Chicagoland Vampires - Friday Night Bites Part 27

"Great," he called after me. "Walk away. That's mature, Merit. I appreciate that."

"I'm sure you can find your way out."

"Yeah, sorry to have interrupted your party. You and your boss have a great evening,Sentinel ."

He spit it out like a curse. Maybe it was, but what right did he have to criticize? Ethan was my obligation.

My duty. My burden. MyLiege .

I knew it was immature. I knew it was childish and wrong, but I was p.i.s.sed, and I couldn't help myself. I knew it was the one thing that as a Navarre vamp Morgan couldn't do. But it was the perfect line, the perfect exit, and I couldn't resist.

I glanced back at him, silk swirling around my legs, and, single eyebrow raised, gave him the haughtiest look I could muster.

"Bite me," I said, and walked away.

Ethan was outside, waiting beside the car in the gravel drive. His face was tilted up, eyes on the full moon that cast shadows against the house. He lowered his gaze as I began to cross the gravel.

"Ready?" he asked.

I nodded and followed him to the car.

The mood during the ride back to Hyde Park was even more somber than it had been on the ride to my parents'. I stared silently out the car window, replaying events. That was three times tonight that I'd managed to alienate people. Mallory. Catcher. Morgan. And for what? Or better yet, for whom? Was I pus.h.i.+ng everyone else away in order to get closer to Ethan?

I glanced over at him, his gaze on the road, hands at ten and two on the steering wheel. His hair was tucked behind his ears, brow furrowed in concentration as he drove. I'd given up my life as a human for this man; not willingly, of course, but still. Was I giving up everything else? The things I'd brought with me across the transition-my home in Wicker Park? My best friend?

I sighed and turned back toward the window. Those questions, I guessed, weren't going to be answered tonight. I was hardly two months into my life as a vampire-and I still had an eternity of Ethan to go.

When we reached the House, Ethan parked the car, and we walked up from the bas.e.m.e.nt together.

"What can I do?" I asked when we reached the first floor, not that I hadn't done enough already on behalf of Cadogan and its Master.

He frowned, then shook his head. "Keep me up to date about Jeff's progress with the e-mail. The Masters are investigating on their ends; I'm going to make some calls on my own until they arrive. In the meantime-" He paused, as if he was debating my skills, then finished, "Try the library. See what you can find."

I arched my eyebrows. "The library? What am I looking for?"

"You're the researcher, Sentinel. Figure that out."

Experienced enough to know that a ball gown wasn't appropriate research attire, I returned to my room to change, trading the silk for jeans and a short-sleeved black top. (A fusty suit wasn't, to my mind, research attire, either.) I was relieved, physically relieved, to hang the dress back in the closet, don jeans and pick up my katana. It felt right in my hand-comforting, as if I'd stepped out of a costume and back into my own skin. I stood in my room for a moment, left hand on the scabbard, right hand on the handle, justbreathing .

When I was calmer and ready to face the world again, I grabbed a pen and a couple of notebooks, ready to begin my own brand of investigation.

The more I thought about it, the more I agreed with Ethan that Celina had a role in this. We didn't have much in the way of evidence, but this was totally her style-to sow discord, put the players in motion,and let the battle proceed on its own. I wasn't sure where Kelley fit in, or if she fit in at all, and I didn't exactly have the skills of a private investigator.

But I could research, study, peruse the library for information that might give us a clue-about Celina's plans, her connections, her history. Whether it would help us in the long run remained to be seen, but it was something proactive, something I had the skills to do.

And more importantly, it was something I could sink into, something that would keep my mind off other things. Off Morgan, and what seemed the inevitable end of that relations.h.i.+p. Off Ethan, and the attraction that, however ill-advised, lingered between us. Off Mallory.

I found the library quiet and empty-and this time, I double-checked-dropped my pens and notebooks on the table, and headed for the shelves.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

IN THE STACKS.

" ate, isn't it?" I blinked away black text and looked up, found Ethan walking toward my table. My immersion solution had worked-I hadn't even heard the library door open.

"Is it?" I flipped my wrist to check the time on my watch, but before I read the dial, he announced, "It's nearly three o'clock. You look to be engrossed."

Over an hour had pa.s.sed, then, since we'd gone our separate ways. I'd been sitting in the chair with my sword poised beside me, Pumas discarded beneath the table, legs crossed, for most of that time.

I scratched my temple and glanced down at the book before me. "French Revolution," I told him.

Ethan looked confused and crossed his arms over his chest. "French Revolution? To what end are you researching the French Revolution?"

"Because we,I , will better understand who she is, what she's after, if we know where she came from."

"You mean Celina."

"Come here," I told him, flipping through a book to locate the pa.s.sage I'd found earlier. When he reached the opposite side of the table, I turned the book toward him and tapped a finger against the relevant paragraph.

Frowning, he braced his hands on the table, leaned forward, and read aloud. "The Navarre family owned substantial holdings in the Burgundy region of France, including a chateaux near Auxerre. On December 31, 1785, the oldest daughter, Marie Co lette, was born." He glanced up. "That would be Celina."

