the perk of sex was it bearable.
Perhaps a quick hunt would do him good. Certainly a little blood was preferable to brooding over matters he couldn’t change. He didn’t particularly like to hunt alone, but he didn’t want to distract Thor from his assignment. He threw on black linen trousers and a pink silk shirt. His flair for hunting regalia was foolish, he knew. With his exotic looks he’d be as recognizable wearing a polo shirt and khakis, but, well, habit was habit.
He told Salt Putnam he’d be leaving for an hour or so. Salt was one of his best bouncers and a big reason Cade didn’t have to waste money on paid advertising. With his pale skin, salt and pepper hair, and ageless features, Salt drew mortals to the club like critters to a salt lick. Like himself, Salt stood out in a crowd, and that’s what Noctule’s patrons wanted.
Cade left through the side door and breathed deeply of the warm air. He loved the smell of the night and its people, the sweat as well as the perfume, for it was all the effluvium of life. Halsted pulsed with light and music from the clubs, but he stalked the side streets, still wrapped in his unsettled mood. Even so, he passed plenty of pedestrians and drew just as many glances, but no one struck his fancy, and he moved on.
He patrolled the neighborhood, as if he himself were a beat cop. He saw a number of feedings, but they were all discreet and consensual in nature. There was nothing vile or shocking enough to raise an anti-vampire hue and cry, but then again, he was seeing out of vampire eyes, and Lincoln Park was his backyard, a privileged and moneyed community. Most of the vamps that lived here were masters, disciplined enough in their own right to know how to behave, but Chicago had thousands of sucklings and more than fifty separate neighborhoods. It was more than possible that elsewhere in the city Deborah’s concerns were valid.
At the perimeter of Oz Park he saw a familiar figure decorating the corner. She was as tall as he was, with a long, red shag and pale green eyes. Tonight she wore white lace stockings and a long black blazer open at the front to reveal a mini skirt six inches shorter than the blazer and a vest that Cade was certain hid nothing but skin. A white lace scarf circled her neck and draped nonchalantly over one shoulder.
“Hello, Red.”
She smiled. “Cade.”
“Join me.”
Technically she wasn’t a prostitute, for she never demanded money, but she was a fixture in Lincoln Park, one of the “sluts” Deborah had bitched about.
“What’s the matter?” she asked, taking his arm as they strolled.
“Nothing.”
“You look lonely. Where’s Thor?”
He’d been alone most of his three hundred plus years. “He’s busy at the club. But I’m never alone when I have someone like you to walk with me.”
She stopped and he halted beside her, waiting. She fingered the black hair that trailed down the front of his shirt. “You know, with your looks, you don’t need all that charm.”
He thought about all the alliances that his persuasive skills had helped forge. It hadn’t been all charm, of course. It had been part reputation, part respect, and part fear, but having the cleverness of a sleight-of-hand artist and snake charmer certainly hadn’t hurt. Chicago’s population was far too large and diverse for mere killing to be effective.
“Yes, I do.”
He unwound the scarf from her neck and coiled it around his own, then slipped the blazer from her shoulders. She bent her elbows to catch the jacket so it wouldn’t fall to the ground. They were just inside the park, in the shadow of a large pine tree. He ran the pads of his fingertips across her shoulders and up her neck, feeling for the scars of previous bites. They were small, but she had plenty.
“You’re not donating more than twice a month, are you?” It wasn’t a habit to question his prey, but he liked Red.
“No.”
Cade assumed it was a lie, but he carried on anyway, undoing the top buttons of her vest to reveal more of her. He slid one hand beneath the material and lifted her right breast into view. Her nipple was the shade of blush wine against the white of her skin and was already hard when he bent his head and teased it with his teeth. He suckled her, then pierced the nipple with one fang, relishing the gasp she swallowed as much as her blood. He suckled her again, drawing her blood deep into his throat, but for less than a minute, then kissed her mouth. He finished with his usual, the smallest of bites at the corner of her lip. He released her and watched the bead of crimson form.
“Red, listen to me.”
She stared at him, her pale eyes glazed, like thin ice over deep water. He buttoned her vest and lightly shook her to bring her out of the feeding swoon.
She licked at the drop of blood. “What?”
“When you’re out here, keep walking. Don’t just stand on the corner, or the cops will ticket you for loitering or solicitation.”
“Are you kidding? Just for standing on a corner?”
He nodded. “There’ve been a lot of complaints. Don’t be surprised to see more cops in the neighborhood. Just a warning. Pass it along.”
Her full lips pouted. “If you want me off the street, take me home.”
He wondered if there was any real difference between Deborah and Red. There is. I need Deborah.
Cade pulled up her jacket and straightened it, then pulled off the scarf and looped it around her neck. “No, no sex tonight. Go home.”
His hunger sated, he sought no more prey, but returned to the club and retreated to his suite. The late-night crowd had arrived, but tonight the noise only irritated him. He’d have to initiate more city-wide meetings with his masters. The isolation of the technologically advanced communication of the 21st Century, with email,
instant messaging, and cell phones, had perhaps worked against him. There was nothing like old-fashioned eye-to-eye contact, especially when you could lock and load such stares with a goodly wad of compelling power.
A knock sounded, the door opened, and the disturbance shook him from his musings. It was Thor again.
“What?” But as he spoke the word, Cade knew something was wrong. Too much white showed in Thor’s eyes.
“The mayor’s just been killed.”
Chapter Two
CADE FELT LIKE someone had kicked him. His knees, like the house of cards that was about to fall, had no strength, but Rule Two kicked in. Save the passion for the bedroom. So he stood on legs of water, gave no reaction but a lift of one brow, and simply asked, “How?”
“Shot. A drive-by, just as she was arriving home.”
A howl sounded in his mind, and he clamped his teeth together to keep it voiceless. Deborah lived in Old Town, a mile away. If he hadn’t been so preoccupied, he’d have heard the shots. “Anyone in custody?” His lips felt wooden as he spoke, and he knew the answer as he asked the question.
“Hell, no.”
He sucked air through his still-clenched teeth, determined not to lose control. There were no curse words in his native tongue, and though he’d learned plenty from the white man, he wouldn’t parrot Thor. He concentrated on his breathing instead, feeling the air cool his throat. “I’ll call Rat. He’ll want a statement.” And he wanted some answers.
Thor nodded. “You still want me to work on that problem?”
“What?”
“The noise problem.”
Right now the noise problem seemed so unimportant that Cade wanted to loose the scream still bottled inside him, but he answered as if Thor had asked the time. “No. You’ll be busy. I’ll be leaving. I want you to take all the calls that come to the club. If it’s the media, give them the standard. I’m unavailable for comment. And neither you nor anyone else is available. Understand?”
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