I nodded. Celina Desaulniers, nee Marie Collette Navarre. Vampires changed ident.i.ties with some frequency, one burden of immortality being the fact that you outlived your name, your family. That tended to make humans a little suspicious; thus, the name changes.

Of course, Ethan had been a vampire for nearly two centuries before Celina had been a twinkle in her parents' aristocratic eyes, and she was a GP member. He'd probably long since memorized her name, date of birth, and hometown. But I thought the next few sentences, hidden away in this pet.i.te biography of a long-dead vampire, might be more interesting.

"Marie," he continued, "although born in France, was smuggled to England in 1789 to avoid the harshest persecutions of the Revolution. She became fluent in English and was considered highly intelligent and a rare beauty. She was raised as a foreign-born cousin of the Grenville family, which held the Dukedom of Buckingham. It was a.s.sumed that Miss Navarre would marry George Herbert, Viscount Penbridge, but the couple was never formally betrothed. George's family later announced his engagement to Miss Anne Dupree, of London, but George disappeared hours before the marriage was to have taken place."

Ethan made a sound of interest, looked up at me. "Shall we place any bets as to the disposition of poor George?"

"Unfortunately, that's unnecessary on all accounts. And we know what happened to Celina-she was made a vampire. But what's important is what happened to Anne." I waved a hand at him. "Skip to the footnote."He frowned, but without taking his gaze away from the book, pulled out the chair in front of him. He settled himself into it, crossing one leg over the other, then arranged the book in his right hand, his left across his lap.

"George's body was found four days later," he continued. "The next day, Anne Dupree eloped with George's cousin, Edward." Ethan closed the book, placed it on the table, and frowned at me. "I a.s.sume you've taken me on a stroll through English social history for a reason?"

"Now you're ready for the punch line," I told him, and pulled from my stack a slim, leather-bound volume, this one providing biographical information about the current members of the Greenwich Presidium. I turned to the page I'd flagged and read aloud: "Harold Monmonth, holding the Presidium's fourth position and serving as Council Prelect, was born Edward Fitzwil liam Dupree in London, England, 1774." I lifted my gaze from the book, watched the connections form in his expression.

"So she and Edward, or Harold-what-plotted together? To have George killed?"

I closed the book, placed it on the table. "Do you remember what she said in the park, right before she attempted to fillet you? Something about humans being callous, about a human breaking her heart? Well, let me lay this out for you from a woman's perspective. You're living in a foreign country with your English cousins because you've been smuggled out of France. You're considered a rare beauty, cousin to a duke, and at the age of nineteen, you nab the first son of a viscount. That's our George. You want him, maybe you love him. You certainly love that you've managed to entice him. But just when you think you've sealed the deal, n.o.ble George tells you that he's fallen for the daughter of a London merchant. A merchant, Ethan. Someone Celina would have considered far, far beneath her. You don't bear any particular grudge toward Anne. You may even pity her for being less than what you are." I put my elbows on the table, leaned forward. "But you don't pity George. George, who could have had you, your beauty, your prestige, by his side. He throws you away for London trash." I lowered my voice. "Celina would never let that stand. And what if, conveniently, George has an older cousin, a thirty-year-old cousin, who has an attachment to our dear Anne, who is all of sixteen? You and Edward have a conversation. Mutual goals are discussed. Plans are made, and George's body is found in a London slum."

"Plans are made," Ethan repeated, nodding, "and two members of the Presidium have a murder between them. The Presidium that released Celina, despite what she'd done in Chicago."

I nodded back. "Why bother enthralling Presidium members with your glamour, or relying on your charms, as you put it, when you've got that kind of shared history? When you share a mutual belief in the disposability of humans?"

Ethan then looked down at the table, seemed to consider what he'd heard. A sigh, then he raised his gaze to mine again. "We could never prove this."

"I know. And I think this information shouldn't leave the House, not until we're more certain of who our friends are. But if we're trying to predict what she might do, where she might go, who her friends are, this is the best way to start. Well," I added, "this is the best way forme to start." I gazed across the table of books, open notebooks, uncapped pens-a treasure trove of information, waiting to be connected. "I know how to search an archive, Ethan. That's one skill I have no doubts about."

"It's unfortunate that your best source loathes you."

That made me smile. "Can you imagine the look on Celina's face if I called and asked her to sit down with me? Told her I wanted to interview her?"

He smirked. "She might appreciate the press." He glanced down at his watch. "And speaking of the press, the Masters should be here with the results of their inquiries within the hour."

It wasn't the best thing I'd heard all day, that I'd have to face down Morgan again, but I understood that it was necessary.

"I'd hoped to keep this contained, but we've clearly reached the point where the other Masters need to be brought on board." He cleared his throat, shuffled uncomfortably in his chair, then lifted ice green eyes to mine. "I won't ask what happened at your parents' house with Morgan, but I need you there. Your position aside, you were a witness to the meeting with the Breckenridges, to their accusations."

I nodded. I understood the need. And I gave him points for diplomatically mentioning it. "I know."He nodded, then picked up the small book of history again, began flipping through the pages. I guessed he planned to wait in the library until they arrived. I adjusted in my seat, a little uncomfortable at the company, but once he was settled in, and when I was reasonably confident that he intended to read quietly, I turned back to my notes.

Minutes pa.s.sed, peacefully. Ethan read or strategized or planned or whatever he did on his side of the table, occasionally tapping at a BlackBerry he'd pulled from his pocket, while I continued thumbing through the history books before me, searching for additional information about Celina.

I was beginning a chapter on the Napoleonic Wars when I felt Ethan's gaze. I kept my eyes downcast for a minute, then two, before I gave in and lifted my eyes. His expression was blank.

"What?"

"You're a scholar."

I turned back to my book. "We've talked about this before. A few nights ago, if you'll recall."

"We've talked about your social discomfort, your love of books. Not the fact that you've spent more time with a book in your hand than you have with your Housemates."

Cadogan House was apparently full of spies. Someone was reporting our activities to whoever had threatened Jamie, and someone had apparently been reporting my activities to Ethan.

I shrugged self-consciously. "I enjoy research. And given the ignorance that you've repeatedly pointed out, I need it."

"I don't want to see you hide yourself away in this room."

"I do my job."

Ethan returned his gaze to his book. "I know."

The room was quiet again until he shuffled in his chair, the wood squeaking as he adjusted. "These chairs aren't at all comfortable."

"I didn't come down here for comfort." I looked up, gave him a predatory grin. "You're free to work in your office."

I didn't have that luxury.Yet .

"Yes, we're all agog at your studiousness."

I rolled my eyes, p.r.i.c.ked by the acc.u.mulation of subtle insults. "I get that you have no confidence in my work ethic, Ethan, but if you're going to think up insults, could you do it somewhere else?"

His voice was flat, calm. "I have no doubts about your work ethic, Sentinel."

I pushed back my chair, then walked around the table to the pile of books at one end. I shuffled through the stack until I found the text I needed. "Could have fooled me," I muttered, flipping through to the index and tracing the alphabetical entries with a fingertip.

"I don't," he said lightly. "But you're so-what did you tell me once?" He glanced up, looked absently at the ceiling. "Ah, that I was easy to p.r.i.c.k? Well, Sentinel, you and I have that in common."

I arched a brow. "So in the middle of a crisis, because you're angry at Celina and the Breckenridges, you've come down here to get a rise out of me? That's mature."

"You've missed my point completely."

"I didn't realize you had one," I muttered.

"I find it unfortunate," Ethan said, "that this is what your life would have been."

We avoided, usually, the issue of my dissertation. Of my looming doctorate. Of the fact that he'd had me pulled from the University of Chicago after he made me a vampire. It helped me, and therefore him vicariously, not to dwell on it. But for him to insult it, to insult what I'd done, managed a new level of pretension.

I looked up at him, palms flat on the table. "What is that supposed to mean?"

"It means you'd have finished your dissertation, secured a professors.h.i.+p at some East Coast liberal arts college, and then what? You'd buy yourself a cottage and update that box on wheels you call a car, and you'd spend most of your time in your tiny office nitpicking antiquated literary conceits."

I stood straight, crossed my arms over my chest, and had to take a moment in order to keep from snapping back at him. And I only did that because he was my boss.

Still, my tone was frosty. "Nitpicking antiquated literary conceits?"His arched brows challenged me to respond.

"Ethan, it would have been a quiet life, I know that. But it would have been fulfilling." I looked down at my katana. "Maybe a little less adventurous, but fulfilling."

"Alittle less?"

His voice was so sarcastic it was nearly flabbergasting. I took it to be vampire arrogance that he couldn't believe the ordinary lives of human beings were in any way rewarding.

"Exciting things can happen in archives."

"Such as?"

Think, Merit, think. "I could unravel a literary mystery. Find a missing ma.n.u.script. Or, the archive could be haunted," I suggested, trying to think of something a little more in his area of expertise.

"That's quite a list, Sentinel."

"We can't all be soldiers turned Master vampires, Ethan." And thank G.o.d for that. One of him was plenty enough.

Ethan sat forward, linked his fingers on the table, and gazed at me. "My point, Sentinel, is this: Compared to this world, your new life, your human life would have been cloistered. It would have been a small life."

"It would have been a life of my choosing." Hoping to end that particular line of conversation, I closed the book I'd pretended to stare at. I picked it up, along with a couple of its companions, and walked them back to their shelves.

"It would have been a waste of you."

Thankfully, I was facing the bookshelf when he offered that little nugget, as I don't think he'd have appreciated the eye roll or mimicry. "You can stop plying me with compliments," I told him. "I've already gotten you in to see my father and the mayor."

"If you believe that sums up our interactions over the last week, you've missed the point."

When I heard the slide of his chair, I paused, hand on the spine of a book about French drinking customs. I pushed the book back in line with its comrades and said lightly, "And you've insulted me again, which means we're back on track."